Any and all copyright materials used are for educational, non-commercial, illustrative (research, criticism, & comment), unpublished purposes only. Facts themselves are not copyrightable.

Any other works of mine are under the Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 4.0 International license.

Shield:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

How-to Pterodactyl Multi-game Server Manager
How-to Satisfactory Gamer Server
How-to ARK Survival Evolved Game Server
How-to Modded Minecraft Server + Crafty Web Mangement UI
How-to Run Multiple Minecraft Servers on Same Machine
How-to FTB Server
Edit Minecraft Server Settings
Useful Minecraft Server Commands

Pterodactyl

Pterodactly is a game server manager with a web UI for creating and managing mulitple game servers. If your server is dedicated for games, and you want the versatility of adding/removing/running different game servers on one dedicated VPS or VM, I reccommend installing it.

There are multiple dependencies required by Pterodactly, from Let's Encrypt to a MySQL database which complicates installation; however, thanks to the amazing gaming comminity, vilhelmprytz has created an automated bash script to make installing Pterodactyl a breeze!

Automated Pterodactyl Install Method

Resources:

See the unofficial Pterodactyl script by vilhelmprytz on his: Github
And watch SoulStriker's tutorial video on how to use vilhelmprytz installer script.

Disclaimer: I have not verified if this bash script is malicious or not. Nor have I checked the Pterodactl code. If you are concerned about potential malware or boot/root-kits, exercise zero trust and read through source code line by line to verify nothing is malicous. If this is not worth it, you have to make a choice between convenience and manually installing Pterodactyl yourself.

Start of My Guide

For starters, I'm installing Portainer as my Docker container manager. Open a new tab and follow my Portainer install guide here and come back to this guide.
With Portainer installed, login and navigate to:

Local > Home > App Templates > Select Ubuntu from list

Name the container Pterodactyl and set the Network to bridge.
Grant access conrol to administrators
Click "Deploy the container" button (you should see a "running" status).
Now, access the console of the new container:

Containers > Click Name of Container > Console > Connect (as root)

As root, you don't have to use sudo, but we want to update and install curl in the container first:

apt update && apt upgrade -y
apt install curl

Next, run the bash install script from vilhelmprytz:

bash <(curl -s https://pterodactyl-installer.se)

Choose to install both the panel and wings by entering 2.
Enter two separate, preferred usernames and passwords for both the panel access and the admin account (this will be used to access the Pterodactyl web UI in a moment).
Enter you time zone (ex. America/Chicago, America/New_York)
Enter your FQDN for the panel.

If you don't know what an FQDN is, use your server's public IP address or create A name records pointing to your server's public IP address (ex. Type: A, Name: panel, Conent: [serverIP], Proxy status: DNS only/off, TTL: 1min).

Agree with y to all the prompts (i.e. ufw, MySQL, auto config user, etc.) with y to continue with the installation.
Agree to install wings and all the automatic configurations (i.e. UFW, MySQL, database hosts, etc.).
Ener the panel address (same as the FQDN you enter previously).
Agree to allow traffic on port 3306.

Note: You must ensure that port 3306 and 2022 is open on your router or VPS firewall, too!

You will be prompted to make a username and password for the pterodactyl database, also.

Troubleshooting

If you get a response stating that the "host is down" something went wrong. Try restarting the container and enter the following to test:

sytemctl lsit-units --type=service

Research the required ports to run Pterodactyl and ensure that the Portainer Dockerized netowrk is publishing those necessary ports for panel web UI access.

WIP

Manual Pterodactyl Install Method

If you are more concerned about security and running an unofficial bash installer script, then start with TechnoTim's Pterodactyl install using Docker

For starters, I'm installing Portainer as my Docker container manager. Open a new tab and follow my Portainer install guide here and come back to this guide.
Now, we need the contents of Pterodactyl's docker-compose.yml.
I'm grabbing the docker-compose-example.yml from Pterodactyl's official Github
Next, I have modified the contents of the default .yml file according to TechnoTim's Pterodactyl config to enable my reverse proxy service with Cloudflare to work with Pterodactyl.

version: '3.8'
x-common:
  database:
    &db-environment
    # Do not remove the "&db-password" from the end of the line below, it is important
    # for Panel functionality.
    MYSQL_PASSWORD: &db-password "CHANGE_ME"
    MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: "CHANGE_ME_TOO"
  panel:
    &panel-environment
    APP_URL: "http://example.com"
    # A list of valid timezones can be found here: http://php.net/manual/en/timezones.php
    APP_TIMEZONE: "UTC"
    APP_SERVICE_AUTHOR: "noreply@example.com"
    # Uncomment the line below and set to a non-empty value if you want to use Let's Encrypt
    # to generate an SSL certificate for the Panel.
    # LE_EMAIL: ""
  mail:
    &mail-environment
    MAIL_FROM: "noreply@example.com"
    MAIL_DRIVER: "smtp"
    MAIL_HOST: "mail"
    MAIL_PORT: "1025"
    MAIL_USERNAME: ""
    MAIL_PASSWORD: ""
    MAIL_ENCRYPTION: "true"

