Right- this is seriously getting frustrating.

I cannot unlock a SINGLE new grazer after 20+ attempts- cause the Sika Deer sucks so hard.

The starter areas don't give you enough high ground or tall grass to hug for survival. So either the AI director will spawn a single unavoidable predator to end my run (Cause the sika deer cannot out-run them once detected), or screw me over in the food department and spawn ABSOLUTELY NO FOOD IN THE INITIAL AREAS. (I've had this happen on about a 1/3rd of my attempts- I kid you not)

The only way I've gotten anywhere close to finally making progress towards the unlock is when the game's AI director is merciful and spawns absolutely no predators in the initial area. But inevitably it will spawn an unavoidable one- and thus screw over any chance I have of unlocking the gazelle. (Especially since the woods the gazelle spawns in are even flatter than the other nearby areas- making it nearly impossible to travel through if any predators are spawned in- and by that point they always are.)

The challenge system also seems relatively poorly designed- or at least poorly programmed. Its possible to partially screw yourself out of some early challenges- or at the very least make them much more inconvenient to complete- if you claim the station too quickly, mark too many areas too quickly, or change generation too quickly. (And thus potentially doom the whole point of the run: Unlocking the Gazelle)

It just seems like the game's random generation and challenge systems are generally not balanced with grazers in mind. So is unlocking the earlier, weaker grazers purely luck based? Or am I doing something completely wrong?

If you're holding L1 to sneak, then spam the right analog stick to suddenly dodge really close to your "boss" target, you shouldn't have much difficulty unlocking grazers.

Overall, yes, the whole game seems poorly designed around grazers. When multiple zones are poisoned, all the food seems immediately poisoned, whereas animals seem to take longer to become poisoned. And yeah, it can be hard to shake predators unless you have a bunch of pack mates and press triangle. Also it's like impossible to rank up or accomplish any calorie challenges unless the game gives you several apple trees/giant mushrooms.

As for starting area having predators: your sika deer's sneak attack should be strong enough to kill cats/Pomeranians/terriers, though yeah, I think Beagles and bigger are all too strong. The objectives are kinda dumb, but check them as soon as you spawn, and if one of them is "Mark territory 4 times", simply don't mark until one year has passed and the objectives are active. You should spend the first year doing whatever ISN'T covered by objectives. If everything is objective-related, just run around drinking water for the first year.