Survivor: Summertime (The End!)

[TS]

Firstly I'd like to thank Shii and Chevre. I only applied for this game at the last minute so I'm very appreciative that I was accepted. I like to think I justified my slot, and certainly myself being here I hope shows that I did leave a big impression on this game. I would be fascinated to hear how the playerlist was finalised and decided upon.

Coming into this game I wasn't sure what to expect. My only previous non-anon had been Mario Bros. which I flaked from due to poor modding, far too many live challenges and the start of other games. This game has made me realise that I do actually really enjoy non-anons though, perhaps even slightly more than anons which I have been so used to.
I was pleased to be on a tribe initially of 7 other players who I am all rather fond of, and am glad that I got to know the fans a bit better too as the game went on. I hope they have all enjoyed the game or at least learnt a little more. It takes courage to try something new and have the level of commitment that a survivor game demands. As an enthusiast of dynamic, active and unorthodox playstyles myself, It's nice to see new players and a break away from some of the more gamebotty mindsets. It’s been a much more relaxed too and has let me specialise more in my allies than trying to maintain connections between a network if players as I have done in past anons, usually out of paranoia and as insurance. It has been a welcome change and certainly the game that has exceeded my expectations the most

I shall now make the case for a TS jury vote:

On the subject of my challenge game

On this issue I would like to raise a few points

1) Winning no challenges was a testament to the strength of my social game. My connections and social game made it so that at no point did I ever need immunity and at no point was I ever held back by another player gaining immunity. Immunity and challenges beyond merge had almost zero influence on my game. I play the social side to an extent that, whilst immunity is a nice bonus, I never need to be worried about missing out on it or anxious that another player may be protected by it.

2) The challenge aspect of the game is not that pivotal in the grand scheme of things. The social game is far more of a challenge (no pun intended) to master. Challenges like flash games are merely a test of how much free time you have, and others like the coin game are just a barrel of wifom that is impossible to really work with without illegal communications. I don't think challenges should have any influence, if any, on the decision of who should win this game.

3) Triple winner Snakes won Arkham with only one individual challenge win and he won Mario Bros. with 0 individual immunity wins. This again just shows the small relevance of the challenge game in deciding a winner.

On the subject of my social game

My social game was remarkable in the following ways

1) I was a hub of communications. On the initial tribes I had intel feeding into me from every player (except Ani and Klick I suppose) and any move that happened I knew about in advance. I could count votes before they were cast and for a good deal of the game was able to rely on Orc/Kloud/JDGA/Snakes as vote partners in an unspoken alliance between us all. I was on good terms with Orc due to our regular chats and prior Mario Endurance game, had long been good friends with JDGA, Xof and Snakes, and had Kloud approach me right at the start for an F2 partnership until the end (this was never discovered by the other players and was sadly terminated when It came to my attention that Kloud wanted me gone). But my main point here is that coming into this game my connections were pristine and I regularly maintained them, both for personal enjoyment and to give me as many votes and as much information as I required to progress far into this game. Had I only a couple of allies I'm sure I would have at some point been either blindsided, isolated or simply outvoted. This was never the case though.

2a) I was one step ahead of the game. As time goes on allies decide to change their allegiances and "flip." Back in my young, inexperienced Elekid days I was baffled as to why anyone would even consider flipping from a strong partnership with an ally. Why let them down for others who may not be as strong? The reasons people flipped on me in this game was because I was seen as a threat due to the fact that players like Snakes, Kloud (and later Ceph) were snuggled under my wings. They continually voted as I wanted them to and they were all brilliant companions and allies.

The first flip on myself was perhaps Ani, but that was never really a flip as we had not properly ever been allied.
The next real flip was JDGA flipping on me. Then Kloud did. And finally (though at a similar time) CC. I had been a target the whole game. Whether it was from Ani and his voting bloc or my own allies, I constantly survived.

I have had more attempts to knock me out of this game than any other player and I am surviving still

.

2b) Every time someone wanted me gone I immediately knew. Kloud first informed me Ani wanted me out, JDGA/Orc let me know Xof was voting me, CC PM'd me evidence JDGA wanted me out, Snakes leaked that Kloud was thinking of striking my name out, and Ceph/Snakes made it clear to me at F4 that CC wanted me gone. For a wanted man I certainly knew how to keep my allies when they could have simply flipped on me when I became a TC candidate.

