Make some friends, but above all, having fun and being safe are huge contributions to a good LAN experience

You will drink a lot of alcohol, chat a lot of shite to players you didn't previously know, and have a good time.

If you don't drink, you'll probably still do the 2nd and 3rd.

Just dont do the alcohol part too much because it will annoy people. Speaking from experience ayyyy

I didn't speak to enough people my first lan and I really regret that. Come to the bar on the evenings when the games are over and don't be afraid to speak to some people you recognise, you'd be surprised how welcoming everyone is even if they don't know you.

Gotta personally agree on that one and I've heard it a thousand times from other people

Important shit:
Don't forget to eat 3 times a day, big hearty breakfasts will be a life saver
Don't forget to hydrate, just do it a fuck ton just to be sure

Remember to put on deodorant, it can be really easy to forget in the morning but do it for your fellow gamer.

Yup Streep is right. You don't really need it anyway, as people are surprisingly friendly like Domo said.

Your biggest concern is where you're going to take a shit.

The toilets in the main hall are absolutely grim. Do some extensive scouting

juts be urself :D

this is the most important thing for your first lan for sure.
throughout the day most people are gonna be in the BYOC area but its not too hard to wrangle your way in if you want to

It can be kind of intimidating seeing people you look up to in the community, I remember being super intimidated at i58 at least, but just talk to them anyways, they're all just normal guys and super nice.

One thing people have done at LAN which I kind of regret I never did was getting a mousepad and having tons of people sign it. It's a solid souvenir.

lock your pc every time you leave it

Thanks for the advice guys; hope to see you all there!

Make sure the spectator ticket gives access to the BYOC part.

make sure you say hi to WARHURYEAH he's a really cool guy and an asset to any lan that he attends when he is at that lan when he is there

Cannot agree more.

https://imgur.com/a/Wev0Tti

raymon agrees as well.

+1 as well.
at Rewind 2 i mainly stuck to chilling with the same couple of people but at copenhagen i was talking to basically anyone who was around, and i found copenhagen to be a lot more enjoyable because of that.
also after you talk to somebody once it is easier to go up to them the 2nd and 3rd time around because you've already spoken to them.

Some people tend to starve themselves at LAN. Make sure to eat decent food at least once per day. An easy way to make sure is to eat breakfast somewhere in the morning before going to venue. The NEC has some places inside the building where you can buy non-junk food, but for any LAN it always helps googling nearby shops and restaurants to your hotel.
Also drink water!!!

Try talking to people. Asking their aliases is a good opener if you don't know where to start. If they're from the BYOC area, ask them how their games have been going. It's relatively easy to find people you've interacted with online before. Especially if you spend a lot of time on tftv/twitch

Insomnia splits the viewing area from the BYOC. You can have someone from the BYOC give you a guest pass, but there's not a whole lot to do there usually. BYOC people stay in the area throughout most of the day until the later evening when they go to the viewing area to watch upper/lower bracket finals and drink.
In general there's not much to do in the BYOC if you don't have a PC of your own. Plenty of people to interact with in the viewing area, even when the BYOC people aren't there.
(In this regard Copenhagen Games is an upgrade. BYOC isn't closed off from viewers so it feels more like 1 big community sitting in a single area)

If you know some people on your friends list are going, definitely send them a PM beforehand so you can attempt to find them at the venue (setting a meeting place/hour beforehand rarely works out at LAN, but at least you'll know to look out for eachother)

You'll be watching a lot less TF2 at LAN than you would've at home

edit: thread died but might as well add something in case people are looking for info

Insomnia
*In the BYOC it's a free-for-all of all games. Some TF2 circlejerks will attempt to sit close to eachother, but you'll have to ask around to find many teams and individual player spots. It's a big area with hundreds of people, most of them non-TF2 players
*Main reason to visit the BYOC as spectator is to watch player POVs
*Just ask around if you want a BYOC guest pass. Any BYOC person can give out 1 guest pass to 1 spectator (or was it 2? don't remember). They're partially responsible for the shit you do so don't be an ass
*The production/viewing area is at the edge of the BYOC. Sort of integrated in the BYOC area. The viewrs sit outside the BYOC fences with screens set up next to the production for watching the casts. We usually are next to one of the stages (local LoL and cs:go mostly, not the mainstage) which will look very empty yet have many more chairs than our ghetto "stage". We usually steal chairs from there.

Copenhagen Games
*Here the BYOC for TF2 is all condensed into 1 area. Still need to ask around a bit to find people unless you'd recognize them by looks, but way easier than insomnia
*Viewing area in 2018 was fine, in 2019 there were issues with fire safety (viewing area'd block 1 fire exit and a big entrance for firetrucks) so we didn't have a viewing area for the first day after we pestered the Copenhagen Games staff for a full day. Should hopefully be better coordinated in 2020 (this isn't really advice in any way. But might as well throw the info out there)
*NO CASH AT THE EVENT. bring a card. 2 out of the 3 food trucks outside the event accepted cash. burger food truck and all the bars/food inside was card only

PRO TIP: windows key + L to lock your pc, great to know for lan (or it was for me at least)

The bathrooms down really far all the way past weatherspoons are always completely empty, which is great if you get food poisoning from the pasties.
Stylax is right, not only are the main toilets grim, there's often a queue and sometimes people use the urinal next to you which imo is weird and NOT wanted.

Incredible tip: if you are using indoor camping make sure u have a friend who has a hotel so that you can shower, the lan hall kind of has that classic "gamer lan scent" after about a day so u don't really want to smell like the lan hall

try to remember that LAN is about meeting people not playing tf2 and you may feel bad after if you dont make the most of the few days you have to talk to people!!

also please stay hygenic thats rly important