When using UpdateVehicleDamageStatus, the server will internally store the damage status without any checks and send it to the clients, but the clients will only (partially) apply the damage status depending on the vehicle. This means setting values using UpdateVehicleDamageStatus will be reported back when using GetVehicleDamageStatus but they may not have any effect in players' clients. See tables and notes below for support.

The client usually keeps values that don't mean anything. For example, when setting the unused highest nibble of the panel state to 7 and the player damages the windshield, the panel value after the client reports the update would be 0x70020000.

The client has two distinct ways of handling damage updates, depending on if all of panels,doors,lights are 0 or not (tires do not apply here because those are handled separately). If all values are 0, a game function is called that visually fixes the vehicle. If not all values are 0, a game function is called that applies visual damage. This may create weird side-effects when putting values back to 0 while not all values are 0. For example, setting a single panel state to 0 might remove dents in the panel but can still leave it hanging loosely. This is because only the function that fixes the vehicle will completely reset the visual damage.

Some planes have an additional quirk when putting all of panels,doors,lights to 0 because the client calls a game function to visually fix an automobile, which is not supposed to be used on planes. This results in 'ghost door' effects on some planes, see Plane ghost doors on how to deal with this.

Unsupported damage in the table below also means the damage will not be synced between clients.

Kind	Panels	Doors	Lights	Tires
Automobile(1)	x	x	x	x
Motorcycle				x
Heli
Boat
Plane(2)	x	x	x(3)
Bike
Train
Trailer

(1) following automobiles are excluded and do not sync damage at all: Dumper, Monster, Monster A, Monster B, Quadbike, Dune. All of these vehicles have bulletproof tires, except for the Quadbike. A player can shoot the tires of a Quadbike and they will be popped for the player driving the vehicle, but the tires will stay intact in the clients of all other players
(2) plane damage status can be set (with UpdateVehicleDamageStatus), but clients will NOT report if damage changes. This means OnVehicleDamageStatusUpdate will NOT be called when a player damages their plane's engine/aileron/... and this damage will NOT be synced to other clients.
(3) it is supported as in the client will apply it to the game vehicle, but it has no effect

Each nibble contains the status of a different panel.

Mask	Automobile usage	Plane usage
0x0000000F	front left	left engine(1)(2)
0x000000F0	front right	right engine(1)(2)
0x00000F00	rear left	rudder
0x0000F000	rear right	elevators(3)
0x000F0000	windshield	ailerons(4)(5)
0x00F00000	front bumper	(unused)
0x0F000000	rear bumber	(unused)
0xF0000000	(unused)	(unused)

Individual nibble meaning:

• 0x1 - is damaged
• 0x2 - is very damaged (panel hangs loosely)
• 0x3 - is removed⁽⁶⁾⁽⁷⁾

(1) single-engine planes only use the left engine, setting the right engine status will have no effect
(2) jet engines cannot be damaged (Shamal, Hydra, AT-400, Andromada)
(3) if the plane has two separate elevators, this only damages the right elevator (but it will repair both when setting it to 0)
(4) this only damages the right aileron, but setting it to 0 repairs both left and right
(5) setting this back to 0 while not all of panels,doors,lights are set to 0 will functionally repair the ailerons (fixes the handling of the plane), but the ailerons may still look like they are damaged or slightly loose
(6) plane panels do not get removed, they have another gradation of damaged
(7) if this is a plane engine it will produce barely any thrust and most of the time even reverse thrust

Each byte contains the status of a different door.

Mask	Automobile usage	Plane usage
0x000000FF	hood	rudder(1)
0x0000FF00	trunk	left elevator(1)(2)
0x00FF0000	drivers door	pilot door(3)
0xFF000000	co-drivers door	co-pilot door

The game holds state for 6 doors: hood, trunk, 2 front doors, 2 back doors. It's not possible to get or set the state of the back doors, their states are also not synced between clients.

Individual byte meaning:

• 0x1 - is opened⁽⁴⁾⁽⁵⁾
• 0x2 - is damaged⁽⁶⁾
• 0x4 - is removed

(1) only value 0x4 has an effect: it will spawn a flying part (but the rudder/elevator will not actually be removed nor functionally damaged)
(2) only applies to Stuntplane, Shamal, Hydra, Nevada, AT-400, Andromada
(3) pilot doors can have a 'ghost door' effect on some models when fixing all damage, see Plane ghost doors below
(4) extra plane passenger doors (for Beagle, Dodo, Skimmer) don't open
(5) opening the driver's door will result in the driver immediately closing the door again
(6) plane doors do not have damaged models, so these look like undamaged doors

Mask	Automobile/Motorcycle usage
0x01	front left broken
0x04	front right broken
0x40	rear both broken

Mask	Automobile/Motorcycle usage
0x1	rear right popped
0x2	front right popped
0x4	rear left popped
0x8	front left popped

Fixing the damage of a Rustler, Stuntplane, Shamal, Hydra, Nevada (unexpectedly not for the Cropduster) by doing UpdateVehicleDamageStatus(vehicleid, 0, 0, 0, 0) will cause a 'ghost door' effect: the pilot's door will show undamaged but the door will not open while the player does their enter/exit animation. To fix this, set the value of the pilot's door to 0x2 (damaged). The door will not show as damaged as there is no damaged model for them, but this will fix the enter/exit animation.

This should also be done after calling RepairVehicle, as that internally works by using UpdateVehicleDamageStatus. Example fix:

RepairVehicle(vehicleid);
switch(GetVehicleModel(vehicleid)) {
case 476: // Rustler
case 513: // Stuntplane
case 519: // Shamal
case 520: // Hydra
case 553: // Nevada
	UpdateVehicleDamageStatus(vehicleid, 0, 0x20000, 0, 0);
}