VillageCompanion

Village Companion

By Jay_Walk_King — experimental release 0.18.2

Recruit Viking NPCs and build a working settlement: defenders, haulers, harvesters, miners and animal keepers. Equip villagers, share them with your tribe, assign work areas and give them passive gathering buildings.

These villagers are NPCs, not fake multiplayer connections. Other mods that specifically require real player connections may not recognize them.

Guide contents

• Install and start
• Your first villager
• Controls and orders
• Equipment and classes
• Chest filters
• Jobs
• Night routines and anchor rebuilding
• Tribes and saving
• Knockout taming
• Console and developer tools
• Suggested test session
• Troubleshooting and reporting bugs
• Configuration and release status

Install and start

1. In Thunderstore Mod Manager or r2modman, select Valheim, the correct store and your testing profile.
2. Install VillageCompanion by Jay_Walk_King with dependencies. It requires denikson-BepInExPack_Valheim 5.4.2351.
3. Launch with Modded / Start modded. Starting normally through Steam does not select your manager profile.
4. Begin with a disposable world and character. Back up existing saves before testing this experimental release.

Every participating multiplayer client and the host/server need the same mod version. Multiplayer and dedicated-server behavior still need live verification; do not assume solo results establish multiplayer compatibility.

Remove older manual copies of VillageCompanion.dll before using the managed version. Keep only one copy in the active profile. The manager may put its own loader files in Valheim's game folder; the plugin and its configuration belong in the profile.

Your first villager

1. Obtain wood and stone, equip a normal building hammer and find Summon Anchor in Misc.
2. Build it for 5 wood + 2 stone, with clear dry ground around it. No crafting station is required. It looks like a portal but does not teleport.
3. Press E on the anchor and summon a villager. Default recharge: 60 seconds per anchor after a successful summon.
4. Press E on the villager to claim them and open their inventory. You must already have an anchor accessible to your ownership/tribe.
5. Equip gear and choose a class in their inventory, then give orders with the . command menu.

Villagers can also appear near surviving abandoned huts/town ruins in the Meadows. Defaults: one attempt every 120 seconds, 30% chance, with a nearby limit of 2 loaded villagers within 100 metres of a ruin. These are attempts, not guaranteed spawn times. Summoning is easier for repeatable tests.

Controls and orders

• E on villager: claim/open inventory outside command selection.
• . / > key: open or close the command menu. This is the Period key, not a requirement to hold Shift.
• Left click while aiming at a villager: select/deselect. Selected villagers are highlighted. Selection range is 30 metres.
• E after selecting: confirm the group.
• Esc or .: cancel/close an order.

For a job: Class orders → click villagers → E → choose the job → choose its destination/area. A group must have the same class. Mixed classes trigger a request to reselect; assigning a job does not automatically change their class.

The main menu also provides Follow, Carry, Place, Unload and Inspect. Carry/Place help relocate villagers. Unload drops removable inventory contents near you; equipped and protected starter items are kept. Inspect records individual details in the game log.

Defense placement: aim at clear ground, click and release to set a stationary guard point. Hold left click and move your aim to draw a patrol; release over valid ground to confirm. Routes support up to 64 points / 100 metres total. Aim within 60 metres.

Hauling, farming and husbandry areas: left click/drag paints 2-metre grid cells; right click erases; E confirms. Nearby wooden/stone floor snap points help align the grid. Only painted cells count; gaps remain outside the job. Up to 4,096 cells can be selected. Earlier painted areas are converted when loaded. Use modest areas for your first test.

Equipment and classes

Open inventory with E. Add equipment, then right click it in the villager inventory to equip it. Adding a replacement alone does not unlock starter gear: equip the replacement first. Starting gear is a club, rag chest and rag legs.

Class controls in the inventory select Defender, Hauler, Harvester, Miner or Animal Keeper. Icons above villagers show their class; the defender icon combines a shield and spear. Class changes and new orders can interrupt existing assignments.

Default starting health is 200. Equipped armor contributes protection. Villager gear does not lose durability, and arrows are not consumed. Supply the arrow type you want them to use; knockout arrows change the purpose of their shots.

Chest filters

Open a chest normally. Three filter slots appear to the right of its inventory:

1. Drag an item onto a filter slot. This records its icon/type; it does not consume or transfer the sample.
2. Right click a filter to clear it.
3. Toggle All to accept other items as well. Explicit item filters are preferred over All storage.

Filters control where workers put items and which supply chests they use. A filter does not create supplies: put actual seeds/animal food in the chest. Chests must have space, be accessible through wards and belong to the current local network owner. Workers skip chests while someone is using them.