🏆 Balrond Achievement Rewards

Server-aware achievement reliability, recovery, and cosmetic Titles for Valheim

Balrond Achievement Rewards turns Valheim's achievement system into a more complete multiplayer-ready progression layer for modded games.

The mod still keeps its original purpose — giving every vanilla Valheim achievement a cosmetic Title — but starting with v0.1.1 it also focuses on something more important: making achievements dependable in real modded and multiplayer environments.

Valheim can stop awarding achievements after certain cheat/devcommand states, can leave achievement-facing statistics behind raw gameplay statistics, and can fail to re-evaluate some progress cleanly. Balrond Achievement Rewards is designed to repair those situations without turning achievements into free unlocks.

The goal is simple:

Let players use mods, servers, administration tools, and long-running characters without permanently losing legitimate achievement progress — while keeping the server in control of the rules.

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What this mod does

Balrond Achievement Rewards has two closely connected systems:

1. Achievement reliability

The mod helps Valheim keep legitimate achievement progress working in modded sessions.

Its achievement layer is designed around these rules:

• Valheim's own achievement definitions remain the source of truth.
• The mod does not invent replacement platform achievements.
• The server controls the achievement policy in multiplayer.
• Server-synchronized achievement settings are intended to be locked.
• Legitimate historical progress can be recovered from Valheim's own stored statistics.
• Existing stale cheat-state data can be repaired when the server policy allows it.
• Achievement progress should not be permanently disabled simply because a character entered a modded or administrative session.
• Recovery is based on existing Valheim data and event credit, not on blindly granting every achievement.
• Meta-achievements can be re-evaluated when their prerequisites were completed but Valheim did not update them correctly.

2. Cosmetic Title rewards

Every current vanilla Valheim achievement supported by the mod has a cosmetic Title.

Example:

Achievement: Boss3Bonemass
Reward Title: Lightbringer

Boris
  ↓
Boris the Lightbringer

Titles do not grant stats, buffs, damage, items, recipes, skills, or progression advantages.

Core philosophy

Balrond Achievement Rewards is not an "unlock everything" mod.

It is also not intended to punish players for running a modded server.

The achievement system follows three principles:

Legitimate progress should survive modded play

Using mods, server administration, or development tools should not automatically destroy the ability to earn future achievements forever.

The server decides the rules

On a multiplayer server, achievement-repair and recovery policy is server-authoritative through ServerSync.

Clients should not be able to locally loosen the server's achievement rules.

Recovery is not the same as fabrication

The mod can reconcile stored progress and repair blocked state, but it is not intended to convert arbitrary console actions into legitimate achievement credit.

The objective is to restore real progress that Valheim already knows about, not to generate fake completion.

Server authority and multiplayer

Achievement integrity is a server concern.

For multiplayer, install the same Balrond Achievement Rewards version on:

• the dedicated server or host,
• every client that should earn achievements under the server policy,
• every client that should see player Titles.

Balrond Achievement Rewards uses ServerSync for server-controlled configuration.

Locked server policy

The server can lock synchronized configuration with:

Lock Configuration = true

This should normally remain enabled.

When connected to a server, clients follow the server's synchronized achievement and reward configuration rather than their own local copies.

The server policy covers the systems that can affect achievement eligibility, recovery, or shared Title definitions.

Client-only visual preferences remain local.

Platform/provider authority

Valheim still communicates with its normal achievement provider/platform.

Balrond Achievement Rewards does not replace Steam/platform achievement services with a custom fake backend.

The mod repairs Valheim-side eligibility, progress accounting, reconciliation, and reward presentation around that system.

A dedicated server therefore controls policy, while the player's Valheim client/provider remains responsible for the actual platform achievement state.

Achievement reliability

Why this is needed

In a normal modded environment, several things can interfere with achievements:

• a character can become marked as having used cheats,
• a world/session can enter a cheated state,
• devcommands can cause Valheim to reject future achievement progress,
• items can carry cheat provenance,
• achievement-facing counters can fall behind raw gameplay statistics,
• progress earned while achievements were blocked can remain uncredited,
• meta-achievements can miss their re-evaluation window.

Balrond Achievement Rewards is intended to handle these cases as one coordinated system instead of requiring several separate achievement-fix mods.

Recovery from blocked sessions

When allowed by the synchronized server policy, the mod can restore achievement eligibility for a character/session that would otherwise remain permanently blocked.

This does not mean "every console command gives achievement progress."

The important difference is:

Restore achievement eligibility
            ≠
Grant arbitrary achievement completion

A server can allow players to continue earning achievements after administrative/devcommand use while still relying on legitimate achievement conditions and stored gameplay statistics.

Historical stat recovery

Valheim can retain raw gameplay statistics even when achievement credit was blocked.

Balrond Achievement Rewards can reconcile those values conservatively.

The intended recovery model is equivalent to:

achievement-facing progress = max(existing achievement progress, valid stored raw progress)

not:

achievement-facing progress += all historical raw progress

This avoids double-counting progress that was already credited.

