What's it gonna take?

[Bandit]

We would like to see more of you arrive early and stay late for our parties.  We would appreciate any input on how to make that more appealing for you.  Or if not, what's keeping you from coming early and staying late?

[Mortem Desino]

I've been an admin for a ZM/TF2/CSS gaming group for quite awhile, so I'll probably love my first LAN party's (If you'll pardon the term) intimate competition. What would attract me more, though, is less one-on-one.

Yeah, 1 vs 1 can be fun on occasion (Gmod comes to mind) but RTS's are so much more fun when you've got more than one real threat or ally to deal with. The fun of a shoot-em-up (TF2, Call of Duty) is directly related to the number of REAL people fighting. Board/Card games hold the same relationship unless it's solitaire. And don't forget about paintballing!

What seems to work best to get large groups to play is to hold some kind of goofy competition. I've made a CSS map in which the timescale was roughly 5x normal and you score by teamkilling with a headshot. Another fun time was in Gmod where my colleagues held a "CRASH THE UBER-DEDICATED-SERVER COMPETITION." My signature below comes from that competition.

ELSE, at least include more than the normal induce-migraines-via-computer-monitor-competition. I already mentioned three above: card games, board games, painballing (airsofting, suction-cup dart....ing)

[Bandit]

Hey MD,

Thanks for your input.  I see where you're coming from with the tournament format and I think it is a change we may very well adopt. 
However, I had wanted to talk a bit more directly about why people arrive and leave at the times they do.  At least from my point of view, we take time and arrange provisions for these events to last a full day and a half, but most people only attend for about 6 hours (very rough estimate). 
As with your example, the fun of a LAN party is directly proportional to the number of gamers in attendance.  So, how can we convice gamers to spend more time with us so that we can all have more fun longer?

[SteelWolf5]

Well, at the moment, my availability for Friday-into-Saturday LANs is bookended by my two jobs. I get off from my job at Advanced Healthcare's corporate office building in Germantown at 4:30 PM on Fridays, and then start work at Walmart in Saukville at 4 PM on Saturdays. However, I am still very much interested in staying as long as I can within those limits.