AI-Con Lans

LAN #14 - Early evening

Sorry for the late write up – its been a trying week.

After the success of LAN #13, we were unsure if #14 could meet up to such high expectations. Sadly enough we were running week on from a TUCS lan & head to head with the WarHammer convention in the CBD. This cut our numbers significantly, down to about 14 boxes, with about 20 attendees in total.

This might have shaken the hearts of less strong groups, but we stood fast for a very entertaining day at our new venue in Hobart Showgrounds.

BattleField 2 was our first game of the day, with the action centering on ‘meat-grinder’ like events, with the room vs bots on infantry & tactics heavy game-play. Our sniper corps, consisting of Rev, MorgZ, bot_Morgz were both notorious and lethal.

From that point on the schedule was essentially gutted by rule of the room.

The Lunch run was bumped up and thanks to our decision to deal exclusively with Hungry Jacks, we suffered no real delays or misfortunes.

KillingFloor was then inserted into playlist, much to the delight of the room. Some server issues caused a certain amount of lag for the first part, however once the error was sorted massive amounts of fun were had. None of the 6+ player maps were in the line up, however thanks to player balancing most of the room got the opportunity to play with each other at some point.

WarCraft3 (1.21b) custom maps; DoTA & Castle Fight were the next game. Several hours rushed by in short order, with Scott being the clear winner in DoTA and the humans prevailing against the AI in Castle Fight.

Team Fortress 2 then exploded onto the floor which pretty much everyone joining in for some red VS blue action. Notable stars of the evening where Dhark & Snark, who utilised the double medico + uber combo to leverage extremely frustrating wins against the opposing side. Constantly. Assholes.

The dinner run was… challenging. Slower and less refined, the Pizza Hut website on its best day is cumbersome. However once everyones order was in, the web form promptly shut down. The same happened to the terminal of the customer service representative. Which was later followed up by excuses and delays from Pizza Hut local management. Wasted time; 45 minutes.

We gave up and went with Domino’s. 18 pizzas. 4 sides. 5 minute order time. 15 minutes to pick up. We know where we’re going back to next time.

LAN #14 - Late evening.

KillingFloor was then voted back in after dinner, which turned into an extended play run, with the gloves coming off and the difficulty getting cranked up. There was excitement, cries and rage in the air, right up until we wrapped up.

Despite lackluster turn out and questionable timetable interpretation, everyone who came along had a great time, with plenty of leeching. From an organiser perspective a lot was also learnt, which will hopefully make the next LAN a superior experience. Once again I thank every single person who stayed to help clean up the venue. We could not have done it without your help.

We continue to encourage people to invite friends & family to the LAN’s to help us grow and continue to offer one of the friendliest LAN’s in Tasmania.

Please remember to sign up to either our mailing list on the right, or our Facebook Group. It’s an outstanding way to keep in contact with people and inform them of new events.