Fly with a friend?

[Hoirtel]

I'm hoping this is a silly question, I am going to fly with a friend hosted on my PC. I've seen the YT video showing how to make the mission and press the button, but how does my friend connect to this? I actually can't seem to find this information anywhere. I am sure I have missed it. I don't normally ask how to do something before trying myself but don't want to waste time when we finally get lined up.

Thanks

Edited August 17, 2022 by Hoirtel

[TheRigere]

I'm at the same point you are wondering same. I imagine you can search by name or filter to locate. My question is do both my friend plane and mine have to be listed as "client" or just his and my stays as "player"?

[Hoirtel]

3 hours ago, TheRigere said:

I'm at the same point you are wondering same. I imagine you can search by name or filter to locate. My question is do both my friend plane and mine have to be listed as "client" or just his and my stays as "player"?

In the mission editor they should both be client. I run missions with client just for single player as I can switch aircraft in same mission.

I'm trying to find out what does my friend do when I press the "Launch Multiplayer Server" button. The video on YT (suntsag) seems to miss this as do all the other. I have a horrible feeling it requires some sort of network configurations first....

@TheRigereIf you try this can you let me know how it worked?

Edited August 17, 2022 by Hoirtel

[Maverick87Shaka]

To be able to play in multiplayer with your friend you should prepare a mission to run first of all.

Set all the slot as client, no difference if it's your personal one or the one for your friend, set both as client. You can also add several different plane in the same mission, they will be listed as available options but not activated until someone pick up one of them.

Then you need to prepare your computer to HOST the mission.
Generally speaking you need to open on your local computer firewall ( windows firewall or other ) the TCP and UDP port 10308. You can choose to change the default option while creating the new server, but it's not necessary, so let's assume you'll leave the default 10308.
Than you need to "port forward" the TCP and UDP 10308 port from public internet to your local computer. It's something that you have to do on your router where you tell basically to pass the incoming internet traffic on that port to your local ip address of your computer.

If you have this done, your friend should see your server in the list, and be able to connect.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Maverick87Shaka

[Hoirtel]

On 8/20/2022 at 1:43 PM, Maverick87Shaka said:

To be able to play in multiplayer with your friend you should prepare a mission to run first of all.

Set all the slot as client, no difference if it's your personal one or the one for your friend, set both as client. You can also add several different plane in the same mission, they will be listed as available options but not activated until someone pick up one of them.

Thank you need to prepare your computer to HOST the mission.
Generally speaking you need to open on your local computer firewall ( windows firewall or other ) and open the TCP and UDP port 10308. You can choose to change the default option while creating the new server, but it's not necessary, so let's assume you'll leave the default 10308.
Than you need to "port forward" the TCP and UDP 10308 port from public internet to your local computer. It's something that you have to do on your router where you tell basically to pass the incoming internet traffic on that port to your local ip address of your computer.

If you have this done, your friend should see your server in the list, and be able to connect.

Thank you for that information, I wasn't able to find that specifically for FWAF elsewhere. I had actually thought that the FWAF button did away with this requirement for single sessions. I am a bit concerned about the security of this, I probably just need to do more research and understand how to keep myself protected while its open.

Or just use a public server...

Edited August 22, 2022 by Hoirtel

[Maverick87Shaka]

On 8/22/2022 at 9:50 AM, Hoirtel said:

Thank you for that information, I wasn't able to find that specifically for FWAF elsewhere. I had actually thought that the FWAF button did away with this requirement for single sessions. I am a bit concerned about the security of this, I probably just need to do more research and understand how to keep myself protected while its open.

Or just use a public server...

 

Have just the port open on your firewall, and the port forwarding on your router doesn't expose your computer or network to any risk. When DCS is not running your machine should not have any other "listening" services on that port, so nobody can try to access trough that port to your system.

When DCS is running of course they can connect to your DCS and try to do something, but to mitigate any risk, DCS server/mission environment can't access to your resources, can't read your files on disk! ( sanitize option )

Of course if you de-sanitize your DCS installation ( that is required for some mod if I remember well ) you can expose your system to potential risk, but let me say it's not an easy task try to access a system trough DCS even with a de-sanitized installation.

Edited October 22, 2022 by Maverick87Shaka

[Hoirtel]

On 8/20/2022 at 1:43 PM, Maverick87Shaka said:

To be able to play in multiplayer with your friend you should prepare a mission to run first of all.

Set all the slot as client, no difference if it's your personal one or the one for your friend, set both as client. You can also add several different plane in the same mission, they will be listed as available options but not activated until someone pick up one of them.

