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The Best Rust Plugins for PvE Servers: Raidable Bases, Events, NPCs and Progression

Posted on by Netch Dev

The best Rust PvE plugins

A PvE server lives or dies on what players do once nobody can raid them. They need their stuff to stay safe, something worth fighting, events to show up for and a reason to log in tomorrow. This guide compares the plugins that cover each of those jobs: base protection, raidable bases, NPC encounters, custom events, progression systems and rewards.

PvE essentials compared

Most PvE servers end up needing the same six things. Here’s what each one does for your server and which plugin covers it.

Start with the damage rules. A PvE server first needs a plugin that stops players damaging each other and each other’s bases. TruePVE is the common choice. Everything in this guide sits on top of that.

Locks & base protection

PvE players build bigger and store more, because they expect it to be there tomorrow. These two make sure it is.

Auto Lock | Lock Everything

Every lockable item gets a code lock automatically, with the player’s own code, and their team is added and removed from the lock for them. The part that matters for PvE: it can lock things Rust normally won’t let you lock.

  • Locks the unlockable: furnaces, electric ovens, composters, mixing tables, repair benches, research tables, drop boxes, flame turrets, gun traps, auto turrets, SAM sites and mannequins.
  • Each item on or off: you choose which items get locks on your server.
  • Automatic door closers: doors, hatches and gates close after a delay each player sets, with optional resource costs.
  • Streamer mode and a simple /lock UI for changing codes and settings.

Stops “someone took the fuel out of my furnace” tickets and turret griefing. Works with Chest Stacker to lock stacked boxes too. Commands & permissions

Auto Lock placing code locks on furnaces, turrets and other deployables
Base Protection purchase UI for buying protection time with items

Base Protection

Bases linked to a protected tool cupboard can’t take damage from anything, NPCs included. That’s the gap most PvE damage rules leave open: raidable-base defenders, roaming bots and heli rockets can still chew through a base.

  • Two ways to run it: players toggle it with /protection and stay protected for a set time after logging out (per permission tier), or they buy protection time through a UI.
  • Pay with items, Economics or Server Rewards. For example, 50 scrap for 1 hour.
  • Ignore list for items like turrets and chests, raid block support and file logging.

The purchase mode doubles as a scrap sink and a perk you can sell. Commands & permissions

Raidable bases & NPC encounters

PvE players still want to raid and fight. They just want the other side to be an NPC.

Raidable bases

A raidable bases plugin spawns pre-built bases full of loot and defended by NPCs and turrets, usually in difficulty tiers. It’s the closest thing PvE gets to raiding, and the most-asked-for PvE plugin. Raidable Bases is the best-known one.

ModPulse doesn’t sell a raidable bases plugin, but it fits well alongside the ones here: Base Protection keeps player bases safe from the NPCs those bases bring, and Random Items can pay out for the NPCs players kill on the way in.

Extra NPCs

NPC plugins add scientists and other bots to monuments, roads and custom spots, with their own loadouts and difficulty. BotReSpawn is a popular choice. They turn quiet monuments into fights and give new players something to farm.

Players who kill NPCs can be rewarded through Random Items, so every fight pays out something.

Patrol Heli Kill Tracker

On PvE servers, the patrol helicopter is often the biggest fight of the day, and several groups shoot it at once. This plugin decides who actually took it down: the player with the most hits, or the last player to hit it. Your choice.

No more arguments in chat over who gets credit.

Chat message showing which player destroyed the patrol helicopter

Random Items

Six reward features in one plugin, each on or off on its own: random items for killing players and/or NPCs, on a timer (with permission tiers, so VIPs get them faster), after respawning, for jumping, crafting and farming. Pick specific items or use the whole game, and custom items are supported. Players can turn it off for themselves with /items.

Custom events

Events give a PvE server its busy moments: a time when everyone is online, chasing the same thing.

Locked Crate Event

“King of the Hill” style events built around locked crates: the first player to loot the crate wins. Pick the crate with /setcrate, or let events run on their own with a cooldown and a minimum player count.

  • Optional UI that shows the event to players (needs Image Library).
  • Map markers at the event location with Marker Manager.

On PvE it becomes a race instead of a gunfight.

