Vault Hunters is unlike any other Minecraft modpack. Instead of open-world survival with tech progression, you're running procedurally generated vaults: dungeon instances that test your gear, skills, and decision-making. This unique design has specific hosting requirements.
What Makes Vault Hunters Different
In Vault Hunters, the overworld is your base. You gear up, craft vault crystals, and enter randomly generated vault dimensions. Each vault is a temporary dimension that exists only while you're inside. This means:
- Dimension creation is frequent. Every vault run creates a new dimension
- Storage overhead is temporary. Vault dimensions are deleted after completion
- CPU spikes happen during vault generation. The server builds an entire dungeon on the fly
- Memory usage is spikier than regular Minecraft. New dimensions load and unload constantly
RAM Requirements
| Players | Minimum | Recommended | Space-Node Plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-4 | 6GB | 8GB | MC Diamond (8GB, €7.20) |
| 4-8 | 8GB | 10GB | MC Special 1 (12GB, €10.80) |
| 8-15 | 10GB | 14GB | MC Special 3 (16GB, €14.40) |
| 15+ | 14GB | 16GB+ | MC Special 3 (16GB) or MC Special 4 (32GB, €29.99) |
Prices are the Standard tier per month. The USA regions and the Premium tier cost more.
The higher RAM recommendations compared to similar-sized modpacks account for the dimension creation/destruction overhead. When 4 players enter vaults simultaneously, the server temporarily needs extra memory for 4 additional dimensions.
Performance During Vault Runs
The biggest performance challenge is vault generation. When a player enters a vault, the server generates a full dungeon dimension, with rooms, hallways, traps, loot and mobs, in real time. Expect a short TPS dip while that happens. How long it takes depends on the CPU, the pack version and what else the server is doing at that moment.
Single-thread CPU speed is what shortens it. Generation is heavy work on one thread, so a high-clock modern core gets through it faster than older hardware. On Space-Node Minecraft hosting the CPU depends on the region and tier: Ryzen 9 3900X-class on Standard and a Ryzen 9 9950X on Premium in the Netherlands, Germany, Poland and Canada, Ryzen 9 7950X3D in the USA, Ryzen 9 5950X in Singapore and Australia, and Standard 3900X-class hardware on our Mumbai node in India.
If vault generation regularly takes a long time or causes extended TPS drops while RAM use looks fine, your CPU is the bottleneck. More RAM or configuration changes won't fix that. Only faster single-thread performance will. Run a Spark profile during a vault opening to confirm before you upgrade.
Configuration Guide
server.properties
view-distance=8
simulation-distance=6
max-players=15
Lower view distance helps because some vault rooms contain many entities and block entities (spawners, chests).
JVM Arguments
Use Aikar's flags with an emphasis on larger young generation:
-Xms10G -Xmx10G -XX:+UseG1GC -XX:G1NewSizePercent=40 -XX:G1MaxNewSizePercent=50
The larger young generation handles the burst allocations from vault dimension creation.
Multiplayer Party System
Vault Hunters supports party vault runs. When a party enters a vault together:
- All players share the dimension
- Difficulty scales with party size
- Loot is individual (no fighting over drops)
- The vault is harder but more rewarding
A party shares one vault dimension, so four players in one party vault usually put less load on the server than four players each running their own vault at the same time.
Backup Strategy
For Vault Hunters specifically:
- Overworld backups: Critical. Contains all player bases, storage, and progression
- Vault dimensions: Don't bother backing up, they're temporary
- Player data: Back up
world/playerdata/, because losing vault progress is devastating
Configure automatic backups every 2-4 hours focusing on the overworld. Space-Node plans include backup slots, so use them.
Growing Your VH Community
Vault Hunters has a dedicated community:
- The official Discord helps with recruitment
- Post on r/VaultHunters
- Vault Hunters streamers on Twitch often direct viewers to community servers
- The modpack's competitive nature means players seek well-performing servers
A smooth-running Vault Hunters server with fast vault generation becomes its own advertisement. Players tell their friends when they find a server where vaults open without a long freeze.