These players did not need to tell me there was a bounty on my head. It would have been far easier to let me be voted out than try and save me but:

i) The fact that I was informed is a testament to my social game
ii) The fact that I was able to then outmanoeuvre any coups puts emphasis on the fact that I was organised and well-prepared in terms of allies and negotiations
iii) Any threats to myself in the first place were due to the fact I was a threat in this game. Yet despite being seen as the constant threat, I am at F2.

I outwitted, outlasted and outcompeted

Nothing was a surprise to me this game. I had all the information from my allies so knew every move before it was played. It is like playing a chess game against a computer, knowing what move will be made in advance.

My social skills were the cheat code that revealed every move in this game before that move was made and I could plan in advance

.

3) Not once did I betray an ally in this game. The only players I voted were either non-allies or allies who secretly wanted me gone and expressed this wish to another player (and therefore I no more betrayed them than they intended to do to myself). The only time I can perhaps say I did was at F3 as both Snakes and Ceph were superb allies and friends. I would have loved to have them both with me in the final, were it only possible. But it is just a final. A flashy name for another round. This is the unfortunate conclusion of all survivor games. I have been a completely loyal ally throughout.

Whilst loyalty =/= deserved winner, and I shall concede that my F2 competitor has probably been just as loyal as myself, I like to think it should merit a few bonus points.

4) I evaded the Ani plots, the Orc controversy, the pre-merge coups to take me out, the JDGA mistrust, the Kloud flip and finally the CC double flip (actually CC has tried to boot me at 3 TCs now. The Mhork one, the Kloud one and his own. heh)

I often do feel paranoid in anons but not here. I was paranoid during my early week of v/la and was a bit concerned when I found out about Ani’s targeting of myself in initial tribes. But I never thought I’d be leaving if most of my allies stayed loyal. Having the doublevote later on too was useful but I don’t think Snakes and I ever really needed our lots. We could have just got Ceph to vote Kloud with us (his preferred vote that round) but Snakes didn’t want Ceph to find out until after the TC out of a fear CC would ally with Ceph at F4 if Ceph didn’t vote CC. I do think Kloud would have had a fine chance at F4 poem immunity and would probably have made a brilliant sandcastle in F3 too. It’s a pity he didn’t live in that sense and I was rather u_u about having to vote him. But it had to be done, otherwise he’d be at F2 instead of me I’m sure.

In all honesty I have little idea why so many people flipped or wanted to flip on me. I can only think I became a threat later on due to my connections. But I am a little surprised as I’d expect players to remember I invariably slip up grand-style at some point in these games. At any rate, Like Harbinger and Croagunk, making F2 after being an obvious threat for some time is no easy feat and, whilst I’ve been very grateful for my allies in both the short & long-term, I like to think I have as much a case to win as they both had.

No player has hasd to dodge as much as I have this game in terms of bullets

. Thanks to my social game, intuition, organisation and allies I was able to do so. More has happened to me in this game than to any other player. I have been the central figure of this game and have dealt with each obstacle superbly. With the greatest respect to my F2 competitor, these reasons are why I deserve to win Survivor: Summertime.

But after saying all this, I don’t think it’s all about winning either. I have had an excellent time and met some excellent people. Whilst I think I played the best game (and the only one I can think of without any mistakes in it. I usually have a couple waiting to happen in my anons).
I won’t be down if I don’t win. In fact I’ll be on v/la~/

Conclusions

For the reasons above (i.e. social game) I believe I deserve to win. Whilst I don't think it's as clear cut as Social game Vs Challenge game at all I do think that issue is centric to a decision at this FTC. But having said that, Cephrir's playstyle and way of going about these games is beautiful in itself so I would be more than glad for him, as a friend and ally, were he to win. I would have been very sad if I left early in this game not in the least because I would never have got to talk to Cephrir, Kloud and a lot more of the other players who I am very fond of. It's been a very fun game and I like to think I have done everything I could have, (social game at least) to be here.

Have an excellent day.

[Cephrir]

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. In the interest of sparing your eyes a little, I shall probably opt for more brevity than my counterpart. I don't have quite the way with words that he does, but I hope you won't let that cloud your decision too strongly.

