Merry Christmas and a Happy End-of-the-Semester to you, Exiles! FoRgOtTeN, Blackstatic, and I just finished a rousing game of L4D. (Yes, the first one; some of us haven't ponied-up quite yet.) Even though we haven't had the chance to game for a couple months, we had fun.

     So, what are our plans now that we have some free time to do what we couldn't because of other obligations? Par-tay! In fact we do have a LAN party on the schedule for the near future. We figured since we had so much fun at Lanwar last year, we'd do it again! That and we don't have any local LAN's now.

     Well, once again, this post comes as a derailment of my tarin of thought. I was getting ready to power off for the night. Time to go nestle all snug in your bed while visions of fragging dance in your head. Sweet dreams.

     I feel it's been long enough to bear the news to the world. AsylumLAN passed silently on August 23, 2009 at 4:00pm GMT -6 from complications of technological progress, including increased residential bandwidth, casual varieties of gaming, and a weak economy. It is survived by its community, who despite its declining health, stood by its side until the very end. We, as well as communities of LAN parties that have gone before, grieve with you.

     Well a good Friday morning to you, Exiles! Hope you're enjoying your year thus far. Do I seem like I'm in a good mood? I am! School is out and to celebrate... well, we're doing nothing all that special. Current projects include working on the GMod server, and trying to finish this website, which has been a work-in-progress, slow progress... really, really, slow progress, since this time last year. There's nothing on the GMod section of this site, so don't even try, although I've been working on some power-saving stuff for the Windoze box involving wake-on-LAN and magic packets... and unicorns and fairy godmothers. I hope to create a script that will allow our members and special guests to wake the server on-demand to get their GMod on.

     What kind of post would this be if I didn't mention something about AsylumLAN? Well, a quick recap: most of our members felt that the last AL was one of the better ones in recent years. FoRgOtTeN placed third overall in the Trackmania tournament, RepoMan and carrcra5h entered the CS:S tourney and lost first round, but the team they played against lost two people, so, following the adage, "If you can't bet 'em, join 'em!" And they did. And they ended up winning. So as usual, mad props to the people who keep making it happen, and please, if you're ever in the Evansville area during one of these events, CHECK IT OUT! Until then, though, go here.

     Well, it's 2:00am and thundering outside. Better wrap this up before I lose pow.......

     Happy new year, Exiles, and welcome to a year that will go down in the record books as the year we traveled over 100 miles just to get our game on. How'd it turn out? It was well worth it. So much so, I'd like to give Lanwar a well deserved plug. While they're not quite as big as AsylumLAN, I think the general consensus is we had much more fun, if only for the fact that we got to take a road trip. Before the event got fully underway, the staff challenged everyone to see how much collective bandwidth we could pull. Let me tell you, the University of Louisville has a FAT pipe. In fact we couldn't clog it. Instead, we ended up crashing the Lanwar gateway.

     They have an event called "Duct Tape Wars" and you can only guess what that's about. Each team gets a roll of duct tape and an hour to build. Our challenge: make an airplane that works on the concept of lift. The plane that flies farthest without dropping its Microsoft ball mouse payload wins. I don't think I need to say that we epically failed. In fact, our "Duct Tape on a Plane" got beat by a... well, a wad of duct tape with a pouch which onlookers affectionately named "The Vagina."

     FoRgOtTeN and Terminal Noob entered the WoW fast leveling contest and lost to people who apparently had even less real lives. FoRgOtTeN and myself also played Trackmania, of course. FoRgOtTeN did better than me and I did worse than him pretty accurately describes the outcome.

     As I previously stated, we had a lot of fun and look forward to Million-Man LAN in July. So, if you live in Kentucky or southern Indiana, you should definitely checkout Lanwar in Louisville.

     Here's a change of pace for the Forgotten Exile homepage, an article about our server setup. We have two computers which have so generously been donated when our members have moved up in the technological hierarchy. As with any computer, human, or pet for that matter, it is good to assign names for easy identification.

