Trying to invite a friend to multicrew.... getting fed up. Desperately need help.

[☠Black Knight]

Trying to play with a friend.... and quickly getting fed up. After three hours of trial and error, we are both in the SAME private group. Both in the SAME star system. SAME planet. SAME settlement. I go to my menu, find his name in the list... (we are both friends in-game already) and try to invite him to multi-crew... and wouldn't you know it, it says he is "unreachable."

... and yes, we're both playing Odyseey, on steam, and on PC.

I feel like I am pulling my fcking hair out at this point.

[Agony_Aunt]

Multicrew has always been wonky, depending on your network settings. There is some voodoo you can do with your router settings which can help. Look up port forwarding in relation to ED. There are instructions out there - this of course requires you both to have admin access to your router.

I had an issue with my router and it took a couple of hours on the phone to my ISP to get them to make a minor tweak. I tried to get them to give me the admin password, explaining i've worked as a sysadmin and know my way around a router, but they refuse.

Tempted just to swap out their router with my own so i have full control of it.

Anyway, since you both have Odyssey, any particular reason you want to multicrew rather than just physically meet up? You want them to take control of the turrets in your ship or something?

[☠Black Knight]

Originally posted by Agony_Aunt:

Multi crew has always been wonky, depending on your network settings. There is some voodoo you can do with your router settings which can help. Look up port forwarding in relation to ED. There are instructions out there - this of course requires you both to have admin access to your router.

I had an issue with my router and it took a couple of hours on the phone to my ISP to get them to make a minor tweak. I tried to get them to give me the admin password, explaining I've worked as a sysadmin and know my way around a router, but they refuse.

Tempted just to swap out their router with my own so i have full control of it.

Anyway, since you both have Odyssey, any particular reason you want to multi crew rather than just physically meet up? You want them to take control of the turrets in your ship or something?

We finally managed to get it to work. After like four hours of struggle. Had to look up 7 different youtube videos (not exaggerating) just to be able to play together. Ridiculous. Then we found out you can ONLY share wing missions, all of which are way above our pay grade in threat level.

So effectively... we can't play together. Amazing. 10/10 game design. Tonight has been so frustrating for me that it has effectively killed a lot of my enthusiasm for this game. I was really looking forward to playing it with my friends, and bought multiple copies of the game just to share it with them.

And now... this.

Also, while doing all of this, I found out that apparently this game has no official servers and that everything is just P2P? In other words, it's literally not a multiplayer game. At all. Full stop. It's a co-op game where encountering another player is literally not possible, no matter the system, unless you agree to it beforehand.

I've not seen my feelings towards a game go from "I love it!" to "Why does this ♥♥♥♥ even exist? What's the point?" this fast in a very long time.

[Agony_Aunt]

Generally its better to wing up than multicrew. Winging up tends to work well. Its a force multiplier. Multicrew... basically sucks.

Regarding servers, it does have servers, its not full P2P, its hybrid. Servers handle authentication, matchmaking, adjudication - but player to player stuff is handled via P2P.

It works fairly well, until you start getting a dozen or so players together, then it largely depends on the connection of the "host" of the instance.

Still, we've had occasions where hundreds of CMDRs have met up in the same instance at the same time. Only tends to work out in the black, where there are no NPCs (as NPC data also needs transmitting between all players), so you'll see huge meetups at large exploration events. Group jumps are always impressive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lO-IA_b9rU

[frumple]

Question again: Why don't you meet physically?

You can both board the same ship and fly together, or fly each other's ship.
Go hunt in a RES, no need for multicrew/team missions.

Multicrew is for people who are in different places in the galaxy. One of them can join the other as a hologram. Complete with a stupid looking H on their forehead.

Instead, travel to the same place, be in the same team, and fly in the same ship.
A friend of mine often takes his buddy as a gunner/co-pilot and they go bounty hunting. Its more fun than flying two ships. For them anyway.

[Sighman]

All odyssey missions are shareable. As others have said, the real multiplayer is meeting physically and teaming up, not the multicrew thing.

[Funkynutz]

I found out that apparently this game has no official servers and that everything is just P2P? In other words, it's literally not a multiplayer game. At all. Full stop. It's a co-op game where encountering another player is literally not possible, no matter the system, unless you agree to it beforehand.

This isn't true. Problems like this are usually an issue with your network configuration. For instance are your ports forwarded for the game?

Could also be a geographic thing. If you're on opposite sides of the world, the connection might be timing out.

[Sighman]

Originally posted by ☠Black Knight:

Also, while doing all of this, I found out that apparently this game has no official servers and that everything is just P2P? In other words, it's literally not a multiplayer game. At all. Full stop. It's a co-op game where encountering another player is literally not possible, no matter the system, unless you agree to it beforehand.

No, the game has galaxy servers, matchmaking servers, mission servers, etc (some of them running on AWS), but instances are hosted on player PCs.

I would definitely set up port forwarding at both ends if you've already double-checked firewall settings.

And as someone else said, make sure you're both in horizons live or Odyssey, not one in each. (And neither in Legacy either)