Point of interest

A **point of interest** (**POI**) is a distinctive location, such as a building or dungeon, placed in a biome by *Valheim*'s world generation algorithm.

## Placement

The locations of POIs are pre-determined when the world is created based on the world seed. However, the location of a POI is only fully determined after the zone is generated.

Some game updates automatically recalculate locations of unplaced POIs which may cause issues like Vegvisirs pointing to wrong location or external tools (like the world generator site) showing wrong information.

The recalculation can also be triggered manually by using genloc command. However this usually won't change anything because the outcome is determined by the world seed and the amount of already placed locations.

### Generation

The POIs are generated one by one depending on their order in the data (with prioritized getting generated first).

For each POI, a random zone is picked up to 100000 times (2x for prioritized) until max amount is placed. Any zone within 10000 m of the world center can be picked (world radius is 10500 m). However if the POI is "center first", then the limit starts at the minimum distance (0 for the start temple, 1500 for the vendor) and is increased by 1 meter for every picked zone.

The picked zone is valid if:

* It doesn't already have any POI
* The zone is not already generated
* If POI requires full biome, the following 9 coordinates must have the same biome:
	+ Zone middle position.
	+ 64 meters towards north, east, south and west.
	+ 90.5 meters towards north-east, south-east, south-west and north-west.
	+ Note: The coordinates are actually outside the zone area.
* Valid coordinates are found with up to 20 attempts

Coordinates are randomly selected within the zone (so that the POI exterior radius (and interior radius if specified) fits inside the zone). The picked coordinates are valid if:

* Distance from the world center is within minimum and maximum distance
* The biome is valid (as shown when hovering the map, not the averaged text in the minimap)
* Altitude is within the limits
* If POI requires forest, then the forest factor is within the limits
* Terrain delta (the maximum altitude difference of 10 random points within the POI exterior radius) is within the limits
* Similar POI doesn't already exist too close

### Data

Following table shows placement parameters for each POI, ordered as they are generated.

* Altitude from 1-1000, unless otherwise specified.
* Random rotation, unless otherwise specified. Slope rotation rotates the POI based on the terrain.
* Max terrain delta 3, unless otherwise specified.
* No vegetation can appear within the radius, unless otherwise specified.
* Unique POIs only appear once on the world. When the zone is generated, all others placements are removed.

## Dungeons

### Troll Caves

They appear as large rock formations with a large entryway, usually decorated with two or three bone piles. They are either empty or contain a troll. If they are empty, no troll will ever return to them.

### Burial Chambers

A tomb-like structure with entrance to dungeon-instance. Often surrounded by Skeletons. Dungeon-instance also contains a lot of Skeletons and chests with loot. Primary source of surtling cores.

### Sunken Crypts

Sunken Crypts are dark and gloomy dungeons, lit if at all with green torches, located in the Swamp and unlocked by the Swamp key dropped by The Elder. Oddly, they are not considered a Wet environment unless the player is forced to traverse flooded corridors. This is the primary source of iron scrap.

### Frost Caves

A frozen cave in the Mountain biome home to wolf-cultists, Ulvs, and bats with entrance to dungeon-instance. Dungeon-instance loot includes Fenris hair, Fenris claw, Red Jute, and gold.

### Infested Mines

Infested Mines are the remains of a Dvergr mining camp now overrun by Seekers in the Mistlands biome. Dungeon-instance loot contains Black cores, Sealbreaker fragments, and Royal jelly.

## Instances

Instances of a POI may have random variation.

Some elements like enemies and treasure often have a random chance of appearing.

If the POI gets randomly damaged, each structure randomly loses 40%-90% of its health.

## Dungeon generation

Some instances get randomly generated as dungeons. Depending on the dungeon type, the way in which rooms are placed in each dungeon may vary significantly - as an example, "rooms" of Fuling Villages are placed in a very different manner than rooms of e.g. Sunken Crypts.

Each dungeon may contain a random number of rooms, within a certain range; dungeons may also specify a minimum number of *required rooms*. During generation, rooms will continue to be added to a dungeon until either the maximum number of rooms has been reached, or until the minimum number of required rooms have been placed (*and* the minimum number of rooms have been placed). Note that if the minimum number of required rooms is zero, the latter condition will never be satisfied. It is allowed for dungeons to contain more than the minimum number of required rooms, but if they do they will be of minimal total room count; it is also allowed for dungeons to contain *none* of the required rooms, in which case they will be of maximal total room count.

### Dungeon algorithm

Rooms are placed in an arbitrary fashion, based on different parameters defined on each room choice. Each room has one or more **connections**, which define where the room can attach to other rooms. Each connection has a *type*, which determines what types of rooms the connection may lead to: Rooms are placed by rotating through each of the dungeon's *open connections* (connections not yet leading to a placed room), and attempting to place rooms leading from those connections such that the connection in the current room *and* the connection in the new room are of matching *type*. When a room is selected for placement, only *one* of its connections needs to match with the type of the existing room's connection; the new room is allowed to have any number of additional connections which align against existing open connections, even if their types do not match. (This allows for the placement of dividers.)

