Online connection problems; is there anyone who is actually playing this MP?

[firearms2k]

I've been recently introduced to this gem through the free trial, as of such, I've found out this game is extremely addictive, and caters to a great deal of challenge instead of luck over mind like in various other RTS's(CoH). I've recently had this masterpiece purchased as well, including Red Tide, through Steam - It's insanely good, almost too good.

Playing this game multi-player online however is one of the best experiences in a game - the short few minutes you are connected. I've been trying to get a match going all the way through for over 4 days now, and out of all the games played(too many to count by far now), I've only managed to stay connected through ONE entire match. This problem isn't just for me, I've been playing this with 5 other friends, one of which we even tried to play it LAN to see if it would hold out - this didn't work either.

- TL;DR: Insanely good game, been playing it for a while now with persistent MP connection problems, doesn't even work on LAN with friends close by, same problems for my peers playing this game.

The various types of problems I've seen through this, to mention a few, are "Connection lost(cd:3)", the game stops and it displays in the upper part of the screen "Waiting for server" until I give in and exit, then it gives me another "Lost connection" error, "(cd:4)" I believe on return to the main menu. I have also got the "(cd:0)" message quite a few times. It seems to pick one of the above at random in every game. Sometimes it even CTD's trying to join a lobby too.

What do these error messages mean? How can I/we fix them so I can actually play this game? Is anyone actually playing this at all without connection problems!?

I'm on the Victory Day edition, 1.17.5, though the Steam version 1.11.3 persists with the same problems. The problem is NOT related to firewalls/ports/Anti-Virus, because I have nullified all of these simple "burdens". Hosting games myself end up in the same fashion as well.

Looking through the various forums related to this game, it seems like there's a lot of people out there that actually have these same problems. The game is virtually unplayable outside of the SP Campaign, and nobody seems to have a hard, conclusive answer to what is actually going on. This is why I'm making this thread, to ask if there's any way to brighten the mind to a few(Although it seems like all of them to times) players with these same problems, and actually have an insanely good time playing this - instead of setting it up to decay on the shelf with these very frustrating, seemingly minor problems that make the game entirely unplayable.

[Korsakov829]

As a random guess, I would say its a steam problem. I've always had problems with steam games, so yeah.

[firearms2k]

I don't think this is related to Steam, Steam has very little to do with the game when it's playing online(so I would think). I am however running the Victory Day edition by a Steam shortcut so I can use the ingame overlay.

I have taken that issue into concideration as well, even though it seems a little far fetched. It still won't work even if I'm running Men of War entirely voided from Steam.

[Korsakov829]

If its a connection problem something is blocking you from connecting. If I were you id risk it, and turn off your firewall or allow for exceptions.

I myself never had a problem with MoW.

[firearms2k]

Thank you for your insight, it's greatly appreciated - But as mentioned in the OP, it's not related to that. I have both a public IP adress, and full exceptions through the Windows firewall.

[CzaD]

I know what you mean. This game is really good. Not perfect, but it still gives huge amounts of challenge and fun. I am a Total War fan, but the new titles like Empire or Napoleon are only for casual gamers: terribly easy and boring. Moreover, I don't like MP in Empire or Napoleon, which is all about exploiting AI: your opponent will flack your unattended unit and shoot at it “for free” and my idle men, who are ordered to fire at, will not turn and fire back.

I myself am a bit disappointed with the quality of the MoW MP. Too many different versions and incompatibility issues. I was getting the out of sync error all the time and if I install the Russian patches and the fix, my firewall warns me about buffer overflow attack, which was completely new to me. But when I downloaded the Men of War v1.17.5 Free Multiplayer Client from:

http://www.gamershell.com/download_58730.shtml

I finally am not out of sync and my firewall is happy. So my problem is gone but I still see that we lose many players due to the out of sync error.

And I still see lots of yellow shields, like 90% of all games. In the manual, it says it is best to avoid them. So I need to avoid 90% of games?


I get the “waiting for server” message sometimes, but it doesn’t take that long but maybe I was lucky.

The MP experience is a bit spoilt by the community too. My first impression is not that good compared to Total War community. But that is another story.

