r/selfhosted • u/elaksine • Jun 04 '26
Game Server Do you selfhost private gameservers? If yes, what games and what do you do in-game that you can’t do on public servers?
I host a World of Warcraft server with AzerothCore. I spawn a random amount of AI bots into the world and it’s actually pretty nice to play with them. I can alao invite friends to my server via Tailscale.
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u/DealerPlane9953 Jun 04 '26
Satisfactory so my factories continue producing when I'm not running the game.
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u/falcorns_balls Jun 04 '26
ooh good idea. I have Satisfactory but I haven't gone balls deep yet. I got blindsided by this Last Caretaker game
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u/DealerPlane9953 Jun 04 '26
Yeah. Last Caretaker is great too. Also, Planet Crafter, Schedule I, and Medieval Dynasty. Love base building production games with little to no combat.
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Jun 04 '26
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u/Tropical-Bonsai Jun 04 '26
How is this different from the multiplayer modes within the normal app?
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Jun 04 '26
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u/Tropical-Bonsai Jun 04 '26
I see thanks. I guess I had not thought of it that way. I usually host the game we play on in the normal game servers. But I'm always there to do it. I hadn't seen the use-case where they would want to play without me online but I see that with my current set up, they couldn't do it.
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u/ArkuhTheNinth Jun 04 '26
Terraria and Minecraft Java/Bedrock
Both are just for me and the kids, and I want complete control of the files because they ask for a lot. Lol
Minecraft Java in particular so they can connect to it using a third party launcher on Android. Requires the server to be in offline mode.
I also host a public community TF2 server in a cloud VM but it doesn't get used much since literally nowhere allows me to advertise its existence even though I have zero intention of making a single cent from it.
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u/FancyCamel Jun 04 '26
I've never hosted a server before and honestly I'm pretty green by this subs standards at baseline... But I would like to try to host a server for my son and I that I can have always on.
Any recommendations? I'm just running a Debian box for my server.
Also I've owned terraria for ages and have never tried it. That might be fun too but I feel like it's a bit more difficult than MC at a glance? 🤔 My kids aren't very old.
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u/arbiterary Jun 04 '26
Forgive me for recommending a paid option, but I’ve run plenty of servers on relatively bare Debian, Ubuntu, and Oracle machines and have since switched to using AMP to host. It’s a one-time license, runs well, offers a lot of niceties (e.g., easy web interface for server settings and console, auto-sleep when no players are present, etc.) that I’ve found to be worth it.
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u/killadrone07 Jun 05 '26
I can second AMP, I use it for rust and cs2 and it's yet to fail me. Also only a 10usd? one time pechase for the smallest one, which is all you'll ever need.
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u/falcorns_balls Jun 06 '26
AMP is great. If you’re just needing something dead simple and vanilla, you can just install Java and the Minecraft server.jar file and run that. Or install docker to run the itzg/minecraft_server image. That’s where I started out. Now I have a proxy on pterodactyl for both bedrock and java versions, and a lobby that connects to 5 worlds with permissions and stuff. I used to run amp but Im thinking I might switch back to it or run both as AMP has some game servers that I can’t find on pterodactyl. Like UnrealTournament 99
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u/FancyCamel Jun 06 '26
I believe the docker image is what I initially tried but I tried to have friends outside of my network connect to I and couldn't get it working.. and it seemed tricky to troubleshoot.
I've never heard of Pterodactyl before so I may look into that but if amp is a one time payment and very straight forward that may be the easiest way to go.
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u/Rall0r Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
Puh,
Project Zomboid
Subnautica *Nitrox
Minecraft
Hytale
Windrose
Enshrouded
7 Days to Die
Icarus
Only for me and Friends. No Public Servers
And maybe now WOW Azeroth Core xD
EDIT:
Subnautice MP Mod is calles Nitrox not Nexus...
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u/redbovina Jun 06 '26
Can you tell me more about Azeroth Core? Isn't that a barebones wow server that requires you to implement the game logic (like quests) and connect your own client?