Asteroids
Make/Model: Dell Deminsion 2400
Specs: Intel P4 2.2GHz, 512MB RAM, 40GB HDD
OS: Fedora 9
Services: HTTP, FTP, MySQL, MaNGOS, TeamSpeak, TrackMania Nations Forever, VNC, Folding@home

Pong
Make/Model: HP Pavilion a250y
Specs: Intel P4 2.6GHz, 2GB RAM, 150GB HDD
OS: Windows XP Professional
Services: Source Dedicated Server, VNC, Folding@home

In order to get these machines to talk to yours, as at least one is now, they have to be on a network. These machines share a network with Q-tip's desktop, named Q-tip, Quantum, the laptop, and iPeen, the iPod Touch. Once connected to the Linksys WRT54G (v8) router, the traffic is shoved up a relatively skinny 8Mbps/1Mbps pipe, across the Intarwebz and into your box, filling it with digital gaming love.

     First off, I speak for the entire clan when I extend our gratitude toward all the people who made this AL a success. There were a few bugs with things like network and power, but the staff was able to solve it quickly and efficiently and we were able to carry on with the par-tay. The new venue has huge potential to revive AL, since we've been in an attendance slump, but nevermind that. This AL was one of the best normal events in over a year. Congratulations and thanks to the AsylumLAN staff including Grym, Dev, Insane, Drale, and Smooth.

     As far as Forgotten Exile is concerned, this was quite an enjoyable event. Forgotten made it to finals in TrackMania Nations; Q-tip to Semi-finals. Forgotten Exile, with the help of Flomp, Morpse, and Snuffles, got our behinds handed to us in Team Fortress 2, but I believe there's a lesson to be learned there. (Oqtix, if you have anything to add to this page, send me an email.)

     So until next time, we'll keep on doing what we love, but remember to ask yourselves this: "Are you ready for a throwdown?"... Oh wait, sorry, I'm not Bobby Flay, am I? Ummm... Are you ready to face the Exile?      >.>      Are ya?

     Haven't done much with the site lately, but there are a couple points of interest in this post. First of all, we have migrated the server over to Linux for good. Initially, I was worried about not being able to figure out how to automate the reboot if it crashed, but then I remembered, Linux doesn't crash! Though we are running our Source Dedicated Servers in WinE, it still runs better than Windows.

     <technical_content subject="OS's">Because Windows is such a graphical, eye-candy, RAM-hogging OS, Linux is a better alternative for servers. Linux allows you to disable the window manager altogether, which means more RAM for active processes. Memory management is also better. Instead of using only one of three gigs of memory, and two gigs of swap, Linux will put it all into RAM and use swap only as necessary. This increases the longevity of your hard drives, and increases speed of active processes.</technical_content>

     We found out that University of Southern Indiana, where FoRgOtTeN and I attend class, is having a LAN. We're still looking for details on that, but it sounds like fun. AsylumLAN 31 is coming up soon. We're looking forward to that. And, I'm helping Blackstatic put together a LAN at Ivy Tech's Evansville campus. I'm definitely hoping it works out.

AsylumLAN 30

     ...is fast approaching. Any members planning on entering tournaments need to contact me so we can keep a head count of sorts. Also, if you use gmail, please be sure to label "forgottenexile@gmail.com" as "Not Spam." In closing, I'd like to say THREE DAYS! W00t! -Q

     It was pretty good. FoRgOtTeN and I entered the TrackMania Nations ESWC tournament and made it as far as the third round before elimination. We started with over 40 people, the largest turnout for AL's TM tourney. Round one was a time attack race. There were four servers with 16 players max; top 8 per server advanced. Round two was a Rounds style race with four servers of eight players each; top four in each server advanced. Round three consisted of two servers of eight players. The top four advanced, and we weren't it. FoRgOtTeN came in 5th on server 2 and I was 7th on server 1. We both had fun, and earned our bragging rights, not only as having 11 AL's each under our belts, but as TrackMania semifinalists. (Okay, FoRgOtTeN got to finals at AL 27, the last time TM made the tourney list.)

     We got some kewl swag, too. FoRgOtTeN got a pair of 5.1 headphones w/mic, and if anyone needs to power their computer, I have a 600W and 730W PSU from FSP Group, in addition to many other things. I swear, between all our members, we should set up a retail computer store, but that's another story.

