Port forwarding for a Insurgency: Sandstorm server
Sandstorm needs the game port over UDP and a Steam query port with its own fixed default, not an offset.
Your setup
Choose the firmware family rather than your exact model — every router in a family shares the same menus.
Out of the box it is 27102. If you changed that, use whatever you set in -Port=.
The local address of the computer that runs the server. Find it with ipconfig on Windows or ip addr on Linux; it will begin with 192.168, 10. or 172.
Open these
Your firmware takes ranges, so each line here is one rule.
- 27102 UDP
- 27131 UDP
27102UDPGame trafficPort.27131UDPSteam queryQueryPort, a separate fixed default rather than an offset.
Do not open these
These are admin sockets. Many guides put them in the same list as the game ports, but forwarding them exposes a remote console for your server to the whole internet.
27015TCPRCONAdministrative console.
For remote administration, connect to the machine through SSH or a VPN and use the port locally from there. Nobody else can reach it that way.
Step by step: your router
- 1
Give the server a fixed local IP
A forwarding rule targets a single local address. If the server comes back from a reboot with a new one, the rule quietly points at an empty address — which is how forwards seem to "break by themselves".
On this router:look for DHCP Reservation, Address Reservation, Static Lease or Manually Assigned IP
- 2
Open the router admin page
From a device on the same network, open one of these in a browser:
- 192.168.0.1
- 192.168.1.1
- 192.168.2.1
- 10.0.0.1
Almost always printed on a sticker on the router itself.
- 3
Find the port forwarding page
Port Forwarding, Virtual Server, NAT, Applications & Gaming, or Port Mapping
Vendors use at least six names for the same feature. Whatever it is called, the page you want is the one asking for a port, a protocol and a device on your network. If the external and internal port fields both exist, set them to the same number.
- 4
Create one rule per line
a description field, if there is one External / WAN / Public / Service port Internal / LAN / Private port Protocol Internal IP / Device / Server IP Insurgency: Sandstorm 27102 27102 UDP your server’s local IP Insurgency: Sandstorm 27131 27131 UDP your server’s local IP Use the same number for the external and internal port. You can make the external one different, but then every player has to connect on that new number, so keep them identical unless you have a specific reason not to.
- 5
Let the server through its own firewall
The router is now sending traffic to the right computer, but that computer can still turn it away. Windows Defender Firewall is the usual offender: it blocks a newly installed dedicated server by default, and from outside that is indistinguishable from a broken forward.
Take it with you
Insurgency: Sandstorm — port forwarding rules --------------------------------------------- 27102 UDP -> <server local IP> 27131 UDP -> <server local IP>
Check whether it worked
Always test from outside your network. A connection from another device in the house proves nothing: that traffic stays on your LAN and never passes through the rule you just created.
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The usual mistake
Sandstorm's query port has no relationship to its game port, so relocating the game port and forwarding a block around it quietly strands the query port. If your server can be joined by typing its address yet never turns up in the browser, that is almost certainly what happened.
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Skipping port forwarding
Much of what makes Sandstorm's gunplay feel right comes down to tick rate, and tick rate is the first casualty on a machine that is busy with other work.