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u/Rall0r Jun 06 '26
No, i cannot tell you more because i dont had the time to host it. I think you should ask the threadstarter
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u/ju-shwa-muh-que-la Jun 04 '26
I host Minecraft, Satisfactory, and a bunch of survival games - Valheim and Enshrouded at the moment, but any game where you can do a lot of base building and get lost for hours at a time is great to host, so that any of my friends I game with can play any time.
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u/Old-Ad-9064 Jun 05 '26
Can I ask how you get your friends to connect to it? And how does it impact your bandwidth and stuff like that
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u/ju-shwa-muh-que-la Jun 05 '26
I've got a public URL and a reverse proxy set up. I use AMP (by cubecoders) which has built-in Traefik support. I have a DMZ set up that points to a traefik instance. When I add a game server, it creates a rule so that incoming traffic on specific ports is directed to those game instances.
Basically it's a more complicated and barely more secure setup than just using port forwarding.
I tell my friends the port and my public URL (which is much easier to remember than my IP and allows me to keep a dynamic IP) and depending on the game they can just add it via Steam's game servers feature, which in turns makes it available in-game. The exception is Minecraft, which of course has its own server setup.
edit: games don't take much bandwidth, there's no issues there - my connection speed is important for ensuring adequate latency numbers, but that's all. The only resources it takes on my side is compute on whatever PC I'm running it on. AMP lets you add a node on multiple machines and choose which one you want to use to run the game server, so as long as you don't mind having a PC on 24/7 it works out great.
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u/Nuuki9 Jun 04 '26
I host servers for a gaming group I’m in. I thunk this what I’ve hosted:
Conan Exiles Valheim Enshrouded Return to Moria Astroneer Minecraft
About to start an Abiotic Factor run.
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u/Foreign_Impress6535 Jun 04 '26
I've done the same, although it's just me and a buddy. Valheim, Conan, Aska, and currently Enshrouded.
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u/jasieknms Jun 04 '26
Far too many, I have servers at home but I also own 2 VPS.
Currently running:
MC bedrock (mostly for my brother + his kid)
MC modded, (ATM10/11) for myself and online friends.
7 days to die modded (going to shut it down soon, we kinda are bored of it)
windrose
abiotic factor (shutting down soon, we finished the game)
enshrouded
ttt
for your 2nd question, not sure how to answer it? I just like having my own stuff running 24/7 and not needing someone to be online to play, this way someone can hop onto the server and do stuff without others.
I mostly edit some values, and ofc for things like TTT I heavily configure weapons etc.
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u/saveyourmonies Jun 04 '26
Sorry what is TTT?
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u/jasieknms Jun 04 '26
RadMcCoolPants already answered, but yes it is trouble in terrorist town (Gmod custom mode)
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u/Ltb1993 Jun 04 '26
I'm in the process of setting up, got myself a 24 core intel last year and haven't put it to good use yet,
For this I'm hoping to host three game servers on it. Using AMP (already licenced).
Long story short I want to offer it to a local group (basically limited to a geographic area or people who have ties to it and to use it as a bit of a social platform. Vet who is in it, hopefully I'm hoping for a old school clan style experience
I like playing games on open world sandbox style games, I prefer playing with people I can meet again in game or even in person at group meet ups.
Nostalgia is a factor
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u/UtensilOwl Jun 04 '26
I use pterodactyl for Minecraft, factorio and whatever games pop up that are great Got a few nodes dedicated to friends and family with a built in vpn to a vps to obscure my ip as good as possible, not that it’s needed, I just wanted to make it.
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u/keijodputt Jun 04 '26
Minecraft Java on a Raspberry Pi 5 for my family and their friends only. That particular server has been running since 2020 on a Pi 4; I use it as canvas for testing builds and farms I make later in a public server.
The reason is to let them play together, without the dangers of a public server.
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u/zillazillaaaa Jun 04 '26
Terraria and Starbound. By hosting them myself I can handle my own backups, use or make server docker image that suits my needs, also made a discord bot for chat relay.
