So I want to input special chars like the © symbol with compose+o+c for example. I am in the TTY and I don’t want to waste cpu on a gui. I run a server on this machine. So how can I enable the Compose key in the TTY?
Bump
Please try and avoid “bumping” threads, - if someone can help, they will. 
I think you’ve already had a response to your query, I hope you’re able to get things working!
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That was before I got a response
Is it just me, or do I get cannot open display errors bc I don’t have X started? I said tty.
Well if you look on the right side of that webpage window there are „additional readings“ for example:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Linux_console/Keyboard_configuration
I suggest you also do the research, only trying to help here 
I still dont get it. I read it like 10 times and its just all over the place. This is my first time doing something like this, and the last thing I want to do is to use a GUI that sucks up all my power.
Run this command:
cat /etc/vconsole.conf
Does the value of KEYMAP agree with the keyboard you are using?
You can edit vconsole.conf to change to a different KEYMAP. You can view a list of allowed KEYMAPs by running this command:
localectl list-keymaps
After you reboot, the new keymap will be used while you’re in the virtual console (by which I mean the full-screen TTY that runs without X11).
By the way, you might also want to run the following command, which shows separate values for the virtual console keymap and the X11 keyboard layout:
localectl status
With my keyboard, the dead keys work as expected while I’m using the virtual console. If I change the KEYMAP in vconsole.conf to a keymap that doesn’t have dead keys, like us, my dead keys no longer work as dead keys.
Edit: Just another thought…
If your keymap doesn’t define a Compose key (or defines a Compose key different than the one you want to use), you would need to create a custom keymap, based on one of the existing keymaps.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Linux_console/Keyboard_configuration#Creating_a_custom_keymap
It’s not something I’ve done myself, but a quick search brings up some examples. Here’s one:
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=182679
Your custom keymap would have a line something like the following:
keycode 100 = Compose
In this example, keycode 100 was chosen because it is the Right-Alt key on a us keyboard. You can run
showkey --keycodes
to discover the keycode for any key on your keyboard.