Operating system: Must be a Windows-based 64-bit OS.

Processor: Quad core processor @ 2.5Ghz or faster.

RAM: Minimum of 8GB (DDR3 preferably).

Note: Memory, CPU and bandwidth usage increases as the number of connected players increases. This is worth remembering if you’re using a 3rd party provider who’s rates are based on bandwidth usage or if you have a hard limit of your machine’s hardware.

There are many websites with tutorials on port forwarding. It is highly suggested you visit https://portforward.com/, which offers tutorials for the majority of routers.

What ports work depends on you. 27015, 27016, 7779 and 7777 are the most common.

You MUST forward both TCP and UDP for your server to show up on any lists. You can make sure your ports are open by using http://canyouseeme.org/

Good luck, port forwarding is not very easy.

The information in this section is correct as of Version V0.33 (LIVE) #180808.132514, page updated 15th August 2018.

This guide will demonstrate how to setup a LAN server on your own PC using our Game Launcher.

Make sure that you have the “Live” branch of the game installed, rather than the Beta. For a quick check, in your Steam Games Library if it is displayed like this “The Black Death [beta]” you have the Beta test branch installed. If you don’t see the [beta] on the end of the games title, you have the Live build installed. To switch builds see this Steam post here.

Step 1:
Make sure you are Online on Steam and press “Play” on The Black Death in your Steam Games Library.

Select “Play Launcher” and click Play.



Step 2:

When the Game Launcher has loaded, select the “Server” tab. Enter your desired server name and choose a password.

Please Note: Your Server name CANNOT contain any spaces! If you click on "Launch Server" and a Windows pop-up box saying "PlagueLauncher.exe" has crashed..." this could be the cause.

Your server name cannot have any spaces and the password you set here will be for the server commands and NOT to password the server itself. Select if you want to have Player VS Player damage on by ticking the checkbox, leave this blank if you prefer player vs player damage on (like our Official Servers).

After doing the above, click on “Launch Server”.



After doing the above, click on “Launch Server”, you should see a command window such as the one below. Let this run in the background, and make sure not to close it until you safely press “Quit” when you are finished playing in game.

When you are finished playing, when pressing Quit, you will need to close the game properly for the RAMA Save Engine to save your server data safely without any errors. Pressing the Esc key and selecting “Quit” and then “Yes” and waiting for the game to close to the Desktop is important for the server data to be saved on your PC.



Step 3:

Click on “Enter” on the Game Launcher to load up The Black Death through Steam. Be sure NOT to close the command window, as this will run in the background whilst your LAN server is running. Be sure to NOT close this window until you have finished your play session as mentioned above, it will need to save your data.

When The Black Death has loaded up, navigate to the “LAN” tab in the Server Browser. Give the game a few moments and your LAN server name should appear! You may need to Tab to the Desktop to allow “Plague.exe” or “PlagueLauncher.exe” through your Windows Firewall or other Firewall software you are using, make sure to click “Allow” on this pop-up.



“Plague” is the project name in our Unreal Engine builds for The Black Death, as it is the original codename!

Step 5:

Click on your server in the browser list. After a short loading screen or 2 you will now be playing in your own LAN server!



Press the Sec key, and look to the bottom left hand corner of the screen. You should see the “SERVER” listed as the one that you set on the Game Launcher!



Step 6:
When you have finished playing The Black Death for your play session. Press the Esc key and select “Quit” as displayed in the screenshot above. Press “Yes” on the Save and Quit pop-up box. When The Black Death itself has safely shut down, you can then press the “X” on the Console Command server window to safely close your LAN server down.

DO NOT close the Server Command window, until The Black Death game process has been closed properly!

You will need to close the game properly for the RAMA Save Engine to save your server data safely without any errors. Pressing the Esc key and selecting “Quit” and then “Yes” and waiting for the game to close to the Desktop is important for the server data to be saved on your PC.

Step 7 (Optional):
If you set an Admin Password in the Game Launcher in Step 2, you can use the guide below to use Server Commands on your LAN server.

In this section we will be covering the Steam CMD command line setup for a dedicated server.