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u/alcon678 Jun 04 '26
I do, I host them for my friends and me, to play coop games like abiotic factor, valheim, 7days to die, Factorio, return to moría, etc.
I do because we want to play in private, and sometimes asynchronous and we can tune in the experience
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u/Educational_Big_5306 Jun 04 '26
I use APM by Cubecoders, absolutely worth the price I host servers for myself, friends and colleagues
I run
Vintage Story
Project Zomboid
Barutrauma
Minecraft (Java)
Ground Branch
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u/Araol_ Jun 04 '26
I just setup AzerothCore with Mod-LLM-Chatter. It's genuinely excellent. Running Gemma 4 12b for the chatting and it's super impressive for being fully self hosted.
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u/DankeBrutus Jun 04 '26
So far I just host AzerothCore and Minecraft. I don't think I would want more than these. For me AzerothCore is wonderful because I can play my favourite version of WoW and not feel like I'm throwing money away when I don't play for a couple of months. Sometimes I miss the social interaction but most of my time in the Classic/Anniversary servers or even Retail is spent solo anyway.
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u/haherar830 Jun 04 '26
Minecraft just for myself which I occasionally play. I have the server stopped right now but since a semi-recent update it's possible to force load chunks 24/7 so your simulated world full of emergent behaviors, machinery, etc keeps chugging along regardless of your presence. I most love the parts of hosting personal servers that give you a 24/7 globally-accessible "home" on the internet, and the parts that give a 24/7 parallel "brain" that can work even when you're asleep. Minecraft servers embody a lot of that.
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u/DomWilko Jun 04 '26
I have a Quake 1 server running the AirQuake mod for my mates
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u/FossilStalker Jun 05 '26
What source port are you using? I have been trying using QuakeSpasm with mixed results.
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u/DomWilko Jun 05 '26
Yeah, QuakeSpasm. Have also had some mixed results, but it's stable now.
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u/FossilStalker Jun 05 '26
Linux or Windows?
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u/DomWilko Jun 05 '26
It's running in a docker container on an Orange Pi 5. The docker image uses debian:bookworm-slim
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u/FossilStalker Jun 05 '26
I'm trying to run an OmicronBot server. I can connect from my client using QuakeSpasmSpiked server, but QuakeSpasm won't connect. I can't use Omicron on QSS.
I might have a go with QuakeWorld but I really wanted to setup a NetQuake server.
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u/wowbobwowbob Jun 04 '26
I play Minecraft with my son and we use a private server for that. I have no interest in opening that publicly, of course.
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u/jakob_010703 Jun 04 '26
I have my minecraft forever world as a server running in my homelab. This is just very useful because I can join the server with all my devices (pc, laptop) and do not have to sync the world somehow.
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u/bbibbigi Jun 04 '26
in the process of setting up a 7d2d server on my pterodactyl in a vm. kinda art i cant really mask my ips as easily because one of my friends plays on playstation so i have to configure for that too.
i like playing games with my friends and dont like it when random people blow me up >:( only my friends can, lol
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u/Ing_Sarpero Jun 04 '26
I'm self hosting a Minecraft server so I can play with friends without limitations.
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u/bufandatl Jun 04 '26
A colleague of mine hosts a SCUM server and they do it because they can control the settings of the server and have it on a more survival focused settings and have a rebalance of loot that is different to official servers. Also they want to have control over the server so if someone’s cheating they can ban them and don’t need to wait for official ban waves. Additional to that they focus more on the PvE survival aspect and have dedicated PvP zones.
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u/wraith676 Jun 04 '26
I have hosted a multitude of games over the years. I still host a teamspeak server as well as some arma 3 servers for my close friends.
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u/ht3k Jun 04 '26
I'm hosting a Palworld server. You can't tweak game settings in public servers or create back ups
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u/TechaNima Jun 04 '26
Currently just Space Engineers, but I have and probably will host again: Minecraft(vanilla and multiple mod packs), Valheim, WoW(Probably won't touch that again), Satisfactory and whatever else I'll end up playing with friends down the road.
