Configure Player Rank/Group Names using Essentials and Essentials GroupManager

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This article is archived. The information provided here does not apply to present day servers and links on this page may be dead. The information is being provided for posterity.

You can add player rank/group names to your in-game Minecraft server chat. This article assumes that you have installed the Essentials, EssentialsChat, and Essentials GroupManager plugins on your Minecraft server.

Adding Player Group Name to Server Chat

1. Open /minecraft/plugins/Essentials/config.yml
2. Scroll to the EssentialsChat section. Hint: press Ctrl + F, type EssentialsChat, and then press Enter to get to it quickly.
3. Find the lines containing the following:

The two lines specify the template that Essentials should display player chat in. Essentials replaces {DISPLAYNAME} with the player name, {MESSAGE} with the chat message, and {GROUP} with the player’s group name.

In the first line, Essentials displays chat in the format of: hello world!

The second line begins with a #. The # is called a comment in computer lingo. Placing a # in front of text in a YML file prevents the plugin from reading the line, effectively disabling it. When this line is enabled, chat will appear in the form of: [owner] notch: hello world! The &6 and &r characters are Minecraft text formatting codes, which the next section will cover.

To display the rank/group name in front of the player name, you want to disable the first line and enable the second. Type # right before “format” in the first line to disable the current format. Delete the # on the second line to enable the group formatting. Be sure to keep the two spaces in front of “format.” You should now see:

Save your edits. In your server console, run ess reload in the console to apply your changes. You should see the group name when you chat.