In Windows Server 2016 you no longer have an opportunity to switch back and forth between core and GUI installation, hence you cannot do install and configure AD DS in a lazy way (using full GUI) and then convert it to core. That was something I discovered hard way long time ago – so I already have separate VHDX templates for Server 2016 core and full GUI VMs.
But it has been quite a while since I was playing with Server Core so when I starting provisioning my new Server 2016 core domain controller VMs today I realized that I need to remember quite a few commands to fully install AD DS on Server Core. I was about to create a blog post listing essential commands, but actually found very well written blog post on TechNet covering exactly that: Chad’s Quick Notes – Installing a Domain Controller with Server 2016 Core. So just sharing it here, instead of writing the same myself 🙂