Netgate Discussion Forum
    • Categories
    • Recent
    • Tags
    • Popular
    • Users
    • Search
    • Register
    • Login

    NAT Issues when playing games on two computers

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved NAT
    49 Posts 12 Posters 8.1k Views
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as topic
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • DaddyGoD
      DaddyGo
      last edited by

      I'm still thinking of a solution, but it's likely that the game server is monitoring your public IP as well, because it's a pattern for old LAN games.

      Cats bury it so they can't see it!
      (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • D
        dmd1234498
        last edited by

        That would really suck because I can't have UPnP going if it's going to screw with that title. It's the only one we play to be honest. You're saying they may be monitoring the WAN instead of the LAN? Forgive my ignorance, I am winging it here lol

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • DaddyGoD
          DaddyGo
          last edited by

          One question, both versions of the software (on the two win10 pc) paid versions?
          because it can cause problems if not ....๐Ÿ˜‰

          LAN - WAN question, the game manufacturers monitor the IP address and game serial number of those logging in to the server, so entering from one address with two identical IDs is not very possible.
          Older games, in which case only the internal LAN mode was allowed and it was not possible to play them online

          Cats bury it so they can't see it!
          (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • D
            dmd1234498
            last edited by dmd1234498

            They are both paid versions of the game โ˜บ I wanted to look a bit more into it last night however we just got evacuated due to some local dam failures and flash flooding. I will get back to you as soon as I can actually go back home lol (assuming my PFSense box isn't under water right now).

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • DaddyGoD
              DaddyGo
              last edited by

              I hope everything is fine with you?
              Such an "accident" is never missing.
              Pls let me know, if everything has returned to the old track

              Cats bury it so they can't see it!
              (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Z
                zgamerpd109
                last edited by

                Hello,

                I think I am having a similar issue (at least with just 1 computer), I have a pfsense setup with 2 vlans I am using, 1 vlan is for the rest of my house and the 2nd is basically for all of my devices. I was able to open NAT for my PS4 and Xbox One without issues following instructions I have found. However (following the same steps I did for my consoles) on my Gaming PC when I go to open multiplayer in Modern Warfare it keeps saying my NAT is strict. I have not tried other games though.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • DaddyGoD
                  DaddyGo
                  last edited by DaddyGo

                  Hi,

                  As I described above, there is no better way to more open the NAT for the game.
                  Many games will not work either, because there may be / are hidden telemetries in the background and they do not work behind the firewall, for example.

                  Detecting and explore this is a big job and requires a managed switch (mirror port) and Whireshark.

                  ++++: I can't say this enough, beware of NGFW / UPnP & NAT-PMP!!!

                  this is the only way you can play, but always split your (always segment) network into a separate game VLAN

                  Cats bury it so they can't see it!
                  (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • DaddyGoD
                    DaddyGo
                    last edited by

                    Hello,

                    by jimp: https://forum.netgate.com/topic/154153/test-request-upnp-fix-for-multiple-consoles-playing-the-same-game-static-port-outbound-nat

                    Cats bury it so they can't see it!
                    (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • M
                      m0t0k0
                      last edited by

                      I had the same issue with Warzone and moved over to OpenWRT for the time being as its just a tick box for UPnP and it all works.

                      I'm following the work done on MiniUPnPd which DaddyGo linked to and will be moving back over to PF once I get some downtime on the network

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • J
                        JosephSlater007
                        last edited by JosephSlater007

                        I have exactly the same problem! Is it possible to fix that?? I wanted to play some games of chance together with my best friend, but I couldn't do that because of this issue. If anyone has found a solution, please, share it here. We were already desperate, so we started gambling and placing bets on some verified sites that we have found on https://www.mt-plus.net. We actually like it very much, it's very comfortable. The most important thing is that these sites are verified, and we can be sure that it's not a scam

                        D 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • D
                          dmd1234498 @JosephSlater007
                          last edited by

                          @JosephSlater007 I just stopped playing MW lol Every other game as far as I can tell works fine with uPnP. as @m0t0k0 said it sounds like an issue with the way pfsense and MW work (or don't) together. That game's netcode is garbage lol. Good ol' activision.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • JeGrJ
                            JeGr LAYER 8 Moderator
                            last edited by JeGr

                            As a non-Massive-Online-Shooter-player myself, we had no problems in the past years to get MP games to run on our gaming VLAN. uPNP is configured, static port and static dhcp mappings are set up and I've never seen a console drop below "NAT type 2" Never before seen 3 or strict. We were at one point even playing on three PS4pros at the same time and partly in the same group without a hitch. Most often then not it's lazy or buggy netcode programming of those games itself or another one hyping it being P2P enabled when that makes the most problems with many gamers behind NAT.
                            Last/worst example in a long line is e.g. SnowRunner which was released with CoOp and isn't even able to connect two players in the same household (behind the same NAT IP). Developer simply shrugs it off now 2 months with "yeah we are on it, don't exactly know why and just use a VPN for one of the players". Amazing response...
                            OTOH: we already played Destiny 2 or Division 2 with 3 consoles behind NAT and pfSense without a hitch. Borderlands Collection, too and even Minecraft via Crossplay, 1 using the Xbox, 2 running on PS4 and 1 joining with W10 client (and the windows client even joined from our more secure LAN network and wasn't even in the "gaming" network). So pfsense and NATPNP work for what they have to, but it's the game devs that have to step up their game and stop being lazy with things like online lobbies and netcode.

