Players Unable to Connect / Connection Test Failure

[Xevach]

Hi everyone. I've been using Fantasy Grounds for almost a year now, and since the recent patch (3.3.2), my players have been unable to connect to my game. I previously did not have port forwarding, and there weren't any issues.

I have tried port forwarding port 1802, but with no success. I have also tested connecting locally, which does work (same computer + another computer on network). I have also tried adding the exception through the Windows Firewall, and it didn't make any changes. I don't have a DMZ setup, so there shouldn't be any issues with that. I also do not have Hamachi installed.

What would my next best bet be? I have checked other threads on the issue (past and somewhat recent), but haven't been able to find a solution. Any advice is welcome.

[Trenloe]

A first thing to check is that the alias is mapping to your external IP address. I've seen this reported a couple of times recently and it happened to me a couple of nights ago.

1) On the Load Campaign screen the GM should check what the alias is and the external IP address (click in the field to get it)- record these values. Then start up the campaign.
2) A player should try to join, then when they fail, click the folder icon in the top right to open up a file explorer in the FG app data directory and open console.log they should see the alias being resolved to your external IP address. If this is a different IP address than the GMs external IP address then generate a new alias and ask the players to connect with that new alias - check it is resolving to the correct external IP address.

[Moon Wizard]

Usually, when the network is working and immediately stops after an update, it's usually because the security software on your machine is blocking network access for the main application file (FantasyGrounds.exe). You should also double-check the IP address for the router port forwarding, but it sounds like you did that already.

Regards,
JPG

[Xevach]

A first thing to check is that the alias is mapping to your external IP address. I've seen this reported a couple of times recently and it happened to me a couple of nights ago.

1) On the Load Campaign screen the GM should check what the alias is and the external IP address (click in the field to get it)- record these values. Then start up the campaign.
2) A player should try to join, then when they fail, click the folder icon in the top right to open up a file explorer in the FG app data directory and open console.log they should see the alias being resolved to your external IP address. If this is a different IP address than the GMs external IP address then generate a new alias and ask the players to connect with that new alias - check it is resolving to the correct external IP address.

Hi Trenloe,

Thanks for your response. I had one of my players test it, and he got the following log:
[25.09.2017 22:24:06] Runtime Notice: Initializing DirectX
[25.09.2017 22:24:06] Runtime Notice: Initializing COM
[25.09.2017 22:24:08] Runtime Notice: Fantasy Grounds starting
[25.09.2017 22:24:19] Runtime Notice: User 'D' attempting connection to '67.244.93.162:1802'
[25.09.2017 22:24:41] Network Notice: Client unable to connect to host - Could not connect to the host. Check your network settings and verify the host address, then try again.
[25.09.2017 22:25:03] Runtime Notice: Resolving alias
[25.09.2017 22:25:04] Runtime Notice: Alias translate result = 67.244.93.162
[25.09.2017 22:25:04] Runtime Notice: User 'D' attempting connection to '67.244.93.162:1802' using alias 'vibrant ninja vast goblin'
[25.09.2017 22:25:25] Network Notice: Client unable to connect to host - Could not connect to the host. Check your network settings and verify the host address, then try again.

I can confirm that the external IP address is the correct one, and the alias translation matches. This is using a new alias (did a reset before asking him to test).

[Xevach]

Usually, when the network is working and immediately stops after an update, it's usually because the security software on your machine is blocking network access for the main application file (FantasyGrounds.exe). You should also double-check the IP address for the router port forwarding, but it sounds like you did that already.

Regards,
JPG

Hi JPG,

Thank you for your response. I double-checked the IP address for the router port forwarding, and it does match the one I currently have assigned (192.168.7.117). I also had previously tried it using a different internal IP address (192.168.7.144), but still ran into the same issue.

[Trenloe]

Please do the following from a command prompt and post the results here: tracert 8.8.8.8

[Xevach]

Please do the following from a command prompt and post the results here: tracert 8.8.8.8

The results I got were the following:
Tracing route to google-public-dns-a.google.com [8.8.8.8]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.7.7
2 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
3 15 ms 28 ms 21 ms 142.254.165.153
4 12 ms 12 ms 14 ms be60.wdsdny0201h.nyc.rr.com [68.173.201.100]
5 17 ms 28 ms 92 ms agg108.nyclnyrg01r.nyc.rr.com [68.173.198.88]
6 18 ms 15 ms 15 ms bu-ether29.nwrknjmd67w-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [107.14.19.24]
7 31 ms 106 ms 20 ms bu-ether12.nycmny837aw-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.6.27]
8 15 ms 14 ms 33 ms 0.ae0.pr0.nyc20.tbone.rr.com [66.109.6.157]
9 60 ms 13 ms 15 ms ix-ae-10-0.tcore1.N75-New-York.as6453.net [66.110.96.13]
10 14 ms 15 ms 19 ms 72.14.195.232
11 * * * Request timed out.
12 13 ms 16 ms 12 ms 209.85.243.31
13 14 ms 16 ms 16 ms google-public-dns-a.google.com [8.8.8.8]

Trace complete.

[Trenloe]

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.7.7
2 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
...
This looks like there are two devices on your network - maybe a modem/router and then a WiFi router?

In this case, any port forwarding needs to be done on both routers - 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.7.7.

1) On 192.168.0.1 forward TCP port 1802 to the 192.168.0.XX IP address of the second router, XX may be 02 or something else - check on the router itself.

2) On 192.168.7.7 forward TCP port 1802 to the GM computer: 192.168.7.117 (I think you have already done that).

[Xevach]

This looks like there are two devices on your network - maybe a modem/router and then a WiFi router?

In this case, any port forwarding needs to be done on both routers - 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.7.7.

