SCUM Loot Settings: Multipliers & the Spawner System

How loot works in SCUM

SCUM distributes loot through two kinds of spawners:

Spawner type	How it works
World spawners	Loot lies visibly in the world (floors, shelves, streets). Respawns only after the spawner’s cooldown expires.
Examine spawners	Loot is rolled when searching an object (cabinets, crates, car wrecks).

You control both globally via multipliers in ServerSettings.ini — and, thanks to the loot customization system, in fine detail via JSON files.

The loot multipliers in ServerSettings.ini

The relevant values (ItemSpawning area of ServerSettings.ini, editable in the panel’s file manager):

Setting	Default	Effect
SpawnerProbabilityMultiplier	1.0	Spawn probability of world spawners. 2.0 = twice as much loot in the world.
ExamineSpawnerProbabilityMultiplier	1.0	Spawn probability of examine spawners (searching).
ExamineSpawnerExpirationTimeMultiplier	1.0	Cooldown of examine spawners — lower = containers refill faster.
SpawnerExpirationTimeMultiplier	1.0	Cooldown of world spawners.

Loot respawn: why is there nothing here?

• Spawners only respawn after their cooldown — permanently farmed-out spots are normal.
• Community experience says loot also only respawns when no player is right at the spawn point (~50 m is often quoted — not officially confirmed). Camping military loot prevents fresh supplies.
• For testing without a restart there’s the admin command #ReloadLootCustomizationsAndResetSpawners — it reloads loot customizations and resets all spawner cooldowns.

Configuring cargo drops

Supply drops have their own values in ServerSettings.ini, including:

Setting	Default	Effect
CargoDropCooldownMinimum / CargoDropCooldownMaximum	90 / 120	Minutes between cargo drop events
CargoDropFallDelay	540.0	Seconds from announcement to drop
CargoDropFallDuration	60.0	Fall duration in seconds
CargoDropSelfdestructTime	1200.0	Seconds until the crate self-destructs

Fine-tuning: customizing loot via JSON

For anything beyond global multipliers, SCUM has a loot customization system: every spawner uses a preset (JSON) that you can override — globally, per sector or per building. The files live under:

SCUM/Saved/Config/WindowsServer/Loot/
├── Items/
│   ├── Default/        (reference, incl. Parameters.json)
│   └── Override/       (your customizations)
└── Spawners/Presets/
    ├── Default/        (all default presets)
    └── Override/       (your customizations)

How to proceed:

1. Export the defaults — as admin in chat: #ExportDefaultItemSpawnerPresets (all presets), plus #ExportDefaultItemSpawningParameters and #ExportDefaultLootTree. SCUM writes the files into the Default folders.
2. Copy the preset you want into the Override folder and edit it there — presets combine FixedItems (always spawn), Items (with probability and quantity), Nodes (references into the loot tree) and Subpresets.
3. Control the scope: an override directly in the Override folder applies globally; in subfolders like Override/A2/... only to that map area. Puppet loot also runs through such presets (Character-Puppets-…).
4. Test live with #ReloadLootCustomizationsAndResetSpawners.

Frequently asked questions

How do I simply get “more loot”? Set SpawnerProbabilityMultiplier and ExamineSpawnerProbabilityMultiplier to e.g. 2.0, restart the server — done. JSON is only needed for targeted changes.

Can I change zombie (puppet) loot? Yes, but not via the INI — puppet loot lives in the spawner presets (JSON override, step by step above).

Loot doesn’t spawn despite high multipliers? Wait out the cooldowns, don’t stand right at the spawn point — or run #ReloadLootCustomizationsAndResetSpawners as a test.

Related guides

• Configuring your server — all other server settings
• Admin commands — export commands & more
• Save game & backups — back up before big changes