     Anyway, we'd like to give a shout-out to all the people who made this AsylumLAN possible, especially the ub3r l33t staff members. Please check them out at http://www.asylumlan.com. And this breaking news from AL|Grymskul, the next AL (30) is the official 6 year anniversary of AsylumLAN, and as such... A THREE DAY EVENT! W00T! -Q

     We apologize for the inconvenience, but due to an IP conflict with our ISP, we had to change our IP to maintain connectivity. the new IP is 68.179.153.78. After our DNS server updates, that will become forgottenexile.uni.cc.

     Yeah, scratch this whole thing. Our ISP got bought out and we're practically forced to use a dynamic IP now. If you check any server stats on Game-Monitor, they reset everytime we get a new IP. =P

     This one comes kind of late in the game compared to how far in advance we usually let you know our plans for LAN's. Really, we weren't sure we were going to AsylumLAN 28 given the bad aftertaste of the last AL, but we decided to go, more of tradition than anything. To look on the bright side, however, Unreal Tournament 2004 4v4 Team Deathmatch made the tournament list, so the clan is going to try to put together a team and enter. I know by this time, it sounds like I'm just crying "wolf", but our chances of entering a tourney are at a two year high.

     In other news, we've had a player approach us about joining our clan. normally, we'd brush this type of thing of, but this person was particularly interesting because they are local, go to AL, and have a good repertoire of games they play. We plan to talk to this person at AL and make a decision there. We'll keep you posted.

     Welcome to the new Forgotten Exile site. What was wrong with the old one? A long, hard-to-type URL and ads. What's new besides the location? First, understand the location. It's on our very own server, which is why it probably loaded so slow, because I don't have T1. However, when I'm done editing the site, I'm able to upload all the files at once, instead of 10 files or 5Mb at a time, which is less of a hassle, meaning I can keep the site up-to-date.

     In other news, I am dropping support for Internet Explorer (at least v6 and below) because I'm too lazy to design virtually two different sites. If you use Internet Explorer, consider getting FireFox, the browser Microsoft tried to copy in Internet Explorer 7. (BURN!)

     Things are rolling at the Forgotten Exile headquarters now. We now have a new Dell Dimension 2400* serveh which is much more stable than our old HP Omnibook 6000*. It's still nothing special, but since it's a desktop, it's expandable. Already, the spec.'s have been tweaked to ensure performance.

     AsylumLAN 27 is coming up February 10-11. [AsylumLAN Website] As always, we invite "groupies" to come if possible. We have no major plans for this event as of yet, but I (Q-tip) may try my luck at TrackMania, although there are other tournaments I would rather enter. Our clan attendance rate is down for this event. Two members are looking at tight finances, and one is just not going. So far, only three members are registered. What we lack in quantity, we will make up for in... something... or other.

Sorry I haven't updated this page in a while. I've been busy doing other things in addition to changing all the GIF images on the site over to PNG, the preferred image type of the W3C. As always, if you have any input, about our servers, website, events, or just general queries, please visit our contact page or our feedback board.

Garry's Mod 10 has finally been released months after the promised time period of "the end of September." Currently the server is down while we update to play the newest version of this Half-Life 2 sandbox mod. The server will be back up by the end of this week. We hope to see you then! [Official Garry's Mod 10 website | Facepunch Studios forums]

AsylumLAN 26 was a blast. For the three of us that went, it was our first three-day event, which, by the way, still seemed to be too short. We took the Garry's Mod 9 server with us in hopes that we'd get a decent game going. FoRgOtTeN, myself, and a fellow LAN partier, DrV, were the only people to play GMod the whole time. Maybe it'll gain popularity with the release of Garry's Mod 10 sometime in the next... eventually.

Other than that, it's been school, work (for FoRgOtTeN feeding the old people at the Home), and BW3's almost every weekend with myself, FoRgOtTeN, his girlfriend, Terminal N00b, and our newest member, Kuro-Neko.

