FFXI Fan Festival Report and Pictures!

[Apelila]

I'm a giant nerd and I have a cell card in my laptop. I promise to take more pictures tomorrow, I was half dead standing in that god awful line listening to a MNK talk about leveling SMN next. But I saw sage sundi!! I was walking towards the line from the opposite direction, and he was outside smoking. Before I could get my camera out and motion for a picture he'd realized he'd been recognized and disappeared into the hiltons lobby.Just as well, probably thought I was going to be asking about AV, lol.

Anyway, Pictures!!!
All from here, nothing special ommited. There's a travel sub folder of pictures between phoenix and cali in case anyone wants to watch how I got lost. http://s5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...x/FanFestDay1/
also, my LJ: livejournal.com/xzelldx if you want, i'll be updating that too. But uh.....there's emo below it, so scroll down with caution.
LOL. Allah was next to them, but I didn't take any pictures of that for the reasons of
1: They looked uh...interesting.
2: I don't mind allah.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...stDay1/lol.jpg

The line from the HALFWAY point:
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...Day1/line2.jpg
The line from across the valet, after I got my camera out for Sundi I saw it and realized 'holy shit thats huge'. The previous picture was taken from the far left corner that you see past the cosplaying bard and mithra. The mithra also drunkely tripped into me. Did Anyone mention the cash alcohol bar yet next to the line? No? Thats probably because it was upstaris and the god damn ATM was downstairs.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...tDay1/line.jpg

A horrible picture of Goddess and Myself. Guess which is which!
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...y1/goddape.jpg

A MANdragora.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...Day1/mandy.jpg

Next post: Swag from the event (Pizza just got here) and write up about what i've seen so far.

[Epical]

Lol, that old man on the right in the bottom picture looks like he's wearing that hat.

Cool beans though, I'll be looking forward to more pictures throughout the event!

[Rocl]

You're the one in the green

[docvicious]

If you guys see docvicious, its not really me, couldn't get off work so had a friend go in my place so he could get the nomad cap for me and so I wouldn't waste 80 bucks.

[Sho]

Take moar pics. I wanna see if I can find my peeps. And /fume more cuz I couldn't go at the last minute.

[tyven]

oh man, gg @ car over heating.

[Builttolast]

ffxichlymidia stall was empty and lolalla

Nice pics keep em coming

Would love to be there but 7500mi away and all it's kinda far.

[Apelila]

Here's all the spam you get! My car is now powered by Nvidia! (explains the overheating)
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16.../swag/spam.jpg

The book you get!
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16.../swag/book.jpg

The layout of the event
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...booklayout.jpg

The insert, i think for events.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/book1.jpg

A page explaining the events
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/book2.jpg

Another page from the book, still munching on food, don't want to go dig it out and find out what it says.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/book3.jpg

Schedule. Good luck reading that.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/book4.jpg

The backpack and the poster you get to throw away from Nvidia. (the poster, not the backpack)
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...g/backpack.jpg

Name badge. ALOT of people had hand written ones, I think that "we don't have a lot of tickets" was code for "we don't want you scabs showing up w/o registering". I wish I had a picture of the SE guy who walked through the line with a SIGN that said "no more tickets".
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/badge.jpg

Next post that i'm writing next: summary. Nom nom nom pizza. Not pictured and i'm too lazy to take pictures: tickets, moogle cap ticket.

[Lordshin]

what is the atomos challenge? i an barely read it xD

[Taj]

Something about giving attendees a character on Atomos. lol.

[Cantih]

Advice to those there:
If you want to buy any merch, do it FAST, they sold out of the good stuff before the first day was over last time.

Last time, there was some things you could only get with "gil", tokens handed out for completing parts of the Live Quest.

However, you also needed gil to play in the Hero's Combat, and you needed to play (and beat) Hero's Combat to finish part of the Live Quest. Parties participating in Live Quest get ranked by how much they completed, the top 3 parties got prizes.

iirc, you also needed to use gil to buy a spot in the Tarutaru marathon



And oh god, that backpack is so much nicer than the bag we got at FF 2006. But no free hat this time =\

Can anyone take a closer/non glare picture (or type out) of the guide? Want to read ; ;

[Ahnuld]

They reused that pic where it looks like Sundi's falling out of his chair.

