[michaelmrose]

Actually you have no problem initiating the connection with port forwarding. Brief reading suggests it would work better/faster with it enabled as some peers may not be able to initiate with you.

[wkat4242]

Initiating no, but if your chosen peer is also behind NAT, you will not be able to connect to them.

For this reason, your selection of peers will be limited. As all other peers behind NAT without port forward will be disregarded.

If you do have a port forward, other peers can connect to you, thus having all peers available.