Ward Cores

Wards protect the buildings in their range. Every ward holds an energy pool, and hits on pieces inside its radius are paid from that pool instead of from the pieces' health. The core installed in the ward sets the pool's size. The pool recharges over time, and Sap speeds that up.

How it works

• Each point of damage to a piece in range of an active ward costs the ward 1 energy instead of the piece's health. Protected pieces take hits without their weaknesses.
• Wards absorb hits from monsters, raids and players without access, and hits without an attacker such as fire and falling trees. Weather wear, collapse from missing support and hits by players with access stay vanilla.
• Overlapping wards split the cost evenly. When a ward can't pay its share, the others pay the rest.
• An area attack counts as one hit: each ward pays the average over the pieces it hit.
• A ward regains 1 % of its maximum per second, and a quarter of that for 5 s after each absorbed hit.
• Below 30 % charge, a ward lets part of each hit through, up to half when it is empty.
• A drained ward switches off, access protection included, and comes back on at 30 %. New wards and newly installed cores start empty, so a new ward is off for its first 30 s.

Floating numbers show the damage that reaches a piece and, in light blue with a ⚡, the energy the ward paid.

Cores

To install a core, look at a ward you have access to and press the core's hotbar key. Every ward starts with a built-in Surtling Core. Installing another core gives back the previous one, and installed cores drop when the ward is torn down or destroyed. A new core starts empty. Item tooltips show each core's "Ward Power".

Cores with an effect

Four cores do more than shield. Their settings are in [Thunder], [Fire] and [Frost], with a switch per core.

The Thunder Stone strikes the attacker with lightning once per attack, for half the damage the wards absorbed, and staggers it. It hits monsters and players without access; bosses are never staggered.

The Molten Core sets the attacker on fire once per attack, for half the absorbed damage, burning over 8 seconds. Further attacks add their own burns on top. Fire resistance counts, and the fire never spreads to your buildings.

The Frostcore chills hostile creatures in its radius, and players without access who have PvP on: 5 % slower each second, up to 60 %, scaled by frost resistance. Tamed animals, fleeing animals and bosses are left alone. The chill costs the ward nothing.

Liquid Frost chills like the Frostcore and also deals frost damage each second, 1 % of the target's max health. The ward pays half of the damage dealt from its energy.

Thunder Stone and Molten Core wards on the same attack share the payback instead of doubling it.

Sap

Players with access feed a ward Sap from the inventory with Shift+E. While Sap burns, the ward recharges an extra 1 % of its maximum per second. One Sap lasts 60 s, and a ward holds up to 50.

Hover text

Core: Dragon Tear
Charge: 1200 / 1600 - 75%
Sap: 4 / 50 - 3m 12s
Status: Ready - Protection 100%

The status is green at full protection, orange while the ward lets damage through, and red while it holds nothing. Texts are in English and German, following the game's language.

Settings

The settings are in BepInEx/config/valheim.wardcores.cfg. With a Configuration Manager (F1), the core list is a table with a searchable item picker.

Multiplayer

Every player and the server need Ward Cores in the same version. The server turns away anyone else, and a player with Ward Cores can't join a server without it. The server's settings apply to everyone, and only admins on its admin list can change them in F1.

Requirements

• BepInExPack Valheim
• Conditional Config Sync by shudnal, 1.0.10 or newer
• Recommended: Configuration Manager by shudnal, for the F1 core table

Tested with Valheim 1.0.17. If the game lacks something Ward Cores needs, it logs what is missing and stays off.

To install by hand, copy WardCores.dll into BepInEx/plugins and install the requirements. Removing the mod leaves installed cores inside their wards.

Changelog

1.2.0

Core Effects

• Molten Core — Molten Core wards now set attackers on fire once per attack, for half the damage the wards absorbed. Every attack adds its own burn on top, so a siege burns hotter the longer it lasts; [Fire] MaxStacks can cap the stacks.
• Frostcore — Frostcore wards now chill hostile creatures and PvP players without access inside their radius, slowing them more each second up to a cap. Frost resistance scales the chill, and tamed animals and bosses are left alone.
• Liquid Frost — Liquid Frost wards chill like the Frostcore and also deal frost damage every second, paid from the ward's energy.
• Shared Payback — Thunder Stone and Molten Core wards covering the same attack now share the payback, so pairing them gives both effects without doubling the damage returned.
• Resistances and Armour — Burns and frost damage now count the target's resistances and armour, like the game's own hits.

Settings

• Element Sections — The effect settings now live in [Thunder], [Fire] and [Frost], with a switch per core, so each effect can be turned off on its own.
• Thunder Stone in the Core List — The Thunder Stone is now an ordinary entry in [Cores] List (Thunderstone:1000) and is edited in the F1 table like every other core. [Thunderstone] MaxEnergy has been removed.
• Config Migration — Configs from earlier versions move their Thunder Stone settings and max energy over on first start, so no values are lost.
• Settings Order — Configuration Manager now lists the settings in a fixed order, with the Liquid Frost settings under their own heading.

Interface

• Core Picker — The F1 core table now picks each core from a searchable list of materials with icons, vanilla and modded alike. Any item ID can still be typed in.
• Ward Number — The energy number above a ward now shows a ⚡ before the value.
• Hover Text — The ward's hover now shows the core's icon, colours the charge and the status by how well the ward protects, and uses the game's own "Use item" hint for installing a core.

1.1.0

Thunder Stone

• One Strike per Attack — Thunder Stone wards now strike once per attack with a single bolt, however many of them cover it.
• Full Retaliation — New setting [Thunderstone] FullRetaliation (on by default): the strike counts what every covering ward absorbed, so normal wards sharing a hit no longer weaken it.
• Tooltip — The Thunder Stone now shows its Ward Power in the item tooltip, and the README describes it.

Bug Fixes

• Ownerless Explosions — Area effects without an owner, such as a lava blob's explosion, now count as one hit. Previously they charged the wards for every piece they reached.

1.0.0

New

• First Release — The first packaged release of Ward Cores.