Palworld Base Camp Settings Guide
Configure base camp limits, worker counts, and understand the performance impact of high base settings.
Three Different Base Limits
Palworld has three settings that all sound like "how many bases", and mixing them up is the usual reason a change does nothing. All three are in Settings under Gameplay, and all three need a server restart.
Base Camps per Guild (BaseCampMaxNumInGuild) - how many bases ONE GUILD may have. Default 4, minimum 1, maximum 100. This is the one almost every guide means.
Total Base Camp Maximum (BaseCampMaxNum) - how many base camps may exist in the whole world across every guild. Default 128, maximum 1000. Lowering this to 4 does not give each guild four bases; it caps the entire server at four.
Workers per Base (BaseCampWorkerMaxNum) - how many Pals may work at a single base. Default 15, minimum 1, maximum 100.
Worker Pal Limits
Workers per Base is the most performance-sensitive of the three. Each working Pal runs AI for pathfinding, task selection and resource gathering, so the cost is roughly workers multiplied by active bases.
The panel accepts up to 100. That is far beyond what a shared host will run smoothly; treat anything above about 25 as something to test rather than to set and forget.
This is also the one setting WorldOption.sav is known to shadow. If you change it and nothing happens in game, that file is the first thing to check - see the WorldOption.sav guide. The other two base settings are not affected.
Performance Impact
The cost of base settings is roughly the number of ACTIVE bases multiplied by the workers in each, because each working Pal is an AI actor the server ticks.
Defaults (4 bases per guild, 15 workers each): normal load, fine for most servers.
Around 6 bases per guild and 20 workers: moderate load, noticeable on a busy server.
The panel maximums (100 bases per guild, 100 workers each): far past what any shared host will run smoothly. The panel allows them; that is not a recommendation.
If your server is lagging and your base and worker counts are high, lowering them is one of the most effective fixes. Pal Spawn Rate and Invading Enemies are the other two big levers - see the Performance guide.
Recommended Values
Small group (4-8 players): Base Camps per Guild 6, Workers per Base 20. Good balance of gameplay and performance.
Medium server (8-16 players): leave both at their defaults - 4 and 15.
Large server (16-32 players): Base Camps per Guild 4, Workers per Base 10. Reduces CPU load from Pal AI.
Leave Total Base Camp Maximum alone unless you specifically want a world-wide cap. Its default of 128 is not a per-guild number and lowering it by mistake will stop guilds placing bases long before their own limit is reached.
Restart after any change. And if Workers per Base in particular refuses to stick, read the WorldOption.sav guide before changing anything else.