#
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# DANGER ZONE BELOW
#
# The remainder of this file likely does not need to be changed. Please only make modifications
# below if you understand what you are doing.
#
services:
  database:
    image: mariadb:10.5
    restart: always
    command: --default-authentication-plugin=mysql_native_password
    volumes:
      - "/srv/pterodactyl/database:/var/lib/mysql"
    environment:
      <<: *db-environment
      MYSQL_DATABASE: "panel"
      MYSQL_USER: "pterodactyl"
  cache:
    image: redis:alpine
    restart: always
  panel:
    image: ghcr.io/pterodactyl/panel:latest
    restart: always
    ports:
      - "80:80"
      - "443:443"
    links:
      - database
      - cache
    volumes:
      - "/srv/pterodactyl/var/:/app/var/"
      - "/srv/pterodactyl/nginx/:/etc/nginx/http.d/"
      - "/srv/pterodactyl/certs/:/etc/letsencrypt/"
      - "/srv/pterodactyl/logs/:/app/storage/logs"
    environment:
      <<: [*panel-environment, *mail-environment]
      DB_PASSWORD: *db-password
      APP_ENV: "production"
      APP_ENVIRONMENT_ONLY: "false"
      CACHE_DRIVER: "redis"
      SESSION_DRIVER: "redis"
      QUEUE_DRIVER: "redis"
      REDIS_HOST: "cache"
      DB_HOST: "database"
      DB_PORT: "3306"
networks:
  default:
    ipam:
      config:
        - subnet: 172.20.0.0/16

Since no user was created via the .yml file, we need to run a specific command to set one so we can access the Pterodactyl web UI. Run the following command to create an admin user:

docker-compose run --rm panel php artisan p:user:mak

Follow the on-screen prompts to create an admin user.
Once completed, try to login to your Pterodactyl web UI (ex. https://x.x.x.x:xxxx).

WIP

Satisfactory

Ref. video

Create a VM running Ubuntu server. Ideally, clone a VM from a cloud init 20.04 on Proxmox hypervisor!
Allocate 12-16GB of RAM to the VM
Install dependencies as root:

Ensure you run commands as root or admin with proper permission level. Type sudo -i to switch to root user. Note: Some servers disable root by default, therefore, you need to give your user account root/admin permissions to run the commands required for a 64-bit machine.

sudo add-apt-repository multiverse
sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt update && apt -y upgrade
sudo apt install lib32gcc1

Check the firewall settings:

sudo ufw status

If the firewall settings return: Status: inactive then enable it and open up the right ports.
Open up the port that is specific to Satisfactory as follows:

sudo ufw allow 15777
sudo ufw allow 22
sudo ufw enable
sudo ufw status

The status should report port 22 as ALLOW.

Create a Steam user (must run as admin)

sudo useradd -m -s /bin/bash steam

Set/create a password

sudo passwd steam

sudo -s
usermod -aG sudo steam
su - steam

Install steamcmd:

sudo apt-get install steamcmd

Learn more about steamcmd and how it functions from the Steam developer Wiki

Login as steam user:

su - steam

Choose your path 1) Make the sever start automatically on boot or 2) Start the server manually every time. See paths below:

Automatically Start Satisfactory Server

In order to make the server start on boot automatically, you have to create a custom systemd service file. Systemd is the service management system installed for many Linux distributions. You can read more about the concepts of systemd service files here. Thankfully, the SatisfactoryWiki already created the service file for gamers to implement. Here's how to do it:

First, login as an admin user (required for sudo to work when creating a service.file).
Make a link from /user/steam/steamcmd to /home/steam/:

ln -s /usr/games/steamcmd steamcmd

Create a new service file for Satisfactory:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/satisfactory.service

Copy & paste the following contents into the new file:

[Unit]
Description=Satisfactory dedicated server
Wants=network-online.target
After=syslog.target network.target nss-lookup.target network-online.target

[Service]
Environment="LD_LIBRARY_PATH=./linux64"
ExecStartPre=/home/steam/steamcmd +force_install_dir "/home/steam/sfserver" +login anonymous +app_update 1690800 validate +quit
ExecStart=/home/steam/sfserver/FactoryServer.sh
User=steam
Group=steam
StandardOutput=append:/var/log/satisfactory.log
StandardError=append:/var/log/satisfactory.err
Restart=on-failure
WorkingDirectory=/home/steam/sfserver
TimeoutSec=240

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Save it:

CTRL + X, Y, ENTER

Note: If you changed the username or decided to run the non-experimental server, you will need to change this service file to reflect your customized configuration. See the raw service file template from the SatisfactoryWiki for refrence.

