Give some love to IPv6, maybe?

I was just wondering, is DST using RakNet for its networking? I fear for the games using that library, if this is their level of expertise with IPv6:

Quote

The loopback address with IPV4 is 127.0.0.1. The loopback address with IPV6 is ::1. The broadcast address with IPV4 is 255.255.255.255. IPV6 does not support broadcast. It does support multicast if you configure your router to do so. There is no default multicast address for IPV6, meaning LANServerDiscovery will not work without manual configuration by the end-user.

What incredulous nonsense.

1. Looking for servers on local subnet, by definition, does not involve the router.
2. The only broadcast that actually works on IPv4, is local, and that is very much equivalent to IPv6 multicast address ff02::1
   Side note: Spamming everyone on the local subnet is the v4 way of doing things. With v6, RakNet-enabled games could go one better and use their own Group ID so that only machines running the servers have to deal with the discovery traffic.
3. Essential mechanisms in IPv6 (host IP address configuration - DHCP, peer MAC address resolution - replacement for ARP) rely on multicast, so the notion that it won't work for most users, or without configuration, is ridiculous.

 

Edited November 1, 2017 by myxal

I'm not convinced of the value of IPv6 support for LAN mode only other than checking a meaningless "IPv6 compatible" box, there's hardly an IP address exhaustion problem for non-internet connected networks.

For internet play I am concerned about the exhaustion of IPv4 in parts of the world, we are monitoring that but at this time we utilize platform NAT traversal tech so we're not able to move on that except in concert with our partners.

Very open to hearing more about anyone who can't play for want of IPv6 though.

10 hours ago, nome said:

IPv6 support for LAN mode only

My intention with this was that it would be a way to test if your protocol can handle v6 at all and probe for higher-layer dependencies on v4 (cf. FTP). If there's a better way to give opt-in v6 support into the hands of v6 enthusiasts in the DST community, I'm all for it. Or perhaps I'm misjudging what a commercial game developer is willing to include in a released product?

11 hours ago, nome said:

there's hardly an IP address exhaustion problem for non-internet connected networks.

I don't see into what the typical and necessary use cases are for DST deployment (I'd love to learn more, assuming any of it can even be shared publicly). So, this probably doesn't affect many DST players, but squat spaces are a thing. TL;DR - some "internal" networks are so big even all of RFC1912 isn't enough for them, so they use old public ranges which their rightful owners do not expose to the Internet. It works as long the rightful owner doesn't decide to use it publicly after all, or sell it to someone who will do the same.

10 hours ago, nome said:

For internet play I am concerned about the exhaustion of IPv4 in parts of the world, we are monitoring that but at this time we utilize platform NAT traversal tech so we're not able to move on that except in concert with our partners.

Great to see it's on your radar. I'll check the state in DST again once I see Steam finally fixing this and this.

10 hours ago, nome said:

Very open to hearing more about anyone who can't play for want of IPv6 though.

Reading about your concerns over support burden in the other thread, I reckon Klei never want to reach a point where people are unable to connect at all, or to a particular game. A more relevant (IMHO) metric would be, 'in how many games NAT punchthrough fails and players need to connect via an intermediary host?' DST's handling of high/inconsistent latency is a meme in itself, and anything that increases RTT is also causing a drop in UX/enjoyability.

China sets goal of running single-stack IPv6 network by 2030, orders upgrade blitz

Here's to hoping that DST remains popular enough by then to be affected by this, and that any netcode upgrades that this will warrant actually make it to the global build.

Prices for IPv4 addresses keep rising, and VPS companies are starting to pass those prices on to their customers. For example, ST Hosting has an IPv6-only LXC server for 2,09 € per month that would be sufficient for hosting my DST server. Instead, I have to use one of their regular LXC servers with IPv4 for 4,49 € per month. That‘s 28,8 € per year that I cannot use to buy games from Klei.