Meta-achievement repair

Some achievements depend on other achievements rather than one direct gameplay counter.

Balrond Achievement Rewards can re-check those relationships after relevant achievement changes and character/profile initialization so completed prerequisites are not ignored because Valheim missed the original evaluation moment.

Legacy cheat-state cleanup

When allowed by server policy, the achievement reliability layer can repair stale character/item cheat state that would otherwise continue contaminating future progress.

This is deliberately treated as recovery/migration behavior, not as a free-unlock mechanism.

Server owners should decide which repair options are appropriate for their community.

Anti-cheat model

This mod is designed for modded progression, not unrestricted achievement spoofing.

The multiplayer model should be understood like this:

SERVER
  │
  ├─ controls achievement policy
  ├─ locks synchronized settings
  ├─ controls recovery/backfill rules
  └─ controls the shared Title catalog
        ↓
CLIENT
  │
  ├─ records local Valheim gameplay statistics
  ├─ applies the synchronized policy
  ├─ reconciles legitimate stored progress
  ├─ interacts with the platform achievement provider
  └─ publishes only the selected Title identity

The mod does not treat client-local configuration as authoritative when connected to a configured server.

This is especially important because achievement progress is a sensitive system: clients must not be able to silently enable looser recovery rules than the server allows.

Cosmetic Titles

The Title system remains fully integrated with Valheim's normal Achievements screen.

There is no separate custom achievement menu and no Title hotkey.

Selecting a Title

1. Open Valheim's normal Achievements screen.
2. Find an achievement you have already unlocked.
3. Click the unlocked achievement.
4. If it has a configured Title reward, the mod opens a native Valheim Yes / No confirmation popup.
5. Choose Yes to equip the Title.
6. Choose No to keep your current Title.

Unlocking a Title does not automatically equip it.

You can switch between any Titles you have unlocked.

Removing your Title

The Achievements screen includes a native-styled:

No Title

button near the normal Close control.

Click it to return to the normal character name.

Example:

Boris the Lightbringer
        ↓
      No Title
        ↓
       Boris

Locked achievements and ???

Balrond Achievement Rewards leaves Valheim's secret/locked achievement presentation intact.

Some locked achievements can open Valheim's normal Achievement Details window and display:

???
??? / ???

That is vanilla behavior.

The mod does not reveal secret achievement information.

Only an unlocked achievement with a configured Title reward can be used for Title selection.

Nameplates

Other players

If a player has an active Title, other modded clients can display it with the player name.

Example:

Boris the Lightbringer

The character's actual saved name remains:

Boris

The mod changes presentation only.

Your own character

Valheim normally does not display the standard multiplayer name HUD above the local character.

Balrond Achievement Rewards can optionally create a local-only self nameplate using Valheim's own player HUD presentation.

Relevant client setting:

Show Own Nameplate = true / false

The vertical position can also be adjusted locally.

Vanilla achievements only

Balrond Achievement Rewards uses the achievement set provided by Valheim.

It does not add replacement pseudo-achievements for:

• collecting arbitrary custom quantities,
• custom mod skill milestones,
• custom boss requirements,
• unrelated mod statistics.

The system may repair how Valheim tracks or evaluates its achievements, but the achievement definitions themselves remain Valheim achievements.

The current supported baseline contains 53 vanilla achievements.

Default Title rewards

The default reward catalog assigns one cosmetic Title to each supported vanilla achievement.

Some examples:

Configuration

The BepInEx configuration file is generated under:

BepInEx/config/balrond.astafaraios.BalrondAchievementRewards.cfg

The config is divided into two categories:

Server-synchronized gameplay / achievement policy
Client-local visual / diagnostic preferences

Server-synchronized settings

These settings are intended to be controlled by the server and locked in multiplayer.

Lock Configuration

Default: true

Keeps synchronized Balrond Achievement Rewards settings under server control.

For public or progression-focused servers, leave this enabled.

Enabled

Default: true

Enables the Balrond Achievement Rewards system.

Title Rewards

Server-controlled mapping from vanilla achievements to cosmetic Titles.

Entry format:

AchievementMatcher|TitleId|DisplayName|NameFormat|OptionalColor

Entries are separated by:

;

Minimal example:

id:Boss3Bonemass|lightbringer|Lightbringer

Default output:

Boris the Lightbringer

Customized example:

id:Boss3Bonemass|lightbringer|Lightbringer|{player}, {title}|#E7F5B6

Output:

Boris, Lightbringer

Achievement integrity / recovery policy

Version 0.1.1 expands the synchronized configuration beyond Titles.

The server policy controls whether the mod may perform actions such as:

These are server policy controls, not personal client preferences.

When connected to a server with configuration locking enabled, the client follows the synchronized server values.

The exact config file comments shipped with the installed version are the authoritative reference for the individual integrity option names and defaults.

Achievement matcher types

id: — recommended

Matches the vanilla internal Achievement.m_id.

