diff --git a/pkgs/development/lua-modules/lib.nix b/pkgs/development/lua-modules/lib.nix
index bdf363fb4799..7c7ffcccf263 100644
--- a/pkgs/development/lua-modules/lib.nix
+++ b/pkgs/development/lua-modules/lib.nix
@@ -89,7 +89,13 @@ rec {
     , rocksSubdir
     }: let
       rocksTrees = lib.imap0
-        (i: dep: { name = "dep-${toString i}"; root = "${dep}"; rocks_dir = "${dep}/${dep.rocksSubdir}"; })
+        (i: dep: {
+          name = "dep-${toString i}";
+          root = "${dep}";
+          # packages built by buildLuaPackage or luarocks doesn't contain rocksSubdir
+          # hence a default here
+          rocks_dir = if dep ? rocksSubdir then "${dep}/${dep.rocksSubdir}" else "${dep.pname}-${dep.version}-rocks";
+        })
         requiredLuaRocks;
 
       # Explicitly point luarocks to the relevant locations for multiple-output
diff --git a/pkgs/top-level/lua-packages.nix b/pkgs/top-level/lua-packages.nix
index ecb022e715d5..bdfa5f60586d 100644
--- a/pkgs/top-level/lua-packages.nix
+++ b/pkgs/top-level/lua-packages.nix
@@ -54,10 +54,10 @@ rec {
     inherit (pkgs.buildPackages) makeSetupHook makeWrapper;
   };
 
-  luarocks = callPackage ../development/tools/misc/luarocks/default.nix { };
+  luarocks = toLuaModule (callPackage ../development/tools/misc/luarocks/default.nix { });
 
   # a fork of luarocks used to generate nix lua derivations from rockspecs
-  luarocks-nix = callPackage ../development/tools/misc/luarocks/luarocks-nix.nix { };
+  luarocks-nix = toLuaModule (callPackage ../development/tools/misc/luarocks/luarocks-nix.nix { });
 
  lua-resty-core = callPackage ({ fetchFromGitHub }: buildLuaPackage rec {
     pname = "lua-resty-core";