I found out that making a server doesn't work for me , and I've seen servers which support multiple versions at once, so players can connect using a wide range of Minecraft versions. How do i do that on my own server?
(I'm looking specifically for help with 1.8 to 1.12.2)
The only way I know of to solve this is by utilizing plugins on your server that create multi-version support.
First, you will need to set up your server to be suitable for the plugin: The server will have to be set to the oldest version supported, which is in this case version 1.8. Be aware that any features added after this version will not be available to any player.
There are a few plugins that create multi-version support, but the most used is Via Version. This plugin can be ran using Spigot.
For your server, this plugin is suitable, as it can create 1.8 to 1.13.2 support. Here is a table of supported versions based on the server client:
After installing this plugin to your server, players can connect with any of the versions 1.8.0 to 1.13.2.
Here is a 7-minute video tutorial explaining the process of setting up Via Version.
They do it with a mod. Vanilla Minecraft doesn't have this feature.
And for good reasons, because opening a server for more than one version brings with it lots of compatibility issues, many of which are impossible to solve. There's usually no reason for a server to support more than one version, the players can just start Minecraft in the server's version to play on it.
