Blood hunting is an action that a commander can do in an owned province where they attempt to collect blood slaves at the cost of population and unrest. You cannot blood hunt in underwater provinces.

Blood hunting is the main way of obtaining blood slaves for blood rituals, unlike other paths of magic which rely on site searching for magic sites to produce a passive income of gems.

In order to successfully blood hunt in a province, a blood hunter must pass three successive checks, each of which can have no more than a 100% likelihood of success.

• First, a level check: % chance of success = 10 + (blood hunting level × 30). Blood hunting level is the commander's level in blood magic plus their blood searcher ability, if any. Boosters or empowering can improve blood magic level, and blood searcher ability can be increased by equipping a Sanguine Dowsing Rod, hereafter shortened to SDR. A blood hunting level of 3 is required to have a 100% chance of success at this check.
• Second, a population check: % chance of success = province’s population / 75. At 7500 or more population this check has a 100% chance of success, with probability decreasing linearly to 0% as population decreases to 0.
• Third, an unrest check: % chance of failure = province unrest / 4.¹⁾ At 0 unrest this check has a 100% chance to succeed, decreasing linearly to a 0% chance of success as unrest rises to 400. Note that multiple blood hunters in a province create unrest sequentially, so the first to hunt will have an better chance of success, cause unrest, and give following hunts on the same turn a lower chance to succeed.

In order to find the final probability of a blood hunt succeeding, multiply the chance of each check succeeding together. For example, a commander blood hunting with a blood hunting level of 2 (1 plus a SDR) in a province with 6750 population and an unrest of 40 has a 70% × 90% × 90% = 56.7% chance of success. On the other hand, a commander with a blood hunting level of 3 in the same province would have a 100% × 90% × 90% = 81% chance of success.

The changes to blood hunting checks from Dominions 5 to Dominions 6 mean that you now need a blood hunting level of 3 (3 or 2 plus a SDR) in order to maximize blood hunting success, compared to a blood hunting level of 2 in Dominions 5. The minimum population for maximizing blood hunting success has also increased from 5000 to 7500 population.

Following a successful blood hunt, the number of blood slaves found will be d6 + blood hunting level.

Magic site frequency also affects blood slaves found. Every increment of 5 above or below a magic site frequency of 50 will add or subtract an average of 0.5 blood slaves.²⁾ Thus the default Early Age site frequency of 65 will produce an average of 1.5 more blood slaves per successful hunt than a game with a magic site frequency of 50. Note that in Middle Age, the default site frequency is 55, while in Late Age it is 45.

Lanka gains an additional slave per Turmoil scale in the province, or one less per Order scale.

The population loss from blood hunting is 10 × ³⁾

All magic paths can be "bootstrapped" into, starting off without access to the path and empowering, boosting, and summoning your way up to reasonable access to the path. Blood is a particularly easy path to bootstrap into because anyone can hunt for blood slaves, even if poorly. This can be especially significant for nations with unique blood rituals but no native blood mages e.g. Patala, Bandar Log.

Initial bootstrapping into blood can be done through a myriad of ways:

• Blood hunting with high blood pretender.
• Intensive use of unskilled hunters such as scouts.
• Purchase of blood slaves by which to empower a blood mage with.
• Finding indies with small chances of blood, e.g. Camazotz and Garnet Sorceresses.
• Finding indies with reliable blood access. The six sites in the game that allow reliable blood access but do not require blood to find are the Citadel of the Lore Masters (2), The Council of the Sages (1), The Hidden Kingdom of Elludia (2), Black Tower (2), Blackrose Tower (1) and The Records of Mankind (3).
• All Zotz have innate Blood Searcher, so even the non-mage version of them can be useful for increasing blood income as empowering them in blood once gives bigger returns on that investment for blood hunting purposes compared to scouts or regular commanders.
• Charming, or enslaving and using Gift of Reason on a hostile blood mage.
• Various events can provide commanders with blood magic. These events all require specific sites or sets of scales, however. Specifically, the following sets of scales and sites:
  • 33, uncommon in a province without a lab
  • 21, uncommon in a province without a lab
  • 31, uncommon in a province with a temple
  • 12, uncommon in a province with a temple
  • 12, common in a coastal province, yields a Lore Master which may have blood
  • 122, uncommon
  • Ancient Scriptorium, which in turn generates only from an event chain
  • The Lower Throne

Regardless of the initial method, the goal is to produce at least one level 1 blood mage by which to gather more slaves to empower yet more blood mages with. Ideally this will also involve the use of a Sanguine Dowsing Rod.

Blood Hunting Analysis Dominions 6 - spreadsheet containing a comprehensive analysis of chances of blood hunting success in different conditions, patrol strength required to manage unrest, optimal number of blood hunters per province, etc.