After creating the service, you will need to execute a daemon-reload to load the new service.file into systemd. To keep the server running enter:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

To start the Satisfactory server, enter the following to commands:

sudo systemctl start satisfactory

You can check the running status with:

sudo systemctl status satisfactory.service

If configured correctly, the output should look something like:

● satisfactory.service - Satisfactory dedicated server
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/satisfactory.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Tue 2021-11-02 15:30:13 CET; 2min 21s ago
   Main PID: 2529 (FactoryServer.s)
      Tasks: 24 (limit: 7053)
     Memory: 8G
        CPU: 4min 5.965s
     CGroup: /system.slice/satisfactory.service
             ├─2529 /bin/sh /home/steam/sfserver/FactoryServer.sh
             └─2536 /home/steam/sfserver/Engine/Binaries/Linux/UE4Server-Linux-Shipping FactoryGame

To stop/restart the server, enter:

sudo systemctl stop satisfactory
sudo systemctl restart satisfactory

Once your server is up and running, you can create a screen and monitor the log in real-time with a tail command:

# monitor the log file
tail -n3 -f /var/log/satisfactory.log

# monitor the log file
tail -n3 -f /var/log/satisfactory.err

Joining the Satisfactory Server for the First Time

Now, open you copy of the game, and navigate to "Server Manager" in the game.
You will be prompted to enter the local IP address of the machine running the server (check your router DHCP server IPs and set it to a static IP so it doesn't change in the future) and the port # 15777. Hit Confrim.
Enter a name for your server, and set an admin password.
Create a new game from the Satisfactory Server GUI
Configure your server settings as you wish
Click Create Game and enter a unique session name

If you get a timeout error, just wait for the server to finish creating.

Manually Start Satisfactory Server

Invoke the steamcmd to install the Satisfactory server in this new steam user directory/folder as follows:

steamcmd
force_install_dir /home/steam/sfserver/
login anonymous
app_update 1690800 -validate

You can also run it as one line:
steamcmd +force_install_dir /home/steam/sfserver/ +login anonymous +app_update 1690800 validate +quit
Change the line after +login anonymous to +app_update 1690800 -beta experimental +quit if you want to install the experimental gamer server version.

Wait for the downloads and processes to complete. Depending on the size of the download, it may take awhile, but you should see a message such as: "Sucecss! App '1690800' fully installed."
We could start the server as-is, right now (see below on how) BUT if you want the Satisfactory server to start AUTOMATICALLY on boot, then you'll want to follow the steps outlined in this section:

cd /home/steam/sfserver
ls
Finding the bash file FactoryServer.sh or similar and run it:
screen -S sfserver
cd sfserver
./FactoryServer.sh
This will start the actual Satisfactory game server with logs inside a screen.

On the Linux server screen, you can type CTRL + A, D to close out the screen. See more details about screen here.
# to see running screens/servers
screen -ls
# to bring the server screen back up
screen -r [screen_name]
# to kill the server
CTRL + A,  K

FIN

ARK

Ref video for ARK
Ref ARK Wiki
Create a VM running Ubuntu server. Ideally, clone a VM from a cloud init 20.04 on Proxmox hypervisor!
Allocate 12-16GB of RAM to the VM
Configure/optomize settings for the Ark gameserver:

echo "fs.file-max=100000" >> /etc/sysctl.conf
sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.conf
echo "*soft nofile 100000" >> /etc/security/limits.conf
echo "*hard nofile 100000" >> /etc/security/limits.conf
ulimit -n 100000

Install dependencies as root:

Ensure you run commands as root or admin with proper permission level. Type sudo -i to switch to root user. Note: Some servers disable root by default, therefore, you need to give your user account root/admin permissions to run the commands required for a 64-bit machine.

sudo add-apt-repository multiverse
sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt update && apt -y upgrade
sudo apt install lib32gcc1

Create a Steam user (must run as admin)

sudo useradd -m -s /bin/bash steam

Set/create a password

sudo passwd steam

sudo -s
usermod -aG sudo steam
su - steam

Check the firewall settings:

sudo ufw status

If the firewall settings return: Status: inactive then enable it and open up the right ports.
Open up the port that is specific to Satisfactory as follows:

sudo ufw allow 22
sudo ufw allow 7777
sudo ufw allow 7778
sudo ufw allow 27015
sudo ufw enable
sudo ufw status

The status should report ports as ALLOW.