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...swag/book3.jpg

[Khamsin]

Something about giving attendees a character on Atomos. lol.

Had you gone, you might have had an opportunity to win that.

[Siralin]

http://img161.imageshack.us/img161/9992/boogerxd8.jpg

[Silvenmyst]

lol I took that pic to....but freaking eh that damn line was lonnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggg.

[Tomiko]

Thanks for the update and pictures!

[Apelila]

This is gonna be a cross post between here and my LG Becuase i'm lazy. WALL OF TEXT WARNING

Why? BECAUSE I WANT TO GO TO BED. Also, to everyone tomorrow: I'm the one who sounds like he's about to die. I have a horrible cough, i'm not sick i'm getting over a stuff from 2 weeks ago thats still working its way out of my lungs. Also: House of pizza is awesome, and cheap, and nom nom nom.

So after leaving chocella valley I headed into the LA megalopolis. And Lo, I missed the CA91. About the time I got to downtown LA I realized "Hmm, maybe I"m further along than I should be, since the 91 was supposed to be 40 miles ago. Before anyone points out this was a stupid route to take, blame google maps and a lack of perparedness on my part (that and it was like, 3 turns including getting on the 10 and i'm lazy).

So I called my ex. Walking his dog, not near home. So I called my sister. Inlaws intown, can't talk. Called my mom, can't use a computer. Called my friend shawn: moving. Brent: Lives with shawn. Brian: Helping shawn. Thomas: voicemail isn't setup. Kenny: at the post office about to kill someone. Kyle: at home. Good old dependable social anxieity keeps me from enjoying life and escaping my house kyle.

Me: Does I5 go to Anahiem?
Kyle: let me check
me: Uh...my directions say I should drive under the 5 to get to this hotel, so i'm guessing thats a yes.
Klyle: wtf do you need me for then?
Me: I'm near railroad tracks and hookers and I don't know how to get to the I5.

Long story short, 3 freeways (and 2 hours) later I got from point "don't make eye contact" to point B. And then I went to find a hotel!

My first choise, the pirate themed hotel was booked. I forget what the exact name of it was, but it looked like a motel 6+1, so i don't think I missed much somehow. I walked next door, (these are behind the hilton btw) to the Portofino, and they had rooms. I have a huge god damn room to myself, with 2 queen beds. If anyone needs accomadations on the cheap, find me and if we don't creep each other out i have no problem letting you crash here for a slight fee (buy me food).
/so lonely. So very lonely.

I started to go up to the room, but then i realized i'd left the backpack with the camera, mp3 player, laptop, and other crap in the front seat of my car @ that ghetto motel in a poorly lit parking lot. So I hobbled my ass back over there and then moved everything to the room. 4 hours of sitting on your ass in traffic makes your legs work funny.

After that I walked over to the hilton (after putting on new shoes) and started taking pictures. I really, really wish i'd kept my camera on the entire time because as I was coming up on the line (Tm) I walked past the far right door and Sage Sundi was hidding behind a pillar getting a smoke. I looked right at the man, kept on walking for 2 steps, stopped and realized just what the fuck i'd seen, turned around, and saw him putting out his smoke and getting the F out of dodge realizing he'd been spotted. Its just as well, we'd have to deal with it being captioned with 'wut' a lot. Yes, I am angry at myself for not realizing just what an opportunity I missed until it went away. I'm sorry. I saw him briefly, my attention was on where to get in. Here's the thought process that happened:

I wonder what that server that group is on? They all have their badges. Could any of them be BG/Allah people?
Wow, AZ has a stricter smoking law than cali? We can't smoke in front of the door like that back home.
HOLY SHIT THATS THE LINE?
HOLY SHIT WAS THAT SAGE SUNDI?
Fucker! Fuck me in the fucking ass, that would have been an awesome picture for the first day if I could have taken one with him.
(He looked out of it, maybe jet lagged. God, I hope if the dev team does take on AV they fly them in 5 hours before hand and they fall asleep during it, that would be funny as hell)

Followed by 'oh, the line goes around this corner' x3. That god damn line When I got in it went from the second floor of the hilton (Where there was ANOTHER line you got treated to, more on this later), down an escalator (no, people didn't wait on that stupid) through the lobby, out along the valet drop, along the side of the hilton, around a corner, to the parking lot for the Anahiem convention center. This is after an hour and a half or registration being open, @ 6:30.

