The Dune: Awakening Base Reconstruction Tool is the closest thing the game has to a save file for your house. With 162 Worlds shutting down on May 26 and players migrating in bulk, this guide walks through the safe way to back up a base, what gets left behind, and the pitfalls that quietly delete months of work.
Funcom’s recent announcement that 162 Dune: Awakening Worlds will close on May 26 has pushed thousands of players into a sudden relocation. My own character is on a server that survives the consolidation, so I am not personally affected, but a great many people are scrambling. This guide is for them, and for anyone planning a long break from the game; the Base Reconstruction Tool is what keeps your base intact while you sort out where to go next.
What the Base Reconstruction Tool Actually Does
The Base Reconstruction Tool, or BRT, stores an entire owned base inside the tool itself. That includes the Sub-Fief Console, every building piece, every placeable, every crafting bench, every storage container, and the contents of those containers. While stored, the base does not consume power, does not decay, and is not subject to upkeep or taxes. It sits safely in the tool, bound to your character, for as long as you need.
This is not a Solido Replicator projection. When you restore a stored base, the physical base reappears fully built with everything inside. The walls are walls again, the cisterns hold water again, the chests hold whatever they held when you stored them. The tool was built for backups, server moves, and long breaks, and it doubles as a way to relocate a base elsewhere in Hagga Basin.
Unlocking, Crafting, and the Core Rules
The BRT is unlocked in the Construction tab of the Research Menu, in the Iron tier. Once researched, it can be crafted at a Fabricator or Survival Fabricator at a modest iron cost. The tool itself cannot be lost on death, not even to the Sandworm, and the stored base data is bound to your character rather than to any specific instance of the tool.
A handful of hard rules govern how the tool behaves. Only the owner of a base can store it; co-owners and clanmates cannot trigger the backup. You can hold up to three stored bases at once. After storing and placing a given base, a seven-day cooldown applies before that same base can be backed up again. The tool only works in Hagga Basin for both backup and restore; it cannot be used in other regions. If someone else picks up your tool, they will only see the bases they have stored with it, not yours.
What Gets Stored, and What Does Not
The stored set is generous but specific. Everything inside the Sub-Fief footprint comes along: the console, all building pieces, decorations, crafting benches, storage containers, water cisterns, blood purifiers, and the contents of those containers. If it sits on a foundation inside the claim, it travels.
What does not travel is just as important. Assembled vehicles of any kind are not stored; ornithopters, sandbikes, and any ground vehicle in the base area will simply fall to the ground the moment your base disappears. Vehicles that are mid-assembly do not store either. Carrier Ornithopter cargo containers are excluded. Anything placed on natural terrain rather than on foundations, including any wall or platform sticking out beyond the Sub-Fief radius, will be left behind. Additional permissions you have granted to clanmates do not carry over and will need to be re-applied after restoring.
The clearest way to think about it: if it is inside the claim and sitting on foundation pieces, it goes in the tool. If it is on rock, on dirt, on grass, or hanging off the edge of your claim, it stays behind.
The Vehicle Problem and How to Solve It
This is where most exodus plans go wrong. Players assume vehicles get packed up with the rest, then watch their assault ornithopter and cargo orni fall to the ground in an empty plot the moment the BRT fires. Worse, when you eventually come back and try to restore your base, any vehicle overlapping the intended footprint will block placement until you move or dismantle it.
The solution is a two-step routine that the official Funcom guidance and the community both endorse. Pick the one vehicle you most want waiting for you when you return, and back that one up with the Vehicle Backup Tool, which stores a single vehicle account-wide. Then disassemble every other vehicle and store the parts in containers that sit on foundations inside your claim. Vehicle parts inside chests are treated as container contents, which means they travel with the base when you use the BRT. Disassemble, store the parts, then back up. Anything else risks leaving working vehicles stranded on a plot you cannot easily return to.
Backing Up Your Base, Step by Step
Preparation is the part that matters most; the click itself is trivial. First, confirm the Sub-Fief Console sits on a foundation rather than directly on terrain. If the console is on bare ground, the base will refuse to store at all. Walk the perimeter of the claim and check for any building pieces or attached platforms that stick out beyond the Sub-Fief radius; anything dangling outside the limits will either block the backup or be left behind. Handle the vehicles as described above.
When the base is ready, craft the BRT if you have not already, equip it in a hotbar slot, and aim it at the base you own. Select Backup Base from the tool’s context menu. The game will show a warning screen listing any placeables that will be left behind, items on natural rock, exterior lights stuck on terrain, stray walls outside the claim. This warning is the single most important step in the entire process. Read it before confirming. It is your last chance to spot something you forgot, cancel out, fix it, and try again.
When you confirm, the entire base is removed from the world immediately and tucked into the tool. The cooldown timer starts; the base sits safely until you place it again.
Restoring and Moving Your Base
Restoring works in the opposite direction, but with one extra concern: terrain. Simple, mostly flat bases place cleanly in a wide range of spots. Complex bases built into cliffs or balanced across multiple pillars may only place successfully in their original location, or in spots that match the original footprint very closely. If you plan to move a base across the map rather than just bring it back, build with that in mind from the start: flat footprints, clean supports, and minimal cliffside spaghetti.
Scout the destination before you commit. Once you are happy with the spot, equip the BRT, select Place Blueprint, then pick the stored base from the tool’s list. A hologram of your base appears at the cursor; you can move, rotate, and adjust its height to match the ground. The placement system blocks restoration if the hologram overlaps another landclaim, sits inside a no-build zone, or overlaps a vehicle. Bases with Advanced Sub-Fief Consoles cannot be placed in Hagga Basin South. Other players standing inside the destined landclaim will also block placement, even if they are not overlapping any building.
When you confirm, the game spawns the entire physical base in place, fully built, with all contents intact. Walk through it to check that everything carried over and reapply any clanmate permissions that were active before storage. Those permissions are the most common gotcha after a successful restore.
Recycling: The Option Most Players Miss
When you store a base in the BRT, you can also choose to recycle it instead of replacing it later. Recycling converts the base’s contents into raw resources, which then become accessible from a new tab called Reserve, available at any Sub-Fief Console or storage container you own. You can withdraw items from the Reserve but not deposit into it. This is the cleanest way to dispose of a base you no longer want without spending hours dismantling pieces by hand, and it preserves the material value of whatever you built.
Don’t Forget the Bank
Alongside the BRT, the settlement bank is the other half of an exodus plan. Funcom buffed bank storage in late 2025; the slot count now sits at around 500 items with roughly 30,000 volume. That is enough to park hundreds of key items and a meaningful pile of materials separately from your base, your backpack, and your stored ornithopter. If something is rare, account-bound-feeling valuable, or simply irreplaceable, put a copy in the bank before you back up the base. Belt and suspenders is the right approach for anyone leaving for weeks or longer.
Base-Killing Mistakes to Avoid
A few errors will quietly cost you significant amounts of work. Sub-Fief Console placed directly on terrain prevents backup entirely; foundation goes underneath first. Building pieces or platforms extending beyond the Sub-Fief boundary will either block the backup or be left behind on restore. Assuming vehicles travel with the base; they do not, and the only way to keep more than one is to disassemble and store the parts. Treating the BRT as a casual teleporter; the seven-day cooldown and the placement restrictions mean this is built for big moves and long pauses, not for hopping around the map every other day. Highly complex cliff and cave bases that cannot place anywhere except their original spot; if you might need to move, design with the placement system in mind from day one.
The Bottom Line
The Base Reconstruction Tool is, in practical terms, the closest thing Dune: Awakening offers to a save file for the base you have spent weeks or months building. For the players caught up in the May 26 server closures, it is the difference between starting over from scratch and arriving on a new World with your home in your pocket. Used carefully, with the warning screen actually read and the vehicle routine handled in advance, it does exactly what it promises. Used carelessly, it will happily leave your assault ornithopter on the sand and quietly forget the storage chest you stuck on a rock. Read the warning. Move the vehicles. Check the claim. Then click.
