ZDL - Advanced Multiplayer Settings

[Xanirus]

Trying to netplay with some friends for the first time, but do I need to fiddle with any of these settings? Not exactly sure what they are.

I got the basics down. I forwarded my ports to the default of 5029, and I give my friends the external IP address. I tried a combination of settings, not knowing too much what they do, like net mode, extractic, etc. I don't know if it makes a difference, but my friend's ZDL keeps saying something along the lines of "cannot find host = NO DATA" or something, pretty sure on the DATA part of the error. He had to leave though, so I'll have to try again later to see the exact error. Is there anything else I'm missing?

We're just trying regular old Doom to see if we can at least connect, we'll deal with mods later.

[edward850]

ZDL is not a connection manager, and thus it's impossible for him to be seeing network related error messages in it. That error message doesn't exist in ZDoom either. No one can help you if you only post what you think you need, rather than what actually happens.

[Xanirus]

I'm not so concerned with the error message at this point so much as what the other settings are though. I just needed the info on the other settings (i.e. if they're necessary) because the next time I'm able to try again it might not be the same person I'm trying to connect with. (It was GZDoom, if it mattered.)

[edward850]

zdoom -host 2
zdoom -join host-name

There is nothing else too it. It's all the FAQ told you to do, after all.
Think about it. If there was some advanced setting you actually needed, why is it a setting? Wouldn't it already be on if you needed it by default? The only thing it can't tell you aren't loading the same versions ZDoom, which is the typical cause for handshake issues.

[Xanirus]

Yeah, see, I didn't add those arguments, however you do that. (Command line?) I read that ZDL was supposed to automate this somehow without having to do whatever that was, which is why I'm using it. I saw a Zdoom tutorial of that somewhere here, but thought it would be different since I'm using ZDL. All I did was

Me as host: Multi settings, port 5000, basically checked off everything else, co-op game mode, Players 1
Him: entered my IP address, same port

Got that NO DATA whatever error. (Will try port 5029 later on now that I found there's a default, not that I think it should of mattered.)

The problem is the person I'm connecting with is a zero on computer stuff that doesn't involve playing games, so I literally took hold of his computer remotely to see what he was looking at.

EDIT: If this FAQ came with ZDL...it didn't come with mine. 3.2.2.3. I'm pressed to even find ZDL online anymore, it's like their site went down.

[edward850]

All ZDL does is construct command lines. You have done exactly the same thing I showed you, except player count which should be at least 2 for obvious reasons. Why would you only set 1 player if you want 2?

[Xanirus]

I thought it was host +1. Will try this again later.

[edward850]

If it was host+1, it would be impossible to do solo-net.

[Xanirus]

Ok whatever, I'm just saying that it's weird to even have "1" as an option then if that just means solo.

Anyway, I got it working, with the exception of one problem. One of my friends constantly gets "Out of Sync." After googling this I found out that this is what those extra settings I was talking about were for. Extratic helps somewhat, but my friend still gets out of sync. Netmode 1 makes it worse. Only thing I haven't tried was Dup. He does have a bit of slow internet, topping out at 8.6 MBPS/sec and 2.4 uploads, but usually he connects fine in other commercial games. (Dying Light, Battlefield 4, etc.) If it's not his Internet, I can't possibly think of what it is.

We are generally trying to play DoomRPG, and it generally works with our group, (with the exception of an error that I already posted in that forum) but even testing in regular Doom that one guy desyncs, DoomRPG or otherwise.

[edward850]

Desynchronization has absolutely nothing to do with settings, latency or bandwidth (who has taught you these lies?) and everything to do with loading two different sets of resources. Anything you load your friend must also load. Mods, autoloads (or rather don't), IWAD, and ZDoom version. If it continues to desync, you have done this step wrong, regardless of what you might think. If you're using a devbuild, everyone must use this devbuild. If you're autoloading Imp Encounter, everyone must load Imp Encounter. In the same order. Always.

Once again, the FAQ explained this.

[Xanirus]

That's just it. Everyone is literally using the exact same files from links I have sent them via Google Drive, and I told them the exact load order of mods. I've even used Teamviewer to see exactly what they are doing, of course with the exception of the iwads, in this case doom2.wad. But would it matter if mine was from a disc I bought from the 90's and everyone else's was from Steam?

I'll check again with the player that keeps desyncing.

[edward850]

If you want to confirm that, tell everyone to run -hashfiles and upload the resulting fileinfo.txt.

[roz1281]

That's just it. Everyone is literally using the exact same files from links I have sent them via Google Drive, and I told them the exact load order of mods. I've even used Teamviewer to see exactly what they are doing, of course with the exception of the iwads, in this case doom2.wad. But would it matter if mine was from a disc I bought from the 90's and everyone else's was from Steam?

I'll check again with the player that keeps desyncing.

It absolutely could matter if your doom2.wad isn't the same version as the steam one (which I believe is the latest version).

I'm going to offer some general advice as I've had the network zdoom headaches before: simplify it as much as possible to start. Zip up the directory you are using and send it to friends so you are sure they're using the same files, and skip ZDL altogether. All you have to do is load it with the -host # command and they have to use -join yourip. They don't even have to type the port if you use the default one. Start adding extras once you've got the basics

[roz1281]

Ok whatever, I'm just saying that it's weird to even have "1" as an option then if that just means solo.

Just want to point out that this is a useful feature because some people like to play 'solo coop', allowing then to respawn upon death and all that. I do it when playing slaughtermaps

[Xanirus]

Well, after playing nearly a week and a half with my friend, I've determined that it was not our mods, considering that we were still going out of sync even in vanilla doom (no mods our user made levels) and having exactly the same (or at least near) fileinfo.txt.

As evident from the last few pages of posts in the DoomRPG thread, the several versions of GZDoom was causing the random errors for seemingly no reason. So we found the latest stable version, as least the one that edward linked over there.