Tips to get started?

[NathanTheDragon]

Hey guys!

I've hosted several servers in the past (including a FTB one), but it wasn't very successful. The main issue was because it was crashing constantly and it wasn't stable. I just didn't have a lot of experience with starting a modded server I guess... What are some tips and plugins I would need to have a stable FTB server? Since you guys are the experts, I just want to seek answers so I may better myself. (Keep in mind the last time I hosted a FTB server was a year and a half ago) I am looking to start an INFINITY FTB server, so:

○ What will I need to get started? (MCPC? or MCPC+, is there something better? What are those?)
○ What plugins do I need? (I remember I had Grief Prevention and some TekkitRestrict plugin, but I think the restriction one is outdated. Not sure...)
○ How many slots should I have (I have a dedicated server ready, no specs on the dot, but would 20-30 be good? I know it depends though...)
○ Any special things I should consider before beginning with my server?
○ How will I moderate crashes and fix these (random) issues?
○ Is it fun and worth it? (I do this for fun, I don't care if my player-base is low, having fun and active members is pretty snazzy!)

I know these are a lot of questions, I apologize. I probably should apologize for not looking for the answers as well, I have in the past, but I feel a more personal approach will help me understand the required material to begin this process, enough of that rebuttal though, if anyone can help me (or several) with different views and opinions this will help me tremendously. If I can also gather these answers, hopefully in the future, this thread will be helpful to other eager beginners in the future!

Cheers,
◘ Nathan ◘

 

[NathanTheDragon]

Bump

 

[Profjb]

Sure I can help out. I'm assuming you want to run cauldron (MCPC+ for 1.6.4/1.7.10).
Bukkit acctually has a DMCA takedown enforced upon it but i'd be willing to share a new copy of it privatly I obtained when the downloads where still up, my skype: profjb58.

This is only temporary whilst spongeAPI is updating and you can view this wonderfull thread by Rebirth if you don't intent to be a pirate, y'arrr: *LINK*

A few protection options:
Coreprotect - A rollback plugin, will work with a majority of modded blocks, e.g. /co rollback urofjb r:15 t:30d would roll back any changes I made in a radius of 15 over a time period of 30 days.
Worldguard - General protection agains't anything mytown2 cannot protect
Mytown2 - Works like towny or factions, you can claim plots to be protected against about 10 different mods, e.g. ic2 lasers.
Greif prevention - I know nothing about this plugin, I assume it would work fine though.

Tekkit restrict isn't needed, infact anything dangerous can be changed by editing the mods config file.

As for specs. I would reccomend 2GB as a minimum and thats for about 10 - 20 players on a modpack with 100 mods or less. 4gb+ is a good amount of RAM to run on although 8gb+ is preffered for large servers, really though everything is down to the CPU, if you could post the CPU your intending to use I could benchmark it against the CPU I currently use. Thanks!

As for fixing random issues, you will first need to navigate to the crash reports folder and check the mods effected, use the search button and input 'errored', that will usually find the mod causing the problem. If you can't find enough information in the crash reports navigate to the 'logs' folder and go into 'fml-latest', remember google is your friend .
If your having any issues you can't understand/fix im willing to help out, just add me on skype or post below, thanks!

As for the rewards, honestly players probably wont ever get to appreciate the effort you put in but that dosen't matter, if you put effort into something people will stay and people will have a damn lot of fun. .

 

[NathanTheDragon]

Sure I can help out. I'm assuming you want to run cauldron (MCPC+ for 1.6.4/1.7.10).
Bukkit acctually has a DMCA takedown enforced upon it but i'd be willing to share a new copy of it privatly I obtained when the downloads where still up, my skype: profjb58.

This is only temporary whilst spongeAPI is updating and you can view this wonderfull thread by Rebirth if you don't intent to be a pirate, y'arrr: *LINK*

A few protection options:
Coreprotect - A rollback plugin, will work with a majority of modded blocks, e.g. /co rollback urofjb r:15 t:30d would roll back any changes I made in a radius of 15 over a time period of 30 days.
Worldguard - General protection agains't anything mytown2 cannot protect
Mytown2 - Works like towny or factions, you can claim plots to be protected against about 10 different mods, e.g. ic2 lasers.
Greif prevention - I know nothing about this plugin, I assume it would work fine though.

Tekkit restrict isn't needed, infact anything dangerous can be changed by editing the mods config file.

As for specs. I would reccomend 2GB as a minimum and thats for about 10 - 20 players on a modpack with 100 mods or less. 4gb+ is a good amount of RAM to run on although 8gb+ is preffered for large servers, really though everything is down to the CPU, if you could post the CPU your intending to use I could benchmark it against the CPU I currently use. Thanks!

As for fixing random issues, you will first need to navigate to the crash reports folder and check the mods effected, use the search button and input 'errored', that will usually find the mod causing the problem. If you can't find enough information in the crash reports navigate to the 'logs' folder and go into 'fml-latest', remember google is your friend .
If your having any issues you can't understand/fix im willing to help out, just add me on skype or post below, thanks!

