Ms Quakecon Exposure [Profile]
Everyone was supposed to meet up at 11am on Friday morning to get details on what was going on. Ms. Quakecon was a 1 vs. 1 OSP mod (v1.03A) tournament with a 10 minute time limit for each match. Each participant chose a map to play. It was 1 out of 3 matches so if you won both maps, there was no need to play the tie breaker map that you both agree to play.

The issue that arose was if they were going to use the reserved area in BYOC. If they did, they would have to get the girls to bring their computers up when they play. They would most like lose their spot in BYOC if this happened so Lamby and crew decided it was best to have the matches at their computers spread through out the BYOC area. There were 32 participants in the tournament.

I went there just to cover the tournament but since there wasn't enough admins helping out, I ended up volunteering when they asked if I wouldn't mind helping to move things a bit faster. The PlayDedicated guys worked hard to get the server running that morning. The guys I met were cptstinky, Eye Xer0, Cann0a and Endoclone.

Since this was the first Miss Quakecon Tournament, it ended up being very hectic, even if exciting the whole time I helped out. Some issues that stood out were the power outages that would go down in strips of two and three rows of computers. In some cases if it wasn't a participants computer going out of power, the server the tournament match was on would drop the participant.

The 2nd issue was how the Admins asked the girls originally if they had the current version of the OSP mod and they all said they did but once they couldn't connect to the server there was a big delay on waiting for them to get the mod installed or updated. There were other crazy things going on that helped delay the process in the first round but overall I was very happy to be there.

People like Beta and Gen-0 were lifesavers later that afternoon when Lamby lost her wallet and had to leave the tourney to search for it around 4-5pm. Losing your wallet is a terrifying experience, I really felt bad about it all. We all rejoiced later that evening when she found it.  

First, Beta took on the tournament, getting things going and boy was she awesome at it. She took it on like she was the tournament director all along. I was really happy we had someone as sweet yet bold as her to help the tournament not stall from such problems that arose. Then after about 2 hours of her hard work she had prior plans and needed to leave. She gave Gen-0 the project to help get us even more organized with times for the girls to come back later for their matches. The tournament then started getting even more strict on times so if you missed your time and were 15 minutes late, you were put down as if you forfeit.

There were a few girls I felt honored to be a spectator for. From being around in the Quake 3 community since it started I know when I see a gamer that has some talent and others that have potential. In case many of you don't know me or maybe my nick name does ring a bell, I ran Quake3world for Mplayer for quite a few years. It was actually id Software's official fansite for the game/ So if you installed Quake III Arena back then, you had it in your start menu where the Quake III Arena game shortcut was. 

I have played some very talented people in my time. Their pointers on what they feel I need to change always made me feel special to know they wanted to help me out with what I needed to improve on. Below you will find the girls I was admin for (a spectator/referee) and my comments on their gameplay. Majority of them were great sports when they lost, while a couple of them refused to be at first.

Beaner Missy Krissy Trixi3 Ms.X Dubird Spicey 

Being admin for Ms. Quakecon was the first time I had helped out with such an event. I have been to various LANs but haven't seen a lot of tournaments  live. Tournaments I have attended in the past are PGL 1998 and E3 related tourneys like Q3 Logitech, Triple Threat Tournament, along with a couple of other minor ones.

I have only heard about the results with female related gaming events in the past through out my time playing Q1, a little Q2 and Q3. The only two I was involved with was both of the Queen of the Hill (QotH) online tournaments for Quake 1 and 2. There's something so much more different between an online and live tournament though. Quakecon is an event I pushed myself to go to this year to see this tournament live. I am the type of person where I have to REALLY have a good reason why I would drag myself to an event to pay extra cash I don't need to be spending. I felt Ms. Quakecon was definitely a great outcome so I am grateful I was apart of the event. Although I am upset I didn't get any finalist pictures with their awards. It was postponed until Sunday and by then there was no way I could find out where they would be taken. [Pictures]

Coach Sitting
Cyric and Anticonscience decided to give us a call at 1:30am. Cyric mentioned he was on the coach downstairs. I didn't know if this was a Canadian term so I asked Jube what coach meant to her. She said, "I don't know." *shrugging*  I asked him quite a few times over and over and finally he started describing where it was located. I still couldn't understand why a coach would be downstairs, and he's in it. I imagined horses in front of a coach. Finally I described to Jube where he said this coach was. Jube said "Oh! Coauch" I said what the HECK do you Canadians think a coach is? Can you describe what it is? She said its the thing you sit on downstairs. I said, "Ohhhhhh! A COUCH!"  The rest of the night I became a pain in the neck, saying mean jokes about coach. Even Anti noticed how Cyric says coach instead of couch. I described to him how you say Couch. It's like saying COW with CH... Cowch.

Tarot in the Cards
I met a guy pretty late on Friday night in the Tournament room. He blocked the tournament area, asking to see the badges before they were allowed to enter. Since I was press, I always was able to get in the door but he was working the late shift so I hadn't met him earlier that day or on Thursday. Tarot and I talked for about 45 mins to an hour about the games we started with. He started with C&C being his first real multiplayer game. We both agreed about the whole halo gamepad vs mouse/keyboard when it comes to First Person Shooters. I also told him about my old C&C days of when I was booted off mplayer for being a newbie girl gamer and so forth. We had the same interest in games and enjoyed Enemy Territory.

Tarot hadn't seen the Doom 3 Multiplayer Demo yet but had a ticket to see it. I told him it was a must, he had to go over and try it hands on! I told him what my issue was and why the Multiplayer demo changed my mind to want to buy it once again.

Mysterious Guy (yeah, that's right! I said GUY, not MAN!)
There was a mysterious guy that wouldn't tell me his name or who he worked for at the event. Most of the day when he'd see me, he'd say did you check her badge? Check her badge! He acted as if I was a criminal sneaking through the tournament door. Finally during the time I was getting finished talking to Tarot, I was heading out the door and this mysterious man called me over to the admin area to talk to him and CC-Nate. At this time he covered his badge. He asked me, "So tell me about yourself. You're press. What site do you work for." 

I didn't know who he was and I was very tired by then from hunting down these girls in a 2,000 BYOC area all day long. I knew I had to get up the following morning for the Ms. Quakecon tournament. So when he asked me this stuff, I was on offensive mode. First off, I wondered why a guy would want to cover his badge and always remark with, "don't you want to know who I am?"  That right off makes me desire not to.  Every time I went to check his badge, he would cover it with his hand. So.. I started being sassy back to him. Most of you who know me, know I am not rude in any way. I never try to hurt anyone's feelings, or say rude remarks to anyone unless I have someone who repeats what I say, or slightly twists things in a flirty way. When it comes down to it if you heckle at me, I'll heckle right back at you.

He also gave me a hard time when I said he was a guy. He did have a point. When you say these guys, it means a type of generalization. But when you say man, this sticks out. I finally came at him because I was in my sassy mode by saying, "oh, you're a man, but you're obviously not THE man. "  So you get the gist of the whole conversation right from that comment alone.

By the time I was finished talking to this guy I decided it was better not to know who he was since he was so into not wanting me to know. I shook his hand and said I was leaving, then said "I think it's best I don't know who you are, that way you'll remain a mystery."  

After the tournament awards ceremony on Saturday, I did find out who he was but to not embarrass him, I won't give his name away or company away. And don't get me wrong, he was a nice guy. He just pushed my buttons the wrong way when I wasn't in the mood for such remarks and actions. I tend to meet many guys like him and I think that's why I said such things to him.

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