Following a successful world transfer to a new dedicated server, Valheim players often encounter an alarming surprise: castles and landscape edits exist as expected, but their character spawns completely naked, devoid of equipped weapons, armor, and hard-earned skill levels, or the character name has vanished from the menu altogether.
In this practical guide, we examine the structural separation of save data in Valheim, explain why character inventories are never stored within the .db world file, inspect local .fch files, and restore characters from automatic .old backups.
World and Character Separation in Valheim Architecture#
A fundamental architectural design of Valheim's networking stack is the strict decoupling of two persistence layers:
- The World: Files with
.db(binary database containing terrain changes, buildings, and container contents) and.fwlextensions (world seed and metadata). These files reside physically on the dedicated server host. - The Character: Files with
.fchextensions (Character Files). These store inventory contents, equipped armor sets, maximum health and stamina thresholds, and weapon skill levels.
On standard dedicated servers without specialized mod frameworks, character files are stored entirely on the client PC, never on the server host. Migrating world databases between VPS providers does not alter client-side character data. If player gear is missing after a migration, the issue stems from local client profile selection or Steam Cloud desynchronization.
Local .fch Files and Steam Cloud Synchronization#
Depending on client configuration, Valheim stores characters locally or routes them through Steam Cloud synchronization.
Locate your character save directory on the client machine:
# Путь на Linux / Steam Deck:
ls -la ~/.config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim/characters_local/
# Путь в Steam Cloud (Linux):
ls -la ~/.local/share/Steam/userdata/*/892970/remote/characters/
On Windows machines, character files are located at %userprofile%\AppData\LocalLow\IronGate\Valheim\characters_local\.
If a cloud icon appears next to the character name in the selection interface, the game attempts to stream state from Steam Cloud. Network interruptions or version conflicts can result in corrupted profile stubs. Clicking «Move to Local» locks the character to your local disk, eliminating cloud conflicts.
Recovering Corrupted Characters from .fch.old Backups#
Valheim automatically generates a snapshot backup upon each character save event, appending the .old extension.
Inspect the local character directory for available fallback snapshots:
cd ~/.config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim/characters_local/
ls -la *.fch*
If the primary Viking.fch file is zero bytes or corrupted, restore the previous working snapshot:
cp Viking.fch Viking.fch.corrupted
cp Viking.fch.old Viking.fch
Restart the Valheim client: the character will appear with all weapons, armor, and skill progressions preserved from the previous session.
Exceptions: Server-Side Character Mods and BepInEx#
The sole exception to client-side character storage is dedicated servers utilizing the ServerCharacters mod via BepInEx. These instances enforce server-side inventory persistence to eliminate client item spawning exploits.
Check whether server-side character databases exist on your host:
ls -la /opt/valheim/BepInEx/config/ServerCharacters/
If your previous server utilized this modification, the ServerCharacters.db database must be copied alongside your .db and .fwl world files; otherwise, all connecting survivors will be treated as level-one newcomers.
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