Warframe Executables and VPN exceptions

[ElAsem]

TL;DR For Moderators: This thread is about making sure that Warframe doesn't use a VPN.

So I regularly use a VPN, but have to turn it off to play Warframe because it interferes with my ping and that makes trading and teaming up for missions a nuisance.

I've tried to carve out a VPN exception for Warframe itself so that Warframe never operates on the VPN connection so I can keep my VPN running in the background for the tasks that I actually need it for.  Problem is that for Warframe I've got to do it manually (the VPN client only recognises some Steam games, not all) - and when I give a VPN exception for Warframe.x64.exe and Launcher.exe and go to test it I can't log in.

Or rather, I can get to the login screen and it can attempt to log in but then it says that it's disconnected from the multiplayer host and then fails to reload the login screen leaving me in a kind of limbo.  I have to assume it is logging in correctly and that's why it can't.

Have I missed an exe file?

[Letter13]

Really depends on the VPN you're using and how it's set up. If your VPN uses a function like PIA's MACE, then it will block all traffic not routed through the VPN regardless of application-specific settings.

What VPN service are you using?

[ElAsem]

PIA, but I know that it will allow traffic not routed through the VPN because I've got an exception working for Secret World Legends already.

PIA currently allows for "split tunnelling" and you can specify programs to always use the VPN or never use the VPN, so even if the VPN's running programs set to "never use the VPN" will simply use standard internet access instead.

[Letter13]

Hm. I was gonna recommend using PIA because I use it and have never had an issue with ping... though I may have lucked out on just being physically close to one of their relays.

Also, and this may seem peculiar, but do you have the right Launcher.exe and Warframe.x64.exe (and should add RemoteCrashSender.exe too just in case) added?

The reason I ask this is that although there may be .exe's in your Steam folder (if you installed it via Steam) and although these may be what Steam runs when you launch the game via steam, they may be instantly closing and opening the latest launcher/executable from your "%localappdata%\Warframe\Downloaded\Public\Tools" directory. I'm not sure if PIA relies on the executable's location to determine if it should allow a process to bypass the VPN or not (or if it just allows any executable with the name "launcher.exe" to bypass).

[ElAsem]

So I am using exclusions on the Steam exes, but only because I don't have any Warframe executables in my AppData subfolders.

That was actually the first thing I went looking for when it didn't work.  Interestingly there is no "Downloaded" folder there.  If it is doing that, then it's doing it after the game starts running and then clearing those files out afterwards...

(And yes, PIA needs the explicit file path for the executable it's excluding/force-including)

 

Edit: Testing indicates that it is not downloading executables to AppData/Local to run on the fly.  So the Steam executables should be the correct ones.  But including RemoteCrashSender.exe did allow me to send a log to the tracking server. :P