Introduction
In this guide, you will invite Pancake to your server, and learn how to use basic commands to stream music to your Discord server.
Prerequisites
You should have the following ready before you start:
- You are logged in to Discord.
- You have at least one server available with administrator or manager server permissions enabled.
- You have at least one voice channel within your server.
- You have the proper role permissions in your server to join voice channels.
How to Read this Guide
Command
A command is a series of words entered into the Discord text channel used tell Pancake what to do.
For example, the command:p! say hello
prompts the bot to respond with the text “hello”.
In order for a command to work, you must:
- Type and enter the command into a text channel that Pancake has “Read” access to.
- Have a prefix attached to the beginning of the sentence.
For a full list of music commands, you can reference the commands section of this guide.
Prefix
A prefix is a series of characters appended to the beginning of a command. This is useful for telling Pancake that the series of text is a command and not regular text.
For example, in the command:p! say hello
p! is the prefix
Default Prefix
This guide assumes that you are using Pancakes default prefix:p!
If you are using a different prefix, replace p! with the prefix you have set.
Change Prefix
Pancake uses the prefix p! for all of its commands by default. You can change this by using the prefix command.
In order to use the prefix command, enter the command:p! prefix [new prefix]
For example:
p! prefix f
Sets Pancakes prefix to f.
Brackets
Brackets [ ] represent an argument that the bot is expecting within a command. When typing a command, you should substitute both the bracket and the text inside of the bracket with the parameter specified within the bracket.
For example:
p! play [song title]
means you should substitute “[song title]” with the song title of your choice.
p! play space oddity
is a valid command.
Invite Pancake to your Server
In order to invite Pancake to your server:
- Navigate to https://pancake.gg/invite.
- Select the server you would like invite the bot to under the Add To Server selection box.
- Select Continue to move onto the next screen.
Warning: If your server does not appear on the list, it means you do not have permission to invite Pancake to that server. Make sure your account has a role with administrator or manage server permissions enabled within that server, and try again.
- Review which permissions you wish to grant Pancake. You can enable and disable permissions by clicking on the checkbox next to each permission.
- Click Authorize to finish setting up the invitation.
Warning: In order for Pancake to play music, you must select the Connect, Speak, Send Messages, Read Messages, and Manage Messages permissions!
Once Discord has confirmed authorization, Pancake will join your server. You will be greeted with a welcome message.
Congratulations! Pancake is now successfully installed on your server.
Test Pancake using Ping
It is good practice to test any bots that you invite to your server. This is to ensure that the bot is working properly and can read and execute commands. You can test this by using the Ping command.
In order to use the ping command, enter the command:
p! ping
Pancake will respond with the message “Pong!”, followed by the amount of time (in milliseconds) it took for the command to process and reply back to the server.
This can be useful for debugging availability and latency issues caused by bot commands.
If you did not receive a response message, please check the FAQ section of this guide.
Get Started
Invite Pancake to your Voice Channel
Pancake must first join a voice channel in your server before it can start playing music. In order to invite Pancake into your music channel:
- Join a voice channel within your server that Pancake has access to.
- Enter the command:
p! join.
You will hear a ding, notifying you that Pancake has joined the voice chat.
Warning: You must be in a voice channel for this command to work. This command will only work if pancake is not already in another voice channel within this server.
Play Music
Pancake uses the YouTube API in order to play music through its audio. This means that you can use Pancake to play any song that you would be able to find on YouTube. You can use the play command in order to find and play music.
In order to start playing music in the voice channel, enter the command:p! play [song title or YouTube link]
Check the Song Queue
Pancake uses a song queue in order to manage multiple song requests from multiple users. The queue has a “first come, first serve” priority. This means that the first song request gets played first, the second song request gets played second, etc. In order to check what songs are in the queue, you can use the queue command.
To check the queue, enter this command:p! queue
Pancake will return a list of all the songs currently in queue, as well as the song that is currently playing.
Pause and Resume Music
You can pause the music at any time while its playing by using the pause command.
To pause the music, enter the command:p! pause
This will pause the music stream
In order to resume, you can use the play command:p! resume
Pancake will resume playing right where it left off.
Stop Music and Cleanup
Once you are done listening to music, you can stop the bot and have it leave the chat using the stop command.
To stop the music, enter the command:p! stop
Pancake will perform the necessary steps to clean up and will clear its queue. Once its finished, Pancake will leave the voice channel.
