Internal networking with FreeAXP - current codebase

Long time lurker - will be almost 15 years now - first time poster. Sorry if that particular topic has been covered but I'm asking this in context of most recent release of FreeAXP and OpenVPN.
Hardware - wise I'm using a desktop PC with one wired Ethernet card and one wireless, having no possibility of cabling Ethernet one at this time. I don't aim at having external connectivity from emulated Alpha, being able to open telnet/SSH from my Win10 box to OpenVMS and move files around (back and forth) is enough.
Found an post here referring to creating Microsoft Loopback (also known as KM-TEST) adapter seems that it doesn't work:
- Created KM-TEST adapter with 192.168.96.10/24
- Bridged that one with OpenVPN's TAP, pointing FreeAXP to (restating msipcap earlier)
- Set up WE0 as 192.168.96.11/24

Sadly, can't ping either guest from host or vice versa. Wonder if I'm that rusty in terms of bandwidth conservation provisions within Ethernet specs I'm missing something obvious, or I rather need to stick to specific versions of FreeAXP/OpenVPN in order for that to work.

There is definitely a YMMV factor with Ethernet and WiFi adapters. That said, almost all 'just work'. But something must be 'up', connected, plugged in or equiv. A 'down' adapter doesn't really work. (using Win/Un*x terminology there I know).

Stray or left behind winpcap dll's have been know to cause difficulties. If I get network related issues, sometimes a global search for *pcap*.dll will reveal some unwanted leftover .....

I guess the PC has a 'real' IP address (not the VPN one(s)) ... have you tried putting the FreeAXP guest into that network, rather than the VPN one ? (you appear to be wanting to simply 'rendezvous' locally on the PC's real network)

John M