If you’ve ever spent hours grinding for ember, refining stone blocks, and building a cozy Enshrouded base only to have a new co-op partner accidentally delete your main storage shed, you know how frustrating unregulated player access can be. Learning how to give permissions in Enshrouded is one of the most important skills you’ll pick up for multiplayer play, whether you’re running a small private world for friends or a public server for dozens of players. It lets you balance fun, collaborative play with protection for all the hard work you’ve put into your world. This guide breaks down everything you need to know about permission tiers, how to assign them, and how to avoid common mistakes that ruin co-op sessions.
How to Give Permissions in Enshrouded: Core Permission Tiers Explained
Before you start assigning access to players, it’s critical to understand what each permission tier lets users do. Enshrouded has three core permission levels, each designed for different use cases depending on how much you trust the player you’re inviting. Picking the right tier for each person saves you a ton of headaches down the line.
The lowest tier is Visitor, which is the default for all new players joining a world. Visitors can explore your world, fight mobs, and pick up loose resources from the ground, but they can’t build, break blocks, open shared chests, or modify any existing structures. This tier is perfect for random players you meet in public lobbies or people you’re playing with for the first time.
The middle tier is Builder, which is what most people will assign to close friends they play with regularly. Builders can place and break blocks, open shared storage chests, use crafting stations, and modify most parts of your base. They can’t kick other players, change world settings, or adjust permission levels for other users. Never assign admin access to players you don't know in real life, even if they seem friendly in chat.
The highest tier is Admin, which gives a player full control over your world. Admins can adjust permissions, kick or ban players, change world difficulty settings, and even delete entire bases with no restrictions. This tier should only be reserved for people you trust completely, like close family or long-time gaming partners who help you run a public server.
Step-by-Step Process to Assign Permissions to Players
Assigning permissions takes less than 30 seconds once you know where to look, and you can adjust access levels for any player at any time, even if they’re currently offline. The process is almost identical for both player-hosted private worlds and dedicated public servers, with only small differences in where you access the player list.
For player-hosted worlds, first open your in-game menu by pressing Escape on keyboard or the start button on controller. Navigate to the “Players” tab, which will show a full list of all players who have ever joined your world, both online and offline. Find the name of the player you want to adjust, and click the small dropdown menu next to their gamertag. Select the permission tier you want to assign, and the change will take effect immediately, no restart required.
For dedicated servers, you’ll access the player list through your server’s admin panel instead of the in-game menu. The exact location of the permission settings varies slightly depending on your server host, but you’ll still see the same three tier options to choose from, and changes apply just as quickly. You must be the world host or an existing admin to change permission settings for any player.
If you’re running a public server, you can also adjust the default permission tier for all new players who join for the first time. Most server hosts let you set this in your server settings panel, so you don’t have to manually adjust access for every new player that joins your lobby.
Common Permission Mistakes to Avoid for Smooth Co-Op Play
It’s easy to overlook permission settings when you’re excited to jump into a co-op session with friends, but small mistakes here can lead to hours of lost progress and frustrated players. After running multiple public Enshrouded servers over the last few months, I’ve seen the same mistakes pop up over and over again, and most of them are completely avoidable with a little extra planning.
- Giving builder access to random players you meet in public lobbies, which puts your base and resources at risk of theft or griefing. Even if a player seems nice, you have no way of knowing if they’ll decide to delete your base for a joke before leaving.
- Forgetting to adjust default permission settings before opening your world to public players, leaving your structures unprotected. A lot of new hosts accidentally set default permissions to Builder, which lets anyone who joins make changes to your base without your approval.
- Assigning admin access to multiple players without clear rules, leading to accidental world setting changes or unapproved player kicks. I once had an admin on my public server change the difficulty to hardcore mode as a “prank,” which deleted 12 hours of progress for 20+ players.
- Limiting trusted friends to visitor access, which wastes time when you need help building or restocking resources during long play sessions. There’s no point in playing co-op if your friends can’t help you finish that castle you’ve been working on for weeks.
Default public world permissions are set to visitor for all new players, which is a safe default you don't want to change unless you're only playing with a closed group of trusted friends. It’s always better to err on the side of caution, and upgrade a player’s access later if they prove they can be trusted.
How to Troubleshoot Common Permission Issues
Even if you set permissions correctly, you’ll probably run into small glitches or misunderstandings every once in a while. Most issues are easy to fix in a minute or two, no technical experience required.
The most common issue people report is that a player with Builder access can’t open a specific chest or modify a specific part of the base. 9 times out of 10, this is because the chest is a personal storage chest, or the area is covered by a claim flag. Personal storage chests are not affected by global permission settings, so you can keep valuable resources safe even from other admins on your server. If you want a friend to access a personal chest, you’ll need to manually add them to the chest’s allowed user list by interacting with the chest and opening its settings.
If a player’s permission changes won’t save, the fix is almost always to restart your world or server. Small temporary glitches are common after big game updates, and a quick restart will clear any cached permission settings that are stuck. You won’t lose any progress when you restart, and the changes you made to permission levels will apply correctly once the world loads back up.
If you want to give a player access to only specific areas instead of your entire base, claim flags are your best friend. You can place a claim flag in any area of your base, and set custom permission levels for that zone that override global player tiers. Claim flags let you set zone-specific permissions that override global player tiers, making them perfect for shared base builds with large groups. For example, you can let a new Builder access your crafting area but not your main storage vault, or let a group of friends build in a designated zone near your base without touching your main house.
At the end of the day, Enshrouded is most fun when you’re exploring the Shroud, fighting bosses, and building crazy bases with people you enjoy playing with. Knowing how to give permissions in Enshrouded lets you enjoy that co-op play without stressing about your base getting ruined or your rare resources getting stolen. Take a minute to adjust your settings before your next co-op session, and you’ll avoid almost all the common drama that ruins multiplayer lobbies. If you’re still unsure what tier to assign a new player, start with Visitor and work your way up – it’s always better to be safe than sorry.