How to set up a Craftopia server

By hosting your own Craftopia server, you gain significant flexibility regarding your gameplay experience and online availability. Once you have the necessary hardware, you can easily install the dedicated server application for the survival crafting game using SteamCMD in just a few steps.

What are the requirements for a Craftopia server?

You basically have two options for hosting on your own — you use your private PC, or you rent hardware from a professional provider. If you want your Craftopia server to run around the clock and to guarantee a permanently stable internet connection, outsourced hosting is the way to go.

The amount of processor power, RAM and hard drive space you need for your dedicated Craftopia server cannot be determined in general terms. Factors such as the number of players or other applications running in parallel play a major role in determining what your hardware should look like. However, you must fulfil the following minimum requirements:

• Processor (CPU): min. 2.4 GHz (2 cores)
• Working memory (RAM): min. 3 GB
• Hard drive space: 10 GB

Then there are the requirements of your operating system. The Craftopia server runs on both Windows and Linux. For the Microsoft Windows Server 2022 system, for example, you also need 1.4 GHz of processor power, 2 GB of RAM and 36 gigabytes of hard drive space (512 MB and 32 GB without graphical user interface).

How to host a Craftopia server with IONOS

When it comes to server hosting, you have a wide choice of providers and plans. The main difficulty is finding the right offer for your purposes. At IONOS, you can choose from the following three server models (each with different service plans) that are suitable for hosting a Craftopia server:

• Cloud Server: Cloud servers from IONOS use virtualized hardware from various hosts. You can scale the rented capacity up or down at any time. As you’re billed by the minute, you only pay for the service you actually use.
• vServer/VPS: IONOS vServers or VPSs also work with virtualized hardware. However, in this case the resources come from a single host. You book a fixed setup, which is available at a monthly flat fee.
• Dedicated Server: Anyone looking for dedicated enterprise hardware will find the right answer in the dedicated servers from IONOS. As with the cloud servers, performance is billed by the minute.

Typical Craftopia server scenarios and suitable IONOS plans

Need a little more help choosing the right Craftopia server hardware from IONOS? Below, we’ve listed three possible scenarios for your dedicated, self-hosted server, including the most suitable options from IONOS in each case.

How to create a Craftopia server for Windows step by step

As soon as the hardware is running, you can start installing and configuring your own Craftopia server. In the following sections, we describe the individual steps as an example for IONOS customers (vServer, Cloud Server, Dedicated Server). SteamCMD is used to download the application and the operating system is Windows Server 2022.

Step 1: Establish a remote connection

You can access the rented hardware remotely, i.e., via remote access. In Windows, you establish a corresponding connection using the “Remote desktop connection” tool. You can find the required login details in your customer account:

1. Go to the IONOS customer account login page and log in.
2. Call up the Server & Cloud product menu and select your server.
3. Under “Login Data”, you’ll find the server IP address and your data for the remote login (“User” and “Initial Password”). Copy or make a note of this information.
4. Start the Remote Desktop Connection application and connect to the server remotely.
5. If a corresponding query appears, classify the server’s certificate as trustworthy.

Step 2: Install SteamCMD

SteamCMD is the easiest and fastest way to install the Craftopia Dedicated Server app. The Steam command line client allows you to easily register on the public servers of the gaming platform, where you can then download the application to your server in just a few minutes. Follow these steps to make the client ready for use on your system:

1. Download the SteamCMD installation package via the link provided.
2. Create a suitable directory such as C:\SteamCMD and unpack the ZIP file in this directory.
3. Install SteamCMD by double-clicking on the unzipped file.

Step 3: Install Craftopia dedicated server

You can now start the command line client at any time by clicking on steamcmd.exe. Right at the start, the program updates itself automatically if there is a new SteamCMD update. You can tell that the client is ready for your input by the Steam> input line. To install the dedicated server application for the Craftopia server, proceed as follows:

Create a directory for your Craftopia server, for example C:\craftopia-server, by executing the following command:

force_install_dir C:\craftopia-server

Then log in to the public Steam servers. An anonymous login without entering your Steam account is sufficient:

login anonymous

Use the command app_update and the app ID of Craftopia dedicated server 1670340 to start downloading and installing the server files:

app_update 1670340 validate

As soon as the process is complete, exit SteamCMD by entering the command quit. To update the server at a later date, simply carry out these steps again.

Step 4: Configure the Craftopia server

You configure your Craftopia server through the ServerSetting.ini file. This file isn’t present by default in the specified directory after installation, but it is automatically generated after you launch the Craftopia.exe file for the first time.

If you then open the file with any text editor, you’ll see all available options listed right at the beginning. The prefix ; means that these are only explanations of the individual parameters. The actual server configuration begins further down with the line [GameWorld]. Use the instructions to create the desired settings for server name, difficulty level, number of players, etc. and then save the file to confirm the new configuration.

Step 5: Open server ports

To ensure the availability of your server, some ports must be opened in the firewall settings. The following TCP/UDP ports are affected (provided you have not made any adjustments in the configuration file):

• TCP: 6587, 27015-27030, 27036-27037
• UDP: 4380, 6587, 27000-27031, 27036

You can easily adjust the firewall configuration of your Craftopia server via your IONOS customer account. To do this, log in again and then proceed as follows:

1. Go to the Server & Cloud category.
2. Select the plan on which you have installed the Craftopia server.
3. Click on Network and Firewall policies in the menu on the left.
4. In the last step, create the rules for the listed TCP/UDP ports under incoming.

Step 6: Start the server

To start the server, you can now simply execute Craftopia.exe. The best way to do this is to create a simple batch script with the following content:

start Craftopia.exe -batchmode -showlogs

Step 7: Connect with the Craftopia server

To establish a connection with the created server, follow the steps below:

1. Start Craftopia.
2. Select Multiplayer from the menu.
3. Create or select a character.
4. Click on Join via IP.
5. Enter the IP address of your server and add the port 6587 followed by :.
6. Click on Start to establish the connection.

As soon as you have connected to the server, the crafting adventure can begin!