Master Server Unavailable...

[merlin34baseball]

Could one of the brilliant minds here help me out?

When I attempt to log on to an internet game in NWN, it says master server unavailable so some option are not available or some such thing.  I have a great connection, wireless as I am not at home, but I can't see any of the servers.  It's not just Layo, even if I go to view all servers I get nothing.

Any ideas?  Oh... and this laptop I just bought has Vista (cringes) if that helps any.

Thanks,
Merlin34

[Dorganath]

Sometimes Bioware's master server is down/out for some reason.  It might prevent you from browsing servers via GameSpy, but you should still be able to direct-connect of use your favorites to get onto Layo.

The other possibilities are:

a) The Vista firewall isn't letting NWN go through
b) The firewall where you are is blocking things.

If you can't direct connect and get onto Layo, my money would be on one of those two things.

[merlin34baseball]

Vista's firewall is off, McAffee's is the default evidently.  I changed the settings to allow NWN full access.

I'm on a college campus using their wifi (I'm a student so I have logon rights to the system) so I don't think it's blocked from here.

Oh and my address to west in my favorites is now just an IP address instead of West Server or whatever it used to say and it's grayed out.

Oh and I connect through a VPN to the wifi.

Any help would be appreciated, I'm here for another 2 months and am missing playing already.

Any other ideas?

Thanks!

[Weeblie]

One very real possibility is that your college is blocking UDP ports...

My highschool did that, which required an ugly VPN-on-TCP connection to bypass...

[merlin34baseball]

Any way to figure that out?  And what's a UDP anyhow?  I don't know squat about anything past the plug that goes in the wall.

[merlin34baseball]

Is there anyway to get around this block (if there is one at all) or... is this something I shouldn't be discussing on this forum?

Also is there a way to find out if it is blocked so I know its not something silly I'm doing wrong?

I would just like to play!!!!:(

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Awww...  We all Miss Laaren...

[Stephen_Zuckerman]

Try just Direct Connecting to west.layonara.com (or central.*) with the password.

Just putting my bets on one of those "obvious but hidden" things.

They always get me with those.

[Weeblie]

There are ways to bypass firewalls like this, but it requires that you have another computer that can be online when your laptop is also.

Simply (or perhaps it's not super simple...) to setup a OpenVPN server on that computer and a OpenVPN client on your laptop!

[merlin34baseball]

Eh, I tried direct connecting... no luck.  I type in west.layonara.com and it tells me server timed out.

And I don't have another computer to hook up and attempt what Weeblie was saying...

So, unless someone has a brilliant idea, I will be out of game until around the 5th of December when I get home.

[silverblades]

hm try going into a nearby parking lot for a hotel, Bestwestern ,days Inn, you know. You should be able to logon there and find out if its your computer or its the schools thats not allowing you to connect. you have to be pretty close to the transmitter for the wireless just look around the eaves of the building and a long tube attached to it with a wire coming from it, or just hang out in their lobby and act like you own the place, you should be able to connect by favorites LAN conection and typing in west.layonara.com. let me know!!