How to Put Your Minecraft Server in Creative (and Change the Difficulty)

The four game modes

1. Survival

   The normal one: health, hunger, mining to get blocks, and monsters depending on the difficulty.

2. Creative

   Every block in the inventory without limit, flying, no damage and everything breaks on the first hit. It's the one for building.

3. Adventure

   Like survival, but without being able to break or place blocks except with items set up for it. It's the one for adventure maps and minigames: the player can't wreck the map.

4. Spectator

   You fly through walls and look at everything, without touching anything. It's what people switch to when they die in hardcore, and the one for watching an event.

The mode for new players: “Game mode”

The server has a default mode: gamemode in server.properties. It's only given to people joining for the first time. Every player who has already joined keeps their own in the world, and that's the one they'll have even if you change the server's. That's why, when you change it, you stay the same.

In the NapNodes panel it's in “Settings” → “The game” → “Game mode”. It saves by itself when you pick it and applies from the next restart: the notice below has the “Restart” button.

Changing the mode for people already playing

For anyone who has already joined, you use the gamemode command. In the panel's “Console” it's typed without the slash and applies straight away, no restart needed; from the game, an admin types it with the slash in front. To be an admin, add your name in “Settings” → “Players” → “Operators”.

Since 1.13 the mode goes by its English name: “gamemode 1” or “gamemode c” from old guides no longer work on a server without plugins.

gamemode creative PlayerName
gamemode survival PlayerName
gamemode creative @a
gamemode adventure @a[gamemode=survival]

1. One player

   gamemode creative PlayerName, with their exact Minecraft name.

2. Everyone who's online

   @a means “all connected players”. Nothing changes for people who aren't on right now: when they join, they'll have their usual one.

3. Only those in one mode

   @a[gamemode=survival] picks only those in survival: handy for moving everyone to adventure except the people building in creative.

4. Shortcuts with EssentialsX

   If you have EssentialsX (from “Mods & plugins”), /gmc, /gms, /gma and /gmsp do the same thing, shorter. It's in the EssentialsX guide.

Everyone always joins in the same mode: force-gamemode

For a building server where everyone is in creative, or a minigames one in adventure, the easy way is to have the server set the mode by itself. With force-gamemode=true, every player gets the server's mode every time they join, even if you changed it earlier with a command.

In the NapNodes panel it's in “Settings” → “The game” → “Force game mode on join”: turn it on (it saves by itself) and restart. By hand, it's the force-gamemode=true line in server.properties.

Be careful if you turn it on: an admin who switches to creative to fix something gets the server's mode back when they leave and rejoin. That's the point, but it's a surprise the first time.

gamemode=creative
force-gamemode=true

The difficulty, and why it goes back to what it was

There are four: peaceful (no monsters, health comes back by itself and hunger doesn't go down), easy (hunger leaves you with at least 5 hearts), normal (it leaves you with half a heart) and hard (hunger can kill you, zombies break doors and monsters do more damage). The difficulty is one for the whole server: it can't be chosen per player.

“difficulty hard” in the “Console” changes it straight away. But at startup, the server takes the one in server.properties: if you only use the command, after the next restart it goes back to what it was. To make it stick, change it in “Settings” → “The game” → “Difficulty” (it saves by itself and applies on restart) and, if you don't want to wait, type the command as well.

In hardcore the difficulty is always hard, whatever you choose: it's in the hardcore server guide, with the detail that it's decided when the world is created.

difficulty hard
difficulty peaceful

A creative world and a survival world on the same server

With a single world, the mode and the difficulty are the same for everyone. If you want a creative building area without spoiling the survival game, the clean way is a second world with Multiverse-Core (from “Mods & plugins”): each world with its own mode and difficulty, and you move between them with a command.

The inventory is the same in every mode and every world: what you take out in creative goes with you to survival. If that's a problem, Multiverse-Inventories gives each world its own inventory. The commands are in the guide to multiple worlds with Multiverse.

If it doesn't work

1. It gives an error when I type the mode

   You've probably written the mode as a number or a letter (gamemode 1, gamemode c). Write it out in full: gamemode creative.

2. From the game it says the command doesn't exist or I don't have permission

   You aren't an admin. Add yourself in “Settings” → “Players” → “Operators”, or type the command in the panel's “Console”, which always can.

3. I changed “Game mode” and nothing happened

   That's normal: it only counts for people joining for the first time. Switch yourself with gamemode or turn on force-gamemode.

4. I lose creative every time I join

   You have force-gamemode=true and the server's mode is a different one. Change “Game mode” or set force-gamemode=false.

5. F3 + F4 does nothing

   The game's mode switcher (F3 + F4) and F3 + N only work if you're an admin on the server.

Frequently asked questions