Needless to say, I entered this game with no clue what I was doing. Sure, Survivor is my favorite TV show, but that counts for roughly nothing. Even if the games were the same, theory and practice are not close friends. I was confronted with 7 other players about as clueless as I was, facing down 8 players who actually knew what they were doing. And I think it speaks volumes that I (and some of my fellow fans) actually made it deep in this game despite our inexperience and coming into merge looking very pagongable.

I'll address the elephant in the room, if you will. Yes, I won a damn lot of immunity challenges. I think it's a testament to the effort I was willing to go to in this game that I was able to go on such a run. Challenges aren't all that important in terms of deserving-ness, but I think it's worth mentioning that even in challenges that seemed silly, I was out to win. In the auction, I didn't even consider budging until I saw something that could be immunity. In the Coin Game challenge, I looked up past Coin Games to determine a round 1 strategy, and moved from there thinking carefully about what my competitors were likely to do. I don't think you can argue it's a coincidence I won so many of those.

The most important thing I want to speak to here, though, is that I rarely felt like I actually needed to win immunity. There were a few times I might have been in trouble if some particular player won immunity, and I did everything in my power to prevent such scenarios. If I won zero immunities, would I be here? Maybe, maybe not, but I think I played well enough socially that I could have done without the majority. Once I got comfortable in the merged tribe, though, I didn't feel as though my life was usually on the line or anything. I was not a Troyzan or a Peih-Gee that happened to get lucky. I think I recall feeling that I had to win at F6. I certainly didn't find a lot of purchase probing about for possible plans that round until after I won immunity. After that though I wasn't terribly worried.

I came in playing a cautious social game. I didn't know what was generally accepted around here, how much open scheming is expected, to what extent information tends to get around. I think this decision paid off for me, because the second the tribes merged players began placing their feet in their mouths, and I steered clear of the mess by pretending, at least at first, not to be terribly strategic except for loyalty to my allies. I think I proved to have a better social game than the favorites would expect, and I managed to make friends better than I do IRL. I was perceived as disconnected, but I didn't need to risk myself in the thick of things when I was getting all the important information via TS. I'll admit up and down that he was more connected than I was. I also don't think it's remotely reasonable to expect the level of connectedness out of me that you can of him, given that he had pre-existing relationships with the other players to build on and I was the new kid on the block.

It's true that I voted the way TS wanted me to after the ani vote. It's also true that he voted the way I wanted him to at every non-Candi vote, and at that point I felt about equally loyal to both of them. So what reason did I have to break away from that when things were playing out precisely the way I wanted them to? I recognized that kloud was a huge jury threat, for instance, and wanted to vote him out. I only chose not to do so in an attempt to hide my alliance with TS from Snakes. Apparently this effort was less than successful, but the point remains that I was not caught with my pants down there, despite a certain someone's attempt to make me look like an idiot for reasons that still don't make any sense.

As TS has alluded to, both of us played fairly loyal games, I think himself moreso than I (I leave it to you to judge whether that's actually a virtue), though I also think I was thrust into circumstances that didn't allow me to be completely loyal without shooting myself in the foot. For instance, I could have protest-not-voted-for-Candi, but it would have been a pointless gesture. There are several other examples of this I can provide if asked but I don't see a reason to bog this down with the list. I'm not a realist, but I played like one. When I got separated from my closest allies in the shuffle, knowing KBW would probably vote me out in a heartbeat given the chance, I immediately knew I had to align with the favorites. So I did. You might even call me a survivor. Imagine that.

I'm not one for boasting but it's hard to argue with the statement that I was underestimated in this game seeing as, you know, I'm here, and I don't think anyone expected me to be, least of all myself.

I'll agree with TS wholeheartedly in saying that I won't be crushed if I lose here. He played a very solid game as well, I'll be happy to see a friend win, and both of us are deserving. Thank you.

[Shiidaji]

-

Jury Questioning

-

Now that we've heard the two finalists speak, it's time for the jury to address their candidates.

Jurors,

48 hours

for questioning. You may only make one

question

to each finalist, though you can continue relevant threads of discussion past that point if you need to.

Jurors must not address each other in-thread. Jurors cannot use the jury qt to discuss the proceedings, though they may whisper to each other privately one-on-one if they'd like.

