KEY POINTS:
Act Party supporters will likely party through the night after achieving a better than expected result of 3.72 per cent - which would see 5 Act MPs in the next Parliament - three new seats for Act.
Walking in early in the scene to the election party in Orakei, leader Rodney Hide wore a yellow shirt and a black jacket, rather than his trademark yellow jacket.
The mood of the party faithful was buoyant and got even more wild as the night got on, after it became clear that Mr Hide will win Epsom with a landslide. Mr Hide comfortably won the seat of Epsom with a majority of 11,813 votes ahead of his nearest rival, National's Richard Worth.
After that, news of every National win or lead was greeted with cheers and applause.
From a crowd of about 50 at the start of the night, that swelled to about 200 by 10pm, and furniture in the RSA hall had to be moved to accomodate them.
Two people Act supporters seem to just love to hate are Mike Williams and Winston Peters, and while jeers and chants of "Batman" greeted Williams when he appeared on television, the crowd broke out with loud applause at the news that Peters has lost Tauranga and NZ First will not be returned to Parliament.
Late in the night, the crowd again broke into another round of mad applause when Hide announced that John Key will be the next Prime Minister - and that a meeting will be taking place on Monday between them to discuss details on the new government.
