Configuring Caves on Your Nodecraft Don't Starve Together Server

If you want to change the default settings for "Caves" world generation on your Don't Starve Together server, you will have to add a config file to your server which records what changes are to be made. The file is called leveldataoverride.lua, and once created it must be placed in the Caves folder for your server.

This config file will allow you to set all kinds of things on the "Caves" server, such as increased or decreased resources, spawn rates of animals and enemies, and much more.

Creating the `leveldataoverride.lua` File

The most accurate way to create the config file is to let the game itself do it! If the game creates the config file, it will have all the most up to date settings, including any new settings for any of the special events that are frequently introduced into the game (The Gorge, The Forge, Return of Them, etc).

The only problem is that the leveldataoverride.lua file won't normally be found on a multiplayer server at all. There is no existing file that can be opened up and edited, and no way to easily see what settings are. While you can find examples of the file on the game's wiki and online in forums, they are usually severely out of date.

Start a Single Player Game

Start the Don't Starve Together client on Steam. Once the title screen appears, click "Play!", then choose "Host Game" on the left side of the screen, and you should see the following below:

A view of the world creation UI for hosting a new world in Don't Starve Together

Choose Playstyle

You need to choose the playstyle you want to have by clicking one of the four choices: Social, cooperative, Competitive, and Madness. It doesn't matter which one you pick, it won't affect making the config file. Until you do pick one, all the other pages of game settings shown behind it are locked.

Configure World Settings

There will be 5 Tabs across the top of the page: Settings, Forest, Caves, Mods (0), and Rollback. On the "Settings" tab, choose a slot on the far left for the new world, and then change all the settings for your new world, like the server's name, description, password, and other settings.

Like above, you don't need to be too picky here. You're only creating a single player game for the sole purpose of making this config file, and you can't finish the process if the "Settings" page is blank.

A view of creating a new server in Don't Starve Together

Configure Cave Settings

This page shows the settings for the "Caves." Use the arrows to change each setting just the way you want it. If you have any questions about what a settings controls or does, the information in the online wiki for Don't Starve Together is accurate (just the examples of the config file they show are usually out of date).

A view of the configuration screen for caves in the single player game of Don't Starve Together

When you're finished changing the settings for your world, click the "Generate World" button in the lower right corner.

It will create a new world, which may take a few minutes. Choose your character (any character, doesn't really matter since we only want to start a new game just make the config file) and then click "go!". Once your character appears in the game world, hit ESC and then disconnect from the server.

Return to the main menu of the game, and then look for the "data" button in the lower left corner. Click on it, and it will open a window which shows the game save files on your computer, which will look something like the image below:

A view of the data folder for Don't Starve Together newly created server

Each world that has been created will be in a different Cluster folder, like Cluster_1, Cluster_2, Cluster_3, and so on. Simply find and open the "Caves" world you just created.

Open the cluster folder, and then open the Caves folder inside. There you will see the leveldataoverride.lua file that you will need. Copy that file from your local computer, so that you can upload it to your online server!

Upload the `leveldataoverride.lua` to Your Server

Open the control panel of your Nodecraft Don't Starve Together server and navigate to the following folder:

/.klei/DoNotStarveTogether/MyDediServer

You should see the following:

A view of where to place the leveldataoverride.lua file in a newly created Don't Starve Together server

Open the Caves folder and place the leveldataoverride.luafile you created into the folder. If everything has been done right, when you start the server next time, it will create a whole new world, using the settings from the leveldataoverride.lua file you added to your server!

Previously Created Worlds

The leveldataoverride.lua file is is only used when the game needs to make a whole new world, and the game won't create a new world if one already exists.

The presence of a save folder inside theCaves folder is how the game tells that a world already exists. The save folder is loaded, and it won't look at or use the leveldataoverride.lua file at all.

So you need to move or delete the save folder first. With the save folder gone, it triggers the game to make a new world, and that's when it will read in and use the leveldataoverride.lua file.