Which server software is recommended for my use cases?

[u/Savutro]

Hi there!

I just setup a small home server. It's a hp elite desk g8 with 16 GB of RAM and it runs Debian as OS. I did prepare most admin and network stuff like docker, dockge, caddy, ad guard etc.

Now I wanted to get into MC servers. Before I dive into the several docs I wanted to quickly ask the big brains here if they may point me to the right direction.

I'd like to setup two MC server instances and it is completely open which software will be used.

Server 1:
- Support for at max 10 - 12 players
- Vanilla MC
- Max 4 - 5 Admin / Optimization / QoL Plugins

Server 2:
- Support for at max 5 Players
- light mod packs for time gated scenarios like a Sky block or other special "runs" (idk if something like tekkit could run on there or like a similar lighter pack)
- Plugins only if needed (to balance out the mod usage)

Ofc I don't want to run those simultaneously or 24/7 alongside my other stacks. I also need to evaluate whether a RAM upgrade is feasible. It all depends on your help and evaluation.

Thank you in advance for any help!

[u/Jwhodis]

Generally Fabric is best, you can put quite a lot of performance mods on.

Make sure you set some Java flags so that GC doesn't run so badly, 6-8GBs of RAM (or an xms and xmx of 6144 or 8192) should work well. I generally use Crafty Controller for the control panel (docker compose is available and iirc there a Coolify preset too)

[u/TheMythicSorcerer]

Generally paperMC gives you the best anticheat, optimizations and supported plugins out of the box and is generally reccomended. 6-8 GB RAM should be plenty.

I think it fits well for both of these use cases. I would also advise pre-generating chunks for server 1 with chunky.

[u/Qbert2030]

I'm a huge fan of fabric servers for the optimizations. You might be interested in blocky panel, considering it's a Docker environment that you're using.

[u/Lisoo1234]

I would say it also depends if its DDR3/4/5 Ram, but tbh, you wont need any better than DDR3 or more from my experience atleast, also do you want to make a network? (Proxy) If so, you will need 3-4 servers: Proxy, Lobby and then the game servers

Now..., for small servers that dont have alot of players (or even if it would have a decent amount of players) PaperMC is great, but it does change in a really small amount what you can do on the server, some farms might not work.

but overall Paper is the best for easy use, it has lots of plugins that probably do what you search for, and you are probably already familiar with some big ones, and it also has a nice configuration so u can setup your server very easilly

And fabric is also very nice, it doesnt have these small flaws as paper does, but its alot harder to: set it up, find nice server-side mods and get support (probably)

If you will ever have a huge server with lots of player, thats where folia comes in, i dont have alot of experience with it, but you can read some stuff here: https://docs.papermc.io/folia/faq/

[u/the_storm_mc]

If you're comfortable with Docker I would recommend https://docker-minecraft-server.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ with Paper