If the dungeon uses *weighted placement*, rooms and endcaps are selected for placement according to their *weight*; if not, the *weight* parameter is ignored, regular rooms are chosen randomly in an unweighted manner, and endcaps are placed according to their *endcap priority* (which is 0 unless otherwise specified). Rooms also define a *minimum depth*, which specifies how many connections deep in the dungeon the room may begin to generate (which is 0 unless otherwise specified). Note that except for required rooms, there is no definite upper limit on how many of a given room type may spawn in a single dungeon, although other constraints (such as the overall room count and room types) often are limiting factors.

Certain special types of rooms have different placement rules; these are places *after* regular rooms are placed, and do not contribute to the dungeon's room count:

* **Endcaps** are rooms with only one connection, such as wall segments or small alcoves: they are placed after regular rooms and do not contribute to the dungeon's room count. Once all main rooms and dividers have been placed, endcaps are used to plug any "holes" (any open connections without rooms attached yet). Endcaps have no minimum depth.
* **Dividers** are rooms with only one connection, similar to endcaps; however, unlike endcaps (which plug open connections), dividers are placed across *closed connections* (i.e. connections already with an adjacent room). They can be placed *only* where two rooms have adjacent connections which are of different types. Also, unlike endcaps, dividers may (or may not) be passable by players. Dividers have no minimum depth.
* **Doors** are not *technically* rooms, but *obstacles* which can be placed across closed connections, like dividers. Doors are placed after all other types of rooms; they are selected for placement randomly based on weight and the type of the connection they are being considered for placement at (with only matching types being considered). The *overall door chance* parameter of the dungeon defines the frequency of door placements. If no door types are defined for a connection type, no doors will ever appear over connections of that type. Doors have no minimum depth.

### Camp radial algorithm

Each dungeon of this type has a few extra parameters defined: a *minimum radius* and *maximum radius*; a *perimeter buffer* and *perimeter section count*; and a *maximum tilt* and *minimum altitude*. The former two control the radius of the camp: Each dungeon instance will first randomly pick a radius between the given minimum and maximum. The second pair of parameters specifies the number of "perimeter" (or "wall") rooms to be generated around the outer edge of the camp (if any), as well as the width of the *buffer zone* (defined below). The last two parameters control the maximum allowed tilt (ground incline) and the minimum allowed altitude (relative to water level) which rooms may be placed upon.

After randomly picking a camp radius and a room count within the respective specified ranges, room generation proceeds as follows: Rooms are selected for placement by choosing a room type at random (based on weight), and then applying a random position to that room. The random positioning is done by first moving the room to the center of the camp, then sliding it out by a random horizontal displacement (between 0 meters and the start of the *buffer zone*, which is equal to the camp radius minus the perimeter buffer), then rotating it around the center point of the camp by a random amount (0-360 degrees). This means that all rooms in the camp are randomly distributed throughout the camp radius (except for the buffer zone). Some types of rooms are subsequently rotated such that they always face the center of the camp; others will be rotated randomly instead. Only room types *not marked as perimeter* are eligible for placement in the camp interior.

After the inner rooms are placed, the perimeter rooms (if any) are placed. The system for placing the perimeter rooms is exactly the same as for the other rooms, except that perimeter rooms are always placed at the camp radius (instead of at a random distance from the camp center), and that only room types *marked as perimeter* are eligible for placement here.

Note that required rooms, endcaps, dividers, and doors are all ignored in the camp radial algorithm. (That is to say, camps do not obey the *required room* count, and never generate any endcaps, dividers, or doors.)

## Dungeon rooms

Below are the different types of dungeons and the rooms they can contain, along with what loot those rooms may hold. The "type" column indicates the type of room or the type of loot, and the "weight or amount" column indicates the weight (for rooms) or else the amounts and chances (for loot).

### Frost Cave

Type: **Cave**

Number of Rooms: 3–64

Minimum Required Rooms: 3

Weighted Placement: Yes

Overall Door Chance: 20%

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 1.21 1.22 1.23 1.24 1.25 1.26 1.27 1.28 1.29 1.30 1.31 1.32 1.33 1.34 1.35 1.36 1.37 1.38 1.39 1.40 Pickable **Crystals** drop exactly 1 crystal each when picked. However, they are also fragile and destructible in pickable form, and when destroyed they drop 1-3 crystals instead.