Absolutely no pre-jurors may post in-thread, the same goes for spectators

[/align]

[JDGA]

TS: How close did you believe kloud and I to be throughout the game?
Cephrir: Talk me through exactly how my elimination happened, from your point of view.

[CuddlyCaucasian]

TS: How possible is it that the only reason you made it to F2 is because Cephrir and Snakes both dragged you, with both of them thinking either of them could easily defeat you in a jury vote?

Cephrir:

What would you say if I asked you and TS to have a Pokemon battle for my vote?

Honestly, since it seems apparent that you weren't always as aware of what was going on as TS was, how would this game have gone if everything went exactly the way you wanted it to?

[Candillan]

TS: Win me over. You have only spoken a few words to me throughout the course of the game. From my perspective, you were carried through the whole thing. Why should you earn my vote?

Ceph: You didn't put up much resistance to the idea of voting me out, and I definitely was hurt when you decided to vote me out in the end. Why should you receive my vote when you clearly had other plans for F2, therefore betraying our deal?

[animorpherv1]

TS: I have several issues with why you should win. In the challenge game aspect I do believe that you shouldn't let challenge wins be a major factor as to who should win. However, you go on to talk about Snakes lack of challenge wins like it apparently was a strategy of his. I'm pretty sure it wasn't. Entering the social game section, you then go on to describe the basic principles of only one strategy - Sure you were a communications hub, but I believe if you wanted to play that game, then I shouldn't have wanted you out ever - and you should've attempted to make friends with me, instead of ignoring me completely. If you did that, I wouldn't have wanted you out, and that should've been hilariously obvious. I don't have much of a question for you. Do you really think it was you who dodged those bullets, or was it other people doing your work for you? I'm currently believing it was the later. If not, prove it to me.

Cephrir: I don't have much to say here - you won enough challenges for most people to immediately deem you as a threat, social game or no social game, but when you didn't win a challenges you weren't really gaining many votes. This speaks wonders to your social game, I believe. While winning challenges may not be a crucial part of the game in many scenarios, the aftermath of the challenges certainly can be, especially after an Immunity run. I think you handled it really well, all in all. My question to you is very simple - explain to me who, aside from you and TS, deserves to win the most, and why. And no, picking me because I asked will not get you bonus points.

[TS]

TS: How close did you believe kloud and I to be throughout the game?

Whenever I asked one of you about the other the response was always positive and as though we were talking about similar things. We also voted in the same patterns most of the time. Really I thought that since I thought I had a very friendly connection to you both that you might have something similar to what you had with me (if not as strong perhaps? I don't know how often you talked really so I have no idea for sure. Maybe tighter since it can be hard to catch me at times due to timezones)

But yeah, if you were close then great. I sure love being close to Kloud and JDGA in my games and would certainly promote that experience.

EDIT: after reading it again I now realise you mean to myself and not to each other (bluh it's early) or at least I think that's what you mean?

Will get back to that later >.>

TS: How possible is it that the only reason you made it to F2 is because Cephrir and Snakes both dragged you,

with both of them thinking either of them could easily defeat you in a jury vote?

I don't think that was the reason. I don't think either really thought they could beat me. It certainly wouldn't be as clear-cut as had they brought the other F3 person with them.

But Snakes/Ceph were hugely loyal to me which is why they took me. If they didn't think they could win then that is just a testament to how lovely and loyal they are. I know they would have both taken me. My social game is to thank for that. Even at F3 I never needed immunity I'm sure.

As you indicate in your question "how is it possible" it evidently isn't possible and I agree with you. Therefore I am not being taken to F2 as a sheep but as a partner with every chance of winning. I like to think again that is due to my golden social game.

TS: I have several issues with why you should win. In the challenge game aspect I do believe that you shouldn't let challenge wins be a major factor as to who should win. However, you go on to talk about Snakes lack of challenge wins like it apparently was a strategy of his. I'm pretty sure it wasn't. Entering the social game section, you then go on to describe the basic principles of only one strategy - Sure you were a communications hub, but I believe if you wanted to play that game, then I shouldn't have wanted you out ever - and you should've attempted to make friends with me, instead of ignoring me completely. If you did that, I wouldn't have wanted you out, and that should've been hilariously obvious. I don't have much of a question for you. Do you really think it was you who dodged those bullets, or was it other people doing your work for you? I'm currently believing it was the later. If not, prove it to me.

