We are playing NWN1
So my friends and I have been attempting to get a multiplayer game off of the ground. We don't know how though. We tried just starting a server and trying to connect through my ip address. No go. We tried someone else's Ip address. We tried port forwarding, although it may not have been done correctly. (I'm trying to use a free program) Essentially we're lost and just want to be able to play a campaign together. What do we do?

(we all have the updates cd keys for multiplayer so that's not a problem)

I never played multiplayer, but from what I know NWN 1 and 2 use the Gamespy-servers for online-mp. They have been shut down recently, however, the community has created some workarounds.

For NWN 2 you can use the Client Extension to re-enable online-mp (it also fixes some other issues):
http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NWN2Other.Detail&id=231

NWN 1 probably uses something similar, but I don't know what it is. I haven't played it since NWN 2 got released in 2006.

Playing over LAN, however, should work fine. The server-problem is only for online-play.

Well, I hope this fixes your issues. If not, then I hope that someone with more knowledge about MP comes along shortly.