V Rising Castle Heart: How to build a Castle and stop Heart decay
Here's how to build your first castle and keep it in check, as well as how to move your castle if you've found greener pastures.
In the vampire survival game, V Rising, drinking the blood of your enemies and gathering materials to craft with are some of the most important components of the title. On top of this, you've also got a glorious gothic castle to build and take good care of while being a vampire badass; there's no rest for the wicked, after all.
Building your castle in V Rising is the easy part. As you progress from a measly vampire and develop your own empire, there'll be new structures to build, and a castle heart that you'll need to prevent from decaying. If your castle heart decays while you're out battling bosses or farming cotton, everything inside of your humble home then becomes free game to anyone looking to invade.
Now, with that being said, we're going to explain how to build your castle in V Rising and how to move it later, if needed. With all this to hand, your humble abode will be nothing short of a palace... eventually.
How to build a castle in V Rising
When it comes to building a castle in V Rising, you'll need to first pick a spot to build on and clear it. You'll need to make sure that nothing is blocking where you wish to build, it all needs to go; trees, rocks, ore veins, stumps, decaying castle walls, and even nearby animals.
Next, it's time to go about getting a castle heart and establishing your base.
- Collect resources and materials
Building your castle, and everything you need inside of it, requires a lot of resources. Before you start out building your castle, you'll want to have plenty of wood, stone, plant fibre, and Blood Essence so that you need not go farming for it halfway through building.
- Find a good base location
You'll want your castle to be placed in an area that keeps it away from prying eyes, but also doesn't situate you too far away from the action. You'll also need plenty of space to build and later, expand, your castle. So, be sure to choose your plot of land carefully.
- Build your castle heart
You will start this by going into your build menu (by pressing 'B'). First, build the castle heart; this will require 240 stone and 30 Blood Essence.
- Build your castle's foundations
Now, you'll need to continue by building your castle's foundations. These are the borders that you will place around your castle, and determine how big your patch of land is. Be sure to place some flooring where you want your base of operations to be, and remember, flooring that matches what that area of your castle is for - be it tailoring, smithing, or something else - can boost production levels.
- Protect your castle with walls
With your base almost established, you now need to keep your castle protected from any invaders while you're building. You can build walls around your castle to deter enemies if you've got additional stone, plant fibre, and wood to hand. Make sure you put down some entrances too, so you can access your castle.
- Craft a Mist Brazier to protect you while you build
Building walls can take some time, and daylight is also not your friend in V Rising. This is where the Mist Brazier comes in; build one and burn some bones. Each bone you burn will protect you for a little longer from the daylight, so you can continue to craft your castle.
- Place your coffin
One of the finishing touches that'll finally turn your castle into a home is to place a coffin and consider building some more structures. Your coffin acts as a safe place to rest whenever you're AFK or offline - and a place to return to if you die - and structures will consist of various stations that aid with crafting, research, and more.
- Place important structures
As mentioned above, to turn this castle into the home of your empire, you'll need to craft and place a few important structures. Not only will they fill the place up, but these structures will help you create resources, craft new items, and research new ones.
First, we recommend building a chest to place your items in that you don't need while beyond the castle walls. Secondly, build a Sawmill using 400 wood and 80 stone, as you'll need the resources from this to create an even more important structure.
This 'more important' structure is a Workbench, which you'll need to craft new items or repair them. You can craft a Simple Workbench using 8 planks (which you will get from the Sawmill), 80 stone, and 120 rugged hides.
- Use your Workbench
Last, but not least, use the Workbench to increase your Gear Level! An increased Gear Level means more challenges, bosses, and areas will become available for you to face.
How to stop castle heart decay in V Rising
If you're told that your castle is decaying in V Rising, it's bad news. This means that the home you put plenty of time into building is slowly crumbling, and sadly, it kind of is your fault. As your castle decays, the walls will crumble and some structures will not have enough power for you to use them, and if an enemy chooses to attack you, you're in trouble.
However, do not fear, as there's an easy solution to this problem that'll keep your castle intact and prevent invaders from prying.
Your V Rising castle will not decay as long as you are feeding your castle heart plenty of Blood Essence. You will easily collect Blood Essence throughout your vampire adventure as you slay living creatures and feed on them. To then feed your castle heart, approach it, and put the Blood Essence in your inventory in one of the castle heart's slots.
You'll need to keep on top of this and ensure your castle heart is always stocked up with Blood Essence to ensure that it doesn't decay or leave your vulnerable while you're AFK or offline.
How to upgrade your castle heart in V Rising
Your castle heart can also be upgraded, allowing you to fill it with more Blood Essence at a time so that you can depart from your castle for longer. Even later down the line, your castle might require that you power it with Greater Blood Essence if you wish to use certain structures.
Since it's hard to get your hands on, we explain the two main ways to craft Greater Blood Essence here.
How to move castle in V Rising
If you're looking to move your castle in its entirety in V Rising, you'll need the Castle Relocation Heart. This is unlocked after completing 'The First Book in the Library' quest, and costs just 100 Blood Essence to build.
You want to scope out new areas to move your base to, and once you find one that you're happy with, place down the Castle Relocation Heart. Then, before you officially move your base of operations, you'll want to clear out the surrounding areas again so there's space for your humble abode.
Once you're prepared, interact with the Castle Relocation Heart and choose the castle you want to move (if you've multiple). You'll then be given some instructions for relocating your castle. First, you'll need to place the mandatory structures that appear in your build menu, as well as the travel bags.
Your mandatory structures will be any floors, walls, and structures you have crafted, and these all need to be placed before you can finish moving. Your travel bags, on the other hand, will contain items stored in chests or materials from your structures.
Once everything has been placed, interact with the Castle Relocation Heart again to finish moving. Wasn't that stressful, was it?
When it comes to some of the best base locations, you'll want to keep an eye out for a spot that is out of the way of main roads, clear of any nearby settlements, and isn't enroaching on another players space.
V Rising castle roof disappeared
Update 13 May, 2024: The below issue affected players during V Rising's Early Access period. The issue is fixed now, but we have left this information here on the off-chance that players run into any trouble with the roof of their castles.
It appears that for some players, there has been a glitch in which the roof of their castle disappears.
This was discussed at the time on the V Rising Discord server. Jeremy Bearson, Community Manager at Stunlock Studios, did share that a patch was being issued to fix the issue that players were running into with their disappearing roofs. Although, it seems that the issue still isn't fixed for everyone in the server.
While players wait for the issue to be looked into once more, there is a temporary fix available to save yourself from becoming a victim to sunlight. Basically, all you need to do is destroy and rebuild one of your castle's walls. This should grant you a roof once more, but only for a period of time. In the Discord server, some players have reported the wall lasting from a few hours to a day.
As you go about building your castle and expanding your empire, you're going to need a lot of crafting materials. Take a look at how to find iron, whetstone, and leather so that you're not underprepared for the build!