Guess what. Another AsylumLAN! By this point, any loyal clan groupie is thinking we're OBSESSED!!! The fact is, we all have lives, but there's not much we do as a clan except AL. Anyway, to quote the preceding article:

We had a chance to talk to "insane" after AL25 and he says that the chances of having another three-day event like AL18 are, "improbable, but not impossible." Either way, he assures us that AL26 is going roxxor your soxxors.

Guess what else. IT'S A THREE DAY EVENT! (Sorry for the geek-asm.) Everyone is excited about this one. What's more? Forgotten Exile is definitely entering UT TDM 4v4.

That's all I have. Short, sweet and to the point, eh? If you want to know more about AsylumLAN, visit their website via the link on our "Links" page. L8rs. -Q

AL25 was great. Although, as always, it seemed to go by too fast. The hours fly when you're having fun. I do have to say this wasn't one of the better AsylumLAN's. The network was unstable, the room warmed up to over 80°F during the day, and, as usual, it was cold at night when added to the natural drop in body temperature when tired.

All in all, we had fun. Our GMod server, which I throw up every so often, was running and we had a few people join. We hosted a knives-only server on CS and played against a CAL dude. Needless to say, we got raped, even with generous handicaps.

School starts for us on August 16, and after that point, much of our time will be unable to be spent gaming. (unless by some miracle the school administrators allow us to bring our computers with us to school and leech off their T3 internet connection. However, I've already been in trouble over computer related issues and don't want to loose what little "computer privileges" they give us.)

The next AsylumLAN is November 4-5. AL26 is the 5th anniversary of AsylumLAN. We had a chance to talk to "insane" after AL25 and he says that the chances of having another three-day event like AL18 are, "improbable, but not impossible." Either way, he assures us that AL26 is going roxxor your soxxors. Until then, this is Q-tip. Cya!

Yet another article about Asylum... Anyway, AL 25 is fast approaching. Personally, I would like to push for our entrance into a tourney, however we are one man down this event as it will be our first event as a clan without Meat. We do have some nominees for induction into the clan that may be able to make this event. Let's keep our fingers crossed for that.

In other news, Sandman is selling his computer yet again to, so to speak, "trade up" to a new one. (You lucky SOB!) If all goes well, he will sell it to a friend who will then become a membership nominee and come to Asylum with us.

Other than that, the usual Asylum stuff. (ie., get a mic, practice, etc. Read previos posts.) Cya there! -Q

First, a recap of AL24. (Not worth it's own article-thing) It was cool. We still didn't enter a tourney, but upcoming reforms may bring about some change.

Alright, so your wondering what we're doing this summer? So are we. We've discussed some ideas, and thrown them around in our heads, but really, we have no clue. School let out a week ago and I and FoRgOtTeN are bored. Sandman has a full time warehouse job, I think Transparent Meat has one, and FoRgOtTeN and myself are looking at some.

Sandman and I have had a potential computer repair job, but the person who owned the computer took it to "the professionals." What happened was a friend of ours installed linux on a computer but didn't quite uderstand partioning and deleted Windows, which isn't a hard fix. the bad thing was his mom uses that computer for business and she lost all the data files and is somewhat computer illiterate and would have had a hard time getting them back. Long story short we didn't get the job other than diagnosing the problem.

Sorry to go on a rant, but I needed something to fill this cell so you would think the site was abandoned. In conclusion,... ya...

We are now coming up on the clan's one year anniversary LAN party. This event, look for us to try to enter some type of tourney, most likely Unreal Tournament 2004 Team Deathmatch 4 on 4. We haven't really done much planning as of yet. Be sure to check back later for more info.

And that was about the highlight of our 30 hours. This Asylum wasn't as great as previous events. There was nothing special, no spaghetti dinner, no bonfire... The only new thing was TrackMania, which is a cool game, btw. We downed some BAWLS, leeched the network, and ate a whole Rounder's jumbo pizza in 5 minutes. Still no tourneys yet...

IronLAN 3 was a success, even though it wasn't a "LAN party" as Sandman will argue. Sandman called a team practice in order to get ready for Asylum, but it ended up being a LAN party, although exclusive to Forgotten Exile members. We had plenty of food and drinks, although we couldn't find Bawls. We called every pharmacy in the tri-state and they were either out or had sugar free. We probably shouldn't have waited until the day of to buy them. It's pretty embarrassing asking for Bawls, too, especially if you get a female pharmacist.

