oh well i used forge, installed the server profile, ran the server properties, changed the eula to true, ran it again, then i port forwarded, then whenever i go on the server i just double click on minecraft_server.1.12.2 and it starts it. then to stop it i
type stop in the chat in the server window
oh just like going into minecraft and pressing multiplayer and doing the direct connect instead of just adding a server, i tried to add the server but it didn't work. I used my IPV4 address and they used my IP address for the direct connect
So I created a forger server, all the mods work and I can play with them the only problem I have is I cannot craft any of the items, I know it's not a vanilla server because I installed the forge server client, did everything i need to do in the server files, port forwarded, etc. When I go into single player I can craft the items just fine.