Game Server Plugin Runtimes

5Stack ships its match plugin for two different CS2 plugin frameworks. Both implement the same match logic — knife rounds, ready-up, overtime, map veto, backups, stats — and both talk to the panel over the same API. What differs is the framework they load into, and therefore which third-party plugins and gamedata files they understand.

	SwiftlyS2	CounterStrikeSharp
Image	ghcr.io/5stackgg/swiftly-game-server	ghcr.io/5stackgg/game-server
Source	5stackgg/swiftly-game-server	5stackgg/game-server
Loads via	SwiftlyS2	Metamod → CounterStrikeSharp
Addons directory	addons/swiftlys2	addons/counterstrikesharp
Default	✅ Yes	No

TIP

SwiftlyS2 is the default. New installs run it unless you pick otherwise. CounterStrikeSharp remains fully supported and is the right choice if you depend on existing CSS plugins.

Which should I use?

• Stay on SwiftlyS2 unless you have a reason not to. It's the default and what new installs are tested against.
• Choose CounterStrikeSharp if you run third-party CSS plugins that have no SwiftlyS2 equivalent, or you already have a working gamedata.json workflow you don't want to rewrite.

The two frameworks are not interchangeable at the plugin level. A CounterStrikeSharp plugin will not load under SwiftlyS2, and vice versa. See Custom Plugins for the per-framework directory layouts.

Switching runtimes

The runtime is a deployment-wide choice, not a per-node or per-match one.

1. Go to Settings → Application → Servers.
2. Under Plugin Runtime, pick SwiftlyS2 or CounterStrikeSharp.

The change saves immediately. No redeploy, no ./update.sh, no restart.

New game servers pick up the new image the next time they start. Servers already running keep the image they were created with until they're recycled.

WARNING

Switching runtimes does not migrate your custom plugins. Anything under addons/counterstrikesharp is ignored by SwiftlyS2, and anything under addons/swiftlys2 is ignored by CounterStrikeSharp. Move your files to the matching directory before you switch, or your servers will start without them.

Runtime versions

Each image pins the framework version it was built against:

• SwiftlyS2 — the plugin is built against a specific SwiftlyS2.CS2 NuGet package, and the image downloads the matching SwiftlyS2 runtime release. The two must agree, so they're bumped in lockstep.
• CounterStrikeSharp — the image downloads a pinned Metamod and CounterStrikeSharp release.

You don't need to manage these yourself; they come with the image.

Each framework has its own plugin release history, and the two number their releases independently — v0.0.42 of the SwiftlyS2 plugin is unrelated to v0.0.42 of the CounterStrikeSharp plugin. The panel tracks both, and the Plugin Version dropdown on a node only offers releases from the runtime you have selected. See Version Pinning.

A node pinned to a plugin version stays on the framework it was pinned under, even if you later switch the deployment-wide runtime. Clear the pin to move that node onto the selected runtime.

Advanced: custom images

If you build your own plugin image, or mirror the official ones into a private registry, set SERVER_IMAGE on the panel API:

1. Open INSTALL_DIR/overlays/config/api-config.env.
2. Add the full image reference:

SERVER_IMAGE=registry.example.com/my-org/my-game-server:latest

3. Run ./update.sh.

SERVER_IMAGE overrides the Plugin Runtime setting. While it is set, the selector in Settings is disabled and shows a note saying the runtime is managed by the environment. Version pinning still applies, replacing the image tag with :v{version}.