Download SteamCMD
Remember your DOWNLOADED_STEAMCMD_LOCATION
Launch SteamCMD

Official SteamCMD Download link:
https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/client/installer/steamcmd.zip

Here is the SteamCMD official documentation from Valve if you need further information:
https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/SteamCMD

Type the following commands in step by step and hit the Enter key. Make sure to type these in slowly, these are also case sensitive. (Note: the step where you install the dedicated server may take some time depending on your internet download speed)

login anonymous

force_install_dir “C:\TheBlackDeathServer”

app_update 485250 validate

exit

Note: you can change “C:\TheBlackDeathServer” into the location of your choosing. This name MUST be the same as it is written above.

Or in command line you can do the following:

C:\DOWNLOADED_STEAMCMD_LOCATION\ steamcmd +login anonymous +force_install_dir “C:\TheBlackDeathServer” +app_update 485250 +quit


In this section we will be creating a .bat file that will be used to start your server.

Windows .bat setup

1. Open notepad, and copy the following below and paste it into a blank Notepad file.
PlagueServer.exe Persistant? -QueryPort=27015 -Port=7779 -MaxPlayers=50 -server -ServerName=MyServerName

Note: you can change "MyServerName" to what you want the server to be called.

2. Save this Notepad file in C:\theblackdeathserver\Plague\Binaries\Win64, next to PlagueServer.exe

3. rename the Notepad file to "StartServer.Bat" and make sure the file type changes. The icon next to the file name should change from a small notebook icon, to a box with a cog in the corner.

Alternatively, when you are saving your file, you can click the drop down menu and from " .txt" you can select "all files" and then enter ".bat" on the end of your file name. Make sure to check the icon image has changed when doing this.

4. Port forwarding for -QueryPort=27015 -Port=7779 might need setting up. For information on how to do this, check the first section of this Guide titled " Port Forwarding And Network".

In this section we will be looking at using the new Admin Control Panel to use server commands on your LAN and privately hosted Community servers.

The Visual Admin Panel is much easier to use and has more commands available for players. Also, you don't need to use the Tilde key to use this panel! (The ` key)

To use this Server Admin Panel, you will first need to setup a password on your server.

On the Server launcher, there is a password field called “AdminPassword”, (Step 2 of the LAN Setup Guide) put your chosen server name and password in the Game Launcher and start your server by clicking on “Launch Server”.

Once you are in game, you can bring up the Admin Control Panel by pressing the F8 key. You will then have this window appear as shown in the screenshot below.



Make sure you made a note of the password that you entered earlier on the Game Launcher setup for your LAN server, or in your .bat file for your Community hosted server! This is where you will need it.

Enter your password in this field and then hit the Enter key. You should then have the Admin Control Panel window that looks like the screenshot below.



There are a lot of different options in this panel. So lets go through all of them.


Currently, there is only one option in here, Starting and Stopping the Day/Night cycle on the server. If you would like to change your server from a PvP to a PvE server, you can select the checkbox/tickbox on the Game Launcher "Server" tab before clicking on "Launch Server".


This section features all of the commands that you can use on your own character.

"Fly" and "Stop Fly" are the same as how the "ServerCommand fly" functions, but this is a more visual way of enabling and disabling these commands.

"Make Sick" and "Cure" are used to infect your character with the Plague and Cure is used to instantly cure your sickness. Players can choose to enable sickness if they want to cause havoc to other players by infecting them!

"Give Health", "Give Gold", "Give Skill Points" and "Give XP" all work on number values. Enter a number, without any punctuation such as "5000" and then click on the relevant command. These commands work instantly and will be applied to your character.


This section will show you how to spawn items into your LAN or private Community server.

Items are spawned in by using the "recipe name" of an item. Some are not the same, for example, if you want to spawn the "Halberd" weapon, this is actually known as the "Iron Spear" as it's recipe name.

Please note: Recipe names are spelt using the United Kingdom (English) dictionary spellings, words like "Armour" are spelt with a U included, rather than the American version spelt like "Armor", just encase your items don't spawn, this might be why. Make sure to such the recipe name!

Here is a screenshot showing some example recipe names that you can use:



You will need to make sure that you type these recipe names in with no spelling errors for them to work. "Bread" and "Clean Water" are good for survival and also "Gauze". Enter the recipe name and then the amount that you would like to spawn and click on "Make Item".

Please note: If you enter a large number of a particular item, such as the Kingdom Wall, you may have some lag as they are spawned in your characters Inventory!

