How to Change Difficulty on Your Sons of the Forest Server

All difficulty and custom game mode options for Sons of the Forest — enemy settings, environment, survival, and season controls.

Sons of the Forest offers preset difficulty modes and a fully customizable Custom mode with granular control over enemies, environment, survival, and seasons.

Custom game mode settings only apply when creating a new world. You cannot change them on an existing save — you'd need to start a new save slot.

Change Difficulty

Stop your server

Go to Console in the XGamingServer Panel and stop the server.

Edit dedicatedserver.cfg

Click Files in the sidebar and open dedicatedserver.cfg. Change GameMode:

"GameMode": "Normal"

(Optional) Start a new save

If switching to Custom mode, set SaveMode to "New" and change SaveSlot to an unused slot to generate a fresh world with your custom settings.

Save and start

Click Save Content and start from Console.

Preset Difficulty Modes

Mode	Enemies	Survival	Notes
Peaceful	No enemy spawns	Relaxed hunger/thirst	Explore and build freely
Normal	Standard spawns and aggression	Balanced	Recommended for first playthroughs
Hard	Tougher enemies, more frequent patrols	Scarcer resources	For experienced players
HardSurvival	Same as Hard	Same as Hard + permadeath	Death deletes your character
Creative	No enemies	No survival needs	Pure building mode
Custom	Fully configurable	Fully configurable	See below

Custom Mode Settings

Set "GameMode": "Custom" and add a CustomGameModeSettings object:

Setting	Values	Description
`EnemySpawn`	true / false	Toggle enemy spawning entirely
`EnemyHealth`	Low / Normal / High	Enemy hit point pools
`EnemyDamage`	Low / Normal / High	Damage enemies deal
`EnemyArmour`	Low / Normal / High	Enemy damage resistance
`EnemyAggression`	Low / Normal / High	How actively enemies hunt players
`AnimalSpawnRate`	Low / Normal / High	Animal spawn frequency
`EnemySearchParties`	Low / Normal / High	Patrol frequency and size

Example: PvE Easy Mode

"CustomGameModeSettings": {
  "GameSetting.Vail.EnemySpawn": true,
  "GameSetting.Vail.EnemyHealth": "Low",
  "GameSetting.Vail.EnemyDamage": "Low",
  "GameSetting.Vail.EnemyAggression": "Low",
  "GameSetting.Vail.AnimalSpawnRate": "High"
}

Setting	Values	Description
`StartingSeason`	Spring / Summer / Autumn / Winter	Which season the world starts in
`SeasonLength`	Short / Default / Long / Realistic	Duration of each season
`DayLength`	Short / Default / Long / Realistic	Full day/night cycle length
`PrecipitationFrequency`	Low / Default / High	Rain and snow frequency

Example: Endless Summer

"CustomGameModeSettings": {
  "GameSetting.Environment.StartingSeason": "Summer",
  "GameSetting.Environment.SeasonLength": "Long",
  "GameSetting.Environment.DayLength": "Long",
  "GameSetting.Environment.PrecipitationFrequency": "Low"
}

Setting	Values	Description
`ConsumableEffects`	Normal / Hard	Hunger/thirst damage severity
`PlayerStatsDamage`	Off / Normal / Hard	Damage from spoiled food
`ColdPenalties`	Off / Normal / Hard	Cold effects on health/stamina
`BuildingResistance`	Low / Normal / High	Structure durability
`ReducedFoodInContainers`	true / false	Less food in world loot
`SingleUseContainers`	true / false	Containers only lootable once
`PlayersImmortalMode`	true / false	Players cannot die
`OneHitToCutTree`	true / false	Trees fall in one hit
`CreativeMode`	true / false	Enable creative mode features

Setting	Values	Description
`Cheats`	true / false	Enable console commands (cheatstick + F1)
`PvpDamage`	Normal	Player vs player damage scaling

Set Cheats to true if you want admins to use console commands like godmode, settimeofday, and season.

How to Change Difficulty on Your Sons of the Forest Server

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