Admin commands and RCON

RCON lets you administer an ARK server remotely without being logged into the game. Admin commands (cheat ...) are used to give items, ban, save or broadcast a message. Everything relies on ServerAdminPassword.

Cause / The problem

Without ServerAdminPassword set (or if it is duplicated in the command line), the EnableCheats command fails silently and RCON refuses the connection. Result: no way to moderate or save the server remotely.

Solution

1. Set ServerAdminPassword in GameUserSettings.ini, section [/Script/ShooterGame.ShooterGameUserSettings] (never in the command line):

   ServerAdminPassword=AStrongPassword

2. Open the RCON port in the panel. ARK uses RCONPort (default 27020); add -RCONEnabled=True and -RCONPort=27020 to the startup parameters.
3. Connect an RCON client (rcon.io, ARKon, mcrcon) to IP:27020 with the admin password. Test with:

   broadcast Server restarting in 10 min

4. Make yourself admin in-game: open the console (Tab) and type:

   EnableCheats AStrongPassword

   Without this, cheat ... commands return “You do not have permission”.
5. Common admin commands:

   cheat giveitem "Blueprint'/Game/PrimalEarth/CoreBlueprints/...'" 1 0 0
   cheat saveworld
   cheat broadcast Message to everyone
   cheat banplayer <SteamID>
   cheat giveexp <PlayerID> 1000 0 0
   cheat fly
   cheat ghost

6. Save before any maintenance: cheat saveworld writes the world state to disk (equivalent to AutoSave).
7. Security tips: change the password regularly, do not reuse it for ServerPassword, and restrict RCON access to a few trusted admins.

For ARK Ascended, RCON works the same way, but some panels expose a dedicated RCON tab that saves you from editing the .ini by hand.