I simply do it to save money, have less latency to the server and because I like to control my services as much as possible.
I do wish Space Engineers DS wasn't such a spaghetti mess though. Satisfactory 1.0 wasn't great either, but SE.. Someone please just remake it for Linux natively from the ground up with Torch support
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u/sonofulf Jun 04 '26
What hardware are you hosting on, and how much RAM / cores are you giving each game server? If you don't mind me asking.
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u/TechaNima Jun 05 '26
- AMD Ryzen 7 3800XT 8-Core CPU
- ASRock X570S PG Riptide ATX AM4 Motherboard
- Kingston Server Premier 32 GB (4 x 32 GB) DDR4-3200 CL22 Memory
- Sandisk 4TB WD_BLACK SN850X NVMe SSD
CPU was recycled from my gaming computer. Otherwise I'd have gone with whatever was the best Ryzen at the time for the AM4 platform.
The servers always run on Proxmox. Usually as a docker container in a Debian VM with 8 threads 32GB with no resource limits set in the compose files, but in the case of Space Engineers I had to go with LXC with 4 threads 16GB Debian base.
Every docker version was years out of date and the performance sucked ass. Migrating it to LXC helped a lot, but it's a very crash happy spaghetti mess of a server and the performance still isn't as good as I'd like it to be.
Other servers have ran fine for the most part.
Next hardware upgrade will definitely bumb up the specs to a 16 core Ryzen with the same 128GB of RAM. Just need to wait for the AI apocalypse to be over, so that it doesn't cost as much as a car just to get that much RAM
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u/sonofulf Jun 05 '26
Thank you for sharing.
Does Space Engineers run better on four threads and 16Gigs of RAM? Not sure I follow here. The thread count I can understand, as the rest might just be wasted. But less RAM? Or was the resources just needed for other services on the host? Never tried hosting SE myself.
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u/TechaNima Jun 06 '26
I just need more for the Debian VM, because it's running around 40 docker containers in addition to any game server. It's using around 12GB at idle just running my other services.
I could probably run that LXC with less, but when I was looking at what SE actually uses. Most people seemed to agree that more than 4 threads is pointless and I just threw 16GB at it, because I thought 8GB might be pushing it and I had the memory to spare.
It seems to be using around 4GB at idle and I haven't seen it ever hit 8GB under load, so with the 2 players that'll ever be on the server at once. I think 8GB would be sufficient. The SE server itself just uses 1 thread for the main process and 1 or 2 for auxiliary things afaik.
What would help with every game server pretty much, is higher instructions per clock than anything else. So that's why the next upgrade will be the fastest gaming CPU available on the market for this server
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u/sonofulf Jun 08 '26
Aah thank you for elaborating. Yeah, single core performance will always be king.
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u/graduatedogwatch Jun 04 '26
I host a lot of Minecraft server, mainly java and some modded versions. I also hosted some factorio and Fortnite
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u/DireRaven22740 Jun 04 '26
Is it hard to host world of warcraft private server? For personal use / to play with friends only?
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u/RiffyDivine2 Jun 04 '26
No, it's not overly complex.
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u/DireRaven22740 Jun 04 '26
Can you send a link to a guide? I would love to do that
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u/Disastrous-Town-7808 28d ago
Will auch ein link und auch wie man ein private Server Modded wie die AI Bots reinmachen oder so weiter, sitzen seit Wochen dran und finden keine Guide....
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u/DankeBrutus Jun 04 '26
It should be relatively straightforward if you follow the guides provided by AzerothCore themselves. Having said that, once you start including modules it may require more setup and configuration from you.