Also, don't forget to port forward 7777, 7778, and 27015 TCP and UDP on your router.
Install steamcmd:

sudo apt-get install steamcmd

Progress through the installer screen that pops up (select OK and agree to terms).

Learn more about steamcmd and how it functions from the Steam developer Wiki

Login as steam user:

su - steam

Make a link from /user/steam/steamcmd to /home/steam/:

ln -s /usr/games/steamcmd steamcmd

Download and install the ARK game server from Steam:

steamcmd +login anonymous +force_install_dir /home/steam/arkserver +app_update 376030 +quit

Depending on your internet speed and server specs, download and install times will vary. Wait until the entire installation process completes before continuing. You should see a message like, "Success! App fully installed."

Create an Ark `systemd` Service file

This systemd file will make the ARK server start automatically on boot.

First, login as an admin user (required for sudo to work when creating a service.file).

Note: After running this command, you should see a new directory in /home/steam/arkserver called steamcmd

-Create a new service file for Ark

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/ark.service

Copy & paste the following contents into the new file:

[Unit]
Description=ARK Survival Evolved
Wants=network-online.target
After=syslog.target network.target nss-lookup.target network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=5
StartLimitInterval=60s
StartLimitBurst=3
User=steam
Group=steam
ExecStartPre=/home/steam/steamcmd +force_install_dir /home/steam/arkserver +login anonymous +app_update 376030 +quit
ExecStart=/home/steam/arkserver/ShooterGame/Binaries/Linux/ShooterGameServer TheIsland?listen?SessionName=ArkServer -server -log -NoBattlEye
ExecReload=/bin/kill -s HUP $MAINPID
ExecStop=/bin/kill -s INT $MAINPID
WorkingDirectory=/home/steam/arkserver/ShooterGame/Binaries/Linux
LimitNOFILE=100000

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

To be cross compatiable with the EPIC game launcher, add -NoBattlEye after -log on the ExecStart line (note: already included in the above configuration).

Save it:

CTRL + X, Y, ENTER

After creating the service, you will need to execute a daemon-reload to load the new service.file into systemd. To keep the server running enter:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

Use the following commands to control your new Ark server:

# choose to run as the `steam` user
systemctl start ark
systemctl status ark.service

# restart or stop the server
systemctl restart ark
systemctl stop ark

You can check the running status with:

sudo systemctl status ark.service

If configured correctly, the output should look something like:

● ark.service - Ark dedicated server
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/ark.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Tue 2021-11-02 15:30:13 CET; 2min 21s ago
   Main PID: 2529 (arkserver.s)
      Tasks: 24 (limit: 7053)
     Memory: 8G
        CPU: 4min 5.965s
     CGroup: /system.slice/ark.service
             ├─2529 /bin/sh /home/steam/arkserver/...
             └─2536 /home/steam/ariserver...e

OPTIONAL Set the server password and admin server password:

sudo nano /home/steam/arkserver/ShooterGame/Saved/Config/LinuxServer/GameUserSettings.ini

# add and modify these lines in the .ini file
ServerPassword=YourServerPassword
ServerAdminPassword=YourServerAdminPassword

WARNING If you decide to set a password for your ARK server, Epic Games clients will NOT be able to join.

Joining the ARK Server

ARK on Epic Games

Open ARK and select the HOST / LOCAL option in the menu.
Click Play Single Player - there is no need to edit settings or change the map as this doesn't affect you connecting to the server.
When loaded in, press TAB to open the game's Console.
In the Console, type open [SERVER_IP]:7777. This will then begin connecting you to your server.

Note that your ARK server may be running on port 27015 as this is the port required by Steam, but for Epic Games, you will need to use port 7777, to allow for direct connection to your server.

ARK on Steam Games

In the Steam client (not the ARK game) under View (top navigation) > Servers, click the Favorites tab.
Add your server by clicking Add A Server, then entering your server address [SEVER_IP:25017] into the popup box and clicking Add This Address To Favorites.
Open the game ARK and click Join ARK.
In the bottom left corner under the filter options, change the Session Filter to Favorites.
Press refresh, and then you should see your server and be able to join.

ARK Server Troubleshooting

If you are expericing installation issues and errors, run through the steamcmd install manually in the following steps:

cd /home/steam/
steamcmd
force_install_dir /home/steam/arkserver
login anonymous
app_update 376030 validate
exit

Now, retry the systemctl start ark. If you are still having issues, run a systemctl status ark.service and research the specific error message you have on the ARK forums and wiki for solutions.

