Multiplayer trouble, unable to host/join

[unmerged(36688)]

I have a slight problem with Europa Universalis II and this problem is that absolutely nothing happens when I press the Join or Host buttons (this includes local area network, valkyre and internet). The game doesn’t report an error or anything, it just doesn’t do anything, at all.

I’m currently using version 1.08 and windows 2000.

I would appreciate any form of help one might give me.

 

[Castellon]

Let's try the experts in the MP forum.
*Moved

 

[Swuul]

First of all, basically all MP games are played with the latest beta, always. I suggest you dl and install the beta and try again after that

 

[Owen]

How long are you waiting for? Is it long enough to see a message saying that you're unable to connect?

Are you using a firewall?

 

[unmerged(27108)]

I have a slight problem with Europa Universalis II and this problem is that absolutely nothing happens when I press the Join or Host buttons (this includes local area network, valkyre and internet). The game doesn’t report an error or anything, it just doesn’t do anything, at all.

I’m currently using version 1.08 and windows 2000.

I would appreciate any form of help one might give me.

I have the same behaviour when i don't set-up my firewall properly. The game just freeze.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

If the game completely freezes when Host or Join is pressed, one possible cause could be that you had a firewall popping up a blocking popup in the background asking if you want to allow the game access to the internet. If that is the case, alt-tabbing out of EU2 to answer the popup should allow you to continue.

But as I have no idea which firewall software you have installed, that is just a guess.

 

[Umbre]

airport problem ?

Hi
I'm jumping in for I have also a problem to join a MP game. I was suppposed to play in DBD3 and got the message :

no ip found at xx.xx.xx.xx when trying to join fredrik's game. Did I miss something ?

I got lastest patch, disabled anti-virus, xp firewall that allows eu2. The players told me it sounds like a router problem, but I have no router except of an apple airport extreme station (which is not a router I guess).

Do you have any idea of what I could do ?

 

[Swuul]

I got lastest patch, disabled anti-virus, xp firewall that allows eu2. The players told me it sounds like a router problem, but I have no router except of an apple airport extreme station (which is not a router I guess).

It is, if you use it to connect to the Internet (my guess is you do that). It uses NAT, and according to the web-manual blocks automatically certain ports (couldn't find which ones, hopefully not some that Paradox games use...).

How to set port-forwarding, from the manual, page 50:

1. Open AirPort Admin Utility, select your base station, and click Configure.
2. Click Show All Settings.
3. Click the Port Mapping tab.In the Port Mapping pane, click Add and enter the following information:
•Public Port: The port number other computers will use to access the servicesprovided by your computer. For example, computers look for web services on port 80.
•Private IP Address: The manually assigned, private IP address of your computer.
•Private Port: The port that will be used on your computer to provide services. In most cases, you can use the same number as the public port.To use port mapping, you must configure TCP/IP manually on the computer that is running the web, AppleShare, or FTP server.You can also set up a computer as a default host to establish a permanent IP address for the computer and provide inbound port mapping information to the AirPort Extreme Base Station.This is sometimes known as a DMZ and is useful when playing some network games or videoconferencing., the NAT router forwards the packet to the appropriate computer.

So you should define your computer as the host (unless another computer is the host already) and then set the router to DMZ.

I hope this helps

 

[Umbre]

So you should define your computer as the host (unless another computer is the host already) and then set the router to DMZ.

I hope this helps

Thanks a lot Jarkko for this useful piece of information. I followed your instructions and you were right the airport uses both NAT and DHCP. Where I failed is when I had to set up the comp on which I'll use eu2 as host (it's a windows xp based comp) and I dont see how i'm going to set the router to DMZ.

Would you be kind enough to precise these two points ?

 

[Swuul]

Would you be kind enough to precise these two points ?

Well, as I am not familiar with the Airport, I really don't know. From that manual description I'd gather there is some way to define (in the Aiport utility) which computer is the host, but if you didn't see an easy way to do that (like a button or check-box ), then I really don't know...

However, I'll try to guess

You need to know the IP address of your computer (if you don't know it, open cmd and type ipconfig (and press enter), it tells you the internal IP address.

Open AirPort Admin Utility, select your base station, and click Configure.

Click Show All Settings.

Click the Port Mapping tab.In the Port Mapping pane, click Add and enter the following information:

Ports 2300-2400 (if it possible to add a range) as Public Port. These same ports also added to Private Port.
Your computers internal IP address as the Private IP.
Similarily add port 47624.

That should be enough, try if it works. If you are not able to connect through V-Net with these settings, try direct IP connection to the EU2 game host. If that does not work, then add the ports 33943-33950 too.

 

[Umbre]

Click the Port Mapping tab.In the Port Mapping pane, click Add and enter the following information:

Ports 2300-2400 (if it possible to add a range) as Public Port. These same ports also added to Private Port.
Your computers internal IP address as the Private IP.
Similarily add port 47624.

