Whether you want to get a local WoW server in order to contribute or simply to fly around the world with full GM access and feel like a god, this tutorial is for you!
This is the simplest way to get an AzerothCore server up and running on your own machine, all you need is a 3.3.5a client. It works with Linux, macOS or Windows. You don’t need to be an expert, and if you have any questions feel free to ping us on Discord.
Introduction
In past, people used to have to follow tedious guides and install plenty of dependencies, compile, assemble the DB, etc…etc… in order to properly get a WoW server up and running locally.
Or they could go the easy way and download a repack, but that would be risky and inconvenient. Explaining why WoW repacks are bad goes out of the scope of this guide, but if you would like to know more about repacks you can read this article.
At AzerothCore (AC), we have been working to make the server installation process simpler and accessible for non-experienced users. We have developed several ways to install AC, and here I’m going to guide you through the easiest one: the Docker pre-compiled setup, which leverages the power of Docker to make the installation process tremendously easy.
Requirement: Docker
First of all, you need to download and install Docker:
https://www.docker.com/products/docker-desktop
This is the only requirement for this tutorial, you don’t need anything else apart from Docker and a clean 3.3.5a client available in your system. Docker Desktop works on recent versions of macOS and Windows. Docker can also be installed on Linux.
Installing the AzerothCore WoW server
1) Download, extract, open terminal
Download the acore-docker-master archive and extract the acore-docker-master folder from it.
Now open a terminal inside the extracted acore-docker-master folder. If you do not know how to open a terminal inside a folder, just read this.
2) Docker pull, database setup
From the terminal you have just opened inside the acore-docker-master folder, run the following commands:
- docker-compose pull
The download can take some time (depending on your internet connection). When it completes, run:
- docker-compose up ac-db-import
Once it’s done, you should see something like this:
3) Run the WoW server
To start the WoW server you just need to run the following command:
- docker-compose up -d
Congratulations! Your WoW server is running on your PC. You just don’t see it… yet 😉
To check that everything is working correctly, you can open the Docker Dashboard which will give you more details about the running containers and their exposed ports (if words like containers and ports don’t make much sense to you, don’t worry):
Accessing the worldserver console and create a game account
Your server is up and running but you cannot do much without creating a game account. To do that, we first need to find the name of your worldserver container.
Sounds complicated? Not at all, run the following command in a terminal (make sure the terminal window is big enough):
- docker-compose ps
You’ll see something like the following:
Your worldserver container name will be something like “acore-docker-master_ac-worldserver_1″, you’ll need it for the following command:
- docker attach acore-docker-master_ac-worldserver_1
This will attach your terminal session to the AC worldserver process, which is a console starting with AC>. From there, you can run commands such as server info to verify the status of your WoW server.
In order to create an account, run the following command:
- account create USERNAME PASSWORD
Then, in order to make it GM level 3, run the following:
- account set gmlevel USERNAME 3 -1
for example, this is how I attach to my worldserver console and create a GM account with the name “shin” and the password “chromiecraft“:
If you’re wondering how to exit the AC console, keep the CTRL key pressed while pressing the P and Q keys (CTRL+P & CTRL+Q escape sequence).
Change the realmlist and enjoy!
Open your realmlist.wtf and set its contents to:
- set realmlist localhost
If you don’t want to completely remove your old realmlist, you can just comment it out.
For example, the following is how I keep my realmlist when I need to access my local WoW server. When I want to log back to ChromieCraft, I just comment the local realmlist using a # and un-comment the one from ChromieCraft (by removing the #):
Now you can just open WoW and access the game!
Good to know…
GM Commands
You can find the full list of GM commands at this URL:
https://www.azerothcore.org/wiki/GM-Commands
Stopping and restarting the server
To stop your server, you can run “docker-compose stop” and then “docker-compose restart” to start it again.
Updating your server
Keeping your server up to date with the latest AzerothCore version is considered a good practice and will make your server automatically get all the fixes we will be releasing.
To update the server you need to stop your server, run the following 2 commands, and then start it again:
- docker-compose pull
- docker-compose up ac-db-import
You can check your server version by using the GM command .server info
More information
This article has been extracted from this page, where you can find more technical details.