Enshrouded dedicated server: the settings that make the difference

Enshrouded on a dedicated server is a different game from co-op via Steam: the world keeps running while you're offline, friends can log in on their own schedule, and you decide how hard the adventure is. You make that last choice not in the game but in one file: enshrouded_server.json. It holds the presets, a long list of multiplication factors and a handful of switches that make the difference between a relaxed building server and a survival trek where every death hurts. This article explains which settings matter, what the defaults are, what version 1.0 (out since 15 October 2026) has changed and which combinations make a good starting point.

Where the settings live

On a hosted server, you edit enshrouded_server.json through the file manager in the panel or over SFTP. The file has a few general fields, such as name, slotCount, queryPort, saveDirectory and the roles in userGroups, followed by gameSettingsPreset and the gameSettings block with the gameplay options. A single server password no longer exists: each role has its own password. Changes only apply after a restart, so edit the file while the server is stopped. In our panel, the server name, the number of slots and the role passwords are written into the file from the startup variables on every start. You change those in the Startup tab, not in the file. The guide for that is in the knowledge base: managing your Enshrouded server.

The presets, and why you usually choose Custom

With gameSettingsPreset you choose a starting point: Default, Relaxed, Hard, Survival or Custom. Default is the standard experience. The names of the other presets say it all: Relaxed is milder, Hard and Survival are tougher. Keen doesn't document exactly which values each preset sets. What Keen does write down matters more: only if you choose "Custom" can you adjust the long list of individual settings. If you want to tweak the factors below yourself, set the preset to Custom. With any other preset, changing individual values is pointless.

Factors: everything ending in "Factor" is a multiplier

The core of gameSettings is the factors. A value of 1 is the default, 2 is double, 0.5 half. A higher player factor helps the players, a higher enemy factor makes the game harder. If you enter a number outside the allowed range, the server simply uses the minimum or maximum, according to Keen. The most important ones:

• playerHealthFactor and playerStaminaFactor (0.25 to 4): health and stamina of players. For a group of mixed experience, 1.25 is a comfortable middle ground without making fights trivial.
• enemyDamageFactor and enemyHealthFactor: how hard enemies hit and how much they can take. If you want a challenge without endless hacking, raise the damage and leave health at 1. Note: the enemy damage scale was recalibrated in 1.0, see below.
• playerBodyHeatFactor (0.5 to 2) and bossHealthFactor with bossDamageFactor (0.2 to 5): body heat in the cold and the toughness and damage of bosses, set separately so boss fights remain a group event.
• miningDamageFactor, plantGrowthSpeedFactor and resourceDropStackAmountFactor: gathering speed, crop growth speed and how much drops each time. These are the knobs that make a building server "smoother" without touching combat.

Day, night and the weather

The length of day and night is in dayTimeDuration and nightTimeDuration, expressed in nanoseconds — not seconds, and that's a common mistake. The default is 30 minutes of day and 12 minutes of night; both may be between 2 and 60 minutes. A short night is pleasant for players who mainly want to build by day. For a server where people log in for an hour after work, 40 minutes of day and 8 minutes of night is a good idea: everyone sees both phases in one session. With weatherFrequency (Disabled, Rare, Normal or Often) you set how often the weather changes.

Durability, tombstone and the price of dying

Two settings decide how strict the server is. enableDurability is true by default; set it to false and weapons and tools never wear out. Handy for casual groups, but it also removes an economy from the game. tombstoneMode controls what's left behind when you die and has three modes: AddBackpackMaterials, Everything and NoTombstone. With a tombstone, a death means a trip back rather than a loss; with NoTombstone, no tombstone is left behind. Combine tough factors with a mild tombstone setting and you get tension without players quitting after one unlucky fall.

