Modding Raid Haven

Mods add weapons, armor, raiders, raid types and buildings to Raid Haven, change how the game looks and sounds, and translate it. This site has the guides and the reference for making them.

What a mod is

A mod is a folder of files. You describe content in Lua tables, which read a lot like JSON with comments. Art is PNG and sound is WAV or OGG.

Most mods need no programming. The first tutorial makes Frost Blade, a blue copy of the Iron Longsword. You copy the sword, rename it, recolour its picture and change a number or two.

Some things can’t be done with data alone, like a raider with its own AI or a raid type with its own rules. For those you write Lua scripts against the game’s mod API. Scripts run in a sandbox, so a mod from the Workshop can’t touch your files, the network or Steam.

What you can mod goes through each area of the game.

Getting mods

Mods come from the Steam Workshop. Subscribe to a mod, open Mods on the title screen, tick it and restart the game. The Mods menu also has a Workshop tab, so you can browse and subscribe without leaving the game.

The game sorts your mods into a working load order. When something is wrong, the Mods menu says which mod it is, what happened and what to do about it. How mods work has the details.

Mods are for the full game. The demo doesn’t load them.

Making mods

Turn on Mod Author mode in the game’s settings to get the tools for making mods.

• New mod sets up a folder from a starter, such as a weapon, a raider, a raid type or a translation.
• F5 reloads your mod’s data while the game runs. Art, sound and text reload as soon as you save the file.
• Test my mod opens the Mod Lab, a small test map with Dev Mode on. You can spawn any raider, start any raid type at any wave and give your pawns any item. Lab runs never touch your saves.
• You publish and update your mod on the Workshop from inside the game.

The free Mod Kit is in the ModKit folder next to the game. It has example mods and sprite templates with the grip, tip and feet points marked. It also has every base item as a file you can copy, and the game’s palette. The examples and templates are CC0, so you can use them in your own mods however you like.

If you work with a coding agent such as Claude Code, Using an AI agent shows how to give it these docs.

Help

Questions go to the modding support channel on the Raid Haven Discord. Get help says what to include when something goes wrong.