FTB Minecraft Server

This tutorial assumes that you already have an Ubuntu server VM ready to go -- if not, then check out my Proxmox guide on how to create a cloud-init template.

Provision Server Resources Appropriately

As seen above, a FTB Genesis server requirements are at least 4GB of RAM but reccomended is 6GB. Check the recc'd servers specs for your server of choice and provision accordingly in Proxmox.

FTB Server Install

FTB Server installs are simpler because they provide installers for your CPU and OS of choice. (i.e. .exe for Windows and/or .deb or .rpm file for Linux).

For ref. this guide follow the official FTB Server installer guide: https://feedthebeast.notion.site/Installing-a-Feed-the-Beast-Server-aeaea8a7220945d0ad0357c80c6c9d12
Since we are running a Linux Ubuntu OS, we will need to open a terminal to the VM and download (or transfer) the installer to the virtural machine.

Create a User for Server Management

Switch to root user to create and give admin rights to the new user. Enter the following series of commands:

sudo su
useradd -m -s /bin/bash ftbgenesis
# Check folder path of new user at:
cd /home/ftbgenesis
# Create a password for the new user:
passwd ftbgenesis
# Type in your new password for this user twice
# Add new user to admin group:
usermod -aG sudo ftbgenesis
# Switch to new user
su - ftbgenesis

You can name the user whatever you like. I chose ftbgenesis because it fits the modpack name.

Select one of the following options to get the modpack installer script (I think Option 1 is easiest, IMO):

Option 1: Download Files Directly via `wget`

Get the URL to the installer script from the FTB website: Modpack > Versions > Server Files > Right-click appropriate OS (depends on your CPU and OS; i.e. 64-bit Linux) > Copy the URL

Option 2: Transfer Files to VM via File Transfer Protocol

Please refer to my FileZilla guide on how to transfer to and from your Linxu VMs here.

Whatever option you choose proceed with the following once you have the installer:

Create a new directory in ftbgenesis:

cd /home/ftbgenesis
mkdir server
cd server

# FTBGenesis Modpack URL for Linux x64
wget https://api.modpacks.ch/public/modpack/120/11425/server/linux

# This assumes you are downloading FTB Genesis for Linux, if you want a different modpack, you'll need to change the URL.

# Check the directory with:
ls

You should now see linux (assuming you downloaded the linux version) in the newly created directory.

If you try to run the linux file as-is you will get a parse error; therefore, we must rename the file to whatever the file name of the FTB download is. To get the file name, you must:
- left-click the file name to download it,
- then copy the file name (exactly as it shows in the download)
- then change the name of linux to <file-download-name-as-shown>

In this case we will change the name to serverinstall_120_11425. To change the name in Linux:

# Action the following from the same directory as before "server"
mv linux serverinstall_120_11425

If you ls the directory, you should now see serverinstall_120_11425 listed. Now, make this file executable so we can run the installer:

chmod +x serverinstall_120_11425

Now, we can finally install the modpack server with:

./serverinstall_120_11425

When prompted "Where would you like to install the server hit:

ENTER
y
y

Now, sit back and watch the matrix (all the downloads of mods and dependencies). Every new download supports a mod creator. According to the FTB guide, "Depending on your internet connection this can take a while. A full server installation is around a few hundreds megabytes in size." In the end you should see:

After the install has completed ls the directory and you should see a bunch of new files/folders:

First, let's rm serverinstall_120_11425 to conserve a bit of space (we don't need the installer anyway).
Next, we need to make the starting bash script executable with chmod +x start.sh

Create Minecraft Server Daemon

This process can be skipped if you don't mind starting the server manually, but this it's handy to implement an auto-start for server on boot especially if you have friends playing on the server.

Start by switching to the root user with sudo su
Next, navigate to: cd /etc/systemd/system
Now create a new minecraft.service file with touch minecraft.service
Let's edit this new file with nano minecraft.service
Paste the following inside the file:

[Unit]
Description=Minecraft FTBGenesis Server
Wants=network-online.target
After=syslog.target network.target nss-lookup.target network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=ftbgenesis
Group=ftbgenesis
StandardOutput=append:/var/log/minecraft.log
StandardError=append:/var/log/minecraft.err
Restart=on-failure
ExecStart=/home/ftbgenesis/server/start.sh
WorkingDirectory=/home/ftbgenesis/server/
TimeoutSec=240

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

To save the added text, press CTRL + X then y then ENTER to save the changes.
If you cat minecraft.service you should see the pasted text added.
Now, we need to make this file executable with chmod +x /etc/systemd/system/minecraft.service
If you ls the directory, you should see minecraft.service change colors indicating it is now executable.
With the newly added minecraft.service we need to reload the systemd with systemctl daemon-reload
Finally, let's enable the service with systemctl enable minecraft.service

Starting the FTB Server

Non-auto-start Method (no minecraft.service file)

To start the server in a separate screen, run:

screen -S ftbserver
cd ~/server
./start.sh
# This will start the game server with logs inside a screen.