So I get in line and start listening to the conversations around me, casually talking to some of the people near by. I came close to being that annoying clingy guy for a group in front of me, and may have done it for the two guys next to me from Valefor from the east coast. I know your reading this, if I was my bad, I was bored and you seemed not dumb. (Unlike the MNK/SMN, who reminded me of someone I like but only in small doses). This was after Goddess and Silven and gone away. It was odd meeting people from my server I know only passingly, but it was sure as hell fun ripping on people I do know with them. Oh, the person who's name I couldn't remember starts with taco, i'll let you see if you can guess who it is. :>

30 minutes past and we got around one corner, another 30 minutes and we can see the doors going inside.Around this point, a mithra bard bumped into me from behind and lost her ears. I liked her costume, but I really wanted to tell her she should be wearing the turban, even if i knew why she wasn't :D
20 minutes later we're at the doors, and 30 minutes after that we're at the escalator. See, the actual staff was upstairs on floor 2, and they had escalators. You can't exactly wait on those in a line. This was solved by the line stopping at the jetsons stairs, and then small groups being sent up to fill the SECOND line upstairs. This one had a minibar that took cash. The ATM was downstairs within an old persons crazy driving distance from the line. See the fail? I do. The bar people looked like they where giving 'em out strong, so i was a bit angry that I couldn't partake. its probably just as well, I ended up holding that god damn dr. pepper bottle for an hour because of a lack of trash cans, I can just see me getting up to the desk and sloshing booze everywhere.

So the second line was made of Fail. Except the mercenaries, who where nice. I hope the girl from Quaz~tab finds people from her server, it seemed like odin, midgardsormr, and Fairy where the order of the day. I learned not to try and read people's names but to look @ the length on the badge to determine if i cared or not.

So after line #2 there was #3. This was the cattle sorting area where you got seperated into groups so they could verify your name/id/character name and give you your crap. This part was really fast, so i'm wondering why the hell I was in line #1 so long. I'm guessing that when they ran out of tickets to sale that sped things up. Thought honestly, when they did announce that the line stopped moving for like 10 minutes, so that might not be true. Probably just the universal truth of people not registering right and then bitching about it the wrong way to someone who doesn't care.

So I got my badge, bid farewell to my Valefor people, went through the line asking for Gligamesh until someone from Fairy who wasn't to the alcohol yet went uh...drunk on me? Well use that verb for his actions, sure. I decided at that point that I was tired, my feet hurt, and I hadn't had a shower in 12 hours and creepy 16 yr old looking twits could wait until tomorrow. I walked back to the hotel and put up all the pictures, and got food and a nice shower.

And tomorrow there's more fun. Hope to see someone there, I'll be wearing white jeans and a asu shirt and i have a cough that sounds like the plauge. guess which is easist to find? <3

[Cantih]

Me: I'm near railroad tracks and hookers and I don't know how to get to the I5.
Long story short, 3 freeways (and 2 hours) later I got from point "don't make eye contact" to point B.

Welcome to the Los Angeles tri-county area.

[Khamsin]

Me: I'm near railroad tracks and hookers and I don't know how to get to the I5.
Long story short, 3 freeways (and 2 hours) later I got from point "don't make eye contact" to point B.

Welcome to the Los Angeles tri-county area.

At least he didn't go "Oh, I know where you are. From the railroad tracks and hookers, keep going west until you see the homeless guys, then take the freeway south to..."

[klvino]

A MANdragora.
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y16...Day1/mandy.jpg

Pardon me, but I believe that's a Morrigan. Please note that it is black, whereas a Mandragora is white. Now insert standard racist joke here.