Arena Combat
Build an Arena Coordinator to summon progression-unlocked enemies. Choose stars, practice for free, or earn loot using regenerating reserve tokens. Includes multiplayer cleanup and configurable arena
About this mod Author’s original text
Arena Combat
Build an Arena Coordinator, choose an opponent, and turn your own arena into a place to practice combat or farm monster resources.
The Coordinator uses Valheim's T.W.I.G. model and stands still. Its searchable opponent menu follows your world's boss progression and offers 0, 1, or 2 stars. Practice is always free; loot fights spend a reserve that replenishes automatically.
Features
- Unlock enemies by world progression: defeating The Queen opens Ashlands opponents. Earlier biomes remain available.
- Bosses and minibosses are excluded, including Lord Reto and Hildir encounter enemies.
- Duplicate enemy variants are consolidated. Dvergr variants appear at their native biome tiers.
- Search and biome filters, trophy icons where available, clear selected options, and fast mousewheel scrolling.
- One encounter per Coordinator, with a five-second overhead countdown.
- Free Practice fights at every star level, with no item drops or trophies.
- Loot rewards fights use regenerating reserve tokens, with discounts for older biomes.
- Automatic silent cleanup when players leave, or when an arena enemy kills the last nearby player.
- Arena enemies cannot be tamed, commanded, saddled, or bred.
- Coordinators are invulnerable by default; you can still remove them with the Hammer.
Installation
Install Arena Combat and its dependencies on the server and every client. Use the same Arena Combat version throughout your group. Mod Manager or r2modman, install the package and launch the profile modded. The manifest declares the required BepInExPack Valheim and Jötunn packages.
For a manual installation, install those dependencies first, then copy the ZIP's BepInEx folder into your game or server folder. Both ArenaCombat.dll and ArenaCombat.Core.dll must remain together under BepInEx/plugins/ArenaCombat.
Launch once to generate BepInEx/config/cheyenne.valheim.arenacombat.cfg.
Build and use
- Equip the Hammer and open the Arena category.
- Build Arena Coordinator with 10 Wood + 5 Stone, near a Workbench.
- Interact with it, choose an enemy and star level, and select Practice or Loot rewards.
- Press Summon enemy and prepare for the countdown.
Only admins or the local host can build Coordinators by default. Everyone can use them. The default world limit is ten; both restrictions are configurable.
A newly built Coordinator starts with zero tokens. You can use free practice immediately. Loot fights become available as its reserve fills.
Progression
Unlocks come from the world's boss defeat keys, rather than the player's current location.
| Latest defeated boss | Newly available opponents |
| --- | --- |
| None | Meadows |
| Eikthyr | Black Forest |
| The Elder | Swamp |
| Bonemass | Mountains |
| Moder | Plains |
| Yagluth | Mistlands |
| The Queen | Ashlands |
| Fader | Deep North, when supported by the installed game |
Earlier unlocked biomes remain available. Unknown modded enemies can be assigned a tier through EnemyTierOverrides; boss and friendly-creature exclusions still apply.
Tokens and loot
Each Coordinator stores up to 200 tokens and regenerates 5 tokens per real minute, including unloaded areas and server downtime.
Practice costs zero tokens, regardless of biome or stars, and produces no item drops or trophies.
With loot rewards enabled, the default base costs are 5 / 15 / 30 tokens for 0 / 1 / 2 stars, plus a 20-token loot surcharge. The total receives a 20-percentage-point discount for each biome tier behind current progression. Discounts stack linearly; five or more tiers behind is free. Fractional final prices round up.
For example, a two-star loot fight costs 50, 40, 30, 20, 10, or 0 tokens at 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 tiers behind.
Failed or abandoned countdowns are refunded. After an enemy successfully spawns, its tokens remain spent even if the encounter later despawns or ends in defeat. Removing and rebuilding a Coordinator starts a new empty reserve.
Encounter cleanup
- After spawning
Install & use Install: BepInEx plugin
- The archive from playbuff is the mod itself — usually a BepInEx plugin (a .dll or a plugin folder once unzipped).
- Recommended: use a community mod manager (such as r2modman) — pick this game, import the mod, and the manager sets up BepInEx and its dependencies for you.
- Manual route: install the BepInEx loader in the game folder, then drop the unzipped .dll or plugin folder into BepInEx/plugins/.
- Launch the game — the BepInEx console logs every plugin it loads; seeing this mod in the log means it is installed.
Mods with listed dependencies need those installed too, or they will not load. Options are usually changed in-game or in the plugin's config file. In multiplayer, the host and every client need the same mods installed.
Install these first, or the mod will not work: