Hi,
TL;DR - Port forwarding works. Not blocked by firewall or A/V. I can connect to non-PZ servers that I host (and simple apps, like netcat), both locally and over the internet. I've hosted PZ Servers (years ago), without any hassle. Netstat indicates PZ Server isn't listening on ANY ports. Please help?
I'm pretty comfortable working my way around CMD, routers, firewalls, and have hosted servers for games before (years ago I even hosted for PZ!). I just returned to the game and wanted to host, but seem to be getting a bizarre issue. Project Zomboid server is NOT listening on any ports. Am I supposed to configure this somewhere? My understanding is that it's supposed to listen on 16261-16262, at the bare minimum. Please see my below troubleshooting steps, if it helps. I am using Windows 10 and bought the game through Steam, fyi. I've attempted running the server via Steam's dedicated tool, via the *.exe file, and most importantly the *.bat (how I used to run it years ago). Also, all below troubleshooting steps were attempted with both administrative and non-administrative modes.
Step 1. Configured router port forwarding for TCP/UDP of 16261-16262 (I'll add more when I seek to add more players)
Step 2. Configured OS Firewall to permit activity on those ports.
Step 3. When I launched the PZ Server batch file, firewall asked me to allow the application. I selected yes.
Step 4. Ran PZ Server. Tried to connect via game, no dice. Tried using an online port checker, no dice. Tried using netcat (via localhost, as well as external IP address), no dice.
Step 5. Ran a netcat listener on ports 16261/16262, then attempted to connect to them (via localhost, as well as external IP address) using another netcat instance, worked like a charm.
Step 6. From CMD, ran: netstat -an | find "16261" Can discover when netcat listener is running, but not PZ Server.
Step 7. From CMD, ran: netstat -abno Can't discover any applications running with "PZ" or "Zom" in the name (varied both, in case of case-sensitivity).
Step 8. Scrutinized the output of the PZ Server CMD window, but found nothing alluding to errors or warnings. Seems to have started up just fine.
Step 9. Read a few other posts (both in this forum, as well as online) trying a few other things, but nothing worked. Querying for "port" problems mostly turns up people who are confused about router management, so the answer I seek is probably out there, but totally buried by those seeking help on how to do port forwarding (which again, is not the issue).
Step 10. Sighed heavily, tried to reset the password for my old PZ Forum acct (from years ago), Indie Stone password reset email requests hanged for over two hours, tried again, still no luck (even checked spam mail!). Decided to make a new forum account, but discovered Indie Stone limits 1 acct, per email address. Decided to create a temporary email account using GuerillaMail, discovered the US Govt forced them to shut down on Nov 4th. Googled to find an alternative temporary email generator (until such time that Indie Stone send me a password reset, so I may respond later with my actual account, hopefully), and brought you this delightful story of technology fighting me.
Note: For those wondering, no, I didn't run a netcat listener and the PZ Server concurrently at any point. So, there was no battle for port ownership.