GlXII Post mortem

Fobia

Good LAN, my review is up if anyone wants to look, I have a few things I'd like to find out though. I left early due to catching a bad cold so I wonder: What were the prizes? I saw the box of t-shirts etc but what were the other ones?

What time did ye finish up at?

que

tman

did the ut tourny take place in the end?
who won it?

cheers to 'Sok and echo for the bountiful leechage btw.

DRakE

tman wrote:

did the ut tourny take place in the end?
who won it?

cheers to 'Sok and echo for the bountiful leechage btw.

It didn't happen because you didn't organise it ^_^

DRakE

Oh, and nice comprehensive review there quetzal.


(I am always a monster with the rail, it wasn't fluke )

Fobia

Haha, pro-q3dm6, GalwaylanIV, bring it

DRakE

Ok.. but GLXIII first.

po0k

Prizes were as follows:
CS Tourny: FunC Mousemat + Alienware T-shirt (again)
Quake3 2v2: €20 GameStop gift voucher and a Hellboy T-shirt
Warcraft3 tourny: €20 Gamestop Gift voucher and a Hellboy T-Shirt
Benchmarking compo: €10 Gamestop gift voucher.

po0k

tman wrote:

did the ut tourny take place in the end?
who won it?

cheers to 'Sok and echo for the bountiful leechage btw.

We couldn't get a server running in time due to lack of network connection and ut dedicated server's insistence that it needed to authenticate itself on the net.

CerebralCortex

AAAAAAaHHHHhhhHHH sOOOOOOOooooo there where no rts's played I see (well not the important ones ahuh[Shogun tw]). I'm sorry that I missed it but I have imo a shiiiit(not enjoyable due to deplorable performance imo imo imo imo) machine and no money to buy a new <make me feel good> system.

OoooHHhh money (and service to ones society) really does dominate ones existance on this planet's life structure. And remember kids money talks and bullshiiiieet walks. I'm having a phsycothic embolism/episode(whatever) or something to that effect. :rolleyes: :mad: :eek: :cool:

Anima

Yeah great lan, really liked the http://galwaylan thing and the timetable worked really well.

NeoSlicerZ

there wasn't enough leechage tbh..

Tar.Aldarion

NeoSlicerZ wrote:

there wasn't enough leechage tbh..

i know what you want,take from my machine (ahem bout 160gigs of it?)
the http://galwaylan thing was really great imho
Thanks for the voucher but i'm just gonna frame that tshirt,i wouldnt even be able to fit a neo in there

ARGINITE

there wasn't enough leechage tbh..

I got loads:) poor falcon!

The http://galwaylan thing was excilent. other than the 1 or 2 power failures it was a great lan!

DRakE

No power failures downstairs

Wish i could have been there before 5pm on Saturday.. nevermind though

Sniipe

The [url]Http://galwaylan[/url] was something I saw at Darkside and gamecon. Its the same program they used. All it takes is a few mins to set it up. I'll add more stuff to it next time (Sniipe's Custom stuff...). The lan was great. I did enjoy setting up the tourneys. I learned alot from it... ie how to put up a q3 server... OSP I would have organised the UT thing but I thought someone else was doing it. DOW would have been a good compo but we had a good laugh without it being tourney.

Next time I do it I will prob start earlier. Limit the teams in CS, as it was difficult to find a sign up number divisible by 5 (someone was ****ing with me....putting there name on and then taking it off as I walked upstairs...and when I find out...) I enjoyed the q3 2v2 (I'm convinced now that it was better than being a 1v1)

I'm totally pissed off at some ppl who didn't participate in the games... I understand that we all can't like every game, but it makes the whole thing better with more numbers. I was going to name names but thats harsh. Anyway you know who you are.

Leeching is a big thing at the lan for some but if I had my way it would be limited vigouriously to certain time frames. Another thing I'd like to see implemented is everyone eating at the same time...

Anyway, I'm re-iterating **** I've been saying before.