As for the rewards, honestly players probably wont ever get to appreciate the effort you put in but that dosen't matter, if you put effort into something people will stay and people will have a damn lot of fun. .

Thanks for taking the time to write this, I appreciate it.

I do have a few questions though:
○ Have you tried Prism, and does it work with the blocks? (I have tried coreprotect for my old Direwolf 1.6 server a year ago, and it didn't rollback modded blocks. So I wasn't sure)
○ Is MYtown2 require economy based transactions? (like taxes with towny, mayors like towny, ect.)
○ Do you have a Cauldron build that works with the infinity pack?

Thanks for answering my question, if anyone has anything more to add I appreciate it.

 

[mc.crab]

I have used Prism and in my experience it worked better than Core Protect, however there were still some blocks prism couldn't rollback or it didn't log at all. That was in 1.6.4, I haven't tried prism in 1.7.10.

MyTown2 by default requires 5 (I think it was 5) diamonds if you want to create a town and 3 diamonds to claim an additional chunk. There is a config option to change it. On problem I noticed is that you get an Internal server error if you place an AE2 cable inside a MyTown2 protection.

I haven't tested Cauldron with Infinity but I was going to .

ForgeEssentials also adds area protection but I haven't tested it yet.

 

[NathanTheDragon]

I have used Prism and in my experience it worked better than Core Protect, however there were still some blocks prism couldn't rollback or it didn't log at all. That was in 1.6.4, I haven't tried prism in 1.7.10.

MyTown2 by default requires 5 (I think it was 5) diamonds if you want to create a town and 3 diamonds to claim an additional chunk. There is a config option to change it. On problem I noticed is that you get an Internal server error if you place an AE2 cable inside a MyTown2 protection.

I haven't tested Cauldron with Infinity but I was going to .

ForgeEssentials also adds area protection but I haven't tested it yet.

Thanks! I'm grateful for the information. I guess I should try setting up a test server... Anyways, does anyone else have anymore input? o. o

 

[Profjb]

cauldron wont work with FTB infinity as stated in the pack options.json

"libraries": [
{
"name": "net.minecraftforge:forge:1.7.10-10.13.2.1291:universal",
"url": "http://ftb.cursecdn.com/FTB2/maven/",
"checksums" : [ "e992c65ece8fd396c6b36ffffa4965c1ebb96ffd"]

the pack runs on version 1291 and cauldron isn't updated to that version 'yet', keep tabs on this site for cauldron mirrors though if one gets released: --Moderator Redacted--

And tbh the best protection for any modded server is a whitelist.

 

[NathanTheDragon]

cauldron wont work with FTB infinity as stated in the pack options.json

"libraries": [
{
"name": "net.minecraftforge:forge:1.7.10-10.13.2.1291:universal",
"url": "http://ftb.cursecdn.com/FTB2/maven/",
"checksums" : [ "e992c65ece8fd396c6b36ffffa4965c1ebb96ffd"]

the pack runs on version 1291 and cauldron isn't updated to that version 'yet', keep tabs on this site for cauldron mirrors though if one gets released: --Moderator Redacted--

And tbh the best protection for any modded server is a whitelist.

Bummer! So it IS available, but only a few people have it right?

 

[Profjb]

Yep.

 

[NathanTheDragon]

Yep.

The person uploaded another build, although no 1291, it should work if the mods don't require 1291 right?
Anyways thanks for your help! Does anyone have any more inputs to my questions?

Cheers,
○ Nathan ○

 

[mc.crab]

I just downloaded the cauldron for version 1286 and tested it with infinity. It works but I had to disable Fastcraft, MobiusCore and NotEnoughResources.
I will test a few plugins and see how well it works.

Edit: Tested CoreProtect and Prism quickly. CoreProtetct didn't log contents of modded chests.
Prism logged modded chests, and items inserted into an AE system but not items taken out.
Also blocks destroyed by thaumcraft excavation wand core are logged, IC2 mining laser is not.
Prism also reuires a MySQL database.

 

[NathanTheDragon]

I just downloaded the cauldron for version 1286 and tested it with infinity. It works but I had to disable Fastcraft, MobiusCore and NotEnoughResources.
I will test a few plugins and see how well it works.

Edit: Tested CoreProtect and Prism quickly. CoreProtetct didn't log contents of modded chests.
Prism logged modded chests, and items inserted into an AE system but not items taken out.
Also blocks destroyed by thaumcraft excavation wand core are logged, IC2 mining laser is not.
Prism also reuires a MySQL database.

Wow! Thanks for taking the time to test it, that was awesome of you! So I bet Prism would be the way to go then.

I did run a test server too, and actually got the server running WITH mobius, unless there is an issue when you join the server? I had to disable fastcraft and NotEnoughResources.