# On the Linux server screen, you can type CTRL + A, D to close out the screen

# To see running screens/servers
screen -ls

# To bring the ftbserver screen back up
screen -r <screen_name>

# To kill the server
CTRL + A,  K

Finally, we need to run it ./start.sh and accept the EULA with y

Systemd Auto-start Method

screen -S ftbserver
systemctl start minecraft.service
# This will start the game server with logs inside a screen.
# On the Linux server screen, you can type CTRL + A, D to close out the screen

You will be prompted to authenticate as the ftbgenesis user with the password you set:

Enter the password and then check on the service with: systemctl status minecraft.service and you should see:

If you want to view a log of the server's activity enter:

# monitor the log file
tail -n3 -f /var/log/minecraft.log

# monitor the log file
tail -n3 -f /var/log/minecraft.err

Troubleshooting FTB Server

Insufficient Memory error

To fix, simply edit the Java parameters with: nano user_jvm_args.txt and change it to the specs you have availalbe or is reccomended by the modpack creator (see below):

In my case, I have RAM to spare, so I'm allocating more than necessary, but you can change the RAM to your liking by changing the user_jvm_args.txt as you see below:

# Xmx and Xms set the maximum and minimum RAM usage, respectively.
# They can take any number, followed by an M or a G.
# M means Megabyte, G means Gigabyte.
# For example, to set the maximum to 3GB: -Xmx3G
# To set the minimum to 2.5GB: -Xms2500M

# A good default for a modded server is 4GB.
# Uncomment the next line to set it.
-Xmx16G - Xms4G

If that doesn't work, then nano start.sh and change the -Xmx and -Xms parameters there.

Modded Minecraft with Crafty Web UI

Crafty is a totally free GUI for managing self-hosted Minecraft servers. It gives you professional control panel similar to what paid Minecraft hosting sites provide.

Crafty Dashboard

Crafty Terminal (for Minecraft server commands)

Crafty File Editor

Crafty Server Metrics

In this guide, you will learn how to:

Create modded Minecraft servers
Manage your self-hosted Minecraft server remotely using the Crafty GUI throught a reverse proxy (i.e. enter www.yourdomain.com and oversee your server)

There are several steps to accomplish our goal:

Create a VM to host your Minecraft servers
Install Crafty
Import you modded Minecraft server into Crafty
Create a reverse proxy to access Crafty GUI remotely and securely

This guide assumes you already have a Linux VPS or VM to host your Minecraft server and we will jump right into installing Crafty to manage your Minecraft servers.

Install Crafty

Ref. Crafty Linux Installer Guide: https://docs.craftycontrol.com/pages/getting-started/installation/linux/

Check Crafty documentaion to ensure that this guide matches recent changes to Crafty.

My Installer Method

Running this method gives you control over the directory of the Crafty install which is vital to import modded server .zip files and other custom modded content from FTB for example.

Install software dependencies:
Create a crafty user

sudo useradd crafty -s /bin/bash

Create a place for your Crafty file contents:

sudo mkdir /home/crafty/server

Make the directories owned by crafty:

sudo chown -R crafty:crafty /home/crafty

cd to the new directory

cd /home/crafty

Please be sure to be in /home/crafty folder before you run the auto installer. To check type pwd and make sure.

Deploy the one-liner installer cmdlet provided by Crafty

git clone https://gitlab.com/crafty-controller/crafty-installer-4.0.git && \
 cd crafty-installer-4.0 && \
 sudo ./install_crafty.sh

Done. Open a webrowser and enter the-IPv4-address-of-your-server and add the port :8443 to access the Crafty web GUI. For example, if you are self-hosting, it will be IP assigned by your router such as: 192.168.1.57:8443.

Important Security Note: Due to recent cyberattacks targetting Crafty servers (read about it on Crafty's Discord), the default login credentials have been changed to a unique 64-character string for the login password is generated at new Crafty server creation. Therefore, you must cat the app/config/default-creds.txt which is found in the root folder path you installed Crafty (if you followed this guide, that will be /home/crafty/crafty-4/app/config/default-creds.txt. Copy the password and paste it into the web GUI to get access to your new Crafty dashboard, and DON'T FORGET TO CHANGE THE PASSWORD after you successfully login. Read Crafty's post-install documentaion here

Importing a Custom Modded Server into Crafty

Create a new server (choose the same versions as your choice modded server)

Click on the newly created server to open the server details.