### Fuling Village

Type: **Goblin Camp**

### Infested Mine

Type: **Dverger Town**

Number of Rooms: 16–96

Minimum Required Rooms: 1

Weighted Placement: Yes

Overall Door Chance: 90%

### Infested Citadel

Type: **Dverger Boss**

Number of Rooms: 512–512

Minimum Required Rooms: 1

Weighted Placement: Yes

Overall Door Chance: 0%

Unlike other dungeons, the overall layout of the Infected Citadel is always the same: the dungeon's entrance room consists of the boss arena in its entirety *except* for the outer walls, which are each divided into sections, each of which is assigned a connection of a certain type. Thus, the only "rooms" in this dungeon which are randomized are the walls (and for one corner of the ground floor, that includes some minor randomization of staircases/platforms).

The endcap connections are of different types corresponding to the vertical layer of the boss arena they are at: the "bottom" layer is at the ground floor and the balcony running around its perimeter, the "middle" layer is roughly at the height of the lowest corner landing above the balcony, the "top" layer is at roughly the level of the top floor and the Hive seat, and the "roof" layer is above even that, near the ceiling. There are also "flat" variants, which are for endcaps which are entirely flat, lacking any randomized stone protrusions. Additionally, one wall of the "middle" layer is not randomized via connections, instead being a predefined stone slope beneath the top floor platform.

For purposes of this section, "ground floor" refers only to the bottommost floor in the dungeon; the "entrance alcove" is the small enclosed area of the ground floor which houses the entrance/exit to the dungeon; the "balcony" is the set of platforms running around the walls just above the ground floor; the "first landing" is the lowest corner landing above the balcony; the "second landing" is the next-highest corner landing; and the "top floor" is the topmost floor where the altar is located.

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 **Seeker eggs** have a 50% chance of spawning one Seeker Brood when destroyed. They also have a 50% chance (determined randomly each time the area is loaded) of being able to *hatch*: Every 1-2 seconds, if there is a player within 3 meters of the egg, the egg will be automatically destroyed and will spawn one Seeker Brood.
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 2.8 **Hanging seeker eggs** have a 50% chance of spawning one Seeker Brood when destroyed.
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 **Trigger spawners** are spawners which are *triggered* by The Queen's mob-spawning ability, instead of spawning their mobs instantly or on a repeating delay. Each time The Queen uses her "call" attack, all trigger spawners within 30 meters begin an attempt to spawn, which works as follows: First, if the spawner's cooldown (0 seconds, by default) has not elapsed since its last successful spawn, the attempt fails and stops. Next, which creature to spawn is chosen at random from the spawner's list of options. Then all creatures of that type within 50 meters (default) of the spawner are totaled, and if their count exceeds the allowed maximum (default is 2.0 plus 0.7 per player within 100 meters horizontally, capping at 5.5 with 5 players), the attempt fails and stops. Otherwise, the attempt succeeds and one creature of the chosen kind is spawned.

## Unused

* Disabled: Entry and data exist but the entry is disabled. Can be spawned to the world.
* Unusable: Entry doesn't exist. Can't be spawned.
* No model: Data doesn't exist. Can't be spawned but may appear on console autocomplete.

## Types

### Abandoned house

The Abandoned house is most often found in Meadows. Ranging from single small houses up to big villages consisting of few big houses like Viking halls.

Players can find Chests and Beehives within the houses; fenced gardens with Raspberry bushes may also be found nearby.

### Draugr village

Draugr Villages can be found in Meadows. They contain a number of large house types not found anywhere else and Body piles.

### Ruined Towers

Ruined Towers can be found in the Meadows and the Black Forest. They can be guarded by Greydwarfs and Skeletons. Most have a chest containing loot inside them, in the form of either feathers, amber, coins, and/or flinthead arrows

### Stone Grave

Can be found in Meadows.

A large stone placed horizontally surrounded my multiple smaller stones.

The player can mine the large stone for a chance of getting Bone fragments as well as valuables.

### Viking Graveyard

Can be found in Meadows.

Looks like big stones placed together in ellipse fashion.

Player can dig down there to find a Chest with some Valuables.

### Shipwreck

Can be found around the shores of the Black Forest. Players can find a chest with valuables inside of it within the wreck.

### Runestone

Big rock with red runes written on one side of it, which contains Lore.

### Ancient Stone Circle

A place surrounded by five or so boulders in the Meadows.

### Abandoned outpost

Ruined tower made of stone. Often got some **Draugrs** outside and inside, and crows
flying around. Usually contains a chest with loot.

### Forsaken altars

Can be used to summon bosses. Looks unique to each of the bosses.

Eikthyr's Forsaken altar is called a Mystical altar.

### Inverted Tower

A circular structure of stone with a spiral staircase leading down from the top with a chest usually at the bottom. [Inverted Tower Swamp Pic]

Found in Swamp and Mountain biomes.

## Removed Types

### Camp ruins

Small circular area surrounded by walls with some clutter and a chest with loot inside. It is also a place of Troll spawns.

### Tower

A structure of stone with two torches and a chest with loot on top.

### Little ruins

A collection of ruins of stone house with a chest of loot inside protected by Draugrs.

### Glade

Little area with dirt covered ground and a stump in a middle surrounded by trees.