Trails - paths worn by walking

Where you walk often, the grass thins, then goes, and the ground darkens into a trail in four steps. Running on a trail is faster and costs less stamina. Busy trails widen into roads, carts leave ruts, and the ways round your base make themselves. Trails nobody walks slowly grow back.

BepInEx mod for Valheim 1.0.20. Every player and the server need it (see Compatibility).

Features

• Worn trails - the grass thins, then disappears, and the ground takes the colour of a trail in four steps (the game's own terrain paint, as the hoe's). Standing still does nothing: a spot counts once per visit, so running and walking wear the same.
• Faster on trails - running and jogging +10 % on a finished trail (less on one still wearing in), running costs 15 % less stamina.
• Trails widen into roads - a path walked a lot spreads wider.
• Grow back - an unwalked trail keeps for a game day, then slowly fades (half its wear in 8 game days by default).
• Soil by biome - in the mountains and the Deep North a trail is packed snow: lighter, and snow drifts over it twice as fast (faster still while it snows). On the plains and in the Ashlands (sand and ash) trails keep three times longer.
• Mud - after some 5 minutes of rain an earth trail turns to mud: up to 10 % slower instead of faster, no stamina saving. It dries in some 15 minutes without rain. Mountains, sand, ash and roads stay firm.
• Roads - the hoe gets a Gravel road (1 stone, next to the Paved road): gravel over a trail makes a road (small pebbles are drawn over it near you); the game's Paved road over the gravel makes it stone. Each step is faster than a trail (+5 % a step by default), stamina comes back faster (+25 % gravel, +50 % stone), carts are 25-30 % lighter, mounts faster. Roads never grow back. Another hoe stroke over a road (path, level, cultivate) takes the road away there.
• Cart ruts - cart wheels press two narrow ruts that merge into a wide road; on a rut a cart is 15 % lighter.
• Crops get trampled - a step on a crop on cultivated ground sets its growth back a tenth, the fifth step in a game day kills it. Sneaking does no harm.
• Roadside - along trails older than three days flowers and bushes sometimes grow: dandelions and bushes in the Meadows, thistle and bushes in the Black Forest, heath on the plains (at most 4 per 32 m area).
• Animals (optional, off by default) - tamed and wild animals can wear trails too, big ones wider. Off by default, or penned animals trample the whole pen.
• Never on buildings, floors, rocks, ships or in water: only steps on bare ground count. Cultivated ground and paving are never repainted.

Installation

1. Install BepInExPack for Valheim.
2. Put Trails.dll into Valheim/BepInEx/plugins/ (a mod manager does it for you) - for every player and on the server.
3. Launch the game.

Compatibility

• Multiplayer: every player and the server (or the hosting player). The host keeps the trails in the world and sends its settings to everybody. A player without the mod still sees the trails (they are ordinary terrain paint), but wears none and gets no speed. If the server has no Trails, the mod switches itself off for the player. All players and the server should have the same version.
• Dedicated server: supported; a player near the trail paints the ground for the server.
• Saved in the world: trails live in the world's own data (one small object per 32 m area with trails), so they move with the world and its backups. No extra files.
• Leash by Chistix (1.0.0+): no trails inside its pens (a fence or walls round a feeder or trough). A cart pulled by an animal gets the rut and road bonus too.
• PlanetPrototype by Chistix: works on the planet.
• Valheim 1.0.20, BepInEx 5.4.23+. No Jotunn needed.
• Other speed mods: the trail bonus is multiplied with theirs.

How it differs from similar mods: AntTrails also wears paths, but gives no speed, does not count animals or carts and keeps its data in a separate file in the config folder. SpeedyPaths and Useful Paths make you faster on any path or floor, but make no trails. In Trails the speed is only on what is worn, trails widen into roads, carts and animals count, and the data is in the world itself.

Settings

BepInEx/config/chistix.trails.cfg, or in game the BepInEx ConfigurationManager window (F1), in this order. Descriptions in English and Russian. Nothing is added to the game's own settings menu. In multiplayer the host's values of the world rules apply.

Console

• trails - the wear under your feet, its step, the speed bonus, how many areas are loaded.
• trails stamp N [radius] - add N crossings here (host, devcommands).
• trails clear [radius] - wipe the trail and road here; the ground is repainted back (host, devcommands). Hoe paving stays.

Known limits

• If a hoe path was laid over a finished trail, it fades with the trail as it grows back: the two cannot be told apart.
• On the planet crops are not trampled.
• Wetness is each player's own, from the weather around them.

Troubleshooting: BepInEx/LogOutput.log, look for "Trails".

Credits

Made by Chistix: idea, design, direction and testing. Code written with Claude Code (Anthropic) as an AI coding assistant, under Chistix's direction. Uses BepInEx and Harmony. The icon is drawn by code; no generated art or audio, no game art included. Valheim is © Iron Gate AB; this is an unofficial mod.

All rights reserved: you may use the mod, show it in videos and streams and list it as a dependency; re-uploading or changed versions need the author's permission.

Links

• Nexus: https://www.nexusmods.com/profile/Chistix/mods
• Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/cw/Chistix
• Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/Chistix
• Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/chistix
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MrChistix