Please help with running zdoom without doom connector

[Michty]

Please help.

How do I start a multiplayer game in Zdoom without using doom connector? And how would somebody join?

[cccp_leha]

Here's one.

[Biff]

Those instructions look outdated, there are simpler commands.

To host a game for two players (including the host), the host computer command line is
zdoom -host or zdoom -host 2
and the other computer joins with the command
zdoom -join (name of host computer on LAN or IP address of host).
Add additional commands as needed. For example, to host a deathmatch game in TNTBlood.wad, the commands are
zdoom -host -deathmatch -file tntblood.wad
and the client joins with
zdoom -join (host name) -deathmatch -file tntblood.wad.

The computer names mentioned above refer the the computer identification in network properties. My computer is identified as Biff on my LAN, so all the client needs is
zdoom -join biff.

If you are going to host for three or more players, you should add the command -netmode 1 on the host's command line for improved networking performance. If you are playing over modems, it may also help speed up the game to use -dup 2 or -dup 3.

[cccp_leha]

Oh well, shows how much I play online.

[wildweasel]

I always use -netmode 1 on a LAN, certainly helps the sync issues a bit (so I've noticed anyway). Unable to do any further testing because my brother has no computer at the moment, plus he's out of state.

[Michty]

I managed to get the multiplayer game working and my friend joined but we were out of sync. How can I resolve this?

[Biff]

What wad were you playing? Everything needs to be exactly the same....zdoom versions, IWAD (doom.wad or doom2.wad, etc.).

[Michty]

We're no longer out of sync, we just get terrible lag. My friend had to patch his doom2.wad. Should we use a faster source-port? What's really annoying is that when I play on ZDaemon I get lag when the weapon fires, so it becomes hard to hit other players who presumably don't have this.

Thanks.

[Biff]

OK, you must be playing over the internet, and maybe on modems? There are a few things you can do to optimize modem performance but it sounds like you are mainly at the mercy of fairly high ping between you two. The weapon lag on zdaemon is another symptom of you having fairly high ping to that server.

Did you try -dup 2 or -dup 3 on the command line? This will send less data between the computers and allow the game to play faster. I think only the host needs to specify this now, but it won't hurt to be on both players' command line.