Hello everyone,

I apologize if this isn't the appropriate forum for my question, but I wasn't sure whether it should have gone under "Networking" or "Internet Software".

I am a college student living with two roommates in the dorms. I am trying to play Starcraft and Warcraft III LAN games with my one roommate named Matt, but when I create a game and he tries to join it, he can't see the game in the list of games to join. My other roommate is named Adam, and I can play LAN games with him, but Matt and I are interested in playing together. I have been unable to determine why Adam and I can play together, but Matt and I cannot. We are trying to play LAN games together under the following conditions:

a. Same subnet on the dorm network, same subnet mask, both using DHCP (dorm server)
b. We can ping each other and join DirectPlay test sessions that each of us creates
c. We have tried disabling our software firewalls to no avail; he is using ZoneAlarm, I am using Norton Internet Security
d. Both using Windows XP, but we have disabled XP's built-in firewall on each machine
e. Same Windows workgroup
f. Both using the same versions (latest ones) of Starcraft and Warcraft III, which are 1.10 and 1.14b respectively
h. To the best of my knowledge, my college is not restricting traffic on port 6112, TCP and UDP (the port that Starcraft and Warcraft III use) in any way. I can connect to Battle.net with both games and I can host custom games with Warcraft III, which requires that inbound traffic on port 6112, TCP be allowed.

Both games use the UDP protocol for LAN games. With both games, you do not put in an IP address to join a game; you have the person you want to play with create a game and then you choose it from a list. If I'm not mistaken, this is because the games use peer-to-peer networking instead of client-server networking. We don't have any games where you put in an IP address to join a game like Diablo II, so we haven't tried testing connectivity with them (although I guess the DirectPlay tests work the same way, so that could be considered a test of that nature).

EDIT:
I am assuming that with Starcraft and Warcraft III, if you are on the same subnet as the person you want to play a LAN game with, you should be able to play with them.

Unfortunately, playing on Battle.net is not an option for us (Matt does not actually own Starcraft and Warcraft III, so he didn't install them with CD-keys that will work on Battle.net), so we have to do LAN games. Matt is using a no-CD crack to play Warcraft III, and I was thinking that maybe the cause of our not being able to play Warcraft III LAN games together is the fact that his game executable has been modified as a result of using the no-CD crack... can anyone confirm for me that playing LAN games with people who are using no-CD cracks works or not?

Adam and I played some LAN games together under the same aforementioned conditions, and while troubleshooting this problem, Matt and I discovered that Adam and I are using the same Internet gateway. Could our problem have something to do with the fact that Matt and I are not using the same gateway? We also discovered that Adam and I can see each other's computers on the Windows Network Neighborhood, but Matt and I cannot.

I appreciate any and all advice anyone can give me that might help me start playing LAN games with Matt.