HazelStakes
A workbench-crafted hazel stake that blocks monster spawns like a campfire and draws its territory outline when you look at it. Install on the server and every client.
About this mod Author’s original text
Hazel Stakes
An anti-spawn marker for Valheim. Craft a hazel stake at the workbench, carry a stack of
them, and plant them from your inventory. Each stake blocks natural monster spawns within
25 metres, as a campfire does, and draws your territory on the ground when you look at
it. It replaces the scattered campfires players build for the same job: same protection,
same durability, with no fuel, light or smoke.
What it does
- Blocks spawns like a campfire. A placed stake carries the campfire's own
player-base area, 25 metres by default. Spawn entries that are allowed inside bases
still spawn there, as they do next to a campfire.
- Shows its territory. Look at a stake and a dashed amber outline appears on the
ground around all the land covered by it and by every loaded stake within 64 metres.
Covered ground has no lines inside it, and a gap shows as its own small loop. The
outline fades half a second after you look away.
- Stays out of the way. No HUD element, no map marker, no count of nearby stakes.
Crafting and planting
Craft a Hazel stake at a level-one workbench:
| Material | Amount |
|----------|--------|
| Wood | 2 |
| Feathers | 1 |
| Leather scraps | 1 |
| Greydwarf eye | 1 |
Stakes stack to 50 and weigh 1 each. Equip a stake from your inventory or hotbar to show
its placement preview, then attack to plant it. No hammer or nearby workbench is needed.
Each successful placement uses one stake; an invalid spot uses nothing. Unequip to cancel.
| Action | Result |
|--------|--------|
| Look at a stake | The outline of that stake and every loaded stake within range shows, then fades after you look away. |
| Use (E) on a stake | Pin the outline so it stays on while you walk the perimeter. |
| Use again on any stake | Unpin. Walking beyond the overlay range of the pinned stake also unpins. |
| Equip a stake | The preview's circle joins the outline of nearby stakes and moves with it. |
The outline is local to your client; other players do not see it.
Durability and raids
- A stake has the campfire's health and damage material, read from the campfire itself,
and does not wear in the rain. Monsters hit a stake only when it is in their way.
- Repair a damaged stake with the hammer. A destroyed stake stops blocking spawns.
- Removing or destroying a stake returns one finished stake, not its ingredients.
- Stakes count toward your base exactly as campfires do, so raids come to staked land.
- A stake is not a ward and gives no protection against players.
Installation
Requires Jötunn. Install
Hazel Stakes on the server and on every client, at the same version. A client
without it, or with a different version, is refused when joining, with a version
message. The artwork is embedded in the DLL; there are no loose art files.
Configuration
BepInEx/config/com.valheim.hazelstakes.cfg. Server settings are admin-only and are
sent to connected clients; client settings are per player.
| Section | Setting | Default | Meaning |
|---------|---------|---------|---------|
| Server | Radius | 25 | Metres of spawn protection and outline radius. 25 matches the campfire. |
| Server | Recipe | Wood:2,Feathers:1,LeatherScraps:1,GreydwarfEye:1 | Workbench ingredients for one stake, as vanilla item prefab names. An invalid value keeps the previous recipe. |
| Server | OverlayRange | 64 | Metres from a hovered, pinned or held stake within which outlines show. |
| Client | RingColour | warm amber | Outline colour. |
| Client | HoverLinger | 0.5 | Seconds the outline stays after you look away. |
Compatibility and known limitations
Version 0.1.0 is the first public release and is in initial development, so settings
may still change between 0.x versions. Placed stakes use the HazelStake prefab and
carried stakes the HazelStakeItem item; both names are kept stable so saved worlds
keep their stakes.
- Built against Valheim 1.0.15, BepInExPack 5.4.2350 and Jötunn 2.30.1, and played on
a Windows client. macOS and Linux clients have not been teste
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: