How to Claim Land on CivSMP

Protect Your Builds with Towny

CivSMP uses Towny for land protection. Instead of every player claiming their own scattered chunks, players band together into Towns — and the town claims chunks of land that all members share access to.

This system rewards working together. Solo players can found a 1-person town, but as you recruit residents and grow, your town can claim more and more land.

Important: You can only claim land in the Survival Worlds (Overworld and Nether). The area must be unclaimed wilderness.

What is a Chunk?

Towny works in whole 16×16 block chunks — you cannot claim partial areas.

To see chunk borders in Java Edition: Press F3 + G to toggle chunk borders on your screen. This makes it easy to see exactly what you're claiming.

Step-by-Step: Setting Up Your Town

Step 1 — Found a town

Stand where you want the center of your town to be — make sure it's in unclaimed wilderness, and ideally somewhere you actually want to build. Then run:

/town new <name>

You become the Mayor, and the chunk you're standing in is automatically claimed as your town's home block. Town creation has a small fee — check /town new without arguments to see the cost.

Step 2 — Claim more chunks

Stand in an unclaimed chunk that's adjacent (touching) one of your existing town claims, then run:

/town claim

You can keep adding connected chunks to grow your town. Each claim has a small fee that's paid from the town bank.

Tip: Claims must form a connected area — you can't claim isolated chunks far from your town.

Step 3 — Invite residents

To let other players build inside your town, invite them:

/town add <player>

They'll get a request to accept. Once they join, they can build inside any plot you've granted them permission for.

Step 4 — Manage permissions

By default, only the Mayor can build everywhere in town. To open specific plots up to residents:

/plot set perm resident build on

Or for everyone (including outsiders, useful for shops):

/plot set perm outsider use on

There are dozens of permission combinations — /town help and /plot help cover the full set.

Step 5 — Deposit to the town bank

Claiming chunks costs money from the town bank. Top it up with:

/town deposit <amount>

Withdrawals require Mayor rank or above.

Town Ranks

Towns have three default ranks:

Rank	Permissions
👑 Mayor	Full control — claim, unclaim, kick, deposit, withdraw
🛡️ Assistant	Most Mayor powers except disband/transfer
👤 Resident	Build inside permitted plots, use town spawn

Promote a resident with /town rank add <player> assistant.

Towny Command Reference

Basic town commands

Command	What it does
/town	Open your town's info screen
/town list	Browse all towns on the server
/town new <name>	Found a new town
/town add <player>	Invite a player to your town
/town kick <player>	Remove a resident from your town
/town leave	Leave your current town
/town spawn (or /t spawn)	Teleport to your town's spawn point
/town setspawn	Set your town's spawn (Mayor)
/town deposit <amount>	Deposit money into the town bank
/town withdraw <amount>	Withdraw from the town bank (Mayor/Assistant)
/town delete	Disband your town permanently

Chunk claiming

Command	What it does
/town claim	Claim the chunk you're standing in (must touch existing claim)
/town unclaim	Release the chunk you're standing in
/town claim outpost	Claim an isolated outpost chunk (costs more)

Plot permissions

Command	What it does
/plot set perm resident build on	Let residents build in this plot
/plot set perm outsider use on	Let anyone use buttons/doors here
/plot set shop	Mark this plot as a shop plot
/plot info	Show this plot's owner and permissions

Tips

• Found your town in a flat, open area — building outward is much easier than carving into terrain you'll later want to claim
• Recruit early — more residents means a bigger claim limit
• Keep the bank topped up — running out of money triggers daily upkeep failures, and your town can collapse
• Use plot permissions over rank promotions — give per-plot access instead of making everyone an Assistant
• Outposts are expensive — only use them for special builds far from your main town

Want More Power? Form a Nation

A Nation is a group of allied towns under one banner — with a shared bank, custom badge, level system, and exclusive perks. See the Towns & Nations guide for everything.