Cannot log in on new client - port 8001?

[dananski]

My work friends and I have played on FAF for a few years but can no longer log in from the office. It seems the new client (0.10.5-beta) is trying to use a new port (8001) which would be blocked on our firewall. Since we can't just go unblocking random ports on the company firewall, are any alternative ports on the server open for connection? It seems the second default of 15000 in the login screen (the hidden bit where you put in URLs and port numbers) is not active.
I don't know what port FAF Client used to use, but I'm assuming it changed as that is where the problem is now occurring.

[Geosearchef]

Nothing changed about the server port. It has been using 8001 all the time. The IRC is also still running on the same port.
The only difference is the API, but that is using https and running on port 443, which should be open in almost any network.

Also, due to ICE, the client is no longer using 6112 for game connections but the ice adapter picks a random port between 6112 and 7112.

[dananski]

Thanks for the info, Geosearchef, and for making a good point on the other thread that firewall shouldn't block outgoing based on destination. Is there a way perhaps to configure which port is used client-side? It seems to be using a new port each time according to Wireshark.

[Geosearchef]

Currently there is none. You can ofc try building yourself a client that binds to a specific port. The OS just assigns the client a random port and the NAT also then assigns another random port on the outside.

[dananski]

I've done a bit more testing. Ping works fine to lobby.faforever.com, but the port definitely poses a problem for us. The following powershell command gives a tcp test fail when run in the office:
Test-NetConnection lobby.faforever.com -port 8001

So it seems likely that our firewall does in fact (silently) block outgoing traffic destined for port 8001. 15000 is also blocked for us. Outgoing rules are a thing and I don't think we can justify opening ports on the company firewall for FAF.

It would be really great if the FAF server could have a secondary port binding; one that is very likely to work for everyone, such as a Steam port (27015-27030), but I know this won't be a problem for most people with out-of-the-box home routers so I suppose it's a low priority for dev effort.

I'll try to figure out an alternative for myself. Might look into hosting my own little FAF server for office games. However it's really weird that it worked before in the old client and doesn't now.

Thanks again for your input Geosearchef.