Dedicated BMS Server (I have questions)
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Hi All,
I’m brand new to BMS , but I just setup a BMS server to go along with all my DCS servers, I have a few questions:
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So when using the .dll file to prevent the rendering of the screen and once the server (player) is in the mission , how do I then get back to the main map screen if I need to on the server??
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Is there anyway to setup my server so that i don’t have to broadcast my WAN IP to the entire world If i want to make my server public?
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When I jump into a client and forward the time to get to my takeoff time, how do I start on the ground, the units I have chosen so far seem to just be air starts…or are there just some aircraft that are air starts automatically?
I’m sure I’ll have a ton more questions.
Thanks,
FWIW, I’m running the server on a VM version of Windows 11 but I have an old radeon HD 7000 series Physical GPU as the GPU inside it being passed through to the VM
Smack
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@Smack 1- I don’t think you need the hacky DLL anymore…
https://forum.falcon-bms.com/post/377411
2- not entirely sure what you mean … it’s pretty much the definition of an IP address, right? setup port-forwarding so not everything is wide open, just BMS/IVC ports.
alternatives: you can host in the cloud (AWS or Azure or there are cheaper/easier options). also there are special “gaming VPN” systems that will basically allow everyone to fly as if they’re on the same local LAN… but I haven’t tried those, others here may have more experience to share
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@airtex2019 I was hoping I could use my domain name as opposed to my wan ip address. for example bmsserver.mmunraid.net but it doesn’t look like BMS understands urls and will only let you insert numerical ips.
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@Smack not sure. the domain name in question appears to resolve to Cloudflare … from a quick google I’m not sure if they support arbitrary UDP packet forwarding, or not
https://www.nslookup.io/domains/bmsserver.mmunraid.net/dns-records/
https://developers.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-one/applications/non-http/arbitrary-tcp/
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@airtex2019 that’s because my domain is proxied through cloudflare!
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@Smack can’t work behind cloudflare because they only provide an http proxy service…
If you want to use a domain for the server, you’ll have to remove the proxy protection in the cloudflare dns settings
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@MaxWaldorf Yeah still struggling to get the server to allow connections regarding the domain name. I’ll have to look into it some more.
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@Smack that blog post about UDP was from 2021 but I still don’t see that as an option live on the Zero Trust console. do you have it?
regardless, this is probably a topic for Cloudflare forums / support … not a BMS thing
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if anyone find instractions with step by step how and what we need in order to establish correctly BMS dedicated server please post your finds
i am interesting to make it also -
@Geraki Max’s video is still probably the best I’ve seen…
but yeah with the new g_bNoRender and server-compression flags… how to use ‘falcon bms server.cfg’ file etc. all the blog/wiki docs out there, and videos, could use a round of updates.
it would be neat if someone made a video, like Max’s, that focused either on low-cost cloud host options … or gaming-VPN products or smarter (?) approaches like Cloudflare Zero Trust to forward packets … if that’s possible, idk
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@airtex2019 yeah I’m usually pretty good with this stuff, not a networking expert by any means , I’m pretty sure it has to do with the fact that most of the proxy/forwarding services I use are setup for http(s) , such as dcs serverbot, sneaker etc.
It looks like I have to figure out how to get the bms game/server to allow me to forward an IP address to my domain name and use that , but I think it’s a case of the User interface on the game is awaiting an IP and not a URL to my domain using its subdomain.
Hopefully it’s not hard coded in BMS that it’s expecting a numerical IP but I believe it is .
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@Smack yeah, I don’t know the answer to that part of your question. you could just try it on 2nd box on your local LAN … or host BMS on a vm or what have you … just to test if the UI accepts strings like “localhost” or “localvirt1” or whatever. let us know what you find out
I also don’t know, even if you could get CloudFlare to forward UDP packets, if that would be sufficient to work with BMS protocol. (viz. different pilots will be “connecting” to different regional CF edge locations… and sometimes multiple pilots will be connecting through the same CF edge location… how will all that “look” to a BMS server). TCP-based protocols are typically easier to forward.
I’m no networking guru… maybe it can work, idk! I remember a similar thread here with multiple pilots in same house, connecting out through a NAT router. I don’t remember if they got that working… will try to find it.
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@airtex2019 said in Dedicated BMS Server (I have questions):
alvirt1” or whatever. let us know what you
I AM runnning BMS on a VM atm on my unraid box. I will try the other suggestions when I get home from work today! Thanks.
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@Smack https://forum.falcon-bms.com/post/374036
Sounds like they made this work. (There, the NAT router is acting similarly to a CF edge location.)
/shrug it’s what I love about this forum, almost everyday I learn something new, about IT or game development, or sometimes about F-16s
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@airtex2019 see that’s not the problem I’m having no problem connecting to my server from WITHIN my lan, (I use a custom opnsense router and you have to set nat translation to on) , but I am having issues connecting to the server from both internal and external machines IF I try to use a domain name (despite the said name working perfectly via tcp). This leads me to believe it is directly related to UDP packets.
I read through the linked post but didn’t see them set up their server with a URL as opposed to an IP address.
When I use an IP address the setup works flawlessly with internal and external connections (with the caveat that internal clients on my LAN have to enter my LOCAL IP not my WAN IP for obvious reasons).
I’m trying to conceal my WAN IP (behind my domain name) for other obvious reasons.
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@Smack yeah I get it … sorry to confuse the issue, I was just trying to remember if it was even possible to forward a UDP “connection” in that way. apparently it is … which is nice to know.
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@Smack said in Dedicated BMS Server (I have questions):
I’m trying to conceal my WAN IP (behind my domain name) for other obvious reasons.
Hosting a public gaming server from your own home network is never going to be secure. It is not recommended and not at all ideal. Without applying additional and significant security measures, supplying a domain name instead of an IP address will not prevent users from discovering the IP address of your server if they really want to.
For example, we have a registered domain at Veterans-Gaming for our TeamSpeak 3 server - when folks ask for our TS3 address, we can just tell them it is
ts3.veterans-gaming.com
and it will properly resolve to our IP address of5.9.23.136
… entering this domain into a lookup will easily reveal this IP address:
For these reasons and more, it would be wise not to host a public multiplayer gaming server out of our own local home network. That being said, BMS has rarely (if ever) had issues which other games experience such as griefers and trolls and DDoS script kiddies. In 14 years running a BMS server at VG, we have never had to punish let alone ban a pilot. By contrast, in our Battlefield 2: Project Reality Mod server, our Admin Team warns, kicks, and/or bans at least a dozen players each week, if not more.
Whatever you do, be safe. It’s all fun and games until it isn’t.
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@SemlerPDX supplying a domain name instead of an IP address will not prevent users from discovering the IP address of your server if they really want to.
Which is precisely why I have it proxied through multiple services and running on a vm on a different subnet.
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@Smack so I got further than I have before (with BMS) I’ve managed to get it so that the domain name bmsserver.mmunraid.net now resolves to the cloudflare wan IP (which is NOT my wan IP) so the way I intended and cloudflare doing its job, still not able to get BMS to either let me use the cloudflare IP to connect to or use the domain name.
I think the person above was on the right track when they said cf doesn’t allow udp packets to be proxied but I’m wondering what/if there is a service that provides this , surely there is.
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@Smack there are things like https://developers.cloudflare.com/spectrum/reference/configuration-options but I don’t know of anything free / cheap / easy
standing up your own EC2 virt to route UDP is probably cheaper/easier but at that point you may as well host the BMS server in the cloud
maybe if you planned to leave a server running 24x7 … there would be considerable cost savings to host on a big box at home, and only pay for a tiny 1-core EC2 virt to route packets