As a seasoned player and server administrator in survival games, I understand the frustration of losing valuable car parts and loot due to unexpected vehicle disappearances. It’s a common issue: you park your car, load it with essential car parts and supplies, only to find it vanished upon your return or after a server restart. Let’s dive into why this happens and, more importantly, how to safeguard your car parts using your car’s trunk effectively.
Understanding Vehicle Despawn and Car Part Loss
One of the most common causes of “disappearing cars” is leaving them on uneven terrain. In many survival games, physics engines can be sensitive, especially after server restarts. If your car is parked on a slope, even a slight incline, the game physics might cause it to shift, bounce, or even flip upon reloading the world. This movement can lead to damage and ultimately, the destruction of your vehicle and the loss of everything inside, including those crucial car parts. This is especially true for newly spawned cars or vehicles with missing wheels, as they are inherently unstable. Each server restart acts like a “nudge,” potentially pushing your precariously parked car closer to its doom.
The only truly safe parking spots are flat, level surfaces like roads or concrete areas. Parking on these surfaces minimizes the risk of physics-induced vehicle displacement and loss.
Furthermore, even if your car isn’t destroyed, individual car parts have their own despawn timers. If your vehicle becomes ruined, dropped car parts like radiators, batteries, and wheels won’t last forever on the ground. These parts are essential for repairs, and losing them can be a major setback.
The Solution: Car Trunk Storage and Smart Item Management
The car trunk is your best friend when it comes to protecting car parts and other valuable items. Treat your trunk as a mobile, relatively secure storage container. Instead of leaving car parts loose in the vehicle or on the ground when performing repairs, utilize the trunk space.
For enhanced security, especially on private servers, consider using in-game containers like sea chests (if available in your game). Sea chests offer a significant advantage: they can be placed inside your car trunk. If your car is unfortunately destroyed, the sea chest and its contents may survive, allowing you to recover your stored car parts and other essential loot.
By placing vital car parts like spare wheels, radiators, batteries, and repair tools inside a sea chest within your car trunk, you create an extra layer of protection against item loss due to vehicle destruction or despawn timers.
Server Admin Tips for Car Part Longevity (Private Servers)
If you are running a private server, you have additional tools to mitigate car part loss and improve the player experience:
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Adjust Cleanup Timers: You can modify the global cleanup timer, which dictates how long ruined items persist before despawning. However, be cautious as this setting affects all ruined items, not just car parts. Adjusting this can be done in your server’s
globals.xmlconfiguration file. -
Increase Car Part Lifetime: A more targeted approach is to increase the “lifetime” value specifically for car parts in the
types.xmlfile. By default, items like car radiators and wheels have relatively short despawn times (e.g., 4 hours for radiators, 3 hours for wheels). Extending these values gives players more time to recover and retrieve these parts if their car is damaged. This ensures that even if a car is ruined, the valuable parts will remain accessible for a longer duration.
By implementing these strategies – parking smart, utilizing car trunk storage, and adjusting server settings where possible – you can significantly reduce the frustration of losing car parts and valuable loot in your survival game adventures. Keep your car parts safe, and keep your ride running!
