Two words explain why your gear is sometimes gone: persistence (bases, tents and stashes that survive server restarts) and a wipe (a deliberate reset that clears them). Knowing how your server handles both saves a lot of heartbreak.
What is going on
- Restarts — servers restart regularly; persistent things (your base, stashes, vehicles) should survive a normal restart.
- Persistence timers — stored items and base parts despawn if nobody touches them for long enough. Visit your stuff to keep it alive.
- Wipes — a full reset of the world (and sometimes characters). Official servers wipe on a schedule; community owners wipe when they choose, often announced in their Discord.
- Characters are saved per server (or per linked cluster), so your survivor stays on that server unless it is wiped.
Protect your progress
Read your server's rules and Discord for its restart schedule, wipe policy and item lifetimes. Keep stashes alive by visiting them, spread loot across multiple hidden containers, and do not pour weeks into a base on a server that wipes often without knowing when. On community servers the owner controls all of this.