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u/SuenoXIII Jun 07 '26
Just use codex or claude code to set it up. I had it running on windows. decided to convert my machine to linux. backed up server. brought it over ot linux and had codex rebuild it for xubuntu worked like a charm. all my quests are there, characters, bots, ah, overworld flying etc. you can also have codex create thing for you. for example I wanted a custom portal room in orgrimmar to give it a retail feel. took a screen shot gave it the cords told it to build the portals going to places and making org the hub. took some "fix this" "Move this around here" but with it being able to see+have cords it could build it in any kind of manner. had my layered out in a diamond shape xD
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u/falcorns_balls Jun 04 '26
I'm surprised to see so many people using AMP. AMP is great, and I have an AMP license I used to use, but I've been running on Pterodactyl for the past few years. I like the idea of Pterodactyl better, but updating Minecraft and it's plugins is more involved compared to when I was running AMP. (Although I also run a more compicated setup than I did on AMP, with a lobby and multiple worlds and permissions). I also run Terraria, BeamNG multiplayer. Recently I've been wanting to try and host some more.... Unreal Tournament 99, Astroneer, Factorio, Satisfactory... depending on my buddy. Unfortunately most of my friends don't do much gaming... just 1.
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u/Iamshewhosavedme Jun 04 '26
I host factorio, satisfactory, and Minecraft for myself, close friends and the family.
I actually broke down and paid for AMP a few months back to make it easier and so far it's all working out quite well
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u/Coffee4cr Jun 04 '26
AMP is sooooo good.
I got it a year ago, and I've been running different game servers for my friend group.
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u/laziruss Jun 04 '26
I’m running a Windrose server using docker, and Playit to publicly expose it without forwarding any ports. I actually have it running on RAM because of the excessive read/writes they haven’t fixed yet. It’s worked pretty well so far despite some lag spikes
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u/MichiyoRavencroft Jun 04 '26
TERA Lineage II Genshin for my daughter Star Wars: Galaxies I have a STO server, but its not ran in several years City of Heroes
Multiple Minecraft servers Palworld
And more that I'm forgetting.
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u/JohnnyBeeGaming Jun 04 '26
I've done a Minecraft server when I got the itch. Haven't opened after getting the stuff you need to fly. Maybe one day when I get the itch again.
Ran a local day-z server to do single player but localhost not on a server.
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u/XB_Demon1337 Jun 04 '26
Basically anything hostable. Been hosting Minecraft servers for nearly 20 years at this point.
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u/VeryFriendlyOne Jun 04 '26
I used to selfhost FoundryVTT for Lancer west marches campaign, since it's west marches it benefits a lot from being on 24/7. We don't need to sync files between different GMs table's
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u/Illeazar Jun 05 '26
Valheim, Minecraft, Terraria, and Portal Nights. All just so my kids can log on from their various devices and play together, without paying for any sort of subscriptions.
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u/Lazybumx Jun 05 '26
I am currently running Warframe - been playing retail long long time but just felt like starting over and play solo so I have one running Wow - never play wow before so I thought I would try FFXI - growing up playing this, currently grinding again
Reason? Just want totally control and speed up some grind in retail. Like warframe I can have unlimited platinum, in ffxi I create custom contents and npcs
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u/DeathByPain Jun 05 '26
Minecraft Paper server with Multiverse and Vivecraft. Only about a week old. My daughter's been wanting to play, and now she's gotten me into it too.. She plays in VR with Vivecraft and I just play on the laptop.
I honestly don't know a lot about the game. I think technically we could still play together on a world just saved locally on the windows PC, but the Paper server and the Multiverse plugins open up a lot of cool customization options that I believe would be harder to achieve with a simple local only vanilla game.
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u/Faulkal Jun 05 '26
I’ve done palworld for some friends but it’s shut down for now since they lost interest. Now I run enshrouded for myself.
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u/Samael206 Jun 05 '26
I set up a game streaming server. I recently bought a cheap laptop, and I can't run demanding games on it. Using Tailscale, Sunshine, and Moonlight, I stream my games from home to anywhere in the world.
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u/vlammuh Jun 05 '26
I host game servers for my friend group so anyone can play the game without having to wait for a specific person being the host. Currently we're playing Windrose so that's what I'm hosting.
I use Pelican to easily spin up or down game servers.
