So you have just created your new server and feel you are ready to open it up to the public. But are you truly ready? Have you gone over a checklist with yourself/other staff first off?
If you feel you are ready and within the week or month no players are coming into the server or just join to ask for staff and leave when they don’t get the rank - you have a problem.
In this guide, I will teach you how to start up a high quality minecraft server, how to keep players interested and how to manage and properly select a good staff team. You will also receive pointers, a beginners checklist and my email for further consultation over this guide.
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Am I ready?
Most of the time, when you feel “ready”, you actually aren’t. You don’t know what to expect, you’re experiencing major bugs, chunk errors, missing or incomplete builds, little to no staff team and no server plan. You may or may not have a voting system set up or even a website as of yet. This checklist below will help accommodate to your needs as a server owner before you decide to open to the public.
**Note** Keep your server on whitelist until it is completely finished - you don’t want griefers coming in before you fix your perms.
Have I built everything completely? No missing shop/pvp arena/games/ect
Have I checked out the server to see if permissions run properly?
Have I installed the proper plugins/desired plugins and ran them through twice to make sure they are working?
Have I made sure to hire a trustworthy staff team?
Have I set up my website?
Have I fixed any recurring errors on the server?
Have I triple checked to make sure everything is in order and ready for the release date?
Have I advertised thoroughly to make sure I have players come online for the launch date?
Keeping players
You’ve done all you can to create your idea of an awesome server, but is it really that good to keep players actively interested? Take the time to consider what has been done over and over and what kind of things seem to be generic in minecraft servers. For instance, if you wanted to create a Faction server, you could add an MMO or FPS setting to it. Players could roleplay while still enjoying the aspect of playing Factions.
Or you could look all all the different plugins that have been made and decide for yourself what you think will make your server stand out from all the others.
Examples for keeping players:
Cool plugins
Custom builds
A great staff/player relationship
Contests
Drop parties
If you have ideas of your own, you could totally add them in, anything to keep your server going.
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Selecting a staff team
Deciding on who makes a better staff member is harder than it seems. You’ve got to keep in check who is there to actually HELP out the server, who is there for the rank and who might abuse their staff powers. When looking for appropriate people to work on the server, you need to create a staff plan. This plan entitles what you look for in staff and what you’d like them to follow by. When creating said plan, remember main things that you want different staff to memorize and practice.
Example of a staff plan:
Head Administrators
Have power over staff below him or her
Work with problems regarding buycraft, complaints, server related issues
Report to Owners if necessary
Take care of the server as second representative.
Administrators
File all reports given by developers/mods/helpers
When there’s a problem they cannot fix, they’d go to their Head-Admin
Work on the server as required and keep staff below him or her in line
Work on the website if needed
Head-Moderator
Keeps moderators and Helpers in check
Helps create contests
Hosts drop parties
Is a part of the community
Makes sure players are happy
Reports to Admin if needed
Moderator
Watches over the Helper, makes sure he or she does their job
Helps host Drop parties
Moderates the chat as needed
Helps players out as needed
Creates a warm community - great player/staff relationship
Reports to Head-Moderator as needed
Helper
Moderates chat
Is the voice of the players
Helps players new and old
Greets players and directs them to the rules and their kit
Creates a great community for players to enjoy
Reports to Moderator as needed.
Things you want to remember to tell your staff:
Go by the Law of F - Be Firm, Fair and Friendly
Don’t automatically go off of what a player says. Confirm.
Take screenshots or videos. Proof is always needed.
Players are players. Staff are staff. You are there to make sure your server runs smoothly, don’t get caught playing favorites.
When recruiting a staff team, be sure to have your applicants go into detail. Have them list previous servers and do a small background check to make sure they are indeed who they say they are. Make sure to interview them to go over what you’ve accepted as their application and see if they’d truly like to become staff on your team.
So you have just created your new server and feel you are ready to open it up to the public. But are you truly ready? Have you gone over a checklist with yourself/other staff first off?
