Minecraft Administration & Moderation

Running a server means eventually dealing with griefing, mistakes and rule-breaking. Rollback plugins log what happens to the world and let staff reverse it for one player or one area. Backups let you recover from anything the log cannot, such as a corrupted world or a broken update. Punishment plugins record bans and mutes so they persist across restarts and, on a network, across servers.

Treat these tools as a system. A rollback log is not a backup, and a backup you have never restored is not yet a backup. Decide how long you keep logs, who may use rollback commands and where backups are stored, ideally off the machine that runs the server.

Staff tools also hold personal data, such as player names, addresses and chat. Collect only what you need and set a retention period.

Is a rollback plugin a replacement for backups? No. A rollback plugin reverses logged actions in the world. A backup restores files after anything goes wrong, including problems the plugin did not log.