I want VERY few plugins for the server, but I mainly want:
○ Essentials
○ Some Restriction Plugin (TekkitRestrict, I do not know? any newer ones?)
○ Worldedit/Worldguard
○ Grief Prevention
○ Prism
○ A plugin to manage player intake/outake. (there's a plugin that increase the playercount by 1 similar to some big servers, it also has a cap limit!)

What do you guys think?

Cheers,
○ Nathan ○

 

[mc.crab]

In my current server I use ForgeEssentials and Server Tools. Cauldron is running on a test server and I plan to switch to Cauldron.

ForgeEssentials adds pretty much the same funcionality as Bukkit essentials. In my opinion it is easier to set the permissions if you are using Bukkit essentials and groupmanager. ForgeEssentials also adds a bunch of different modules like economy, world border, afterlife aka death chest... only a couple of those are updated to 1.7.10 but a few of the not updated are working fine.

To restrict crafting items I'd go with Minetweaker. It allows you to disable and change recipes.

In my experience Worldguard does not work that well with modded Minecraft. It is good if you want to prevent placing down certain blocks in a world. ForgeEssentials has a protection module which so far works quite well. Some things like IC2 laser and turtles are able to bypass it. Protecting areas with ForgeEssentials is not as easy as it is with Worldguard or Grief Preventation, you first deny access to the area from all players and then allow access to the player you are protecting it to.

I used Grief Preventation in 1.6.4 and while it worked there were some minor problems, I can't remember exactly what.

Based on the list of things that Prism can log on Prism website, Prism in my opinion is the way to go. I still suggest testing different items and blocks to see if Prism is or isn't able to log it and consider banning those items.

Edit: well the cauldron server won't start with ForgeEssentials, FE wiki says there should be a config option to allow it but I can't find it.

 

[NathanTheDragon]

In my current server I use ForgeEssentials and Server Tools. Cauldron is running on a test server and I plan to switch to Cauldron.

ForgeEssentials adds pretty much the same funcionality as Bukkit essentials. In my opinion it is easier to set the permissions if you are using Bukkit essentials and groupmanager. ForgeEssentials also adds a bunch of different modules like economy, world border, afterlife aka death chest... only a couple of those are updated to 1.7.10 but a few of the not updated are working fine.

To restrict crafting items I'd go with Minetweaker. It allows you to disable and change recipes.

In my experience Worldguard does not work that well with modded Minecraft. It is good if you want to prevent placing down certain blocks in a world. ForgeEssentials has a protection module which so far works quite well. Some things like IC2 laser and turtles are able to bypass it. Protecting areas with ForgeEssentials is not as easy as it is with Worldguard or Grief Preventation, you first deny access to the area from all players and then allow access to the player you are protecting it to.

I used Grief Preventation in 1.6.4 and while it worked there were some minor problems, I can't remember exactly what.

Based on the list of things that Prism can log on Prism website, Prism in my opinion is the way to go. I still suggest testing different items and blocks to see if Prism is or isn't able to log it and consider banning those items.

Edit: well the cauldron server won't start with ForgeEssentials, FE wiki says there should be a config option to allow it but I can't find it.

Awesome! I may probably use minetweaker, sounds cool! Does anybody have any more input?

 

[NathanTheDragon]

Just a shameless bump for more inputs, the more the merrier. Hopefully this thread can also help people in the future out.

 

[Baron]

cauldron wont work with FTB infinity as stated in the pack options.json

"libraries": [
{
"name": "net.minecraftforge:forge:1.7.10-10.13.2.1291:universal",
"url": "http://ftb.cursecdn.com/FTB2/maven/",
"checksums" : [ "e992c65ece8fd396c6b36ffffa4965c1ebb96ffd"]

the pack runs on version 1291 and cauldron isn't updated to that version 'yet', keep tabs on this site for cauldron mirrors though if one gets released: --Moderator Redacted--

And tbh the best protection for any modded server is a whitelist.

How do you know which version of cauldron you need to use? Also how do you know what version that cauldron can be used for?

 

[NathanTheDragon]

How do you know which version of cauldron you need to use? Also how do you know what version that cauldron can be used for?

Basically in the configuration, you see the part that is listed "net.minecraftforge:forge:1.7.10-10.13.2.1291:universal"? The "1.7.10-10.13.2.1291" is the version and build number. You would normally compare the build number and version number with your cauldron to see if it would work.

For example:
cauldron-1.7.10-1.1307.06.218
forge-1.7.10-10.13.2.1291

The cauldron build is a higher version than the forge build, so depending on the mods whatever you have may not run. Currently FTB Infinity uses Forge Build 1291 (The forge build for infinity could be different, I haven't check in awhile) and for the same forge compatibility you would need a cauldron build of 1291. Comically, the build for 1307 is released, which is higher than the 1291 build, but then again, the 1291 build is rare as only some people have it here and there.

Anymore inputs or comments?

○ Nate ○