1) On 192.168.0.1 forward TCP port 1802 to the 192.168.0.XX IP address of the second router, XX may be 02 or something else - check on the router itself.

2) On 192.168.7.7 forward TCP port 1802 to the GM computer: 192.168.7.117 (I think you have already done that).

I set up the port forwarding so that 192.168.0.1 (modem/router combo) forwards TCP to port 1802 for 192.168.7.7 (router), and 192.168.7.7 forwards TCP to port 1802 for 192.168.7.117 (desktop).

When I ran the connection test again, I still get the failure message. I also had a player test the connection, but he could not connect. To verify, I did check out https://www.yougetsignal.com/tools/open-ports/ and it says the port is closed.

[Trenloe]

I set up the port forwarding so that 192.168.0.1 (modem/router combo) forwards TCP to port 1802 for 192.168.7.7 (router)...
This probably won't work as 192.168.0.1 won't be able to access 192.168.7.XX network.

Try and find out, on the 192.168.0.1 router, what the IP address of the second router is - maybe from attached devices or something similar. It should have an IP address in the range 192.168.0.XX as it needs to connect directly to 192.168.0.1.

[Xevach]

This probably won't work as 192.168.0.1 won't be able to access 192.168.7.XX network.

Try and find out, on the 192.168.0.1 router, what the IP address of the second router is - maybe from attached devices or something similar. It should have an IP address in the range 192.168.0.XX as it needs to connect directly to 192.168.0.1.

The 192.168.0.1 router is actually a 2-in-1 router and modem, so it can't be on the same subnet as the other router (192.168.7.XX). When I did try getting them on the same subnet, I wasn't able to connect and had to split them to different subnets.

[Bidmaron]

Set the device closest to the incoming internet to bridge mode and then do the port forwarding on the inboard routing device

[Xevach]

Set the device closest to the incoming internet to bridge mode and then do the port forwarding on the inboard routing device

Hi Bidmaron,

Thank you for the suggestion. So good news is that this solution does work, which is great for anyone with this problem. However, for me this causes an issue in the sense that the 2-in-1 router/modem was creating a Wi-Fi network for my roommate, so he now has no Wi-Fi (the second network device is my router for my own network).

It seems that we have narrowed down that the issue lies with the 2-in-1 router/modem, since putting it into bridge mode has solved the problem. What would you recommend should be done to get it so it functions properly while in it's standard mode without the issue?

[Trenloe]

What is the second network device and how is it providing you with Internet access? From your tracert it is connecting to 192.168.0.1 - so it must have an IP address on the 192.168.0.XX subnet - otherwise it wouldn't get the Internet connection.

How is your second (WiFi) router connected to the 2-in-1? By a network cable? Have a look at your 2-in-1 router/modem and see if there is a list of connected devices - probably in the DHCP/IP Address section and work out what IP address your WiFi router has on the 192.168.0.XX subnet. Then use port forwarding on the 2-in-1 device to this 192.168.0.XX IP address.

[Xevach]

What is the second network device and how is it providing you with Internet access? From your tracert it is connecting to 192.168.0.1 - so it must have an IP address on the 192.168.0.XX subnet - otherwise it wouldn't get the Internet connection.

How is your second (WiFi) router connected to the 2-in-1? By a network cable? Have a look at your 2-in-1 router/modem and see if there is a list of connected devices - probably in the DHCP/IP Address section and work out what IP address your WiFi router has on the 192.168.0.XX subnet. Then use port forwarding on the 2-in-1 device to this 192.168.0.XX IP address.

The second network device is a router that is connected to the router/modem combo that is what's hooked up for the Internet.

Thank you for the clarification; I was able to get the IP address that you mentioned, thanks to the tip for referencing the DHCP/IP Address section, and I was able to set it up properly for the router/modem combo to do the port forwarding to the second router, which has resolved the issue.

Thank you to everyone who has assisted. My issue has been resolved, and I hope that this can help others in the future.

[Trenloe]

Thank you to everyone who has assisted. My issue has been resolved...
No worries! Glad you got it working. :)

[Nylanfs]

Hooray!

[Ugotstuck]

Can i get some help with my fantasy Grounds game as well? I get the failure test just like he did. Not sure where to begin but i did run the command prompt.

1 1 ms <1 ms 2 ms HG6Box [192.168.1.1]
2 13 ms 14 ms 16 ms cpe-24-163-96-1.nc.res.rr.com [24.163.96.1]
3 29 ms 33 ms 30 ms 66.26.45.121
4 13 ms 14 ms 16 ms cpe-024-025-041-046.ec.res.rr.com [24.25.41.46]
5 24 ms 13 ms 15 ms be31.drhmncev01r.southeast.rr.com [24.93.64.184]
6 24 ms 22 ms 15 ms 66.109.10.176
7 19 ms 21 ms 15 ms 0.ae0.pr1.dca10.tbone.rr.com [107.14.17.200]
8 16 ms 23 ms 19 ms ix-ae-17-0.tcore2.aeq-ashburn.as6453.net [216.6.87.149]
9 19 ms 26 ms 25 ms if-ae-2-2.tcore1.aeq-ashburn.as6453.net [216.6.87.2]
10 27 ms 25 ms 26 ms 66.198.154.14
11 27 ms 33 ms 28 ms 108.170.246.33
12 28 ms 22 ms 28 ms 216.239.41.11
13 20 ms 16 ms 19 ms google-public-dns-a.google.com [8.8.8.8]

[Moon Wizard]

Your traceroute output looks fine; so you just need to configure port forwarding on your router. Here's a link to our wiki article on port forwarding:
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/How_to_Port_Forward_and_Host_a_Game

Regards,
JPG