Direct Connect from the Desktop

Have you gotten tired of drudging through all of the menus in NwN just to get to the same spot? Want to help cut down a tiny bit on server lag? Why not direct connect from your desktop?

So... I use this at the moment and it's great... I don't have to go through all of the annoying buttons in the normal NwN just to get to the gamespy menu to access the same server I go on most of the time... instead, I just click the shortcut for the server (details in a moment) I play on and it opens up the login screen, then the character join screen. That simple.

Now for the technical details...

Spoiler:

Hope it helps and happy gaming!

NICE! Thanks Kitten

That would be totally awesome! Alas, I can't seem to change my target (as an Admin, etc...)

make sure you are editing a shortcut for NWNMAIN.exe, and not NWN.exe

also make sure the +connect IPaddy are OUTSIDE/AFTER the quotes.

It wouldn't let me edit the "Target" field.

But yeah, got it to work after I made a shortcut from the exe itself (rather than creating a copy of the shortcut I normally use).

Nice Thanks for sharing this.

Great! Just what i´ve been looking for...works like a charm

Nice, Im gonna have ta try dat out Thanks!

So hawt... works great! Thanks again

If you guys can make this work with the Gnomish Log Rotator, I will serve up great bowls of epic wins!

Ah ... go here.

It's a small program that renames your log files so that you don't lose them, and can access them easily to get information (error messages, snippets of conversations, that sort of thing).

It does some funky shortcut thing to get it to run, but I know squat about these types of operations. Hence my request.

Would this direct from desktop be better than the Direct Connect on Gamespy, or is it the same sort of thing?

Code:


@echo off
SET NWN_PATH=C:\NeverwinterNights\NWN
SET LOG_PATH=%NWN_PATH%\logs
SET SAVE_LOGS=1
:redo
cls
echo --------------------------------------------
echo ///// ///// //// // ///// /////
echo // // // // / // // // //
echo /////// //// // // // //// ///////
echo // // // // //// // // //
echo // // ////// // // ////// // //
echo ------------------------------------------
echo ------------------------------------------
echo Select a Server
echo =================
echo [1] Aenea
echo [2] Aenea [DM Mode]
echo [3] Aurora Toolset
echo [4] Nwn Main [Normal Mode]
echo =================
cd %NWN_PATH%
set /p server= Server Number:
if %server% == 1 (start /wait nwmain.exe +connect 70.190.83.96:5121
goto logger)
if %server% == 2 (start /wait nwmain.exe -dmc +connect 70.190.83.96:5121 +password [password]
goto logger)
if %server% == 3 start nwtoolset.exe
if %server% == 4 (start /wait nwmain.exe
goto logger)
if else goto redo
exit
:logger
if %SAVE_LOGS%== 0 exit
cd %LOG_PATH%
for /F %%A in ("nwclientLog1.txt") do If %%~zA equ 0 del nwclientLog1.txt
for /f "tokens=1-5 delims=/ " %%d in ("%date%") do set datestamp=%%e-%%f-%%g
for /f "tokens=1-5 delims=:." %%d in ("%time%") do set timestamp=%%d-%%e-%%f
rename "nwclientLog1.txt" %datestamp%[%timestamp%].txt
exit


For those of you who wish to save the log file created every time you run nwn, this is for YOU! You will not need Gnomish Log Rotator because all it does is rename the nwclientLog1.txt file as the current time. In which I have now added. For instructions on how to create a batch file goto the above post.

Things to Note:

NWN_PATH must be set to your NWN directory.
SAVE_LOGS can be set to 0 to disable log saving.
File is renamed to Month-Day-Year[Hour-Minute-Sec].
I have ensured that it will not copy nwclientLog1.txt if it is empty. It will just delete it. Therefore preventing a billion 0 byte sized log files.
As before, the Batch file may need to be placed into the NWN directory, if NWN creates a bunch of files on your desktop. I do not know why that happens...
If the AENEA logo is messed up just copy the one from here
If you need to know how to create this in a batch file, click here

Alundaio,

Thanks so much! Works like a charm! Later when I get on, I'll have to check the log function, make sure I've got it working ok, but the selection menu is simply awesome! Thanks again!

Everything I could ask for and more asides...
A fantabulous offering, my friend Alundaio, absolutely fantabulous!
Thanks again!

Updated the info on how to create a direct connect batch file and included a link to the Neverwinter Nights Direct Connect Generator. Click here to go to the post.

For those interested, I just noticed the generator is available for download (and votes).

Nice job, by the way. My only feedback is that for DM mode on most servers, there is a second password (besides the one with the username) needed to log in.

The DM password field works fine for me. One click, and I'm on my way to mayhem, kittens and cheese sandwiches (not necessarily in that order)!

Well you may call me obsessive or just plain insane. But here is it folks, The Neverwinter Nights Launcher...yes you read that right! To my knowledge it's the first and only
NWN Launcher. It has lots of features that make the old batch files seem like crappy ways to launch Neverwinter Nights. Give it a try now!

Features: Allows you to add servers to Direct Connect to servers via buttons. Allows you to display a banner for the PWs website, which on-click will launch the URL. This can all be configured via the Options Icons when you load up the application. I've retained the Enable Log Renaming Feature. But this time the log is renamed before Nwn launches. Which fixes alot of problems people had with Gnomish Log Rotator.

TIPS for Neverwinter Nights Launcher:

• If you like to add Aenea's banner to the launcher just type "aenea.jpg" in the Banner field.
  
• Read the Readme on a full explanation on how to use the Launcher.
  
• You can get fast access to your Log files via a button in the Options tab of the Server Options menu.
  
• Make sure the Game Directory in Options is pointing to the NWN directory. It does not look for it automatically.
  

If you have feedback or request help on the app, tell me.

Was bored so I updated the launcher with minor update. Due to release of CEP 2.3 and a suggestion, I've added the ability to launch the CEP Updater from the Options menu in the Neverwinter Nights Launcher. No more digging through your NWN folder to find that pesky CEP update shortcut.See post above for link.

Hey, look what the cat dragged in. WB, Alundaio, and cool, increased launcher functionality

Hey y'all

So I got a new(ish) computer running Windows 7, and the direct connect doesn't seem to work. A bit of Googling leads to believe this is a common issue w/ Win7. Any ideas?

I'm trying to tear myself away from DDO long enough to sneak in some Aenea again!

The IP address listed in the above post may or may not be correct. I have this working just fine on my laptop, and I am running Windows 7, and the only time I had problems was when I tried to run nwmain.exe outside of the NWN folder.

Is it, by chance, creating a link to the NWN directory instead of executing the nwmain.exe file?

[I was trying to make it easier for myself to play on different servers without conflicting anything, but I settled for just renaming the folders when I want to change over. Anyhow... ]

EDIT : I just checked my icon, and the IP address above was an old IP address. I edited the post and it should be up to date now.

What happens is that it just starts up NWN as normal, as if it's ignoring the '+connect' bit. I have added the up-to-date IP address, but it doesn't work. It's pretty weird.

ETA: I just figured out what I was doing wrong... forgot to add a space after the colon in the IP addy! It works now.

Make sure you start the launcher by running as administrator. You can right click your shortcut or the launcher executable and choose properties, then Find the checkbox for run as admin, check it, and then save the setting.

The only other thing I can think of is if you have some quotation marks around the nwnmain.exe command... Can't remember if the quotes should include or exclude the +connect part... Try it both ways and see maybe...

My experience is that when you have the quotation marks, the link won't work. Any time I've had the quotation marks in the link box, it opens the folder it's in rather than executing nwmain.exe

Either way, glad to hear you got it working.