PLEASE READ EARLY TESTING WARNING BELOW
Water Chambers
Create dynamic underwater spaces anywhere you build.
Water Chambers is an early experimental mod that allows players to build custom water-filled rooms, aquariums, breeding pens, pools, underwater tunnels, and other creative aquatic spaces using modular chamber pieces. The goal is to make water feel more flexible and buildable, letting you create controlled water volumes inside structures instead of being limited to oceans, lakes, and natural water areas.
This is very much an early testing build, but the core system is now working well enough to share. Please use caution, especially with important tames, and expect changes as the mod continues to improve.
Dynamic Water Volumes
The main feature of Water Chambers is the ability to place structure pieces that generate their own water volume. These chambers are designed to behave like contained water spaces, allowing players and aquatic creatures to interact with them in ways that are much more dynamic than standard static water placement.
The system supports adjustable chamber behavior and is being built with future expansion in mind, including more shapes, more structure compatibility, and more realistic water containment logic.
Glass Walls and Open Access
By default, chambers include visible glass-style outer walls, making them useful for aquariums, viewing rooms, and enclosed aquatic habitats.
Players can also turn off the visible glass walls if they want a more open look or want to move through the sides of the chamber to enter and exit wherever they choose.
For the current version, player movement through the sides can be allowed, but dino collision on the outside walls remains blocked for safety. This helps prevent aquatic creatures from accidentally escaping or getting pushed out of the water volume.
Dinos can still enter and leave through the top surface of the chamber, but they cannot currently pass through the side walls.
Creature Safety System
Adding custom water volumes in ARK is tricky, especially when dealing with aquatic creatures that can die quickly if the game briefly thinks they are out of water.
To help reduce the risk, Water Chambers currently uses a short recurring protection buff for creatures inside the chamber that would normally die out of water. This buff is designed to protect them for a few seconds in case the water volume briefly disappears, reloads, or refreshes.
This is not meant to make creatures permanently safe outside of water. If a creature leaves the chamber or remains without water for more than a few seconds, it can still die as normal.
This system is an attempted safety layer, not a guarantee. Please test carefully before trusting the mod with valuable tames.
Current Limitations
This first release is focused on getting the core chamber and water behavior working safely. Because of that, some restrictions are intentional.
In the current version:
Dino collision is blocked on outer chamber walls for safety.
Dinos can enter and exit through the top surface, but not through the sides.
The system is still experimental and may have edge cases with loading, rendering, server restarts, or unusual structure layouts.
Important aquatic tames should be tested carefully before long-term use.
More structure shapes and advanced behavior are planned, but not yet included.
Planned Features
If testing goes well, future updates may include expanded compatibility with additional structure pieces and more advanced water behavior.
Planned ideas include:
- Half walls
- Quarter walls
- Additional foundation and ceiling support
- Triangle pieces
- More flexible chamber shapes
- Improved dino entry and exit options
- A more realistic containment mode where water requires sealed walls to be held in place
- A flood-fill style system that can detect a sealed space and automatically fill the contained area dynamically
The long-term goal is to make Water Chambers feel like a true dynamic water-building system, allowing players to create anything from small aquariums to large aquatic bases and breeding facilities.
Early Testing Warning
Water Chambers is currently an early test release.
Please use with caution, especially on live servers or with valuable creatures. The mod is actively being tested and improved, but custom water volumes are complex and may behave differently depending on server load, structure placement, rendering, stasis, restarts, and creature behavior.
Back up your saves and test with less important creatures before relying on it for your main aquatic tames.
Thank you for testing and supporting the project. Feedback and bug reports are welcome as the system continues to grow.