That should be enough, try if it works. If you are not able to connect through V-Net with these settings, try direct IP connection to the EU2 game host. If that does not work, then add the ports 33943-33950 too.

Wow ! It works ! Great. Thank you very much
Very impressive to do that without knowing the machine...
C U

 

[Swuul]

Wow ! It works ! Great. Thank you very much
Very impressive to do that without knowing the machine...
C U

I'm happy I could help

 

[Umbre]

errr...
Indeed it's only working half of times

I tried with several persons on Valkyrie net and I could enter games with some, while others not (especially the MP game i'm supposed to take part in). The message error is always the same as described above.

My opinion is, that the source of the problem is related to the fact that I wasn't able to define ranges in the port mapping tab. Instead, I could only enter the ports one by one so I only entered a few of them. I checked and the airport manual doesn't explain how to define ranges of ports to be mapped.

Could that be the source of the problem ?

 

[Swuul]

Could that be the source of the problem ?

Yes.

 

[Umbre]

OK I have found an option which lets all ports open. I tried to connect with that, no firewall, and still had the message NO IP FOUND AT XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX.

Then I switched back to my old config with only a few ports open and then I was able to connect to a game (the same person than before).

This experiment seems to show that this no ip found message is not related to opened ports.

So now with my actual config I can sometimes connect, sometimes not, with no indication on the cause.

Maybe is it related to the way the host has its setup ?

 

[Swuul]

Just opening the ports is not enough, you have to forward them correctly to your computer too. Did you do that?

 

[unmerged(7276)]

Yes, as jarko said there is a big difference between a router and a firewall. A firewall is like a filter and is simple to understand. Certain traffic is blocked (closed), certain is allowd (open). Routers dont have open and closed ports as such. They may have built in firewall but dont get this confused.

A router is what is actually connected to the internet, not your PC. All traffic is therefore sent to and from the router. As far as the internet is concerned your PC doesnt exist(assuming we are using NAT of course which nealry EVERYONE does). Therefore an incomming packet to your router has to be told to go to your PC. Otherwise it would simply be disregarded as junk by your router. Unless of course your router has an app running that recognises it. Think of your router more like a PC than a modem or switch. It does afterall have memory, CPU etc.

You should see something like this inside your routers config file. It may refer to the host as a virtual server. This is port fowarding..

port number host

80 192.168.0.2
21 xxx.xxxx.xxxx

A port number is used to recieve traffic on for a certain application/service. Since the client machine will be sending to your router, (as that is the device connected to the internet), it needs to be told to foward the packets to your PC manually. This is what the host field there is for. Without it the router would just ignore the packets as it has no application running that can make use of them.

common question. Why does being a host cause so many more problems than being a client? Also why does EU not work when my other games do?

Well you need to understand a little about packets first before i can answer this. A packet is a block/chunk of data that is sent through the internet. These chunks of data are then reassembled at the 'other end'. The packets contain a header which is basically information about it. eg seq number so they are reassembled in the right order. The 4 most important things are source mac address, source ip, dest mac, dest IP. When you are the client your source ip address is 'known' and put on the packet. This is because the source IS your PC, not your router(note your router uses its MAC as the source mac). This allows data to find its way back to you because your router can see the information on the returning data. However if you are the host then you are not the source anymore. The source is the client machine at the other end and tries to connect to your ports directly. it is like trying to play EU with your router. THe only way the packets can find their way to your machine is through port fowarding as described above. I THINK EU needs to set up a host proccess even when you are not hosting. Most games dont require this. This is why i think other games may work when EU doesnt with your router/firewall.

 

[Owen]

...I THINK EU needs to set up a host proccess even when you are not hosting. Most games dont require this. This is why i think other games may work when EU doesnt with your router/firewall.

This is correct. Johan has said that all players act as hosts during the hosting up process. This is why one player crashing while hosting up prevents all players entering the game and leaves them continually trying to connect to the crashed player until they restart EU2. Thinking about it, the connections should time out after 5 minutes or so. Time for a bug report I think.

 

[Owen]

Bug report thread.

 

[Umbre]

I have no port forwarding in this apple airport interface but when opening ports I must indicate a "private IP" which is the one of the client that will use the opened ports. So that should be the equivalent of port forwarding.

When I told the airport to open all ports, I had to specify the ip of the pc that would then become the "defaut host". And I had to manually change the tcp/ip set up in this pc. It is possible that at this level I did something wrong but I cant figure out what it was... maybe not enter the DNS and such information in the tcp/ip setup ?

I have learned many things reading your explanations, and I'm grateful for that but still I don't know what to do

Paradox should make it easier in the future to play MP because I doubt most people would be inclined to spend so much time and effort in order to have the game running.