How to Make a Hardcore Minecraft Server to Play with Friends

What changes in hardcore

Difficulty is locked to hard and can't be lowered. When a player dies, they don't respawn: they switch to spectator mode and can keep watching and flying around the world, but without touching anything. Everyone else keeps playing.

It's a Minecraft Java option, the one in the server's server.properties (hardcore=true). You don't need any plugin or mod.

The important part: it's decided when the world is created

Minecraft stores whether a world is hardcore inside the world itself, and it does so when generating it. That's why changing the option on an existing world doesn't fully convert it, and removing it doesn't turn it back into a normal world either. The safe way is to turn it on and start a new world.

If you want to stay in the world you already have, it can be done, but by hand: with the server stopped, download the world folder's level.dat file, change the “hardcore” value to 1 with an NBT editor (such as NBTExplorer) and upload it again with the same name. Make a backup first: a broken level.dat leaves the world unable to start.

On your NapNodes server

1. Make a backup

   In “Backups”, create one. That way you can go back to the current world if you change your minds. (The free server has no backups: there, set the world aside as in step 4 instead of deleting it.)

2. Open “Settings”

   Under “The game”, turn on “Hardcore”: it saves by itself. The difficulty doesn't matter: in hardcore it's always hard.

3. Stop the server

   With “Stop”, and wait until it says “Offline”. World files should always be touched with the server stopped.

4. Set the current world aside

   In “Files”, rename the “world” folder (since 26.1 it contains the Nether and the End; on an older Paper server, also rename “world_nether” and “world_the_end”), for example to “world-before-hardcore”. When it can't find it, the server will create a new one.

5. Start it and wait

   With “Start”, the server generates the new world, already in hardcore. The first time takes a couple of minutes.

How to revive a player

Someone who dies in hardcore doesn't come back on their own, but an admin can give them survival mode back. In the panel console, without the slash: “gamemode survival PlayerName”. From the game, an admin types it with the slash in front (more commands in the admin commands guide).

They appear right where they were as a spectator. If you want them back at the start, take them there with “tp PlayerName x y z”. Admins are set in “Settings”, in the “Operators” list.

Agree on the rules before you start: whether reviving is allowed (for example, once per person) or whether a death is forever. If there are no admins who bend the rules, the game is fairer.

Ideas for playing as a group

Seasons: when the last one falls, set the world aside and start another, with a different seed if you like (level-seed in “Settings”, which only counts when creating a world). The old world stays saved in its folder.

Whitelist: in hardcore a single outsider can ruin the game. Turn on “Whitelist” and add your people to the list in “Settings”.

If it feels like too much, without hardcore and with the difficulty on “Hard” you get almost the same challenge, but respawning when you die.

Frequently asked questions