User Authentication in Laravel 4

Having problems authenticating and logging in users in Laravel 4.

My login form directs to this route.

Route::post('login', function() { // get POST data $userdata = array( 'username' => Input::get('username'), 'password' => Input::get('password') ); if ( Auth::attempt($userdata) ) { // we are now logged in, go to home return Redirect::to('/'); } else { // auth failure! lets go back to the login return Redirect::to('login') ->with('login_errors', true); // pass any error notification you want // i like to do it this way :) } }); 

At this point everything seems to be going fine. I'm redirected to the home page just fine however, there is no user object stored. If I try to access any user function I get the "Trying to get property of non-object" error.

Here is my User Model

<?php use Illuminate\Auth\UserInterface; use Illuminate\Auth\Reminders\RemindableInterface; class User extends Eloquent implements UserInterface, RemindableInterface { /** * The database table used by the model. * * @var string */ protected $table = 'tblusers'; /** * The database key used by the model. * * @var string */ protected $key = 'userid'; /** * The attributes excluded from the model's JSON form. * * @var array */ protected $hidden = array('password'); /** * Get the unique identifier for the user. * * @return mixed */ public function getAuthIdentifier() { return $this->getKey(); } /** * Get the password for the user. * * @return string */ public function getAuthPassword() { return $this->password; } /** * Get the e-mail address where password reminders are sent. * * @return string */ public function getReminderEmail() { return $this->email; } public function roles() { return $this->belongsToMany('Role'); } public function permissions() { return $this->hasMany('Permission'); } public function hasRole($key) { foreach($this->roles as $role){ if($role->name === $key) { return true; } } return false; } } 

A Piece of information i find strange. If, instead of redirecting to '/' I return View::make('home') it stores the object just fine, however when I leave that page it disappears again.

EDIT:

Since this must have something to do with sessions I've posted my session.php file for reference.

<?php return array( /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Default Session Driver |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | This option controls the default session "driver" that will be used on | requests. By default, we will use the lightweight native driver but | you may specify any of the other wonderful drivers provided here. | | Supported: "native", "cookie", "database", "apc", | "memcached", "redis", "array" | */ 'driver' => 'native', /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Lifetime |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Here you may specify the number of minutes that you wish the session | to be allowed to remain idle for it is expired. If you want them | to immediately expire when the browser closes, set it to zero. | */ 'lifetime' => 5, /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session File Location |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | When using the native session driver, we need a location where session | files may be stored. A default has been set for you but a different | location may be specified. This is only needed for file sessions. | */ 'files' => storage_path().'/sessions', /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Database Connection |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | When using the "database" session driver, you may specify the database | connection that should be used to manage your sessions. This should | correspond to a connection in your "database" configuration file. | */ 'connection' => null, /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Database Table |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | When using the "database" session driver, you may specify the table we | should use to manage the sessions. Of course, a sensible default is | provided for you; however, you are free to change this as needed. | */ 'table' => 'sessions', /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Sweeping Lottery |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Some session drivers must manually sweep their storage location to get | rid of old sessions from storage. Here are the chances that it will | happen on a given request. By default, the odds are 2 out of 100. | */ 'lottery' => array(2, 100), /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Cookie Name |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Here you may change the name of the cookie used to identify a session | instance by ID. The name specified here will get used every time a | new session cookie is created by the framework for every driver. | */ 'cookie' => 'laravel_session', /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Cookie Path |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | The session cookie path determines the path for which the cookie will | be regarded as available. Typically, this will be the root path of | your application but you are free to change this when necessary. | */ 'path' => '/', /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Cookie Domain |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Here you may change the domain of the cookie used to identify a session | in your application. This will determine which domains the cookie is | available to in your application. A sensible default has been set. | */ 'domain' => null, /* |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Session Payload Cookie Name |-------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | When using the "cookie" session driver, you may configure the name of | the cookie used as the session "payload". This cookie actually has | the encrypted session data stored within it for the application. | */ 'payload' => 'laravel_payload', ); 

So far I've tried 'cookie' and 'native' session drivers each with no luck.