I don't want to be known as a moaner like que. Best lan I've been at since the last GLan (besides darkside).

Roll out Glxiii and I would prefer it next time in Menlo (heating will be fixed). We can go back to the anno every second one or something??


[edit: ppl that don't arrive before 2pm or something should not be guarnteed a place, unless they let an organiser know before hand. A few ppl did not turn up on the day. There was someone on the waiting list that could have gotten in plus there was also 2 others who arrived at the lan that would have payed and played had we known that u guys weren't coming. /edit]

Fobia

Sniipe wrote:

I don't want to be known as a moaner like que. Best lan I've been at since the last GLan (besides darkside).

Oh stfu, the only other LANs you've been to since the last glXII (besides darkide) are Gamecon, which seems to be mainly aimed at console gamers, and Midlan, which, though growing, is nothing compared to Galwaylan in terms of size.

I aint moaning, I just think alot of changes could be made, so in the words of the infallible Syxpak, Suck my balls.



your humble non-comformist who'll take part in the dance-off so as not to comform with the other non-comformists,
quetzal

Tar.Aldarion

next time i call not sitting in the middle seat in ye ole sniipe mobile que,so you wont have an excuse to '''''miss'''' the seat belt thing and touch me :P
aha i called not in the middle way before you !! i cant believe you called it twice.....

Tar.Aldarion

oh ya the lan was great btw. next time ill remember food though.only bad thing was some hilarious rates in cs :P good things all the free stuff like the 9 games i got

DRakE

Tar.Aldarion wrote:

oh ya the lan was great btw. next time ill remember food though.only bad thing was some hilarious rates in cs :P good things all the free stuff like the 9 games i got

Wow, you must have spent lots of money to get that many games!


Also, Menlo is just too far away from town

po0k

Sniipe wrote:

I'm totally pissed off at some ppl who didn't participate in the games... I understand that we all can't like every game, but it makes the whole thing better with more numbers. I was going to name names but thats harsh. Anyway you know who you are.

Fobia

Hey, Syxpak, how many tournis did you compete in this LAN?

Ruffty^

I think he assassinated sin and claimed victory in the q3 tounry along side drake...

ARGINITE

I think he assassinated sin and claimed victory in the q3 tounry along side drake...

from the look of the pictures taken of them, he must have been on something!

Tar.Aldarion

DRakE wrote:

Wow, you must have spent lots of money to get that many games!


Also, Menlo is just too far away from town

yes you would think lots of money but i know ppl who can get good deals

wherever menlo is further away from town sounds worse

Sniipe

Menlo = more ppl = bigger lan = more money = more tourneys with more ppl

aSS g0BliN

lol microsoft is getting to him

Ronan|Raven

I like cake.

Sniipe

aSS g0BliN wrote:

lol microsoft is getting to him

Its a capital M for Microsoft, mister

U back yet Ronan|Raven? How did the Vimen treat u?

Actually now that I have thought about it; Anno is fine atm, but if more ppl sign up we should consider menlo. As an example this time Anno was perfect as there was only 1 on the waiting list.

DRakE

Micro$oft!

Fobia

Sniipe wrote:

As an example this time Anno was perfect as there was only 1 on the waiting list.

More people sign up depending on what the number allowed is, for example a couple of IrishWAN lads were interested but didn't sign up cus there were already 6 on the waiting list......I think Menlo + Heating would make for a great LAN, stay tuned and remember; Cake is a made up drug.

Fobia

CerebralCortex

Sniipe wrote:

Menlo = more ppl = bigger lan = more money = more tourneys with more ppl

why does menlo = more ppl i dunt standunder teach????

Fobia

Well Mr Cortex, the theory is that, with a larger area of space, one can fit more people into it. Hence Sniipe states that Menlo Hall, as it has a larger floorspace, can hold more people.

Before you ask the next questions with regards to the rest of Sniipes equation let me answer them for you also.