In past games I've tried to be friends with everyone. It never works. People get annoyed and you end up being close to no-one. So obviously I didn't want to do that this time and I suppose that's why I didn't talk to you and Cand so much (will get to his questions later, I haven't forgotten!)

I just cited Snakes in the challenge game area as an example of how little the challenge game means when you have a very shiny social game. I didn't mean to imply it was a strat of his not to win challenges, but that really challenges <<<<< Social game.

At the start I suppose you wanted someone out after Klick. Why not me? You may have been annoyed after AA or something in which case reasoning with you would have been tricky and slightly illegal. Furthermore I kinda needed a boot on early tries too after Klick left in case we went to TC. I liked everyone on the tribe but I knew you wanted me gone. So you lended yourself nicely to be an insurance should we ever hit TC.

I dodged the bullets but obviously I couldn't do it alone. I needed to get the info from my network of allies as part of my excellent talks with them. If I needed to know about players/votes/alliances I could see all the cards and I knew enough people to never be at a numerical TC disadvantage. I don't think my competitor here showed as much in terms of quick-thinking, orchestration of TCs and alliance efficiency. But that's just my opinion

(will do Cand and JDGA later)

[TS]

but when you didn't win a challenges you weren't really gaining many votes. This speaks wonders to your social game, I believe

I would just like to comment here and say that from ~F6 Ceph (whether he knew it or not) needed me to deflect votes from him. I know Snakes and Kloud would have wanted him gone long before F3 and I think if I wasn't here to steer votes in the other direction then Ceph wouldn't be at F2 with me. Ceph's social game was like a beautiful, but very small garden whereas mine was a tropical rainforest.

In a sense I dragged Ceph to F3 with me, but I never saw it in that way because that would imply I only talked to him for strategic purposes.

TS: How close did you believe kloud and I to be throughout the game?

Kloud I thought to have always been a close ally. I was under the impression that I was his #1 for 98% of his game (1% at the very start and end) and he and I had an excellent partnership in which we spoke and shared notes and generally furthered our own game. It went very nicely but obviously not until F5 when I voted Kloud out due to being told by Snakes that he was considering voting me.



With regards to yourself I thought we always got on well and, though I was very surprised to see you in this game, I was also really thrilled that you were. More on that bit in my TW perhaps. But yeah, I felt that you were very well integrated in the initial tribes and I was very proud and glad to have you as a close ally, even if any alliance we had was probably unspoken in itself (then again all the best ones are).
I liked to think our alliance was on equal terms with each other. I was sad to vote you out and would have liked to have think we could have been allied for as long as possible.

What would you say if I asked you and TS to have a Pokemon battle for my vote

?

Does this count?

(ty to Ani for the suggestion)

[TS]

TS: Win me over. You have only spoken a few words to me throughout the course of the game. From my perspective, you were carried through the whole thing. Why should you earn my vote?

Yeah I wish I'd been able to talk more. You seem a very nice person (see TW)

But yeah I suppose when I came back from my short v/la Mhork had left my new tribe and I had two new faces in yourself and CC. I hadn't heard too much from you but CC had sent me a very large PM and a big apology too so it lent itself more to me talking to him at that point in time. As I've said before I didn't want to be friends with everyone because that would be uncomfortable when I'd end up having to vote them. I'm sure next time we can be. I hope that you can be impartial in your vote as jurors often are, but at the same time I wouldn't deny you a Ceph vote now if you wanted it.

I was not carried through the whole thing. People always wanted me to vote as I asked them too. I was the behind the scenes director and the others were my actors, but I like to think I did plenty of acting too. I was never in any danger since I kept enough allies to always make up the numbers and be able to think ahead. I probably knew more info than any other player due to how I was able to combine my many sources. I think the only time I have been carried is F3 when I was taken to F2, but I knew that both Snakes and Cephrir would take me. I wanted them in F3 because I knew they would. They are two very loyal players and It was nice to have them at F3 to take me all the way. Maybe in that sense they carried me, but they would not have done so had my social play not been so great that they felt compelled to, even in the face of a more likely FTC defeat. That is something remarkable I have done

[kloud1516]

I had composed an intricate address made mostly of GIFs, but I think I'll let the comedic kloud take a seat. Instead, I would like to start by first congratulating both Cephrir and TS on making it to the Final 2.

