Meshtastic – Admin & Event Setup
This page is intended for session administrators – the person who creates the AFT game session and is responsible for configuring Meshtastic for all participants.
Players do not need to read this page. Their role is described at the end of this article and covered in detail in the Getting Started guide.
Two roles
- Session administrator — creates the session, sets the three Meshtastic parameters described below, and shares the session ID and password with players. Does this once, before the event.
- Players — join the session and press Configure Channel in the AFT Meshtastic panel. Their devices are configured automatically based on what the administrator set. Players do not need to understand radio parameters.
How to open Meshtastic settings
Configuring Meshtastic settings for your session
Before setting Region, Preset, and Hop Limit (or instead of them), the session administrator now chooses a Configuration Mode. This choice affects every player who wants to use Meshtastic in this session, so it’s worth understanding both before you save.
- Basic is the mode AFT has used from the start — a simplified setup built specifically for AFT. This is what we recommend for everyday use: once you save your Region, Preset, and Hop Limit values, each player configures their own device with a single tap on „Configure Channels” right inside AFT. No manual radio settings required on the player’s side.
- Advanced hands full control of the mesh network to you as the organizer. Instead of Region, Preset, and Hop Limit, AFT only needs one thing from you: the Channel Index your devices actually use. You’re responsible for configuring the PSK, modem preset, and every other radio setting on each device yourself, outside of AFT, and propagating it to your team manually. In this mode, AFT won’t show players a „Configure Channels” button — there’s nothing for AFT to configure.
Use Basic unless you specifically need custom, self-managed Meshtastic settings that AFT’s automatic channel setup doesn’t cover.
All three must be set correctly before players connect. If any parameter is wrong, devices will either fail to communicate with each other or operate outside legal radio limits for your country.
Basic settings
Preset
The modem preset defines the radio communication profile — how fast data is transmitted and how far the signal can travel. These two properties are inversely related: faster presets offer lower range, slower presets offer greater range.
Common options include LONG_FAST, LONG_SLOW, MEDIUM_FAST, and others. For most airsoft and milsim events, LONG_FAST is a reasonable starting point — it balances range with update frequency.
All devices in the same session must use the same preset. AFT enforces this automatically when players run Configure Channel.
Region
The region setting tells the device which radio frequency band to use. This must match the legal frequency allocation for the country where your event takes place. Using the wrong region means your device transmits on a frequency that may be illegal in your country, and it will not communicate with other devices set to the correct region.
Common regions:
| Country / Area | Region code | Frequency band |
|---|---|---|
| European Union | EU_868 | 868 MHz |
| United States | US_915 | 902–928 MHz |
| Other countries | varies | see table below |
For a full list of regions by country, refer to the official LoRa Region by Country table on the Meshtastic website.
Note on hardware: Meshtastic devices are manufactured for specific frequency bands. A device sold for the European market typically has an antenna tuned for 868 MHz and may not perform correctly — or at all — on 915 MHz. If your participants are coming from different countries, verify that their hardware matches the region you configure for the session.
Hop Limit
The hop limit defines how many times a packet can be relayed across the mesh network before it is discarded. Each relay device decrements this counter by one. When it reaches zero, the packet is not forwarded further.
A higher hop limit extends the potential reach of a message across the mesh, but also increases the total number of radio transmissions on the network — which can contribute to channel congestion.
The Meshtastic documentation recommends a default value of 3 for most use cases. This is a reasonable starting point for airsoft events. For larger areas with many relay nodes, increasing to 4 or 5 may be appropriate. Values above 5 are generally not recommended and can degrade network performance.
Maximum value is 7.
Advanced settings
Channel Index
The channel (0–7) your devices are configured to use, chosen and communicated to AFT by you as the organizer — not by AFT. AFT sends and expects mesh data on exactly this channel, so it must match what you’ve already set up on your own radios; AFT does nothing to verify or enforce this in Advanced mode. Remember: the first channel is Channel 0, not Channel 1 — a common point of confusion.
Common settings for Basic and Advanced modes
Enable Mesh Tracking
Today, this toggle lets AFT detect other Meshtastic devices visible on the mesh network – not just AFT players, but any node the radio can see (for example, a teammate carrying only a Meshtastic radio, without a phone running AFT). Detected devices currently appear only on the map of the player whose device found them, if that player has also enabled „show Meshtastic devices” in their own player settings.
Coming soon: we’re working on syncing these detected nodes through the server, so players who don’t have a Meshtastic device of their own will also be able to see them on the map – letting a teammate carrying only a mesh radio show up for the whole session, not just for whoever detected them.
This setting works the same way in both Basic and Advanced mode.
After saving the settings
Once you have saved the three parameters, the session is ready for players to connect.
Players who have not yet joined should join the session normally and follow the Getting Started guide to configure their devices.
Players who are already logged in should log out and log back in before running Configure Channel. AFT loads Meshtastic session parameters at login — a player who was connected before you saved the settings will not receive the updated configuration until they reconnect.
After reconnecting, each player presses Configure Channel in the AFT Meshtastic panel. Their device is automatically configured to match the parameters you set here.