Valheim Visual Enhanced

Valheim Visual Enhanced is a fully client-side visual mod for Valheim. It adds soft, wind-driven cloud shadows and optional underwater caustic lighting without changing gameplay or network state.

Features

• World-anchored cloud shadows that follow Valheim's wind.
• Direct-light attenuation integrated before fog, preserving atmospheric haze.
• Native Valheim shadow maps remain active.
• No directional-light cookie replacement, so the cookie slot remains available to Valheim and other mods.
• Optional animated underwater caustics on opaque terrain, rocks, structures, characters, and other depth-writing surfaces.
• Caustics respond to sunlight, weather, water depth, viewing distance, and wind.
• Flowing caustic motion bends layers independently and varies filament thickness without requiring an external texture or additional texture samples.
• Automatic fading at night and under roofs or inside caves.
• No Harmony, Jotunn, network synchronization, or additional cameras.

Underwater caustics are enabled by default and can be controlled independently through Water Caustic Lighting.Enabled in the configuration file or BepInEx ConfigurationManager.

Requirements and compatibility

• Valheim 1.0 / Deep North on Windows.
• BepInExPack for Valheim 5.4.2350 or newer.
• Unity Built-in Deferred Shading with directional shadows enabled.
• Direct3D 11. The included shader bundle is built for D3D11; Vulkan is not currently validated.

This build's AssetBundle was rebuilt with Unity 6000.0.75f1, matching the Valheim 1.0 Windows engine. Valheim Visual Enhanced is client-side. Servers and other players do not need to install it.

Installation

Thunderstore, r2modman, or Gale

Install Valheim Visual Enhanced with the mod manager. Its BepInEx dependency is declared in the package manifest.

Manual installation

1. Install BepInExPack for Valheim.
2. Copy the ValheimVisualEnhanced folder into Valheim/BepInEx/plugins/.
3. Start Valheim once to generate BepInEx/config/dev.local.valheimvisualenhanced.cfg.

Do not install the mod on a dedicated server unless you only want to keep a copy there; it has no server-side behavior.

Default configuration

Section	Setting	Default
General	Enabled	true
General	DebugMaskView	false
General	LeaveRequestedDepthModeForCompatibility	false
Cloud Shadows	ShadowStrength	1.45
Cloud Shadows	CloudSizeMeters	85
Cloud Shadows	EdgeSoftness	0.035
Cloud Shadows	CloudCoverage	0.4
Cloud Shadows	ShadowDrawDistance	365
Cloud Shadows	MaskQuality	Low512
Cloud Shadows	WindSpeedMultiplier	0.8
Water Caustic Lighting	Enabled	true
Water Caustic Lighting	Intensity	1
Water Caustic Lighting	PatternSizeMeters	8
Water Caustic Lighting	AnimationSpeed	1
Water Caustic Lighting	FlowingMotion	true
Water Caustic Lighting	MaximumDepthMeters	10
Water Caustic Lighting	DrawDistanceMeters	45
Automation	AutoDisableAtNight	true
Automation	AutoDisableInRain	true
Automation	AutoDisableUnderRoof	true

Hotkeys are unassigned by default. BepInEx ConfigurationManager is optional.

Existing configurations for Valheim Visual Enhanced retain their saved values when the mod is updated. The former CloudShadows package uses a different GUID; remove it before installing this renamed package.

Known limitations

• Cloud shadows affect opaque lighting only and require Deferred Shading.
• Caustics require a depth-writing receiving surface; depthless transparent objects cannot receive them.
• The caustic pattern is an efficient visual approximation and is not derived from Valheim's actual water normals or wave simulation.
• Stereo/VR cameras are disabled rather than using an incorrect mono projection.
• Vulkan and non-Windows graphics backends have not been validated.

Troubleshooting

• If cloud shadows are absent, confirm that Valheim is using Deferred Shading and directional shadows are enabled.
• If another visual mod produces unexpected results, temporarily disable it to identify command-buffer or post-processing conflicts.
• The optional diagnostic hotkey writes debug_output.txt beside the plugin DLL. Assign it through the configuration file or ConfigurationManager first.

Plugin GUID: dev.local.valheimvisualenhanced
Version: 0.2.1