What Enshrouded 1.0 changes in the settings

With 1.0, Keen adjusted two difficulty settings. The setting for the number of enemies got a new mode, Automatic. It takes your group into account, and according to Keen the group is "every player actively playing in the vicinity"; players elsewhere on the map don't count. In addition, the enemy damage slider has been recalibrated, so the values better match the extra damage enemies actually deal. If you raised it before 1.0, check after an evening of play whether it still feels as tough as you intended. The updraft charge duration and the Flame level needed to push back the Shroud can now also be set in the world settings.

The caveat: on 18 October, Keen's documentation still shows the settings of version 0.9, with randomSpawnerAmount (Few, Normal, Many or Extreme) for the number of enemies and enemyDamageFactor from 0.25 to 5. Keen hasn't published how to write Automatic in the file or what the new limits of the damage factor are. Don't guess, because the server won't start with invalid text. If you set a lot of enemies, do make sure you're running the latest version: hotfix 1.0.0.2 fixed a server crash "when fighting a very large number of enemies". How to update is explained in Enshrouded 1.0 dedicated server: keep your world, back up and update.

Players, slots and performance

slotCount sets how many players can log in at once: 1 to 16. With reservedSlots you keep slots free per role. According to Keen, the server uses about 4.4 GB at idle plus up to 100 MB per player, with about 6 GB at most; the 16 GB in Keen's specifications applies to the whole machine. Our measurements under Proton are lower: 0.7 to 1.1 GB with few players. Our advice for our Enshrouded servers:

• 1 to 2 players, new world: Amateur (2 GB, €3.00) works, but with little headroom.
• 2 to 4 players: Beginner (4 GB, €6.00).
• 5 to 10 players: Traveller (6 GB, €9.00).
• 11 to 16 players, or a large, heavily built-up world: Explorer (8 GB, €12.00).

According to Keen's figures, you don't need more than 8 GB. The CPU matters more: Keen lists 6 cores and 12 threads at 3.2 GHz for 4 to 6 players, and 8 cores and 16 threads at 3.7 GHz for 16. Our servers run on AMD hardware with NVMe; the reasoning behind this is in How much RAM does an Enshrouded server need? Our 1.0 measurements.

Three combinations to start with

For all three, set gameSettingsPreset to Custom, otherwise you can't adjust the individual values.

• Building server with friends: miningDamageFactor 1.5, resourceDropStackAmountFactor 1.5, enableDurability false, night 6 minutes.
• Balanced adventure: enemyDamageFactor 1.25, playerHealthFactor 1.1, a tombstone mode that leaves a tombstone, standard day and night length.
• Hardcore group: bossHealthFactor 1.5, enableStarvingDebuff true, night 15 minutes, durability on, and agree that nobody softens the settings halfway through.
• 7 Days to Die co-op server settings: blood moons, loot, difficulty
• Counter-Strike 2 server setup: GSLT, subtick and plugins explained

Common mistakes

When editing, watch out for four pitfalls. Seconds instead of nanoseconds for day and night length: a value of 1800 isn't half an hour, and because the server raises values that are too low to the minimum, according to Keen, you get a 2-minute day. Adjusting factors while the preset isn't set to Custom: then your custom work has no effect. A typo in a text value, such as a misspelled tombstone mode: then the server won't start, according to Keen. And changing the name, slots or passwords in the file: our panel resets those from the startup variables on every start. Work in this order: server off, edit the file, keep a copy of the file, server on, and wait in the console for 'HostOnline' (up)!. If that line doesn't appear, look at your last change first.

Updates and what to arrange in advance

Keen Games releases regular updates that add new settings or change defaults; 1.0 is the latest example. Back up the save folder and enshrouded_server.json before every update, and check afterwards that your custom values are still there. If a file from an older version gets updated incorrectly, Keen says you can delete it; the server will create a new one. If you want to open the server to people outside your circle of friends, use the roles in userGroups. By default these are Admin, Friend, Guest and Visitor, each with its own password. For each role, you use settings such as canEditBase, canEditWorld and canKickBan to decide who may build, who may only look around and who is an administrator. On a dedicated server, those roles work "as before" in 1.0. That way, your world stays yours even with a changing set of players.