How To Find Bases On DonutSMP — The Argon Base Finder Stack

Finding bases on DonutSMP isn't one module. It's five modules stacked, each catching a signal the others miss. Done right, you can locate a buried 4-stash base in under 20 minutes.

This is the exact workflow the Argon team uses on a fresh account. Five modules, three phases, one repeatable system.

The five-module stack

All five ship with Argon Addon by default. Toggle them in this order:

1. ChunkFinder — detects loaded chunks outside spawn radius. If a chunk's loaded, someone's online there.
2. ClusterFinder — flags unnatural block density. Tells man-made from terrain.
3. HoleTunnelESP — renders mining tunnels through stone.
4. StorageESP — chests, barrels, shulkers through walls.
5. ShulkerHole ESP — buried shulkers inside 1x1 holes or wall cavities.

Phase 1 — Wide sweep (ChunkFinder)

Toggle ChunkFinder. Fly out 5-10k blocks from spawn in any direction. Your map fills with chunk markers. Most are random nearby players — you're looking for chunks far from any known player base.

Settings that matter:

• · Render Distance · 128 chunks (the max)
• · Min Distance From Spawn · 4000 blocks (filter out spawn-area noise)
• · Highlight Recently Loaded · true (catches active players)

When you see 3+ chunks loaded together in a remote area, that's your target. Drop in.

Phase 2 — Confirm structure (ClusterFinder + HoleTunnelESP)

Now toggle ClusterFinder. It scans 16-chunk radius for unnatural block density — bases create dense clusters of cobble, glass, or stone bricks that don't occur naturally.

Pair with HoleTunnelESP. Most DonutSMP bases entrance through a mining tunnel. ClusterFinder shows you the base; HoleTunnelESP shows you how to get in.

If ClusterFinder lights up but HoleTunnelESP shows nothing, the base is ground-level or sky-level. Surface bases are rarer on Donut but worth raiding when you find one — usually less defended.

Phase 3 — Locate stash (StorageESP + ShulkerHole ESP)

Once you're within 64 blocks of the base, StorageESP and ShulkerHole ESP do the rest. StorageESP renders every container through walls. ShulkerHole ESP catches the buried shulkers — these are 80% of the loot on a serious base.

Recommended StorageESP filters:

• · Filter · shulker_box, trapped_chest, ender_chest (skip regular chests — they're usually traps)
• · Tracer Lines · true (draws lines from you to each container so you don't lose them in dense terrain)
• · Group Adjacent · true (collapses storage rooms into single markers)

How long does it take?

Realistic timings on a fresh account:

• · Phase 1 wide sweep · 3-8 min per direction
• · Phase 2 structure confirm · 4-10 min per candidate area
• · Phase 3 loot localisation · 2-5 min once you're inside the cluster

Total: 10-25 minutes from logging in to standing outside someone's stash. Adding the fly bypass to the workflow speeds it up by 3-5×.

If you're on the defensive side

Reading this and thinking about your own base? Five rules that defeat this stack:

1. Build far. 10k+ blocks from spawn. Make the wide sweep boring.
2. Don't load chunks unnecessarily. Log out before AFK at base.
3. Random block-density. Don't mass-place identical blocks in tight clusters — break up your build with naturally-occurring blocks (stone, dirt, deepslate).
4. Long entry tunnels. Make HoleTunnelESP show a tunnel that leads nowhere relevant.
5. Pure shulker storage. No regular chests in the base. ShulkerHole ESP catches them, but at least filtering doesn't shortcut to your loot.

A note on server rules

DonutSMP allows base finding via in-game mechanics (Nether-Overworld coords, public coords leaks, etc.). What's against rules is what the anti-cheat actively flags — Argon's ESP modules are passive (no packet sent to the server, purely client-side rendering) so they don't trigger flags. That said, the line between "passive client mods" and "cheating" is the staff's call, not ours. Read Donut's current rules before you raid.