Red Discord Bot Setup

Red-DiscordBot is a modular, cog-based Discord bot framework. Unlike JMusicBot (which is purpose-built for music), Red is a platform you extend — moderation, music, economy, mini-games, custom commands, and thousands of third-party cogs are all one install away.

When to pick Red over JMusicBot

• You want more than music — moderation, leveling, economy, auto-responses, and so on.
• You’re okay learning how to install cogs (modules).
• You want a bot that grows with your community.

Step 1: Create a Discord application

Same as any Discord bot:

1. Discord Developer Portal → New Application → create bot user.
2. Enable Message Content and Server Members intents.
3. Reset the token and save it.

Step 2: Deploy on Witchly

1. dash.witchly.host → Deploy → Applications → Red.
2. The Helper is enough to start; move up if you load many cogs.
3. Click Deploy.

Step 3: Configure

On the Startup tab:

Variable	Value
TOKEN	Your bot token from the Developer Portal
PREFIX	Command prefix (default .)
OWNER	Your Discord user ID (so [p]shutdown, [p]load, etc. work)

Press Start once those are set.

Step 4: Invite & first-run

1. Use the Developer Portal’s OAuth2 URL Generator with scopes bot + applications.commands and permissions Administrator (easiest; you can tighten later).
2. Paste the URL in your browser and invite the bot.
3. Back in the console, Red will generate a default data path and start up. First start takes longer because it initializes its database.

Installing cogs

Red’s power comes from cogs. Install one via Discord chat:

.load downloader
.repo add 3rd-cogs https://github.com/aikaterna/gobcog
.cog install 3rd-cogs adventure
.load adventure

Popular community cog repos:

• aikaterna-cogs
• TrustyCogs
• Phen-Cogs

All cogs live under data/cogs/ inside your server. You can SFTP in and edit them like any other file.

Persistence

Red uses a local SQLite or Postgres backend for storing settings, user profiles, economy data, etc. By default it’s SQLite — everything lives in data/core/settings.json and per-cog data files. Enable backups to avoid losing this.

Upgrading Red

Red auto-updates on each server start via the installed egg image. To pin a specific version or run the update manually, use Pterodactyl’s Reinstall (Startup tab) to re-run the install script.

Troubleshooting

• “Login failure” — wrong token, or you need to reset it after intents were changed.
• Slash commands missing — run .slash enable and .slash sync in a channel the bot can see.
• Cogs won’t install — the cog needs Python packages; install them via .pipinstall <name> through the Downloader cog.

Next steps

• Backups so your cog data is safe
• Scheduled restarts for hygiene