Commands
This section is used to reference all the different music commands Pancake is able to perform. If a command has the premium perimeter set as true, this means that the command is only available to premium members who have purchased a pledge on Patreon.
autoplay
command:p! autoplay [song title or youtube link]
example:p! autoplay https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQp! autoplay Never Gonna Give You Up
premium:
true
Autoplay is a premium feature that allows Pancake to automatically join your voice channel and play the song specified whenever a user enters the voice channel
bassboost
command:p! bassboost [true or false]
example:p! bassboost true
premium:
true
Bassboost is a premium feature that allows you to boost the bass of the song currently playing in the song queue.
join
command:p! join
premium:
false
The join command allows Pancake to join the voice channel that the user is currently in.
lyrics
command:p! lyrics [song title]
example:p! lyrics Another Brick in the Wall
premium:
false
The lyrics command will output the lyrics of the song into the text channel specified within its arguments.
move
command:p! move [song in queue position] [position to move song to]
example:p! move 1 2
premium:
false
The move command allows you to change the position of a song in the queue to another position. The first argument expects a number from the position the song is in the queue, and the second argument is where in the queue you want to move the song to.
nowplaying
command:p! nowplaying
premium:
false
The now playing command will display the song currently playing in the song queue.
pause
command:p! pause
premium:
false
The pause command will pause the current song that is playing in the queue list.
play
command:p! play [song title or youtube link]
example:p! play Africa Toto
premium:
false
The play command will add the song specified in the argument into the song queue. If there are no songs in the queue, it will automatically play the song. If the bot is not in a voice channel, it will automatically execute the join command and join the voice channel.
queue
command:p! queue
premium:
false
The queue command displays the current song playing as well as the list of songs currently inside the queue.
remove
command:p! remove [queue position to remove]
example:p! remove 1
premium:
false
This command allows you to remove a song from the song queue.
repeat
command:
p! repeat [all or one or off]
example:
p! repeat one
premium:
false
The repeat command tells Pancake to repeat the current song once it ends. The all argument specifies that it will continuously keep looping the current song, one specifies that it will loop this song only once, and off will turn off looping.
resume
command:p! pause
premium:
false
The resume command will resume playing the song at the top of the queue if it is currently paused.
search
command:p! search [song title]
example:p! search in the aeroplane over the sea
premium:
false
The search command will return the top 5 songs that pancake found on youtube matching the song title provided in the argument. You can click on any song link in order to add the song to the music queue.
seek
command:p! seek [duration in seconds]
example:p! seek 11
premium:
false
The seek command will fast forward or rewind the song to the seconds provided in the arguments.
shuffle
command:p! shuffle
premium:
false
The shuffle command will randomize the positions of the songs in your queue list.
skip
command:p! skip
premium:
false
The skip command will skip the current song playing and play the next song in the queue.
stop
command:p! stop
premium:
false
The stop command will stop the bot from playing music, clear the queue, and exit the voice channel.
volume
command:p! volume [percentage]
example:p! volume 50
premium:
true
The volume command allows you turn the output volume of the music to the percentage specified in the arguments. An argument of 50 will turn the volume down by half, a volume of 0 will play no sounds, and a volume of 100 will play the volume at normal sound.
FAQ
My server doesnt appear in the Add to Server list when I try to invite Pancake.
This means that you do not have the proper role permissions on that server. Make sure your account has a role with administrator or manage server permissions enabled within that server and try again.
Pancake is not responding to any of my commands!
Use the p! ping command to confirm that Pancake is not responding to your commands.
- If Pancake responds with the pong message, please make that you are typing the commands correctly without grammatical errors and try again.
- If Pancake doesnt respond to your ping command, check to see that the bot isnt offline. If the bot is offline, then the bot is currently down for maintenance, and you will have to wait for the bot to come back online.
- If the bot is online and still isnt responding, make sure that your prefix is set to the correct set of characters and try again.
- You can set Pancake back to its default settings by kicking and reinviting Pancake back to your server. Try kicking and reinviting the bot and try again.
If you still arent receiving a reply, please open a ticket on Pancakes Github page.
I dont hear any music playing from the bot.
- Make sure the volume is working on your end. You can test this by playing a video on Youtube and seeing if you can hear audio coming from your speaker.
- If Pancake is the only source of audio that you cant hear from, make sure the bot isnt muted or turned down in your volume settings under Discord.
- Make sure you arent deafened within the voice channel. If there is an icon of a headset with a cross over it next to your name in the voice channel, this mean you are deafened. Click on the headphones icon on the bottom left of the screen to undeafen yourself and try again.
If you still cant hear music coming from the bot, please open a ticket on Pancakes Github page.