More people = bigger lan because generally, LANs are measured by the number of people attending.

bigger LAN = more money because each person who attends the LAN is supposed to pay an entry fee, generally around 35 euro.

more money = more prizes with more people because, after an enormous hunk is taken out of the pot for servers, networking gear etc, the remainder *should* be spent on prizes, hence if there is more money, more can be spent on prizes.


Why the **** am I posting this?

aSS g0BliN

yeah wtf ..tbh

po0k

Fobia wrote:

I think Menlo + Heating would make for a great LAN

It's a different story when you're the one who has to lug all the across the city.
It's 3-4 car-trips at least.

Also, I'm skeptical about the power capacity of Menlo.
40 PCs + servers etc. is pushing it.

Doodee

Fobia wrote:

Well Mr Cortex, the theory is that, with a larger area of space, one can fit more people into it. Hence Sniipe states that Menlo Hall, as it has a larger floorspace, can hold more people.

Before you ask the next questions with regards to the rest of Sniipes equation let me answer them for you also.

More people = bigger lan because generally, LANs are measured by the number of people attending.

bigger LAN = more money because each person who attends the LAN is supposed to pay an entry fee, generally around 35 euro.

more money = more prizes with more people because, after an enormous hunk is taken out of the pot for servers, networking gear etc, the remainder *should* be spent on prizes, hence if there is more money, more can be spent on prizes.


Why the **** am I posting this?

No idea why you are, you'd swear you had organised a lan before

The menlo was good as it was one large room for the lan. The anno is capable of holding more people, the second room that was in use (Pizza Room) isn't wired for 3 phase, but its on the 3 phase circuit. The very top room and the very bottom room are both fully 3 phase powered, wired and have sockets in the walls. the very top room has the advantage of having the network ports in the wall beside the sockets.

Having spoken to the gaffer he said that he would consider directly connecting both rooms (Top and bottom) but have the pizza room wired up would cost more than the lans would bring in.

also, to equate that the menlo would generate more revenue is second guessing tbh.
atm there appears to be a decent following of galway heads for the lan, hence the numbers, however, expansion is dependant on either others travelling from dublin/waterford/whereever or more galwayheads going lanning. The latter is achieved by word of mouth.

If yee want more tournies at the lan then i'd suggest yee play more than just Q3, CS and DC. There are alot of other fun games that can be played

po0k

Doodee wrote:

If yee want more tournies at the lan then i'd suggest yee play more than just Q3, CS and DC. There are alot of other fun games that can be played

And people actually showing up on time.
One major problem is that alot of people who sign up on Room101 don't read this forum.
In future I'll put links to tourny sign-up threads on the lan description section.

Fobia

Doodee wrote:

No idea why you are, you'd swear you had organised a lan before

If I had a euro for every time you've said that, I'd have enough money to run a big LAN.

As for venue, I hadn't thought about the power problems with Menlo, with that in mind perhaps it's time for another "find the venue" game.....

As for transport...I think you'll find that only a small percentage of galway heads find it harder to get to the menlo venue than the Anno Santo so I wouldn't consider that a real problem.

With regards to expansion, ye've gone as far as ye can with the current way the LANs are run, once again (no-ones actually addressed this), why not take some of the money you get from attendee fees and rather than buy more servers etc (I think 2 is enough...), put it up as prizemoney for cs/q3 tourneys. You'd see alot more people coming from Dublin etc if there's big prizemoney involved. Now I know what the main arguement will be - having big tourni's would make the LAN too competitive and less fun. But tbh you've said it yourself Doodee, as have ronan|raven and one or two others; the LANs aint got that childish spark they used to. So ye can either leave it the way it is (fun, but not as good as the ones in say, the college, even though we had to leave at 11), or make a big change...

Fobia.

Ruffty^

easy on mate !!
I know I`ve only been to 3 lans, but I had great fun. I hardly heard any complaints, did you ?? So many more problems in menlo then there were in anno
"Don`t fix what ain`t broke", works here I would think..
Ages to the next one anyway.