Pharmacist: Stratman's Pharmacy, how can I help you?
Caller: Yes, do you any Bawls?

Later that day, we piled three computers, a DDR pad, card table, and a box of Grippos in my Taurus and set out across town for Sandman's. But, before that I had to get my own stuff packed up and get a shower, and Sandman was calling every five minutes asking where I was.

During our only "practice," we played a bombing run on UT at BR-Serenity with twenty some-odd bots. We established the facts that playing with that many bots is pointless, FoRgOtTeN is a sniper whore, Sandman is a Redeemer whore, and I just plain suck. That one round went on for over two hours. The score when we quit was 0-0.

If anything good came out of it, it was that we now have an accurate evaluation of how we would do if we entered a tournament, which is still a good possibility.

Wow, seems like the only thing I ever talk about on here is Asylum. It is, however, just around the corner, so I thought I'd let you all know what's going on. This event may see us get back into tournaments. Most likely not Counter-Strike: Source 5v5. Instead, FoRgOtTeN has been throwing around the idea of entering the UT2K4: TDM 4v4 tourney, which I also think would be too bad. We'd like to know what you think. Please give us your input in the forums.

In other news, since Asylum is fast approaching, we ask that all members have decent microphones and use them to better assist team communication. This has been a problem in the past that has caused massive suckage of the clan members. Also, from the people on the team who have mics, please listen to us. We do not talk just to hear our voices.

That's all for now. We'll keep you posted.

Our new clan is moving right along! We already have a t-shirt designed for our clan members. Please see Transparent Meat for more information on that.

Next order of business, we would like to try to get our members together for a photo shoot for pictures to go on the members page of the website. See FoRgOtTeN about that. The general idea is just to get a picture of the members and their computers.

And the last thing I have for now is about a surprise event from sandman. He refuses to give anyone details, but I guess we'll find out soon enough…

Sup, y'all? In case you haven't noticed that the LethalShadows page has been neglected for over a month, this is why. We've changed our clan name to Forgotten Exile since we needed to ditch the reputation that sprung from the mishap(s) at AsylumLAN 20. So this is it! Now we're just waiting on video of us doing stuff to put on our intro page. Otherwise, I'm hoping to have the web site done before AsylumLAN 22. That's about it for now. Stay tuned…

So, here comes the next Asylum, and we're as ready as ever! We're actually planning on entering a tournament this time. Fortunately, we've improved. (At least, I have.) So look out Allied Ranges you've got competition.

The annual LAN party was the best one yet! We'd like to thank everyone who made it possible. Sandman for donating your basement and $24 out of a $30 case of BAWLS. Q-tip for the other $4 of those BAWLS and setting up the network and playing music and videos.

The annual LAN party is scheduled for Friday, September 2nd in Sandman's basement. This will be the first one since the clan started. This year is going to be bigger and better than ever, with an estimated four to five people! We'll also have finger StepMania, and a case mod contest. First prize is… uhhhhhh… TBA?

After AsylumLAN 20, the clan decided to stay out of tournaments in order to get up to speed with each other and avoid the embarrassment of looking like idiots due to just a couple of people. So far, we're planning on getting back together for AL22, and hopefully we can have fun with each other.

All in all, we still had fun, that is, after we got all our problems straightened out. R34CT10N was working on his box for the first few hours trying to get into Windows. And from me, a little tip on how to deal with the error message, "Cannot connect to workgroup 'WORKGROUP.' Access denied." If you ever get that message, change your workgroup to "SANDMAN545." [Sorry, Tyler. lol :)] For the first twelve or so hours, I kept getting that message when I tried connecting to browse the network. Long story short, I finally changed my workgroup and it was fine the rest of the time.

Sandman started out the party by leaching the crap out of the network, but surprisingly, he didn't crash it. Now he just has to find out what to do with all the crap on his hard drives.

And so ends the latest AsylumLAN. But According to Sandman, there's another LAN party in the near future…