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Build and Defend Your Raft — Building & Raft Size Guide
Building Updated 2026-09-03

Building & Raft Size Guide

Your raft is your base, your vehicle and your loot vault. This guide lists every build piece confirmed in game, explains the raft size system, and covers the placement rules that separate hour-100 rafts from floating loot piñatas.

The build piece catalog

All pieces are crafted at the Crafting Table and placed on your raft’s grid. Pieces can be picked up and rearranged at any time — unless they’re too heavy or you lack crew permissions.

Category Pieces Notes
Floors Floor, Reinforced Floor Expand the deck; reinforced versions resist raiders
Walls Wall, Wall 2, Reinforced Wall Your raid armor. Reinforced walls shrug off low-level cannons
Doors Door Place several, but every extra door is an extra entry point — raiders will use them
Stairs Stairs, Reinforced Stairs The only way up; second-floor cannons need them
Windows Reinforced Window Wall sections you can see (and shoot) through
Defense Tower, Reinforced Tower, Fence, Spike Trap, Barrel Towers take 15 seconds to build and are climbable
Utility Net, Trash Can, Chest, Captain’s Chair, Steering Wheel Nets auto-collect loot; extra steering wheels let you drive from anywhere
Cosmetics Flag, Torch Zero defense value — build these last

Raft Size: the 180-wood wall

Every raft has a build limit. Hit it and pieces refuse to place — the game tells you the raft size limit is reached.

The Raft Size upgrade lives in the Crafting Table’s upgrade tab and costs 180 wood for the first level. It raises the placement cap and prints “Raft size limit increased” when it lands. Players consistently call it the best wood sink in the mid game: no more choosing between a cannon slot and a wall segment.

Wood pain is real — the community joke is that the wood multiplier is the true final boss. Harvest islands, run nets constantly, and consider the cheap Starter Pack if you’d rather skip the first grind wall.

Second floors

Stairs unlock a second deck, which matters for three reasons:

  1. Height advantage in boarding fights — defenders drop down on attackers.
  2. Cannon placement — floor layout determines what your auto-cannons can actually see. Read the cannons guide before you commit.
  3. Chest rooms — a chest on an inner upper deck, behind a reinforced door, is the hardest steal in the game.

Video walkthrough — Watch a starter pallet grow into a two-deck cannon raft — the 180-wood raft size upgrade and second-floor build happen live.

## Placement rules that get rafts killed
  • Test your own ring. Walk it like a raider would: count doors, look for the uncovered side, check whether your chest is visible from the water.
  • Don’t build a maze you can’t escape. Raiders get lost in your clutter — so do you, mid-fight.
  • Pick up and re-place freely. Pieces can be moved; wasted walls are a refund away. (Nets are the exception — placing one over the net cap burns the materials.)
  • Mind the build height. A team member answered “sky’s the limit” about vertical building in the official Discord, though practical multi-story builds so far stay at two decks. Treat vertical mega-builds as unexplored.