Modding from the Start
Hytale has had modding on the menu since the beginning. The developers introduced mod support at launch, and even got some active Minecraft modders to develop mods before that, which kickstarted the modding scene right from the start.
In another effort to bolster the modding scene, the game makes it incredibly easy to manage mods for dedicated servers and users. When you add a mod to a server, anyone who joins will automatically install and activate the mod. That means no tinkering, installing, configuring, or troubleshooting for the end user. You just join, and that's it. You can also join multiple modded servers with different sets of mods and the game handles it all automatically.
And adding mods to servers is almost as easy. It really just boils down to:
- Put the mod file in the mods folder
- Restart the server
- And that's it! Of course, actually doing it involves a few more steps than that like downloading the mod and uploading it to the server, so in this article I want to go over how to upload mods to your Hytale server, as well as mention a few notable mods that I think everyone should check out.
How to Add Mods to Hytale
###Step 1: Download the mod.
The first step to add mods to your Hytale server is to download the mod. This can be done on Curseforge, among other places. The file will usually come in a .jar or a .zip file.
###Step 2: Upload the mod to your Hytale server.
This step varies depending on where you are hosting your server, but with Akliz, it is easy. Just use SFTP to connect to your server and find the mods folder, then drag the mod file into that folder.
###Step 3: Restart the server. Finally, simply restart the server and the mod will load.
And that's it! You now have a mod installed on your server, and any user who joins your server will automatically have the mods activated too.
Important Mod Utilities
There are a couple mods I want to bring up separately from other "fun" mods. These are the nyoUpdates mod and the performance saver mod. In my opinion these two are essential additions to any modded Hytale server.
nyoUpdates
This mod is my favorite. It has 2 main functions - the graphical mod manager and the auto-update function. While the former is great, the crown jewel, in my opinion, is the latter. Let me explain how it works.
The GUI lets you browse and install mods from Curseforge. That in itself is very nice, you don't even have to leave your game or use a separate application to mod Hytale now. Very convenient. You can edit the mod's settings in-game as well, which is nice. There are several other things the GUI can do, but I'll let you check out the rest of the features for yourself.
What I really want to talk about is the ability to automatically update mods. The mod has two modes; manual and automatic. On single-player, you have to use manual mode (as of the time of writing). On servers, you can either use manual mode, or automatic mode. In automatic mode, the mod can scan all of the mods you have installed, identify which Curseforge mods they are, check for updates, and even apply updates. You can disable auto-updates for specific mods if you'd like as well on a case-by-case basis. Amazingly, the mod can even automatically update itself! The machines are self-improving. Humans' time on this planet is drawing to a close.
One thing to note, though, is that not all server hosts will support this out of the box, as you need a special start command flag set to allow this mod to update mods on startup. That would be --accept-early-plugins. Luckily, Akliz does support this as of the next update to the game, and already supports it in the pre-release version of the game. Until then, if you want this added to your game, just reach out in our support chat.
"I've seen auto-updating in action before," you might say. "Steam games auto-update don't they?" This is true. But everything changes when it applies to manually installed mods. The ability to automatically update mods individually, paired with Hytale's ability to send mods to clients automatically makes for a truly seamless user experience. No longer do you have to tell your users to update their game or their mods, and you don't even have to tell users anything was updated at all. To the end user, it's like magic. They load up Hytale, join the server, and BOOM! All of a sudden there are new features to see, bug fixes applied, and if you like sneaking in mods without telling anyone like I do, swaths of new content to accidentally discover naturally. As a server owner, you can install a mod and then forget about it. It will update itself, fix bugs by itself, and keep up to date with new versions of the base game without you having to constantly check for updates or keep watch for bug fixes.
I know, I'm really hyping this mod up. But it is truly one of the most seamless and convenient mod management experiences I've ever had with a game, especially for the end-user.
To learn more about this mod and how to use the more advanced features, check it out here.
PerformanceSaver
This mod, while not as cool and revolutionary as nyoUpdates, is just as game-changing. Understandably, Hytale is still in very early access and can sometimes have some performance hiccups. If you get enough players online, explore quickly enough, or even just get unlucky, you can notice server lag and TPS drops. This mod was made to eliminate that almost entirely.
Through several different methods, it achieves near perfect performance in most servers. In my personal server, I never saw a single bit of lag once I added it. It requires no manual configuration to work its magic either - just drop it into the mods folder, restart the server, and it starts working.
However there are several features you can configure. I won't bore you with the details - you can check out the mod's Curseforge page for that, but it achieves huge performance increases by enabling features like dynamic view distance, TPS limiting, efficient RAM management, and other background tweaks.
Until the game is further into development and gets some serious optimization passes, I recommend this mod for every server.
Other Fun Mods
Now that I have gone over my two favorites, the absolute necessities for running a server, let me tell you about a few other mods I enjoy that you might too. These aren't strictly necessary, and are very subjective, but I think they are very neat.
Better Map
This mod is quite simple. It saves your map data so it persists between world and server joins, increases the range in which you can see the world around you on the map, and adds features like waypoints, zoom, shared mapping, and improves performance over the default map.
Daily Dad
This is one of my favorites. Each time you log in, it displays a corny dad joke. That's it. Love it.
Eye Spy
This one is just like WAILA, Jade, or The One Probe. It just shows you what block you're looking at. With a brand new game, I frequently have no idea what I'm looking at so this is a great utility.
Hyroll
You know those under construction signs you see all over the place? Ever get bored of them? Do you want to Rick Roll your friends? Well do I have the mod for you. It replaces all under construction signs with a pixelated Rick Astley from the music video "Never Gonna Give You Up."
Gone Fishing
This mod adds a fishing pole which you can use to catch every fish in the game. It's pretty simple now, but will hopefully get fleshed-out eventually. It's a nice way to sit back and chill out while your friends go get themselves killed by vikings or dinosaurs.
Macaw's Mods
You may know of Macaw's furniture, doors, roofs, windows, and more, the popular Minecraft mods. Well sketch_macaw has made similar mods for Hytale, and they're all very nice. If you're a builder, I definitely recommend checking all of them out.
Simple Chest Manager
This one is one of my favorites. Similar to Tom's Simple Storage, you can connect to several nearby chests and display them in a single interface. You can search, retrieve, deposit, quick stack, and find locally all items in chests that are in range of the chest manager block. I'm sure in the future someone will make something that rivals Applied Energistics, but for now this is so much better than having a huge room full of chests where you can never remember exactly where everything goes.
Infinite Water Source
By default, Hytale does not have infinite water like Minecraft. If you accidentally bucket out a block of water from the middle of a lake, that lake now has a permanent ugly crater in it. No longer though, with this mod you can have as small as a 2x2 grid of water that replenishes itself for infinite water. You can build your own huge lake with just 2 buckets to get started.
Item Magnet
This one is a nice little convenience. It will pull nearby items toward you and eventually into your inventory. No more will you have to watch that piece of adamantite ore fall into the lava pit or have to run around that field you cleared picking up every last piece of dirt.
Want to start up a server and dive into all of these cool mods? It has never been easier with Akliz. You can start with as little as the 6gb plan. Grab a server here! We support the auto-update mod as well!