Thank you need to prepare your computer to HOST the mission.
Generally speaking you need to open on your local computer firewall ( windows firewall or other ) and open the TCP and UDP port 10308. You can choose to change the default option while creating the new server, but it's not necessary, so let's assume you'll leave the default 10308.
Than you need to "port forward" the TCP and UDP 10308 port from public internet to your local computer. It's something that you have to do on your router where you tell basically to pass the incoming internet traffic on that port to your local ip address of your computer.

If you have this done, your friend should see your server in the list, and be able to connect.

Just coming back to this. On win 10 firewall the rules allow for UDP or TCP, whereas the router will do both. Does it need two rules? or just we just pick one?

[Maverick87Shaka]

On 10/21/2022 at 10:05 AM, Hoirtel said:

Just coming back to this. On win 10 firewall the rules allow for UDP or TCP, whereas the router will do both. Does it need two rules? or just we just pick one?

Yes DCS need both TCP and UDP, so add two different rules, one for TCP and the other for UDP.

 

[TonyRS]

Good info here, thanks. But…
I’m really not that bright!
You say, for example that we would need to port forward Port 10308, both TPC & UDP, yet in your firewall rules it shows TCP 10302/10312 & the same for UDP.
Would you, for the sake of idiots like me, explain the significance of this ‘Range’ of ports? Presumably this ‘Range’ of ports would also need to match on both the Router and Windows 10 Firewall?
Further, the 'advanced' section of windows 10 firewall has 'inbound', 'outbound' and 'connection security' rules. Which rules do we need to setup? I'm assuming (but don't know, we  would need 'inbound rules'?

Cheers!

Edited May 25, 2023 by TonyRS

[Maverick87Shaka]

34 minutes ago, TonyRS said:

Good info here, thanks. But…
I’m really not that bright!
You say, for example that we would need to port forward Port 10308, both TPC & UDP, yet in your firewall rules it shows TCP 10302/10312 & the same for UDP.
Would you, for the sake of idiots like me, explain the significance of this ‘Range’ of ports? Presumably this ‘Range’ of ports would also need to match on both the Router and Windows 10 Firewall?

Cheers!

I have several instance running on my server, not just one, that's why I'm using a range instead of single port.
If you're running just one instance, one port ( default is 10308 but you can change it) on both protocol ( TCP and UDP ) it's fine

Edited May 25, 2023 by Maverick87Shaka

[TonyRS]

6 minutes ago, Maverick87Shaka said:

I have several instance running on my server, not just one, that's why I'm using a range instead of single port.
If you're running just one instance, one port ( default is 10308 but you can change it) on both protocol ( TCP and UDP ) it's fine

 

OK, thanks for that. Appreciated
I did just edit my post in include another question about rules in windows firewall. I don't suppose you could.....
And, just to be clear, I'm not running a DCS Server, I'm just running the latest standalone Open Beta.

Edited May 25, 2023 by TonyRS

[Maverick87Shaka]

7 minutes ago, TonyRS said:

OK, thanks for that. Appreciated
I did just edit my post in include another question about rules in windows firewall. I don't suppose you could.....

Didn't notice the edit in fact sorry, thanks for reminder.
 

46 minutes ago, TonyRS said:

Further, the 'advanced' section of windows 10 firewall has 'inbound', 'outbound' and 'connection security' rules. Which rules do we need to setup? I'm assuming (but don't know, we  would need 'inbound rules'?

Cheers!

You don't have to worry about the Outbound Rules in the 99% of the case, by default outgoing traffic is always enabled.
So yes, you're right, you need to add port only in the Inbound Rules section of the windows firewall.

7 minutes ago, TonyRS said:

And, just to be clear, I'm not running a DCS Server, I'm just running the latest standalone Open Beta.

It works in the same way as server when you host a mission from your installation in terms of communication, and firewall/router settings that you need to apply

Edited May 25, 2023 by Maverick87Shaka
Missing part

[TonyRS]

On 5/25/2023 at 9:50 PM, Maverick87Shaka said:

Didn't notice the edit in fact sorry, thanks for reminder.
 

You don't have to worry about the Outbound Rules in the 99% of the case, by default outgoing traffic is always enabled.
So yes, you're right, you need to add port only in the Inbound Rules section of the windows firewall.

It works in the same way as server when you host a mission from your installation in terms of communication, and firewall/router settings that you need to apply

 

Many thanks for all your advice on this. I now have it working fine.
Thanks again.