                            Don't forget to upvote ๐Ÿ‘ those who kindly offered their time and brainpower to help you!

                            If you're interested, I'm available to discuss details of German-speaking paid support (for companies) if needed.

                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • Raffi_R
                              Raffi_ @DaddyGo
                              last edited by Raffi_

                              @DaddyGo said in NAT Issues when playing games on two computers:

                              then let's see:

                              First, create an independent interface for the game machines.
                              This can be a physical interface, if you have an empty port on your hardware (NIC), or it can be a separate VLAN (on LAN interface)

                              540de5ed-bbd9-4f1f-b532-edbd95f28099-image.png

                              Second step, set a fixed IP address on the game machines or you can use dhcp too, if you record the IP addresses of the machines in the dhcp server "static mapping" - in this case run dhcp server on the interface which you created in the first step

                              1ab72a84-5525-48f5-b987-f67a1d3d1b2d-image.png

                              third step: add the default NAT rule of the interface (game interface), so that the interface has an internet connection, so:

                              41204bcd-7b7e-4eb0-bcc4-b6ee384e27cf-image.png

                              fourth step: create a hybrid outbound NAT mapping containing the IPs of the gaming machines (with / 32 subnets (no / 24!)), so:

                              89e1927b-1a1d-4310-aece-9552938f071b-image.png

                              step five: turn on UPnP & NAT-PMP for the game interface ONLY to separate game machines from other vulnerable network components

                              0dcdca53-f0d4-4cbf-af36-053100fa88a4-image.png

                              when you start a game machine (on this separated game interface) you can check the open ports in the menu: Status / UPnP & NAT-PMP

                              b35d94a7-3e95-4eb6-87f0-ca40022b9d44-image.png

                              As I mentioned on a firewall, UPnP & NAT-PMP is not a really good thing, so you need to separate this intarface.
                              if you have any questions, I am at your disposal

                              Thank you very much for these instructions. I finally got my gaming VLAN to come up with NAT Type open. ๐Ÿ‘

                              I followed the steps exactly and it was perfect except for one thing which messed me up. After the last step, I had to go to Diagnostics > States. I filtered for my Xbox static IP and then I had to Kill the states. Without doing that it kept the old states and kept showing NAT type strict.

                              Just wanted to add that in since that could cause headaches for others. By the way, I'm not taking credit for discovering this, I found it in the documentation. I just knew I was missing something!
                              https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/nat/static-port.html

                              DaddyGoD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                              • DaddyGoD
                                DaddyGo @Raffi_
                                last edited by

                                @Raffi_ said in NAT Issues when playing games on two computers:

                                I followed the steps exactly and it was perfect except for one thing which messed me up. After the last step, I had to go to Diagnostics > States. I filtered for my Xbox static IP and then I had to Kill the states. Without doing that it kept the old states and kept showing NAT type strict.

                                you're absolutely right...๐Ÿ‘
                                since, I always restart (NGFW) when such a configuration change (greater extent) is made, I forgot to describe it

                                Cats bury it so they can't see it!
                                (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

                                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                • H
                                  Halsey568 Banned
                                  last edited by

                                  This post is deleted!
                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • Raffi_R
                                    Raffi_
                                    last edited by Raffi_

                                    This post is deleted!
                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                    • K
                                      KylieHodges Banned
                                      last edited by

                                      This post is deleted!
                                      DaddyGoD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • DaddyGoD
                                        DaddyGo @KylieHodges
                                        last edited by

                                        @kyliehodges
                                        Hi,

                                        With Destiny 2, it won't work, sorry ๐Ÿ˜ž (on the same sub-net)

                                        Cats bury it so they can't see it!
                                        (You know what I mean if you have a cat)

                                        T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • K
                                          KylieHodges Banned
                                          last edited by

                                          This post is deleted!
                                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                          • T
                                            Truckin @DaddyGo
                                            last edited by

                                            @daddygo said in NAT Issues when playing games on two computers:

                                            @kyliehodges
                                            Hi,

                                            With Destiny 2, it won't work, sorry ๐Ÿ˜ž (on the same sub-net)

                                            So,
                                            If I follow your guide I would still get the warning when playing D2 on the PC? What would I need to adjust in order to get rid of that warning?
                                            Thanks,
                                            Truckin

                                            DaddyGoD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                            • First post
                                              Last post
                                            Copyright 2025 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.