Offline LAN playing

[Scubamax]

So I got this issue and I know how I ran into but, I am hoping that you guys are able to work with me to get a work around.

A little background on me. I work for the US Navy and I am constantly on deployments underway where I do not have access to the internet. This is problematic for running Fantasy Grounds Unity. I have been a huge fan of this program and bought the Ultimate version of both the Classic and the Unity of Fantasy Grounds. I have purchased all sorts of rule book sand adventure books too. Of recent I have had some players that wanted to use the program as well when we are playing while underway at sea. We ran into the issue of this error: "Authorization failed: The host is running an unauthorized copy, or authorization server is down." I am hoping to either get you guys to help me out with some sort of patch file I can run on my personal computer that will let it see that I have the ultimate version and let my players who have a demo version connect to me or maybe come up with something for all military personnel that may be forward deployed that can't access the net.

I am sure I am a very small percentage of your user base that would actually run into this problem, but I'm sure other military and seafarer that use this program have the same problem. I currently run the program on my laptop and display the current map on a TV for all of my players to see. If they were able to manipulate their own character sheets it would make getting new players into this amazing game a bit easier.

[damned]

Scubamax you might find that Standard licenses work better for your environment. The license check is done at installation (I believe) on this type of install. You might log a ticket at https://support.fantasygrounds.com maybe there is a way to swap your license?

[Scubamax]

But why should I as the host that has an ultimate version need to downgrade. I got the ultimate version so that people can get the demo version so that they can play in the game that I host.

So why should I get to the standard version.

[damned]

When connecting to an Ultimate license with a demo license the demo license does a license check.
If you have no internet the license check fails.
Standard doesnt do this.

[Scubamax]

So you are saying that my players need to get the standard.

[Trenloe]

So you are saying that my players need to get the standard.
That is correct. The issue is with the demo licenses needing to verify that the ultimate license they're connecting to is valid. This doesn't happen with a standard license.

[Scubamax]

That unfortunately isn't very helpful to new players. I have been GM on my ship now for a little over a year and with the turn over of crew and constantly looking for new players to join I have had to teach at least a dozen guys how to play. I am personally supplying dice for the guys. If I tell people that they need to buy the game. I will have a much smaller turnout of brand new players

[Trenloe]

That unfortunately isn't very helpful to new players. I have been GM on my ship now for a little over a year and with the turn over of crew and constantly looking for new players to join I have had to teach at least a dozen guys how to play. I am personally supplying dice for the guys. If I tell people that they need to buy the game. I will have a much smaller turnout of brand new players
Understood, but that's the way the system is setup to try to combat piracy of the Ultimate license. I suggest you email [email protected] to discuss your specific situation to see if there is anything they can do to help.

[Scubamax]

Someone at support is helping and suggesting the same things. They also suggested making this a suggestion on the wish list

[Weissrolf]

Maybe SW could offer to turn the one Ultimate license into multiple Standard licenses that the GM and alternating players then use?! Would the GM still be able to share his rulebooks/modules during the campaign session then?

[Scubamax]

I would rather not lose my ultimate version though. So when I am on land and playing at home with friends and family they to could just get the demo version to play with me.

[Weissrolf]

Personally I would prefer if FGU did not test the license every time a demo player connects. Rather make it once in a while or every X demo clients connecting. This way there could be a grace period of several days/weeks before a new license check needs to be made, leaving some leeway for internet outage or your situation. This would also help with temporary outage of SW's license servers (did this ever happen?).

[Scubamax]

That could work a bit better

[Trenloe]

Grace checks/check every X times can be abused and would need something telling you how many days/times you have left (which, again, would open it to abuse). Even with this, it wouldn't help @Scubamax because the delayed check could happen when they're not online anyway. It basically has to not check at all to completely avoid what is being discussed in this thread - which would disable the anti piracy check completely, which I'm sure is something SmiteWorks want to avoid.

@Scubamax - glad to hear support are looking into options for you.

[Scubamax]

I was thinking of a solution that would have a military mode or something similar. Where guys in the military get a single use code to disable that check.

[Weissrolf]

Grace checks after "period of time" would at least allow them to connect whenever possible and then use the grace period until they can connect again.

In the end all of these authorization/copyright schemes come with the disadvantage of hampering the paying user more than the ones using cracks. Grace periods would meet paying customers somewhat half-way as a compromise.

Leaving that aside there is another possible way to handle this very specific case short-term that would need some "being generous" part. I am sure SW knows what I mean. ;)

[Scubamax]

The support guy I'm talking to was in the navy and knows the life style I'm talking about so hopefully he is able to get some developers onboard to make this a bit easier is sailing folks

[BrisMatal]

The support guy I'm talking to was in the navy and knows the life style I'm talking about so hopefully he is able to get some developers onboard to make this a bit easier is sailing folks

Did you guys ever figure out a solution? I’m running into this now onboard my ship lmao

[jharp]

i'm sure there is someone out there who could remove the check, Moon?

[Moon Wizard]

There are no plans at this time to remove the online checks for Ultimate licenses. If you need to play completely disconnected, we recommend using Standard licenses for GM and all players, which do not require the check for LAN play.

Regards,
JPG

[JohnD]

Non programmer thought but could you make a button to disable the check and then the Ultimate license would then act like a Standard until the button is pressed again?

Edit - probably just restating what's already been asked for.

[Trenloe]

Non programmer thought but could you make a button to disable the check and then the Ultimate license would then act like a Standard until the button is pressed again?

Edit - probably just restating what's already been asked for.
This isn't needed. If all clients connecting have a license then the Ultimate license essentially acts the same as a Standard. The Internet connection is only needed when a player instance without a license tries to connect to an Ultimate license - and it's the player instance that checks the validity of the Ultimate license they're connecting to. Have licenses for all players and there's no Internet connection needed.

[LordEntrails]

Non programmer thought but could you make a button to disable the check and then the Ultimate license would then act like a Standard until the button is pressed again?

Edit - probably just restating what's already been asked for.
Not needed. If standard licenses connect to an ultimate license, their is no check. There is only a check on the validity of the ultimate license when free/demo accounts connect to an ultimate host.

[JohnD]

Ah so the OP has a solution then... his players should buy licenses... which just happens to be on sale right now. :)

[Scubamax]

Did you guys ever figure out a solution? I’m running into this now onboard my ship lmao

As both Jharp and Moon Wizard said.
I was got a router on my ship that I would turn on when we gamed. But yes if all of you have the standard version or ultimate version you will be able to connect. It seems that it when the demo version tries to connect to you it wants to ping home.

We had a ton of fun, but yes this is the only solution currently. If you want other advice about how I ran my sessions on my ship let me know.

[jharp]

If the only solution is to be online for Demo to Ultimate, or everyone has standard then I'm sure people just hack at it until they make it work. I can't imagine this is to SW's benefit in the long run. I have standard so I've never concerned myself with it.

Jason