If you feel you are ready and within the week or month no players are coming into the server or just join to ask for staff and leave when they don’t get the rank - you have a problem.
In this guide, I will teach you how to start up a high quality minecraft server, how to keep players interested and how to manage and properly select a good staff team. You will also receive pointers, a beginners checklist and my email for further consultation over this guide.
Most of the time, when you feel “ready”, you actually aren’t. You don’t know what to expect, you’re experiencing major bugs, chunk errors, missing or incomplete builds, little to no staff team and no server plan. You may or may not have a voting system set up or even a website as of yet. This checklist below will help accommodate to your needs as a server owner before you decide to open to the public.
**Note** Keep your server on whitelist until it is completely finished - you don’t want griefers coming in before you fix your perms.
You’ve done all you can to create your idea of an awesome server, but is it really that good to keep players actively interested? Take the time to consider what has been done over and over and what kind of things seem to be generic in minecraft servers. For instance, if you wanted to create a Faction server, you could add an MMO or FPS setting to it. Players could roleplay while still enjoying the aspect of playing Factions.
Or you could look all all the different plugins that have been made and decide for yourself what you think will make your server stand out from all the others.
Examples for keeping players:
If you have ideas of your own, you could totally add them in, anything to keep your server going.
Deciding on who makes a better staff member is harder than it seems. You’ve got to keep in check who is there to actually HELP out the server, who is there for the rank and who might abuse their staff powers. When looking for appropriate people to work on the server, you need to create a staff plan. This plan entitles what you look for in staff and what you’d like them to follow by. When creating said plan, remember main things that you want different staff to memorize and practice.
Example of a staff plan:
Head Administrators
Have power over staff below him or her
Work with problems regarding buycraft, complaints, server related issues
Report to Owners if necessary
Take care of the server as second representative.
Administrators
File all reports given by developers/mods/helpers
When there’s a problem they cannot fix, they’d go to their Head-Admin
Work on the server as required and keep staff below him or her in line
Work on the website if needed
Head-Moderator
Keeps moderators and Helpers in check
Helps create contests
Hosts drop parties
Is a part of the community
Makes sure players are happy
Reports to Admin if needed
Moderator
Watches over the Helper, makes sure he or she does their job
Helps host Drop parties
Moderates the chat as needed
Helps players out as needed
Creates a warm community - great player/staff relationship
Reports to Head-Moderator as needed
Helper
Things you want to remember to tell your staff:
I love this guide. Thanks. I may be bookmarking this.
Thanks so much, this feedback means alot to me
I hope this helps with your future server endeavours.
It definitely does, as it makes me think more into my staff members and what they should really be doing. Keep it up!
Great tutorial, nice work. This could definitely be some help towards new server owners.
Thank you for your kind words. I hope to see a lot of great servers in the future.
Saved this to Pocket for future reference when it's time to start up my server. Right now I'm working on configuring it.
Gaming PC: AMD A8-7600 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor | Gigabyte GA-F2A68HM-DS2H Micro ATX Motherboard | Kingston HyperX Fury Blue 4GB DDR3-1866 Memory | Western Digital BLACK SERIES 500GB 2.5" 7200 RPM Internal Hard Drive | Thermaltake VL80001W2Z ATX Mid Tower Case | Corsair Builder 430W 80 + Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply | Windows 10 Insider Preview 64-Bit |
Laptop: Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 2.4GHz Dual-Core Processor | Dell Inc. 0F328M Motherboard | 4GB DDR2-667MHz Memory | 74GB Seagate ST980313AS ATA Hard Drive | Dell Latitude E6500 Chassis | Dell 90W AC Adapter | Windows 10 Insider Preview 32-Bit |
Contact me for support or just to chat about PCs, gaming, anime, etc.
Hope this was helpful. If you ever want, I can teach you a bit more when setting up a potentially great server.
I now do one on one server setups if you ever need help.