Check original Play! Framework documentation first:
Distribution archive can be prepared by calling one of the two goals:
play2:dist goal creates distribution archive.
play2:dist-exploded goal creates distribution archive structure in target/dist directory, e.g. for testing.
Before calling any of distribution tasks, project must be packaged first (jar file must be created).
Creating distribution archive:
mvn package play2:dist
Creating distribution archive structure in a directory:
mvn package play2:dist-exploded
If above distribution goals are not sufficient, custom distribution archive can be created - read documentation.
Read documentation.