Could someone walk me through a client session setup?

[bot403]

I am having trouble NAT'ing with my LAN and a Linux firewall and i thought maybe i should ask teh forums for help. Can anyone walk me through step by step the process that happens after you click play to enter a server. This is the nearest i can figure it.
(hope im close)
My setup: 1 router box with a direct connection to the internet running world server-eqserver.bot403.dns2go.com
2- fileserver box behind firewall using natt'ed connection to internet running mysql and zone servers- eqserverzones.bot403.dns2go.com

1) Client asks login server's address
2)Login passes it eqserver.bot403.dns2go.com as defined in loginserver.ini
3)client connects to world server at eqserver.bot403.dns2go.com:9000
4)Client creates new account or picks char.
5)Client hits enter world
6)World server passes client eqserverzones.bot403.dns2go.com as defined in ./boot script (zone init script)
7)World server sets up zone for player (tells init oggok for ex.) and passes client zone address eqserverzones.bot403.dns2go.com:7995 (fabricated on the fly?)
Client connects to zoneserver at that address and plays.

Please correct the above steps to what they should be. Are any hostnames resolved or are they passed as hostnames for the client to resolve? I assume client, because i can use the hosts file in windows to pretty much redirect where i want the client to connect. I can get into my server from the local network but no-one can connect from the internet. Are the ports connected to on the zoneserver allocated dynamically and aren't always 7995,7996, etc? If they are another range please tell me the range so i can make some iptable rules.

If you don't understand what i said, its ok, don't reply, i need a knowledgable response. thanks.

[Trumpcard]

Have you looked at the NAT problem understood thread that theCoder posted in the linux forum? Take a look at it, should help.

One thing I can tell you is to make sure you open up UDP connections for the zone ports, not just TCP. (You may already know this)

Ive been told that changing your name resolution for your external address to your internal ip in your windows host file works, but I have been unable to get it to work correctly.. The
only time I was able to log into my server on the firewall was using Coder's NAT patch...

Hope this helps somewhat..

[bot403]

thanks for the pointer, but ive looked both places and i am still quite stumped. Hmm i AM forwarding UDP also. I guess ill just give it a few more 8 hour days and it should be working :p If anyone has any other ideas im open to suggestion. I also was unable to patch using the nat patch. it fails to patch net.cpp, assumedly its for a previous server vesion. Im using 3.3.1. Any ideas?

p.s. do the clients always connect to the zoneservers at the ports they listen on such as 7995-8000 or is some sort of new connection attempt made on another port because i only forward the zone ports. I am using Linux NAT and i am sure the port forwarding rules work because i am able to stick a telnet server on ports 7995-8005 and get to it from teh outside through my NAT box. Any ideas on what kernel/iptables version i might need?

[steve]

Do what I do, forward ports 7000-9000 to the server machine. Works fine, users can get through the firewall and have no issues. I am forwarding both tcp and udp.

[bot403]

yea i did that. I ended up putting my ip addr in the server ip fields instead of a hostname. I would MUUUCH rather use a hostname cause i have a dynamic ip, but i guess this will have to do for now.
SO im assuming its a loginserver problem. They should let you put in hostnames so stuff like that CAN work.