Example:

id:Arrived
id:Boss3Bonemass
id:SoloBoss

name:

Matches the vanilla achievement name/localization identifier.

auto:

Uses the mod's supported automatic matching logic.

For server configurations, prefer id: whenever possible.

TitleId

Stable internal ID for the Title.

Example:

lightbringer

Allowed characters:

A-Z
a-z
0-9
.
_
-

Do not use spaces.

DisplayName

Visible cosmetic Title.

Example:

Lightbringer

NameFormat

Optional.

Must contain both:

{player}
{title}

Examples:

{player} the {title}
{title} {player}
{player}, {title}
{player} — {title}

OptionalColor

Optional hexadecimal Title color.

Example:

#E7F5B6

The receiving client must have Title colors enabled for the color to render.

Client-local appearance settings

These options do not change achievement eligibility or server progression policy.

Show Titles Above Players

Default: true

Shows active Titles in other players' displayed names.

Show Own Nameplate

Default: true

Shows your own name and active Title above your character.

Own Nameplate Vertical Offset

Default: 0.30

Adjusts local self-nameplate height.

Use Title Colors

Default: true

Allows synchronized optional Title colors to be rendered.

Diagnostics

Verbose Logging

Default: false

Adds detailed achievement matching, recovery, synchronization, and Title-state information to the BepInEx log.

Enable it when reporting:

• an achievement that should have progressed but did not,
• a recovery/backfill issue,
• a ServerSync mismatch,
• a Title selection issue,
• a nameplate issue.

Write Achievement Dump On Initialize

Default: false

Writes discovered Valheim achievement IDs and state to:

BepInEx/config/BalrondAchievementRewards/achievement_dump.txt

This is useful after Valheim updates and for server administrators maintaining a custom Title catalog.

Character and Title persistence

The selected Title is stored per character in:

BepInEx/config/BalrondAchievementRewards/character_titles.v1.tsv

You normally do not need to edit this file manually.

The Title system stores the selected Title identity, not a second custom achievement database.

Achievement completion remains tied to Valheim/platform state plus the mod's repair/reconciliation layer.

Installation

Mod manager

Install Balrond Achievement Rewards with a Thunderstore-compatible mod manager and install the package dependencies declared by the release.

Manual installation

Use your normal BepInEx Valheim workflow.

For multiplayer, install the same release on the server and all participating clients.

Do not run mismatched client/server builds when using synchronized achievement policy.

Updating from v0.1.0 to v0.1.1

v0.1.1 expands Balrond Achievement Rewards from a Title reward layer into a broader achievement reliability system.

Your existing Title selections and vanilla achievement mappings remain conceptually compatible.

Server administrators should review the new achievement integrity/recovery settings before opening the server to players.

For progression-focused servers, keep:

Lock Configuration = true

and configure the achievement policy on the server rather than allowing clients to choose their own recovery rules.

Frequently asked questions

Compatibility

Balrond Achievement Rewards focuses on:

• Valheim achievement eligibility and progress reliability,
• achievement recovery/reconciliation,
• the native Achievements UI,
• cosmetic Titles,
• player name presentation,
• synchronized multiplayer policy.

Mods that replace or heavily patch the same achievement/stat/UI systems can conflict.

When combining multiple achievement-fix mods, avoid enabling overlapping patches unless the combination is explicitly tested.

Balrond Achievement Rewards is intended to provide these functions as one coherent system, so separate achievement-enabler/fix/sync mods should normally not be necessary once equivalent functionality is included in the installed release.

Bug reports and support

For support and bug reports:

Balrond's Den — Discord

When reporting an achievement problem, include:

1. Balrond Achievement Rewards version.
2. Valheim version.
3. Complete BepInEx LogOutput.log.
4. Full mod list or mod-manager profile code.
5. Single-player, hosted multiplayer, or dedicated server.
6. Whether the server has configuration locking enabled.
7. The achievement ID/name involved.
8. What progress you expected to receive.
9. Whether devcommands/admin tools were used in the session or earlier on the character.
10. Exact reproduction steps.

For UI issues, include screenshots.

For achievement eligibility, ServerSync, recovery, or multiplayer problems, the complete log is essential.

Support development

Balrond Achievement Rewards is free to download and use.

Development support helps fund maintenance, multiplayer testing, compatibility work, documentation, bug fixing, and future Valheim projects.

Support Balrond on Ko-fi

For custom mods, private integrations, server configuration work, or commissioned systems:

Balrond's Den — Discord

Public bug fixes are not paywalled. Project-specific implementation and private integration work may require a separate quote.

More Balrond mods

Browse the complete Balrond catalog:

Balrond on Thunderstore

Final note

Balrond Achievement Rewards is intended to make achievements usable in the environment many Valheim players actually play in: modded worlds, dedicated servers, long-running characters, administration tools, and multiplayer communities.

The server defines the rules.
Valheim still defines the achievements.
The provider still owns the platform unlock.
The mod keeps legitimate progress working — and lets you wear your accomplishments as a Title.