Open Config and take note of the folder path to your newly created server. You will need this to modify the folder contents insdie Linux VM/VPS hosting your server.

Back on your Linux machine, navigate to the folder path of the new Crafty server:

cd /home/crafty/crafty-4/servers/<nameoffoldercraftymade>

Since we are importing our own custom modpack of choice, we do not need all the pre-built files, so we can remove them all with rm -r *
If you ls the folder (i.e. /home/crafty/crafty-4/servers/<nameoffoldercraftymade>) it should display no contents now. This is what we want.
Now, we are clear to wget your modpack of choice. For this demonstration, we are going to wget the FTBGenesis server modpack. Refer to my FTB server installer guide on how to get the clean link. From inside the /home/crafty/crafty-4/servers/<nameoffoldercraftymade> enter:

wget https://api.modpacks.ch/public/modpack/120/11425/server/linux

You should now see linux (assuming you downloaded the linux version) in the newly created directory, but if you try to run the linux file as-is you will get a parse error; therefore, we must rename the file to whatever the file name of the FTB download is.

Rename the linux file to <name-of-FTB-download-modpack-ID>, in the case of FTB Genesis, we simply take the URL /120/11425 and change linux to serverinstall_120_11425 (we are simply adding serverinstall and replacing the \ with _). Make sense? In this case, the command would be:

mv linux serverinstall_120_11425

Once the file has been renamed, we need to make that installer executable with:

chmod +x serverinstall_120_11425

And now, we run it!

./serverinstall_120_11425

When prompted "Where would you like to install the server? [current directory]", hit ENTER and y to everything to install it to the Crafty directory we created prior.

Depending on the server modpack size and your internet speed, this may take a few minutes. Download times vary. In the end you should see "The server installed sucessfully".

In the end, ls the directory and you should see all the modded server files and folders. If not, you may have accidentally installed the files somewhere else...

Crafty x Custom Modpack Settings

In order to make a custom modded Minecraft server work, you have to cat whatever the run.sh or start.sh generated by the modpack author (if there isn't one, you'll have to create one which is outside the scope of this tutorial, but basically, you need to create the custom server execution command required to run the server. Search "minecraft server execution scripts" to get an idea on how to make your own).

To get the custom server execution command for our example modded server for FTB Genesis, you need to run:

cat start.sh

You'll need to copy the server exec snippet that looks like this:

"/usr/lib/jvm/java-17-openjdk-amd64/bin/java" -javaagent:log4jfix/Log4jPatcher-1.0.0.jar -XX:+UseG1GC -XX:+UnlockExperimentalVMOptions -Xmx6144M -Xms4096M @user_jvm_args.txt @libraries/net/minecraftforge/forge/1.19.2-43.3.5/unix_args.txt nogui

Paste the string you copied from the start.sh into the Server Execution Command text box in Crafty.
Also, you'll need the change the Server Executable text box to whatever the .jar is in the modpack. In my case, it is minecraft_server.1.19.2.jar

Next, hit the Update Executable yellow button FIRST and then the Save button after the server updates the executable settings (do not hit Save first because this bricked my Crafty UI for some reason.)
It's finally time to start the server, so navigate to the dashboard and hit the play button on the server.

If this is the first time you have to agree to the Minecraft EULA first then start the server again.

Server fail to launch? If the server fails to start, check Terminal for errors and troubleshoot accordingly (in my case, I had a typo in my Server Executable).

Start Crafty and Server on Boot

Let's start by enabling Crafty on boot with systemctl enable crafty.service this will ensure the Crafty UI is available at boot.
Next, navigate to Crafty Web UI > > Config > and toggle on "Server Auto Start" (scroll to bottom of config page).

If Crafty Failes to Auto Start Server

If Crafty's auto start ever fails you can always create bypass it with a service file.

Note: This method will also bypass Crafty and the server stats will not dispaly in the Crafty UI. So, only use this method if you want the convenience of uptime, but don't need the Crafty UI.

Start by entering sudo su to switch to the root user then cd / to go to the root directory and then cd /etc/systemd/system where we need to create a new .service file.
pwd to makes sure in the right folder, and then create a new service file with touch <server_name>.service. For example, touch ftbskies.service.
Next, edit the new file with nano ftbskies.service and paste the following:

[Unit]
Description=Minecraft FTB Skies
Wants=network-online.target
After=syslog.target network.target nss-lookup.target network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=crafty
Group=crafty
StandardOutput=append:/var/log/ftbskies.log
StandardError=append:/var/log/ftbskies.err
Restart=on-failure
ExecStart=/home/crafty/crafty-4/servers/<folder-name-of-crafty-server>/start.sh
WorkingDirectory=/home/crafty/crafty-4/servers/<folder-name-of-crafty-server>
TimeoutSec=240

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

To get the exact folder name, you'll need to open a new screen with screen -S crafty, then su - crafty, then cd ~/crafty/crafty-4/servers, to find the right folder. If you cd to the folder and then pwd then you can copy the long folder name to then paste in the .service file.