Fobia

Ruffty^ wrote:

easy on mate !!
I know I`ve only been to 3 lans, but I had great fun. I hardly heard any complaints, did you ?? So many more problems in menlo then there were in anno
"Don`t fix what ain`t broke", works here I would think..
Ages to the next one anyway.

I've heard complaints from people who've been going to these LANs for alot longer than you or I have...so I think it's time for change is all.

Ruffty^

:eek:
you should have said that above...

po0k

I *really* don't like the idea of cash prizes.

LANs are for getting together with a few mates, playing some games and doing stuff you couldn't feasibly do over the internet, along with being face-to-face with the prick who just shot you before you reached the flag and discussing a match over a pint.

When big prizes and serious competition become the main attraction of LANs I'll probably stop going to them. If you want to play for money, challenge the pikeys to that punchbag game in the arcade, or go for a pint in Mixers and get the shít kicked out of you over a game of pool.

I'm looking into extra sponsorship thingies, I'd like to run a big LAN in Galway at some stage in the future, but the organisation and basic capital required for something like that is exponentially greater than what the majority of LANs in Ireland are based on.

I like tournys at GalwayLANs, I preferred them when it was a bunch of lads jumping into the game for fun and messing about and just playing for the pleasure of besting your mates. Prizes are all well and grand, but they are not the reason I play.

JP has a good point in that tournaments need to held for other games.
We've had a CS tourny at *just about* every GLAN that's been held, I'm sick to the teeth of that game now, partly due to my not playing it at all nowadays, and partly due to certain people's proficiency at the game. It's not fun for me to play anymore. It's not gaming - it's work.
DC is still fun for me as it has enough variety and craic to keep me interested.
Quake3 is fun because it's nice, fast and furious. I had an excellent time at QuakeLAN last year even though I am pretty much a noob at Quake, but the oldskool lads didn't give a shíte and helped me out which considering the state I was in was very much appreciated and made the matches even more fun.

The downstairs of the Anno was a bit cramped, but that was due to anyone who came early on Saturday heading straight downstairs and not enough people making use of the upstairs room.
If it was too cramped for you, why didn't you go upstairs?
Christ, at the first LAN we had about 20 or so people crammed in, back-to-back in the top-floor room and it was excellent.

Expansion-wise, we could go to about 50-60 people in the hotel spread between the 3 rooms - laptop gamers being herded into the Pizza room naturally and would still have a big of space for a XBox corner or something.
When we get everyone using Sniipe's intranet site, IRC and voicecomms, inter-room communication shouldn't really matter.
As regards servers, they can be stacked in a corner with the switching gear with one monitor, keyboard and mouse. Windows boxes can use VNC for remote administration, and *nix boxen can use SSH.

We now have enough servers to host pretty much whatever we need to, and this has taken a long time to get to.

The next step is to upgrade the network to GigE and sort-out some issues with the servers and streamline some things.

I'll also be finishing college soon, so I should have a bit more time and energy to do the behind-the-scenes stuff to the standard I'd like.

Asok

Fobia wrote:

I've heard complaints from people who've been going to these LANs for alot longer than you or I have...so I think it's time for change is all.

So have I but they are mainly about you annoying them.

Doodee

SyxPak wrote:

I *really* don't like the idea of cash prizes.

I like tournys at GalwayLANs, I preferred them when it was a bunch of lads jumping into the game for fun and messing about and just playing for the pleasure of besting your mates. Prizes are all well and grand, but they are not the reason I play.


Expansion-wise, we could go to about 50-60 people in the hotel spread between the 3 rooms - laptop gamers being herded into the Pizza room naturally and would still have a big of space for a XBox corner or something.
When we get everyone using Sniipe's intranet site, IRC and voicecomms, inter-room communication shouldn't really matter.

We now have enough servers to host pretty much whatever we need to, and this has taken a long time to get to.

The next step is to upgrade the network to GigE and sort-out some issues with the servers and streamline some things.

