I reckon I figured it out thanks to this tutorial that CrowdRender posted on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttZVSYKFcgE
Not the most ideal solution as my file ends up being an egregious size and syncing takes forever/doesn't happen. I am having issues connecting with other nodes now — after going through the connection process they remain gray, no text beside the node name or anything as is usual. Occasionally one or two will connect, but they either stall out at ready or syncing, but this might just be a network speed/latency thing.