Multiplayer - A problem getting started

[Drake_NS]

First off, my sincerest apologies if this has been answered and I missed it in my search. Been digging here and the rest of the internet for an answer (or even someone with the same problem) for quite a few hours now.

The problem is this: following the FAQ (also found here), I was able to set up a server started to the point where it is "Waiting for players to connect..." My friend, elsewhere, tells his game to connect. On the host, his name pops up, his status as "Connected." Now, the weird thing - his game, after a few moments, says it is unable to connect. The host continues to think he is connected until he actually quits his game.

Now, at first I thought it was a router or firewall issue, but here is the really weird part: I can start up a second instance of the game locally, tell it to connect to the host, and it does the same thing. The client says it cannot connect, while the host thinks the player is connected.

Anybody else had a similar problem?
(also, I know that PBW is a popular thing, but I'm planning on doing this as a kind of games-night thing, and getting everyone I want in on it to register and use what they would think of as 3rd party programs wouldn't fly too well).

Anyways, thanks for any ideas.

[Suicide Junkie]

If it is going to be a games night LAN thing, then the best thing to do is "manual file moving"

Share your drive and have the other players run over the network. That way their PLRs automatically get saved to the right spot.

You can run my autohost program to automatically process the turns and show you who has finished their turns so far.
http://imagemodserver.mine.nu/other/...autohost2C.zip

[Atrocities]

We played over IM, that worked well. But SJ's suggestion also works really well.

[Drake_NS]

Unfortunately, my original plan was to do it over internet using the TCP/IP option (a couple of the prospective players are too distant to do a LAN game). My attempt at connecting to a local server was to find out if the problems I was having were due to any firewall or router setting. Apparently that isn't the case.

Anyways, thanks for the suggestions. I'll see what more poking I can do. I think, at this point, we may swap over to something that doesn't require the stars to be in proper alignment to play, however. Still, it will be a fun setup if I can ever get it to work.

[Suicide Junkie]

An FTP server would do great.
SE5a made a client to upload PLRs and download turns automagically, although manual movement is just a click drag away too.

Bonus: You get efficient File Transfers, which helps vs the big savegame files.