Locked Crate Event UI showing the event countdown
Farm Event leaderboard countdown on screen

Farm Event

A farming contest: players earn points for gathering, and whoever has the most at the end wins. One random material is worth double points each round, so the best spot changes every time.

  • Rewards: Server Rewards points, Economics currency or items.
  • Automatic or manual with farmevent start.
  • Live leaderboard and countdown on screen, plus chat announcements.

Pure PvE competition: nobody gets shot, and everyone is out farming.

Progression & rewards

Without raids to lose, PvE players finish a wipe quickly. Progression slows that down and gives them goals.

Loot Blocker

Blocks and replaces loot in phases you set. For example: phase 1 primitive weapons, phase 2 shotguns, phase 3 pistols. It checks loot crates, crafting and vending machines, so nothing slips through. Move the server on with lootblock.phase.

The simplest way to give a wipe a real progression curve.

Custom Crafting Menu

A /craft menu with your own recipes, categories and ingredients. The default config includes most DLC and uncraftable items, and custom items are supported. Recipes can require a workbench nearby, or being at Outpost or Bandit Camp.

Turn rare items into crafting goals instead of lucky drops.

Gems

Rare gems drop as an extra reward for mining, with 19 unique gems in the default config. Players can trade them with /exchange for items, Economics or Server Rewards points.

Makes long farming sessions feel worth it.

Loot Box

Unique chests and keys that open for random loot. Hand them out in kits, sell them in shops, or give them out for voting and daily rewards. Admins and Tebex can give them with lootbox.give.

A reward you can attach to anything: events, votes, milestones.

Restart Rewards

Announces restarts on a schedule, for any days and times you set, and rewards players who reconnect within a time window. Rewards can be kits, Server Rewards, Economics or items, in as many permission tiers as you like, with optional Discord webhook alerts.

Restarts stop costing you players.

Storage Restocker

Boxes that refill every X seconds with items you set, on any entity with an inventory. They can be made invincible. Set one up with /storage add while looking at it.

Good for starter areas, free-supply huts and event arenas.

Quality of life

PvE players spend most of their time fighting NPCs and farming. These cut the frustration out of both, and several make good VIP perks.

Self Revive

Players with selfrevive.use revive themselves after they’re downed, at 100%, instead of relying on Rust’s hunger and hydration odds. You can require an item for it and set the healing after revival. A UI shows the countdown.

Health Regeneration

Health regenerates once a player is out of combat. You set the delay, the tick rate, the heal amount and how much food and water it costs. An optional permission makes it a VIP perk.

Support Weapons

Weapons that help instead of hurt: heal and revive, feed, or apply teas to the players you hit. Set up tiers with any weapon or skin. Built for group PvE, where one player can play medic.

Loadout

Players respawn with the gear they saved, including skins, attachments and ammo. Set a cooldown (60s by default, 20s for VIPs) and let VIPs save extra loadouts.

Instant Barrel

Barrels and road signs break in one hit and loot themselves. Less clicking on long farming runs, and an easy VIP perk.

FAQ

Which plugins should a new PvE server install first?

Damage rules first (TruePVE or similar), then protection so players trust the server with their builds: Auto Lock and Base Protection. Then add content: a raidable bases plugin, one event such as Locked Crate Event, and one progression plugin such as Loot Blocker.

Does ModPulse sell a raidable bases plugin?

No. ModPulse plugins work alongside one: Base Protection blocks damage from NPCs, and Random Items rewards NPC kills.

Do these plugins work on Oxide and Carbon?

Yes. Every ModPulse plugin supports both Oxide and Carbon.

Which of these work as VIP perks?

Anything gated by a permission or a tier: Health Regeneration, Self Revive, Instant Barrel, VIP cooldowns and extra slots in Loadout, faster timed items in Random Items, longer offline protection in Base Protection, and bigger reconnect rewards in Restart Rewards. New to permissions? Read the permissions guide.

How do I give event rewards through Tebex or a web shop?

Two of them have console commands you can run from Tebex or a web shop: lootbox.give in Loot Box and gems.give in Gems.

Build your PvE server

High performance Rust plugins for Oxide / Carbon, with support on Discord.