Dedicated Servers
Taken from the Official Page:
Dedicated servers in Space Engineers allow players to connect to a third party host, rather than using a player-host, in a peer-to-peer set-up. They are game instances intended for long time multiplayer games. They don’t depend on any player and they run without render and visual/audio effects.
This will result to a faster connection and a more fluent multiplayer performance with less lag.Dedicated servers are available for everyone who own Space Engineers. You don’t need an extra Steam account, you get Space engineers dedicated server for free to your existing Space Engineers account.
Notes:Dedicated servers are currently allowed only for non-commercial use, so companies that host game servers or everyone who wants to host his server at such company will not be able to do so (this will be available very soon).
In order to run a dedicated server, players don't require a licensed copy of the game. However to legally obtain the game server files, at least one Steam account needs to have a valid license.
REQUIREMENTS
a) A Windows PC with administrator account (only if the server will be run as a service) b) .NET redistributable (version 4 or higher) c) Static IP address, if you intend to host the game publicly, so that anyone from the Internet can connect to it
INSTALLATION
a) On PC with steam and SE- Congratulations! You already have the dedicated server installed along with SE, just go to the game’s installation directory (browse to “ C:\Program Files(x86)\Steam\SteamApps\SpaceEngineers” or alternatively right-click on the game in your Steam library, select “Properties” and under the tab “Local Files” click “Browse Local Files…”). In the installation directory, you will find a folder named DedicatedServer(64) with the server’s executable.
b) On PC without steam- You need to obtain the dedicated server files, which can be found in the C:\Program Files(x86)\Steam\SteamApps\SpaceEngineers\Tools\DedicatedServer.zip archive- Extract the archive on the target machine and you should be ready to run the server (you may need to install .Net redistributable from _CommonRedist folder - www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=17851)
QUICK SERVER SETUP
a) Basic setup as a foreground process -Run SpaceEngineersDedicated.exe -Choose “Local/Console” item in list of servers -Click “Continue to server configuration” -Here you can set variety of options. They work the same way as in the game. -Fill in the name of the server -Press “Save config and start” and you are ready to playb) Setup as a service -Run SpaceEngineersDedicated.exe as Administrator -Press the “Add new instance” button -Fill in the name of the service (must be unique system-wide) -Choose the service you just created from the list of server instances -Setup your game the same way as with a foreground process -Pay attention to ports in “Server settings”, as a single port can only be used by one server instance== USER INTERFACE ==1. Server list Here you can see the list of the server instances. There’s always one instance named “Local/Console” and optionally several other instances with custom names. The “Local/Console” instance is run on foreground as a standard application and is always there, while the other instances that the user creates are run in the background as Windows services 2. Global configuration Here you can set, whether the game log files should have dates appended to them and whether the server should automatically send the log files to Keen Software House upon crash.3. This message is shown when the application is not run with administrator right.If you want to create or manage the server as a service you need administrator rights. The button “Run as Admin” will restart the application with administrator rights.4. Buttons- Add new instance - Creates a new instance of the dedicated server as a Windows service.- Remove instance - Removes an instance of the dedicated server- Continue to server configuration - Starts server instance configuration utility for the selected instances- Exit - Closes the configuration utility== SERVER CONFIGURATION ==1. New game / Saved worlds optionLets you choose between starting a new world generated from a scenario or loading a previously saved worldThe previously saved worlds are loaded either from the “AppData\Roaming\SpaceEngineersDedicated” folder in your home directory (e.g. “C:\Users\John.Doe”) or from the “ProgramData\SpaceEngineersDedicated” folder in the system root. To be able to play a world on the dedicated server that you previously created and saved in the game, you will have to copy it from your save game directory “AppData\Roaming\SpaceEngineers” to the respective folder.2. Game settingsScenario - can only be chosen for the “New game” optionOther settings work as you know them from the game with the added bonus that you can set the numerical options to any value you want.(Warning: Values out of the range allowed by the game user interface are not tested and officially unsupported. They can seriously affect the game experience and performance)3. Server settingsListen IP - Address of network interface that the server will listen on. This can be set to “0.0.0.0” (which is the default value) to listen on all interfaces, which should work fine in most casesServer port – Number of the port that the server will listen onServer name - Name that will be shown in the server listServer admins - Steam IDs (not nicknames) of the players with administrator privileges on the server (such as kicking and banning other players), each of them on a separate line*Steam Group ID – If set to non-zero value, the dedicated server will only be visible for the given Steam group* Note: By “Steam ID” we mean the unique numerical identifier for a Steam account in the 64-bit format. Your Steam ID in this format can be found in the game log after running the game with Steam logged-in to your Steam account (see above) or using external tools like http://steamid.co/ or http://steamidfinder.ru/4. Buttons- Save config - Saves the configuration for the current server instance- Edit config - Opens the current instance’s configuration file in a text editor for manual editing- Save config and start - Saves the current configuration and starts the server either as a foreground application or as a system service.- Restart – (only for service instances) Restarts the server instance- Stop – (only for service instances) Stops the server instance- Back to instances - Returns to the screen with the list of server instances- Exit - Closes the configuration utility (but not the dedicated server, if it is running as a service)== COMMAND LINE TOOL ==You can run SpaceEngineersDedicated.exe with the following arguments“-console” - starts a server instance as an application== ROUTER AND FIREWALL SETTINGS ==a) Static IP: If you intend to run a game that people from all over the Internet can connect to, you will need a static public IP address. Your internet service provider should tell you whether you have one or not. Without the static IP address, you will be able to host a dedicated server on your LAN, but people from outside the LAN won’t be able to connect to it.b) Port forwarding: The game uses UDP protocol to communicate. The default listen port is 27016, but this can be changed in the config tool. In order for people to be able to reach your server, you will have to configure your router to forward all incoming UDP traffic on port 27016 (or any other that you have specified) to the computer where your dedicated server is running.c) Firewall settings: Make sure to set the firewall on your server computer to allow incoming UDP traffic on the listen port.