*Hit* *Nail* *Head*
The most enjoyable lans have been the ones where the prizes were Jam Jiggers or a Bluetack Q3 MAtchstick Statue. Fact was participation in the lan was a prize in itself.

As reguards the servers, We were considerably blessed with the last one, so far its only set the lan back about 100e and the rest was funded by myself. Both servers are more than capable of hosting large games of whatever we fancy with enough extra for FTPing.
As John said, when a lan turns competitive and cash prizes are given there is less fun involved. More people will show up to win the money than to have fun. Oh, and the reason i keep using that same line quetzal is cause its true, you should consider listening to your peers instead of following the folly of youth.

We now have 4 organisers for the lan, all of which are more than capable of sorting any problems, mainly cause we've "Seen em all before" so to speak. Fact is, that for the amount of time that can be spent on the organisational process we (Especially John) are doing a great job, and the fact that people keep coming back for more is what speaks for itself.

I think after May more concentration can be done on improvements to the lan as people will have more time. I dont think that the hotel is the wrong venue, way i see it is its the home of the lan and still contains the spirit of the first few lans. *Enqueue the song Memories from the corner of my mind*

Now, im hungover and needa study. Go play in the sandbox until dinners ready.

Sniipe

These talks are great, loads of ideas. I'm motivated

Sniipe

<quote = syxpak>and partly due to certain people's proficiency at the game. It's not fun for me to play anymore. It's not gaming - it's work</quote>

I'd have to say the same about DC. I suck at it. I PLAY IT BECAUSE ITS ALL ABOUT TAKING PART. Sure wouldn't a lan suck if there were like 20 games and people played only certain games and not other ones. I really hate DC tbh. Not giving out @ u syxpak, honestly. I would think a 30 V 30 in DC would kick ass??? I would think a 30 V 30 in AVP would kick ass. I think 12 CS teams in a knock out tourney with seeded ppl on diff teams would also kick ass(harder to do I'll agree).

/me waits for response from such ppl (which is a good few) You can refer back to this if I bring it up again, as thats the last time I'll comment on it... [edit] Not [/edit]

Fobia

Sniipe wrote:

I'd have to say the same about DC. I suck at it. I PLAY IT BECAUSE ITS ALL ABOUT TAKING PART. Sure wouldn't a lan suck if there were like 20 games and people played only certain games and not other ones. I really hate DC tbh. Not giving out @ u syxpak, honestly. I would think a 30 V 30 in DC would kick ass??? I would think a 30 V 30 in AVP would kick ass. I think 12 CS teams in a knock out tourney with seeded ppl on diff teams would also kick ass(harder to do I'll agree).

/me waits for response from such ppl (which is a good few) You can refer back to this if I bring it up again, as thats the last time I'll comment on it... [edit] Not [/edit]

This has been in the books for ages alright, but when Syxpak shouts out "right, EVERYONE IN DC NOW", alot of people don't have it installed, and you can't force them to install it really unless not having a game installed results in expulsion from the LAN . Personally I'll play almost anything, except for games like Warcraft 3. I never really played these type of games and, though in FPS games even the worst player can help a team, I'm not sure how me not having a clue what's going on and being an easy target would help my team? (if I'm wrong, please feel free to explain).

I've decided to stop suggesting ideas, the admins clearly don't want anything to change in the LANs and have exhausted most of the possibilities of a new venue....

Fobia.

DRakE

DC is rubbish

Ruffty^

Its not though; I think the only thing "rubbish" about it is how weak they made the helicopters, they should dominate all land vehicles in 4/5 missiles. In a couple of months BF2 will win over all skeptics
http://www.eagames.com/official/battlefield/battlefield2/us/home.jsp

DRakE

I await the latest battlefield release with baited breath.

DRakE

After actually looking at teh screenshots i'm impressed visually.

But I have no doubts that it'll play like BF1942. Like a big pile of bollocks.

Tar.Aldarion

To mixers for a game of pool and a good fight!
hit*nail*head