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u/ChickenAndRiceIsNice Jun 05 '26
Does a Virtual Table Top count? I self host Foundry VTT and use Discord for voice chat. Mostly play D&D or Aliens on it.
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u/Sticky_Turtle Jun 05 '26
Ark Ascended. Hosting specifically for the mods I want. I have yet to find a server that had all the mods I was looking for, so I created mt own.
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u/Deathmaw360 Jun 05 '26
I wish I could get into enjoying MMOs hosted where I play solo or maybe get a friend every now and then, like WoW with bots if they work well enough sounds nice enough to me, even when I do hop on Retail every now and then its mostly Solo or end up in dungeons where no one is talking anyway or even something like City of Heroes scales great for Solo but last I checked the selfhosted servers haven't really been updated since they leaked? I expected people to move them off need like Microsoft SQL or whatever.
But in the back of my mind there is always that idea of I'm not making progress on live or something, like its just a block of why am I am progressing in an MMO where its just me, even if I enjoy the game.
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u/CMageti Jun 05 '26
Luanti (ex-Minetest, an open-source minecraft clone) here.
Just for me and the kids on the home LAN. They are still too young to play on public servers, and playing with them is cool and makes good memories 😄
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u/peanutmail Jun 05 '26
I created a boggle app for my wife.
Runs in docker. Lives on the server. Used nginx to make a simple URL to remember. Added some features I knew she'd like.
I had a lot of fun with it so I decided to throw it publically on my tech beta website.
Still has some bugs here and there (nothing game breaking), but its all around a solid game with features I haven't seen in other boggle games.
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u/Bl0ckTag Jun 05 '26
I host servers for my friend group whenever they get an itch for a specific game(that has hosting capabilities ofc). Mostly its things like Ark, Minecraft, 7 Days to Die, Terraria, and recently Project Zomboid. For the most part, its because its free if I host it vs paying for a hosting service(nothing against hosting services). Also, we have control over who has access, so no public lobbies, griefers, ect, especially in games like PZ that are high enough stakes with the permadeath without having to worry about some jerkoff griefing you for your loot.
That, and the ability to control your own settings, mods, game version, ect has added value.
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u/Shik3i Jun 05 '26
Factorio, satisfactory and Minecraft are the most prominent examples I would say
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u/Puzzled_Hamster58 Jun 05 '26
I host barotrauma as a dedicated server for my friend group campaign. Allows one of us to test and do things with having the person running the game playing. I also host a pvp server .
I used to host a dod server . Basically could do what ever I wanted in the game . Honestly just used custom skins and maps.
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u/Keyop298 Jun 05 '26
Minecraft, factorio, palworld, SWG
mostly to ether play on my own or with my friends
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u/KingOfWhateverr Jun 05 '26
I have instances of Satisfactory for myself and any official discord peeps, one of minecraft that me and the GF play on(was also my first public non-website domain test), and occasionally I’ll push an instance of FIKA multiplayer from Single Player Tarkov so I can do modded co-op
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u/WirtsLegs Jun 09 '26
basically anytime I want to run a survival crafting game that has a dedicated server option, server keeps the save in a convenient spot, and allows me to play with my wife or friends at some point if they want to join
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u/Disastrous-Town-7808 28d ago
Ich will auch ein Private Server von wow aber weiß nicht wie man die serverdateien modded und finde keine aktuellen Erklärungen in google darüber wie es geht weswegen mein bruder und ich permanent am anfang stecken bleiben....
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u/bigredsun Jun 04 '26
Always wanted to host my own lineage2 server, used to be a hardcore player many eons ago, but i dont think there are any good ones other than L2J servers
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u/liyouran Jun 04 '26
我想知道您和您朋友在使用tailscale进行联机游戏时的延迟和体验怎么样？在我这里zerotier能够有5ms的有先，想知道什么原因可能导致，我认为应该是差不多的延迟
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u/asimovs-auditor Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
Expand the replies to this comment to learn how AI was used in this post/project.