MuchBetterTames

A Valheim mod that makes tamed creatures smarter, more useful, and reliable companions.

MuchBetterTames adds simple follow/stay commands, automatic teleportation, survival mechanics, progression, and server-synchronized settings.

Features

Companion Commands

• Follow / Stay (single tame): Press E (controller: A) on a tamed creature to toggle between following and staying. No on-screen message is shown for single commands.
• Group command (nearby tames): Press H on keyboard or R3 on controller. All tames within the command radius (default 10 m) follow you, or stay if any of them was following.
• The hover text of a tame shows the group key for the input device you are currently using (keyboard or controller).
• Only tames close to you react to the group command, so tames you left somewhere else stay where they are.
• Follow ownership is saved with each creature and restored after teleportation or reloading.
• Shift + E / LB + A keep their vanilla behavior.

Follower Display (local only)

• Blue health bars: Tames that follow you get a blue health bar. When they stop following, the bar returns to its normal color. Only you see this. Color and on/off switch are configurable.
• Follower counter: The number of tames currently following you is shown below the hotbar.
• The group command shows a short message with the number of affected tames.

Automatic Teleportation

• Companions automatically teleport to you when they get too far away or are stuck for too long.
• Teleport destinations are always behind the player. Ground, walls, and positioning are checked to prevent unsafe locations.
• During combat, the teleport distance increases to 90 meters.
• Following companions are also teleported after using portals or respawning after death.
• The server searches for following companions across the entire world, including unloaded areas.
• Large creatures can be excluded from dungeon teleportation. By default this applies to Lox. The exclusion list is configurable.

Companion Survival

• No permanent death: Fatal damage knocks your companion unconscious instead of killing it.
• While unconscious, the creature is invulnerable.
• Recovery takes 45 seconds, reduced by 15% per star.
• Recovery is twice as fast when a player is within 15 meters.
• Press E on an unconscious tame to give first aid (reduces recovery time by 5 seconds per interaction).
• Recovery continues even while the creature is unloaded.
• After recovering, the creature has 30% health and resumes following you.

Automatic Health Regeneration

• Outside combat: 0.8% of maximum health per second.
• During combat: 0.1% of maximum health per second.
• Well-fed creatures regenerate 1.5x faster.
• Hungry creatures regenerate at 0.5x speed.

Taming Information

Wild creatures show extra taming information in their hover text:

• Remaining taming time and total taming time.
• Taming progress in percent.
• A warning when taming is paused because the creature is hungry.

Stars & Experience

Tamed creatures can earn up to 2 stars through combat.

• Experience is based on the enemy's maximum health, level, and boss bonus.
• The creature that gets the kill receives 100% XP.
• Other companions of the same owner within 30 meters receive 25% XP.
• Player kills grant 25% XP to their following companions.
• 1st star: 300 XP. 2nd star: 1,000 XP.
• Leveling up restores full health and plays an effect with a speech bubble.

Improved Defense

• Wild creatures become enemies to your companions as soon as they attack a player or another tame.
• This also works between creatures of the same species (e.g. wolf vs. wolf).
• Applies to all types of tamed creatures.

Multiplayer Support

• All gameplay rules are synchronized by the server.
• Local-only settings: key and button bindings, language, taming timer display, health bar color, follower counter, and debug log.
• Every setting in the config is labeled (Server-synced) or (Local only, not synced).
• BepInEx and Jotunn must be installed on the server and on all clients.

Languages

Mod texts are available in 14 languages (English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Polish, Turkish, Dutch, Swedish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean). Choose a language or Auto to follow the Valheim language.

Controls

Action	Keyboard	Controller
Follow / stay (single tame)	E	A
Group follow / stay (nearby tames)	H	R3
First aid (unconscious tame)	E	A

Keyboard key and controller button for the group command can be changed in the config (restart required).

Requirements

• Valheim
• BepInEx
• Jotunn

Important: BepInEx and Jotunn must be installed on both the server and all clients.

Installation

1. Install BepInEx for Valheim.
2. Install Jotunn.
3. Place the MuchBetterTames plugin DLL into BepInEx/plugins.
4. Make sure the server and all players have the mod and its dependencies installed.

Configuration

The config file is generated by BepInEx after the first launch (BepInEx/config). Settings are grouped into sections:

Section	Content
1 General	Enable/disable the mod, language, debug log
2 Follow	Teleport distances, command radius, portals, dungeons, dungeon exclusion list, recall on death
3 Survival	Knock-out and recovery settings
4 Regeneration	Health regeneration values
5 Taming	Taming timer display
6 Stars	XP and star settings
7 Defense	Defense against attacking wild creatures
8 Keyboard	Group command key (default H)
9 Controller	Group command button (default R3)
10 Visual	Follower health bar tint and color, follower counter

If you update from an older version, delete the old config file once so the new sections and defaults are created.

Building from Source

Requirements

• .NET SDK
• Valheim game installation
• BepInEx
• Jotunn

Build Instructions

1. Open the .csproj file.
2. Update the ValheimDir path to your Valheim installation directory.
3. Make sure the project references the Unity modules it uses, including UnityEngine.IMGUIModule and UnityEngine.TextRenderingModule (needed for the follower counter).
4. Run:

dotnet build -c Release

The compiled plugin will be generated in the build output directory.

Troubleshooting

• If the group button does not react, check that the controller button is not also bound to another Valheim action, or change it in section 9 Controller.
• If follow/stay on a single tame does not behave as expected, enable DebugLog in section 1 General, try it once, and check the Interact ... lines in the log.
• Errors and runtime problems are written to:

BepInEx/LogOutput.log

MuchBetterTames – Better companions, better adventures.