Debug log or anything for frequent disconnect issues?

What is the size of the maps you are using?

How many maps do you keep open at one time?

Does this happen at random times, or just when broadcasting new maps or creatures?

 

Have you looked at the memory settings for Java on you and all of your players D20PRO applications? When you execute D20PRO, there is a Batch File that runs (looks like a little DOS Window) right before the D20PRO Main screen comes up. This file has a designation of how much RAM your D20PRO will allocate. I know on the 2.4 release that the updater has options to set this, but I have found that editing the Batch File is effective. I had some super lag issues with my players (only 2 slots) and found that their settings were all at 512mb. Once I corrected the memory (I think they all set to 1024 mb) then the lag went away (I run mine at 1.5 GB).

The Batch files are in your D20PRO Folder, and will be labeled as d20pro but listed type will be "Windows Batch File". You can open this file in Notepad to edit it.

NOTE:You should create a copy of this file elsewhere as a backup, and there are separate batch files for 64 bit , and are labeled with the 64 in the name.

You will see a string of code that looks like this:

@echo off
setlocal

REM By default, we locate java in the path. If you do not have a valid 32bit JRE found first in the path
REM The update the below with a full absolute path to a javaw.exe
set JAVA=javaw

start %JAVA% -Xmx512m -Dsun.java2d.ddoffscreen=false -Dsun.java2d.noddraw -Dsun.java2d.d3d=false -jar d20Pro.dat

The part you will change is the -Xmx512m . You can change the number from 512 to 768 or 1024 and then save the file. When you run D20PRO again, it will utilize this new allocation of RAM on the machine it is running on. This should be reviewed on all player machines as well. The rule of thumb is to never allocate more than 1/4 of your PC's total ram to this process. If you are only running 2 gigs of RAM, leave it as 512m. I have 8 GB, so I run it at 1.5 GB (1536m).

I have seen these settings at 256m, and that is super slow. If your players are running with the default settings, this could be part of your connectivity issue.

Just my 2 cents

 

To piggyback on Golkiwu's sane advice, you should make sure everyone that is playing has the same settings in their batch file. The reason is if you set your system to 1.5GB and someone else has 768MB and you broadcast a large file they may be at their memory threshold and(I am not quite positive on this part with d20Pro) their system may begin thrashing moving assets out of memory cache and to the temp cache and may cause a timeout depending on their network stack.

 

Last Friday, my group had to give up on d20Pro for the session and use MapTools on-the-fly (which I didn't have materials prepped for, aside from it being my first time using it). People kept timing out and freezing, seeing only a grey background and some of the characters.

We'd played fine with two connections the week before that (after several minutes while a large map loaded [6MB]), but the 3rd person kept stalling and couldn't enter until the others left for the night.

I'm upgrading my DSL to get 768kbps upstream to help serve up the maps. In the meantime, we tried to get one of the players to host. We used Hamachi for the virtual LAN to avoid port blocking (thanks Curtis!). But nobody else could get us to connect--I think they had security software preventing java and/or d20Pro from running as a server.

After 3+ frustrating hours troubleshooting and experimenting, we ended up successfully using Skype, Hamachi and MapTools to game for a couple of hours.

We'll attempt it again this Friday: I'll host from a friend's house with cable broadband, using Hamachi to avoid port blocking. I'll host on my laptop where I've got the permission to run java and d20Pro as server apps.

Also, thanks to posts regarding issues like this, we'll be sure all of the clients have more JVM memory allocated, and potentially allocate the same for each if everyone has plenty to spare. I already had my 64-bit batch file allocating 2GB RAM.

The smallest map I tried to get to everyone was "Double Bolt Inn" at 4MB. I imported it when creating a map and it was in the clipboard from a PDF snapshot.

I found some tools, first PNG Crush, then IrfanView http://www.irfanview.com/index.htm which rocks!

With IrfanView and the plugins (pack with all included):

- Auto-adjust colors
- Reduce colors from 16.7 million to 256 (it still looks fine since it's not a photo, but a drawing)
- Save compression level 9 (max) and PNGOUT plugin (defaults)

The file reduced 75% to 1MB! (it loads fine in d20Pro; I copied the "original" and compressed/optimized to be the same name expected in the directory)

I'll be using the various tips provided in posts and which I outlined above in an attempt for a successful game this coming Friday. I've had to pull out all the stops since my LAN games had no issues (except perhaps some lag after idleness until GC'ing).

 

My group had serious connection issues last game as well. I have five players. Three of them kept dropping in and out of the game over and over, probably close to 20 times during the four-hour session. Luckily, the players always reconnected to the game automatically within a few seconds. I loaded three maps right at the beginning of the session, to make sure they were available and so we didn't have to put the game on hold to wait for them. Each map was about 1.1 MB. It took probably half an hour for all three of the maps to load for all five players. I have a pretty fast internet connection—20 Mbps download, 800 Kbps upload.

I wonder if increasing the memory allocated to Java would help. How would one do this on a Mac?

 

Success!

One of the players helped troubleshoot by pinging and I turned off some other things on my laptop (not my workstation) and rebooted, and ended up being able to host.

We connected to Ventrilo for push-to-talk voice-chat RP & OOC, Hamachi for VLAN to bypass port-blocking, and the most excellent ("prismatic spray", no wait...) d20Pro.

The cable broadband and optimized PNG's REALLY helped with the game. It took less than a minute for even the largest overview maps to load.

Epic battles ensued, handled deftly with the computerized interface and gorgeous imported graphics.

People had so much fun in this second session (the first one in d20Pro with their new characters), that we played again Saturday as a special add-on session.