Air-Battle Docs

Hosting a Public Server ​

Guide for running Air-Battle on a public-facing server.

Prerequisites

Complete the setup guide first to make sure everything builds and runs locally.

VPS Setup ​

Any Linux VPS with at least 1 GB RAM and 1 vCPU should work fine. Providers like Hetzner, DigitalOcean, or Linode all work well.

  1. Provision a server running Ubuntu 22.04+ (or similar).
  2. SSH in and follow the setup guide to install NVM, Node, and clone the repo.

Running as a Service ​

Use systemd to keep the server running and auto-restart on crashes/reboots.

Create /etc/systemd/system/airbattle.service:

ini
[Unit]
Description=Air-Battle Server
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=your-user
WorkingDirectory=/path/to/airbattle-hosting
ExecStart=/home/your-user/.nvm/versions/node/v22.x.x/bin/node ab-server/dist/app.js
Restart=always
RestartSec=5
Environment=NODE_ENV=production

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Node path

The ExecStart path needs to point to your actual Node binary. Run which node to find it.

Enable and start the service:

bash
sudo systemctl enable airbattle
sudo systemctl start airbattle

You can create a similar service for the bots.

Reverse Proxy with Nginx ​

For TLS (HTTPS/WSS) and proper domain support, put Nginx in front of the game server.

Install Nginx:

bash
sudo apt install nginx

Create a config at /etc/nginx/sites-available/airbattle:

nginx
server {
    server_name your-domain.com;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3501;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
        proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_read_timeout 86400;
    }
}

Enable it and get a TLS certificate with Certbot:

bash
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/airbattle /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
sudo apt install certbot python3-certbot-nginx
sudo certbot --nginx -d your-domain.com
sudo systemctl reload nginx

Domain & DNS ​

Point your domain to your VPS IP with an A record. If you want a subdomain like game.your-domain.com, create an A record for that subdomain.

Environment for Production ​

In .env.server, consider setting:

bash
NODE_ENV=production
HOST=0.0.0.0
LOG_LEVEL=info
LOG_TO_CONSOLE=false
SU_PASSWORD="something-secure"

See Server Options for the full list.