Installing Wings

Wings is the server control daemon. It handles game server processes, monitors resource usage, streams console outputs, and manages server files inside isolated Docker containers.

PrerequisitesCopy Anchor Link

• Operating System: Ubuntu 24.04 LTS / 24.10 / 26.04+ LTS or Debian 12 / 13 (Debian ≤ 11 and Ubuntu ≤ 22.04 are deprecated)
• Hardware Virtualization: Dedicated server or KVM VPS (OpenVZ is not supported due to Docker requirements)
• Kernel: Linux kernel 5.4+ with Docker support

1. Install DockerCopy Anchor Link

Wings relies on Docker to isolate game server instances. Install Docker using the official automated script:

curl -sSL https://get.docker.com/ | CHANNEL=stable bash
sudo systemctl enable --now docker

Enable Swap Memory AccountingCopy Anchor Link

On Debian and Ubuntu, enable swap accounting in the kernel:

1. Open /etc/default/grub in an editor:

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   sudo nano /etc/default/grub

2. Find GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT and add swapaccount=1:

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   GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="swapaccount=1"

3. Update grub and reboot your server:

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   sudo update-grub
   sudo reboot

2. Install Wings BinaryCopy Anchor Link

Create the Wings directories and download the executable binary:

sudo mkdir -p /etc/pterodactyl /var/lib/pterodactyl/volumes
curl -L -o /usr/local/bin/wings "https://github.com/pterodactyl/wings/releases/latest/download/wings_linux_amd64"
sudo chmod u+x /usr/local/bin/wings

3. Configure the Node in AquadactylCopy Anchor Link

1. Log into your Aquadactyl Panel as an administrator.
2. In the Admin area (/admin), navigate to Nodes -> Create New.
3. Fill out the node details:
   • Name: A descriptive name (e.g. US-Node-1).
   • Location: The location this node belongs to.
   • FQDN: The domain pointing to this server (e.g. node1.yourdomain.com) or public IP.
   • Daemon Port: 8080.
   • Daemon SFTP Port: 2022.
   • Total Memory & Disk: Set the hardware limits.
4. Click Create Node.
5. Switch to the Configuration tab. Click Generate Token or copy the YAML snippet shown.
6. On your node server, paste this configuration into /etc/pterodactyl/config.yml:

sudo nano /etc/pterodactyl/config.yml

4. Create Systemd ServiceCopy Anchor Link

Run Wings as a managed background service using systemd:

[Unit]
Description=Wings Daemon
After=docker.service
Requires=docker.service
PartOf=docker.service

[Service]
User=root
WorkingDirectory=/etc/pterodactyl
LimitNOFILE=4096
PIDFile=/var/run/wings/daemon.pid
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/wings
Restart=on-failure
StartLimitInterval=180
StartLimitBurst=30
RestartSec=5s

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable and start the service:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now wings

Verifying ConnectionCopy Anchor Link

Check that Wings is running without errors:

sudo systemctl status wings

In the Aquadactyl Panel under Admin -> Nodes, a green heart icon will indicate that the node is successfully communicating with the panel!