force-disconnect

[small horizon]

I am hosting a Project Zomboid server under CGNAT, so we are using ZeroTier to connect. My friends can join the server, but while playing they suddenly get disconnected with a “force-disconnect” error. It doesn’t happen to everyone at the same time. All of us have ZeroTier set to Private network profile.

LOG : Multiplayer f:351184, t:1771429592095, st:11,717,938> connection: guid=427841969832505860 [force-disconnect] "exit"
LOG : Multiplayer f:351184, t:1771429592207> connection: null [RakNet] "disconnection-notification"
LOG : Lua f:351184, t:1771429592757> : removing all player data
LOG : Lua f:351184, t:1771429592758> : - player: 0
LOG : Lua f:351184, t:1771429592767> : removing all player data
LOG : Lua f:351184, t:1771429592768> : - player: 0
LOG : General f:351184, t:1771429599657> waiting for UdpEngine thread termination
LOG : General f:351184, t:1771429601516> GameThread exited.

[late prairie]

Usually that just means the connection itself drops, meaning it points to ZeroTier config being the problem

Does it also happen when you host a coop server through the Host menu? That bypasses CGNAT

[small horizon]

We didn’t experience this issue when playing coop through the Host menu, but the game was unplayably laggy, so we decided to set up a dedicated server. We tried RadminVPN and Tailscale, but even though they didn’t disconnect us, the connection quality was very poor. With ZeroTier the connection is finally stable and works as we want the only problem left is these sudden disconnects.