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Terraria (tModLoader)

Modded Terraria server for friends, public via playit.gg
Host ShiNAS
Category Game servers
Status ⚫ retired
Exposed? Was: playit.gg tunnel (no open ports)
World ChaosRealm: Large, Master Mode, with a custom modpack

Not a Docker stack (see setup notes below).

Why I ran it

A modded Terraria world for my friends and me, running on my own hardware instead of someone's PC that had to stay on. I retired it when the group stopped playing, and kept the write-up for what it taught me about debugging.

Architecture

flowchart LR
    friends([Friends' tModLoader clients]) --> playit[playit.gg relay]
    playit --> agent[playit agent]
    agent --> srv[tModLoader server<br/>on ShiNAS]
    srv --> world[(ChaosRealm world<br/>+ modpack)]

Security decisions

Decision Why
playit.gg instead of port forwarding No open router ports, and my home IP stayed hidden
Covered by auditd monitoring The NAS's security monitoring watched the host the server ran on

Setup notes

  1. Install the tModLoader dedicated server and build the modpack
  2. Create a Large, Master Mode world (ChaosRealm)
  3. Create a playit.gg tunnel to the server's port and share the playit address with friends
  4. Retired: the world and modpack are kept, the server is stopped

Troubleshooting log

Date Problem Root cause Fix
— The server kept crashing Traced through the logs to three specific mods: TerrariaAmbience, TerrariaAmbienceAPI and PermaBuffs Removed those mods. Switched to vanilla temporarily while narrowing it down.
— auditd flooded my Discord alerts The server's normal runtime writes (world saves, logs) matched my file-watch rules Tuned the audit rules to ignore the game server's expected writes, so real alerts stayed visible (details)

What I learned

  • Debugging by elimination: a crash log plus removing mods one group at a time found the exact culprits
  • Tuning security alerts: rules that fire on normal activity bury the alerts that matter
  • Tunnels for game traffic without exposing my home network