Survival Mode Hub
Everything you need to stay alive long enough to build something ridiculous.
What is Survival Mode?
Survival Mode drops you onto a procedurally laid-out agriculture planet overrun by haywire Farmbots. After your ship crashes, you wake up beside a Mechanic Station — a literal wrench-shaped hub with a Dispenserbot inside. From that moment on, every system in Scrap Mechanic revolves around three verbs: gather, craft, defend.
This hub page gathers every survival guide in one place. If you only read five pages, start with our beginner roadmap, then jump into farming and raids. Combat-focused players should read the bots and combat page next, traders will want the Spud Gun trading walkthrough, and anyone chasing the 1.0 story should open quests and NPCs followed by Cookbot and food for boss prep.
Core survival systems
- Hunger and thirst drain slowly and refill with cooked or fresh crops. The 1.0 patch rebalanced both bars so they no longer feel punishingly aggressive.
- Farming is the only sustainable food source, but every plot you plant draws agro. Plant at least 64 blocks apart for mini-farming to stay under the radar.
- Raids escalate the more crops you plant. Wave 1 is Totebots; later waves include Haybots, Tapebots and Farmbots.
- Schematics, introduced in 1.0, are collectible items that unlock additional Craftbot recipes — many drop from new Drilling Thunder content.
The bot roster you will meet
| Bot | Threat | Where it appears |
|---|---|---|
| Totebot | Low | Daytime raids, all biomes |
| Haybot | Medium | Open fields, near roads |
| Tapebot | High | Warehouses, dungeons |
| Farmbot | Very high | Boss-tier, drops Warehouse Keys |
| Red Totebot | Medium | 1.0 rebalanced encounters |
| Trash Bot | Extreme | Warehouse rooftop boss arena |
| Cablebot | Medium | Underground, Drilling Thunder |
| Minerbot | High | Underground, ore-rich caverns |
Every bot has a weakness: ranged weapons for Farmbots, walls for Haybots, and fire/automation for Tapebot nests.
Multiplayer and 1.0 changes
Scrap Mechanic 1.0 & Drilling Thunder expanded the multiplayer prediction system, which means raids feel more stable even with six friends defending a base. The new underground mining biomes also host Agrobot variants you will not find on the surface.
Use the navigation on the left, or jump straight into the getting started guide if you have never played before.
Frequently Asked Questions
Quick answers to the most common questions.
Is Survival Mode the only single-player mode?
Survival is the only single-player friendly mode. Challenge Mode offers 40 timed trials and Creative Mode removes combat entirely for pure building.
Can I pause the game in Survival?
Not in vanilla. If you must step away, build a small enclosed base with doors and a respawn chest — bots will still path to you but raids pause if you leave the area.
How does the difficulty setting change Survival?
Easy reduces the number and frequency of raids and slows bot aggression. It is recommended for new players or anyone returning to the 1.0 chapter.
Do I lose my world if the server crashes?
Local worlds autosave every few minutes. On dedicated servers the host can roll back to any autosave. The 1.0 patch improved the multiplayer prediction system, so random crashes are rare.