I just hope the DMS will do a good job with Assault Squad MP.

[Korsakov829]

Originally Posted by CzaD

...And I still see lots of yellow shields, like 90% of all games. In the manual, it says it is best to avoid them. So I need to avoid 90% of games?...

...I just hope the DMS will do a good job with Assault Squad MP...

If you have a really, really good PC, don't mind those yellow shields.

As for Assault Squad? I don't expect much. As a guess the Skrimish, if there will be any, will be like playing against AI on a MP map.

[firearms2k]

I too am a great fan of Empire: Total War, and strangely enough share the exact same opinion on Napoleon! MP in these can be pretty fun in LAN games with friends though, it's always epic to see an entire line of an armada slowly advancing into hell with your friends.

But on-topic:

I haven't tried the Russian patch(to my knowledge at least), and I don't have any issues with my firewall, although that sounds a little strange(The "buffer overflow" on your end, that is).

Strangely enough, I downloaded MoW from that very exact link you gave me, and I have been primarily playing on that very version. I got this game purchased only a day after(on Steam), despite these problems and they've been persistent regardless of those 2 versions(Standard Steam 1.11.3, and the free client(Victory Day edition) 1.17.5).

The demo to this game didn't get me interested in it one bit, but MP play however got me deeply enthralled. I found playing some games where they'd rush a mobile AA/AC tank to your spawn area and wait around until you spawn a heavier tank, only to have it taken out in the rear by a seemingly non-armor threatening vehicle

On a side note though, I did not know that about those yellow shields, and oddly enough, they are on about all of the game lobbies for me too.

Thanks for your very insightful reply!

Originally Posted by Korsakov829

If you have a really, really good PC, don't mind those yellow shields.

I don't know, but I think my rig is more than plentiful to run this game.

8800GT 512MB, Q6600, and 5GB RAM seems to be more than excessive for this game.



Last edit for the night:

I've tried this with the firewall completely disabled as well, this did next to nothing so it seems; so it is NOT related to firewall issues. I'm already pretty well experienced on the issue of firewalls and anti-virus programs interfering with games as well with ports.

I'll try and get some screenshots of the error messages tomorrow.

[CzaD]

@firearms2k

I will play some more and give you my feedback after a while.

As to the spawn killing, the rule seems to be simple: wherever there is a respawn in the game, there will be a spawn killer. Some players lack maturity and just choose to be plain annoying.

EDIT: I guess your mayor problem seems to be that you get disconnected too often. Are you using a router? If so, maybe you might be interested in port forwarding.

@Korsakov829

I’ve already played some yellow shield battles and so far so good.


I just hope Assault Squad will offer us some more wicked missions with improved AI and less bugs and fully compatible MP.


As to the skirmish thing, this is going to be like what you described. However, the whole experience going to be much less enjoyable than MP. To get an idea what AI can do in fully scripted games like MoW, you need to picture the most moronic noob you've ever played a match with, multiply it by 1000 and consider the fact the AI never learns from its mistakes. So I don't understand why so many players cry about the lack of skirmish. When they finally get it, there will be never-ending complaints about the AI. Go to Total War Center, and you will know what I mean.

[firearms2k]

As stated in OP, it's neither of those problems. I do NOT have ANY issues with Firewalls/Ports/Anti-Virus software. I don't have any NAT issues, so this isn't where the problem is. I'm almost entirely certain on these issues, as I've dealt with them plentiful of times for both myself and others.

However, I believe the ports for this game are 3110-3210 both UDP/TCP. Correct me if I'm wrong though(For those who might find this useful)

Edit: Here's a few screenshots of various messages. I receive them at seemingly random at any time, including while waiting in the game lobby.

On a side note, the yellow shield icon seems to be nothing related to performance. It's more or less about NAT negotiations when only entering a lobby.

Originally Posted by CzaD

As to the spawn killing, the rule seems to be simple: wherever there is a respawn in the game, there will be a spawn killer. Some players lack maturity and just choose to be plain annoying.

It seems to be a rather unavoidable and cliche attribute to video games... But it was my favorite tank