Yeah, Auckland is large, the transport is weak, and Motu Moana is not central. Accomodation is vital for many Aucklanders, as well as out of towners. I actually live only 15 min drive away, but it was a pain to make that trip 8 times over the weekend (still, worth it for hot showers and my own bed).
Anna, any idea how many people used the accomodation?
It was pretty full up, I thought. Might be worth biting the bullet and opening up the Inn rooms up the road as well? (Yeah, I’m still stuck with Mordavia terms as well.)
On another note, are there any sites available that might have a larger capacity, even though they’d probably be farther from town?
If there is justa bit of overflow, it might be an option to camp in the field next to Puketane (the Keep), if that would appeal to anyone.
Perhaps if there was a small charge for staying in the bunks at Puketane, but camping was free, that would encourage a balance of bunkers and campers?
[quote=“Ryan Paddy”]If there is justa bit of overflow, it might be an option to camp in the field next to Puketane (the Keep), if that would appeal to anyone. [/quote]It’d be a good idea but camping in that field would have been truly revolting this year (ankle deep in mud), and we wouldn’t be able to guarantee the same thing won’t happen next year. Are there some other camp sites with better drainage?
I’d be keen for camping, would bring my tent up to use.
Was it? I’m not sure if it’s even an official camp site, anyhow. I can’t find the old map of Motu Moana showing where you’re allowed the camp. The trouble is, if we overflowed to camping then we’d need to put the tents somewhere close to Puketane but not have them in the way of games. Another option would be for people to bring mattresses, but not tents, and sleep in the halls. Dunno how the camp would feel about that though.
We had 49 people stay on site, which is way more than last year, with 16 of those from out of town. I’ll look into how much it costs to hire Mowgli (formerly known as the Inn) but from what I remember of Multiverse earlier this year, it’s $800 for the weekend, plus the middle scout hall on top of that, we’d be looking at about $2500 in venue costs. Even with our numbers increasing, I don’t think we can handle that yet. And it’s possible they’ve put their prices up again, like they have every year for the past 3.
For comparison:
Venue Cost 2008: $800
Venue Cost 2009: $1200
Venue Cost 2010: $1350
(and note that we haven’t hired additional buildings in this time, this is just prices going up!)
49 is pretty close to the advertised maximum of 54 bunks in Puketane. So we’re bordering on maximum bed use. The 2010 con size was about 74 (based on average total attendance at non-Flagship rounds), so about 2/3 of players seem to want accomodation.
Con size (average non-Flagship round attendance) has done this:
2008: 37
2009: 48 (130% annual growth)
2010: 74 (154% annual growth)
Next year we might expect a con size of anything between about 95 and 120, depending on whether annual growth peaks or continues to trend exponentially. If 2/3 of those players want accomodation, then between about 63 and 80 will want to stay.
If my upper prediction is correct, there will be 26 people without bunks. Some overflow next year could be handled by sleeping some folks on mattresses in the small dining hall, or camping.
By the same sort of logic, the flagship might expect about 110 to 120 players next year, assuming we had 95 this year.
If we actually had 90 people come to the full Chimera next year (i.e. go up to 90 people per round), we’d be able afford the whole venue. It’s sort of a tall order, I have no idea if this growth trend can keep up, a lot of it was powered by bringing in the long time White Wolf crowd who’ve always been gaming, they’ve just stayed clear of our events.
I’m pretty sure 90 is the minimum we’ll have per round next year, even taking using up that White Wolf pool into account. 90 would represent a considerable slump in growth. So you may want to seriously contemplate getting the whole venue for 2011, as the alternative will be camping or sleeping in halls.
At the other end of the spectrum, if we do have non-Flagship round size of 120 next year, and we continue trending exponentially, then 2012 could in fact have a mean con size of 200 players. Then you’ll be wanting a microphone to preserve your voice.
I think the only thing that continued exponential growth would be dependent on is the quality of Chimera continuing to be excellent in 2011 (i.e. it not struggling with the growth), and you and the game runners being willing to contemplate the amount of work involved with running a couple of 50-60 person larps in every round in 2012. I don’t think we’re anything near being restricted by market saturation, I reckon most people in Auckland who might be interested haven’t even begun to hear about Chimera and word-of-mouth from the now-expanded player base is going to continue to create exponential growth for a while yet. I suspect it’s a virtuous cycle of growth.
If we hit 200 players in 2012, we’d obviously need the whole camp. That’s 90 bunks, which will still leave us about 45 bunks short. However although accomodation would be short, and we couldn’t all eat in the same place (i.e. meals would have to be served at both ends), there would be plenty of big rooms to play in so play-space wouldn’t be a problem. Most likely, the whole of Mowgli including its small hall (not the dining room) would have to be used for sleeping, if the camp would let us do that, so Mowgli wouldn’t be a play space at all, but the middle hall would still fill the need for play space.
If you don’t want to contemplate ever camping or sleeping in halls, and you want to stay at Motu Moana, then we’d need to cap the con size at about 140 (average size of rounds, that is - number of registrants would be higher).
These are nice kinds of problems to have. 
I’ve created a monster 
To think that when I started this, my loftiest ambition was that maybe one day, if I worked hard and advertised a lot, we’d get as many as 65 people per round!
Doing some maths, we’re looking at $2,000 to hire both lodges and the main hall next year. Use of the grounds is extra, and going with Ryan’s estimates, we’re looking at $475 to $600 per day for that. So a total cost of anywhere between $2,475 and $2,600 for the venue alone. Assuming they don’t put the prices up between now and then. Food costs I’m not even going to try estimating this far out.
Andrensath, I’m not sure where you are getting your numbers from, it will be significantly more than $2000 for all the buildings. I think the easiest way to figure this out is if I ring Motu Moana and ask 
Everything on the internet about Motu Moana is out of date unfortunately. 
I just got off the phone with them, the prices (per night) are as follows:
Puketane: $570
Mowgli: $390
Takarangi: $130
Motu Moana Scout Den: $130
Maths informs me that hiring the whooooole camp would cost $2440 for the weekend, and the lady insisted that this was for a maximum of 90 people.
Oh, plus $150 we have to pay them for checking out at 6pm. So…$2590.
They’ll have fire regs to worry about.
90 people is the maximum bed space, that’s what’s available in Puketane and Mowgli combined. The venue can take more people if some are camping, so they’re not worried about additional people being on site.
$2590 is quite a jump from $1350. When Mordavia first started using the venue in 2001, I think we could get the whole camp for under $1000. 
I’m pretty sure we’ll have around 10 to 25 people with no bed next year if we don’t hire Mowgli. At a wet time of year. With scout wardens who may be grumpy if we sleep in halls. So unfortunately, I think we need to book the whole place for 2011, and bulk up advertising to make sure we fill it. Of course, it’s possible that we are just about to stop growing… but unlikely given the record of growth to date. The alternative is to secure an appropriate area for camping and let some folks brave the elements. Or to charge for accomodation, which will reduce the number of beds used (at the expense of having some people not attend).
You could also start charging for bunk space to meet the extra costs. It’s been a really great deal so far (especially for us out-of-towners) but I don’t think asking for $10-15 for a bed for the weekend is particularly onerous.