Lightning rod protects from Lightning strikes that originate 10 Tiles from the lightning rod's placement spot. Lightning ignites flammable items such as Grass Tufts, and Chest within 1 tile of its target. Lightning can possibly target players 7.5 tiles from its origin, and hence it may originate just outside the lightning rod 10 tiles protection radius and strike a player 2.6 tiles away from the lightning rod. A single lightning rod thus only provides 2.5 tiles radius of lightning-proof coverage for the player. The area between 2.5 and 10 tiles radius has some lightning protection, but it is not 100%.
Placing a lightning rod every 14 Tiles would optimize the number of lightning rods for 100% lightning coverage. However, considering that lightning rods are rather cheap, and that there may be overlapping coverage with Ice Flingomatic to extinguish any fire from lightning, base layout may not need to optimize around lightning rods. 2-4 lightning rods, instead of 1, is still recommended for a base of 1-6 Ice Flingomatics.
The Lightning Rod also provides a small radius of light (but not heat) after absorbing a Lightning bolt, which is just bright enough to prevent Charlie from attacking. The light lasts for up to a 1440 seconds, but the light will darken at daybreak after 960 seconds.
WX-78 can use a recently-struck Lightning Rod to charge its meter.
Skins
The Loyal Smite'ning Rod skin was awarded for watching 6 hours of Don't Starve Together on Twitch from starting from March 25, 2021 to April 8, 2021. It is also available in the Klei Rewards shop for 1,200 Klei points.
Woven - Elegant Electrobolt Diffuser 300X Divert lightning bolts away from your body in style with the Electrobolt Diffuser 300X! See ingame
Woven - Elegant Experimental Energy Siphon Lightning - the energy source of the future! See ingame
Woven - Elegant Gothic Thundercaller Call down lightning from dark, brooding storm clouds. See ingame
Loyal Smite'ning Rod Woe to this poor fish in particular. See ingame
Tips
On a boat, using a lightning conductor can save room that would have been taken up by the lightning rod.
Attention: The following categories are only for the players look up the page based on their first impression, they have nothing to do with the actual categories/DLC/function/tags of these Things. Some of them are not even.
Attention: The following categories are only for the players look up the page based on their first impression, they have nothing to do with the actual categories/DLC/function/tags of these Things. Some of them are not even.
Attention: The following categories are only for the players look up the page based on their first impression, they have nothing to do with the actual categories/DLC/function/tags of these Things. Some of them are not even.
Attention: The following categories are only for the players look up the page based on their first impression, they have nothing to do with the actual categories/DLC/function/tags of these Things. Some of them are not even Structures.