How to Enable Skins on a Minecraft Server
Last modified on Apr 9, 2021 in plugins
By ApexHosting
Overview
When playing on Minecraft servers, one of the most common ways for players to express themselves is with the use of skins. Skins are the perfect way to add customization to Minecraft characters. While these are great, when running an offline server, or ‘cracked’ Minecraft server, skins can be disabled. This problem can occur because cracked servers do not authenticate with the Mojang skin servers. Although it’s upsetting to lose character skins, it is not impossible to enable them! This will be a brief guide on how to restore the skins for you and your players. The bread and butter of this guide will be utilizing a plugin called SkinRestorer, which is approved for all versions 1.8 and above, including 1.16!
How to install Skinsrestorer
Installing with the Panel
- Head to the Apex Game Panel and stop your server.
- Make sure that your server is running Spigot or Paper. You can check this in the jar dropdown on the game panel dashboard.
- To the left of the game panel, click on “Plugin List”.
- You can search the plugin by its name, SkinsRestorer.
- At the bottom of the page, check the version you have selected. It’s good to cross-reference this to the official Spigot page.
- Find the correct version from the version dropdown, select it, and press install.
- Go back to the game panel and start the server.
- To check if the plugin was successfully installed, type “pl” into your server console.
Installing through FTP
- Head to the official Skinsrestorer page.
- To the top right of this page, press the download icon. Then move the file to a directory for later use.
- Head to the Apex panel and stop your server.
- To the left of the panel, click on “FTP File Access”.
- Once you login to the FTP File Access you will see a list of your server files. Open the plugins folder.
- To the top left of this page, click on the “Upload” button.
- Drag in the Skinsrestorer plugin to the right side of the page and wait for it to reach 100%.
- Head back to the game panel and start the server back up.
- You can check if the plugin was installed correctly by typing “pl” into the console.
Installing on Bungeecord
- Head to the Apex Game Panel and stop your server.
- To the left of the panel, click on “FTP File Access”.
- Once you login to the FTP File Access you will see a list of your server files. Open the plugins folder.
- Place the plugin in the /plugins/ folders of all spigot and bungeecord servers.
- To the top left of this page, click on the “Upload” button.
- Drag in the Skinsrestorer plugin to the right side of the page and wait for it to reach 100%.
- Check & set on every Spigot server spigot.yml -> bungeecord: true
- Give permissions inside the bungee server.
- Head back to the game panel and start the server back up.
- Optional Edit the config inside bungee/plugins/SkinsRestorer/ folder.
How to use Skinsrestorer
Commands
/skin - main command. /skin- Sets your skin. /skin - set a skin from a .png url /skin update - Updates your current skin. /skin clear - clears your skin. /skins - GUI
Admin Commands
/sr - main admin command /skin set- Sets player's skin. /skin clear - clear a player's skin. /skin update update a player's skin. /skin drop - Removes skins data from database. /sr reload - Reloads config and locale. /sr props - Returns properties of a player. /sr status - check the plugin status.
Permission Nodes
skinsrestorer.bypasscooldown -> bypasses skinscooldown config skinsrestorer.bypassdisabled -> bypass the disabledskins list
Common issues
Skin not updating
If you’ve put in the proper commands and the skin does not immediately change, you should disconnect and then reconnect to the server. If that still does not work, you should check the name of the skin you’re trying to snag and ensure it’s spelled correctly.
Conclusion
SkinRestorer has a bunch of other features as well that you can implement to your server, such as denying users from using certain skins or allowing them to swap skins on the fly while playing. You can even change other users’ skins. Configuration of the files allows you to change the language, color codes, and more of the actual commands. Well, that’s everything! I hoped this guide has helped you fix a somewhat common issue. Until next time!
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