After customizing the .service file to your specific server, save the file and then run systemctl enable <server_name>.service to launch the server at boot.

If you want to prevent the server from launching at boot simply run systemctl disable server_name>.service.

Access Crafty Web UI Remotely

If you want to manage your Minecraft servers remotely, you'll need a reverse proxy like NGNIX, but that requires Docker and other VMs. Not to mention, you'll be exposing your server to the outside world tempting hackers to crypto-jack or deploy ransomware on your server, so I prefer to use Cloudflare's free zero-trust tunnels. Learn how to deploy Cloudflare reverse proxy here, otherwise, you won't be able to access it outside your network. Alternatively, you could consider using TailScale which is another secure method of access.

Minecraft Server Settings

You must be in the server folder to access the following server files.

To enable whitelisting, nano server.properties and change white-list: false to white-list: true and save it.
To add players to the white list, nano whitelist.json and edit the following sample whitelist below:

[
  {
    "uuid": "f430dbb6-5d9a-444e-b542-e47329b2c5a0",
    "name": "username"
  },
  {
    "uuid": "e5aa0f99-2727-4a11-981f-dded8b1cd032",
    "name": "username"
  }
]

Tip: To find the UUID of a player, use the Minecraft UUID Converter

If you want to add yourself as operator in-game so you can add whitelists on the fly in-game, nano ops.json and paste the following:

{
    "uuid": "389c92c7-eb5c-4a15-92b8-01a27348ac63",
    "name": "hero887",
    "level": 4,
    "bypassesPlayerLimit": false
  },

Run Simultaneous Minecraft Servers

Yes! It is possible to run more than one Minecraft server at the same time on different ports assuming your server specs (CPU + RAM) can support it (provision accordingly).
Running more than one server at a time is even easier thanks to Crafty. Simply edit a few properties and you are good to go! In this case we need to change the server port in the Crafty UI > > Config > Server Port (set as something other than the default 25565, in my case I went with 25566).
And don't forget to change the port defaults in the actual server.properties settings, see below:
As a last and final step, you must open whatever port you assigned in your router firewall port forwarding rules.

Note: When trying to join your server in-game, you must use the IP:<unique_port_you_made>. So, in my case it would be: <my_public_IP_address:25565>. You must also map your DNS A records to the unique 25566 port you made

Useful Minecraft Server Commands

Description	Example
whitelist players	/whitelist add
ban player	/ban
ban IP address	/ban-ip
unban player	/pardon
view the ban list	/banlist
give player admin	/op
show all op players	/ops
remove player admin	/deop
change gamerules	/gamerule
save a server backup	/save-all
generate diag logs	/perf
send PM to player	/msg
give XP to player	/xp
teleport to player	/tp
clear weather	/weather clear
list commands usage	/help
stop server	/stop
reboot server	/restart

Minecraft Forge Sever - Vanilla

The following guide is to set up a clean Forge server install without a server installer (as shown above with FTB).

This guide assumes that:

You have a modded server picked out in advance (this matters for what Java version and Forge version you install). In this guide, we are going to create a server for: Minecraft version <ver> running Forge as the modbase.
You can modify the cmdlets provded to fit your specific version of choice. This guide should work for other versions of Minecraft, Java, and Forge, but you need to replace all the commands with your-version-specific needs. For example: apt install default-jre to install defaults may not work for your version.

Install Java 8

As an admin user, run the following installation commands:

sudo apt install openjdk-8-jdk
java -version

If the Java version is different from wahat you wish, you can change it using:

sudo update-alternatives --config java

Crafting Environment

If you haven't already, run an update on your Ubutnu system:

sudo apt update && apt -y upgrade

Update Screen, a command that will contain and tail the server logs:

sudo apt install screen

Create a new user (must run as admin)

sudo useradd -m minecraft

Set/create a password

sudo passwd minecraft

Change to new user

su - minecraft

Now, create a new directory for the mcserver

cd /opt
mkdir modserver
cd modserver

If you type pwd you should see the file path as follows: /home/minecraft/modserver you will need to copy/input this path after you install the steamcmd package.

Download the Forge Installer (necessary for modded Minecraft):

Files

how-to_game_servers.md

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