Connecting - seggil/warciv GitHub Wiki

Before a game is started, anyone can connect to the server by supplying its hostname and port number (5555 by default). If the server is started with the -m flag, it will report to the metaserver, http://meta.freeciv.org/metaserver.phtml

The client can fetch this page, too: use the Metaserver button in the connection dialog. If it never shows any results, check if your WWW browser is using a HTTP proxy; to make civclient use the same proxy, set the $http_proxy environment variable to http://proxyhost:proxyportnumber/ before starting civclient.

When the game has started, everyone can connect as any player who
isn't already connected, including AI players. Merely connecting
to an AI player doesn't make it human controlled; this is an
independent server setting. If you lose connection early in
the game and reconnect, use the name you chose for your ruler,
not your original nickname! If the server is reporting on the
metaserver, the player names can be found there.