If you have items on your Quick Slot Bar, when you select "Make Item" they will appear in your Inventory! If you don't have any items on your Quick Slot Bar, they will spawn here first, and then in your Inventory.


Where the "Players On Server" text is located, if you have other players on your LAN or Community server, they will be listed here with their Steam names displayed in a list.

These commands on the right hand side are to be used on other players! Make sure that those you trust on your LAN and Community servers use these correctly and don't abuse your server rules.

If you wish to apply something to another player, click on their name in the list, then click on one of the commands at the side. For commands that require text entry, simply type in the amount, much like the "ME" commands, then click on the command name. When you have selected a player, the green text which defaults to "NONE" will change to the players Steam name that you have selected.

The "KICK" feature at the bottom of this panel will kick that player from your server back to the Main Menu. Currently, this will not ban a player but simply kick them from your server.


These are NOT to be used lightly and are quite powerful in their functions.

"DELETE ALL BUILDINGS"

This process is NOT reversible!
This will delete and wipe ALL player built structures from your LAN/Community server. This won't just delete your own buildings but EVERY player who has save data on your server, it is basically a "full wipe" for buildings. Make sure that whoever has access to your server password is trusted with this Admin Panel. When using this command, a pop-up box asking you to confirm your actions will appear as an extra layer of security. This can be used for RP events or custom rules too.



When performing a full wipe of all built structures on your LAN/Community server, it is best advised, that the person doing this is the only one logged into the server, to prevent any potential issues.

"DELETE PLAYER SAVE"

This process is NOT reversible!
This command will delete a specific player's save data on your LAN/Community server. This will NOT delete the players building save data, but will delete all of their character save data from the server. ONLY enter ONE Steam ID at a time when using this command tool.



When deleting a players character save data, make sure that they do NOT have The Black Death running on Steam. This can cause issues when using this command tool, if they are logged in it can cause the save data to try and load or overwrite itself.

To find players who you have recently played with, or you are currently playing with on your own LAN/Community server you can do the following.

If you are unsure of a Player's Steam name, or you find that they have changed their Steam name, here is a tip for you to find who you have been playing with on a server.

When you are in game:

Press the Steam default keybinding of "Shift + Tab" to bring up the Steam overlay. Then click on "View Players".

"Current Game" will show the player's that are currently playing on the same server you are on.

"Recent Games" will show players that you have also played with, if you have hopped onto other servers for The Black Death and other Steam Games too.

Simply clicking on their Profile picture will take you to their Steam Profile.

We also need their Steam Name and more importantly their Steam ID. This is the long URL/Address of their Profile.

Some players have a custom Profile URL. These can look like one of the following 2 examples:

https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/id/SIG_Emily/

https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/profiles/76561198318030488/

When you are not in game:

Go to your Steam Client and click on “View” at the very top. Then click on “Players” from here you can then select “Recent Games” and see people you have played with on The Black Death recently as well as other Steam games.

On the Server launcher, there is a password field called “AdminPassword”, (Step 2 of the LAN Setup Guide) put your chosen server name and password in the Game Launcher and start your server by clicking on “Launch Server”.

Once you are in game you need to press the tilde key (usually found next to the number 1 on the left and just above the Tab key on your keyboard). Press this to bring up the Console Command line.

If you do not have an English (United Kingdom) layout keyboard you can use our handy guide over on our Steam Hub and bring up the On-Screen Keyboard in Windows to use the Tilde key.
How To Use The Console Command Window Without A UK English Keyboard

From here type in EnterAdminPassword *insert your password here* and press Enter.

As an example, this would look like:

EnterAdminPassword Biscuit



To use Server Commands simply press the tilde key again to bring up the console and enter one of the commands listed below, these are case sensitive so make sure to enter them correctly!

These work as follows:

Fly Command
This command allows you to fly around the world and get to places faster than on foot. With this command to disable flying you will need to make sure that you are close to the ground before you enter the command again else you may die from fall damage. To turn off fly simply enter the same command again.

ServerCommand fly



Give XP Command
This command will give you one skill point when used. This can be entered multiple times, to gain another skill point simply enter the command again and hit Enter.

ServerCommand givexp




Give Gold Command
This command will give you 100,000 gold when used. This can be entered multiple times, to gain another 100,000 gold simply enter the command again and hit Enter.

ServerCommand givegold