ageLANServer-BattleServer

ageLANServer is a LAN server emulator for the Age of Empires Definitive Edition games, developed by luskaner. It replaces the online services (accounts, profiles and the lobby list) with a server running on your Unraid box, so you can play multiplayer over your local network without an internet connection. The game on each PC connects to it with a launcher.

A BattleServer is the program that runs a match while it is played. BattleServer.exe ships with the game and relays the game traffic between the players. Normally the host's own PC runs it; with a BattleServer on the server, matches do not depend on one player's PC. Age of Empires IV and Age of Mythology: Retold only work this way.

This template is the same as ageLANServer plus a BattleServer running inside the same container. It includes Wine to run the Windows BattleServer.exe, so the download is about 1.3 GB. For the original three games alone, ageLANServer is enough.

Template: templates/ageLANServer-BattleServer.xml
Image: ghcr.io/indyone/agelanserver-battleserver
Upstream: luskaner/ageLANServer

Supported games

• Age of Empires: Definitive Edition
• Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition
• Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition
• Age of Empires IV: Anniversary Edition (requires a BattleServer)
• Age of Mythology: Retold (requires a BattleServer)

Configuring the Unraid template

Settings

Each container runs one game. Set GAMES to one of:

The template uses host networking. Port 443 and TCP ports 27012, 27112 and 27212 (the BattleServer) must be free on the host. If the BattleServer stops, the container stops, so its restart policy brings both back.

Providing BattleServer.exe

BattleServer.exe ships with the game and cannot be redistributed. Copy it from your own install into the BattleServer Folder; it starts automatically with the container. Use the one from the game the container serves, except for two games:

• Age of Empires IV does not ship a BattleServer.exe.
• Age of Mythology: Retold ships one that is buggy.

For both, use the BattleServer.exe from Age of Empires II: DE, the newer version. Do not also add a BattleServer for the same game in config.toml.

config.toml

On the first start the config folder is filled with the per-game folders (do not delete them) and a fully commented config.toml.example. Rename it to config.toml, edit it, and restart the container.

Multiple games

Each container serves one game, so for several games run one container per game:

• With host networking only one container can use port 443 and the BattleServer ports, so create an ipvlan L2 network (Settings > Docker > Docker custom networks) and give each container its own LAN IP. ipvlan is preferred over macvlan because it does not need promiscuous mode.
• Use separate appdata folders for each container, for example .../appdata/agelanserver-battleserver-aoe4/....
• Name each container after its game: agelanserver-battleserver-aoe4, agelanserver-battleserver-aoe2, ...

Playing the game

Hosting a game

When you create a lobby:

• Choose Server in the game's Server list to use the BattleServer in this container.
• Alternatively, choose Use Local Lan Server to run the match on your own PC.

Connecting from your PC

Use the launcher from the upstream releases. In resources/config.toml set:

[Server]
Start = 'false'
Host = '<your server IP>'

Then run the game's start script (for example start_age2.bat) as administrator. The launcher points the game at your server and undoes its changes when you quit.

Troubleshooting

• Multiplayer is greyed out. The server's data is for the newest game build. Update the game (check it is the copy the launcher starts).
• "Could not create game. Unknown error". Choose Server (or Use Local Lan Server) when creating the lobby.
• The container stops right after starting. For age4 and athens the BattleServer Folder must contain BattleServer.exe. Open the container's log.
• The container keeps restarting. Open the container's log. Port 443 and the BattleServer ports must be free on the host.

About the image

ageLANServer is developed by luskaner. The Docker image comes from my fork, indyone/ageLANServer:

• Kept in sync with upstream. A GitHub Actions workflow merges luskaner/ageLANServer into the fork every day, and every change to the source rebuilds the images and publishes them to the GitHub Container Registry.
• The server itself is untouched. The fork only adds files: a Docker setup under tools/server-docker-unified and the build workflows.

What the fork adds so that it works well on Unraid:

• One image instead of two. Upstream's Docker setup runs the certificate generator and the server as separate containers. Here they are combined: the SSL certificates are generated on the first start and reused afterwards.
• Volumes that work with Unraid shares. Per-game config files and a commented config.toml.example are placed into the config folder on first run, so a bind-mounted appdata folder works from the start.
• One game per container, chosen with the GAMES variable, so several games never fight over port 443 or the UDP discovery port.
• An optional BattleServer, in this image, which runs the game's own BattleServer.exe under Wine next to the server. The ageLANServer template uses the image without it.
• The Unraid templates in this repository.

Support

• Unraid setup (this template, the Docker image, volumes, networking, installing on Unraid): open an issue here.
• The server software itself (game behaviour, launcher, bugs, feature requests): supported by its original author, luskaner/ageLANServer issues.