Well, I guess the difficult part of this message is now out of the way. Moderators, spectators, and jurors: Get out your library cards because reading is fundamental.

TS:

If you were to win this game and walk away with the million-dollar prize, I think you should invest in a fragrance line. It might help mask the obscene amount of BS that has taken up the last page or two of this game. Here, I even have a name suggestion for you:

I think your Opening Statement and responses to the jury thus far are pretty indicative of how you played this game: in the dark and grasping for straws. To say you were a director in any regard is an insult to the players that time and again lined up the votes to keep you safe before you even realized you were in the crosshairs. This applies to:

• • Round 01
  • Round 02
  • Round 05
  • Round 06 (Though we didn't attend TC)
  • Round 07
  • Round 09
  • Round 11

Since we are allowed to engage in discussion if it pertains to these messages, I would be more than happy to elaborate on any of the provided rounds so that jurors have a better understanding of how this game proceeded.

On the topic of my disloyalty, I will say this: I was not a saint this game--I have admitted that in private conversations and now in public--but your name was brought up in the Final Five for the following reasons:

• 01.
  You admitted that you weren't sure who you'd want to keep in the F4 between Snakes and Ceph. This suggested you had at least entertained the idea of voting out Snakes, which concerned me.
  
  02.
  When I approached Snakes with my concerns, he informed me that you had said the same to him, but had put my name in there instead of his own. It was then and ONLY then that I voiced any plan to vote you out, and that was also as a last resort in the event Cephrir won the F4 immunity.
  
  03.
  To conclude, you were again fed information -- misleading information for that matter -- and ran win it. Between the two of us that round, one of us voting for CC while the other used his double vote to eliminate the player that had kept him safe for about two months. Consider yourself lucky that I made a miscalculation and assumed CC was removing himself from the game, because I had a plan that would have turned things on their head.

Cephrir:

TS is (partially) correct on one thing: I saw you as a fierce competitor, and knew that if you made it to the end you would have a legitimate case to make for your winning this game. Not only that, but I wanted you out because you were so close to TS -- something that Snakes and JDGA can both attest to. You are not in this position because TS "deflected" votes away from you. Last time I checked, TS was not an immunity necklace. No, you are here because you fought your way to the Final Two.

To conclude, I might have entered this game as a Favorite, but I am first and foremost a fan of Survivor. I do not intend to be a bitter juror. Simply put, one of you played a strong game, and then one of you is TS. Good luck to the both of you.

[TS]

I do not see how I played in the dark at all. When a good proportion of the playerlist tell me everything that ends up happening I hardly call that the dark. No-one needed to tell me any of the times I was being considered for voting and they could have just let me be another TC fodder. But evidently I wouldn't let that happen and my connections saw me through to the end. Snakes and yourself could have ejected me, or even at the Orc TC or any other between then and F3 if I ever was truly in the dark.

Even if it was only a possibility in your F5 plan, I don't see why you make out like I'm foolish for going with the info I got and decided to work with. It would be far more myopic to just ignore it. Snakes, Ceph, CC and you were all my allies at F5 and you couldn't all go to the end with me. Yes you left at that point but realise that word travels fast in these games and you evidently weren't as close to Snakes as I was (and you say my game is bad. Snakes and Ceph were my allies all the way.) I know Ceph would have voted you too had I asked him to.

I can't be bothered to use your clichéd smear terms "I find it insulting" and all the rest back at you because it's just needlessly antagonistic and your final statement shows you have already made your mind up. I think you may be more suited to that fragrance line than myself.

You say you aren't a bitter juror as though that means everything before isn't bitter at all. I mean you didn't even ask a question just a bile waterfall. In fact you didn't ask Ceph a question either.

You may only make one

question

to each finalist[/align]

Get out your library cards because reading is fundamental.

Deliciously over your head

Your game in a nutshell. Feel free to scribble over the history books as though I was "carried" like I was suppose to play this game without allies and win every TC sword in hand in a barefist combat but I couldn't care less what you have to say right now

[JDGA]

You

may

only make one question to each finalist

(Point of order: it's entirely valid to just make a speech and sit back down again; something which kloud has done. Calling him out on this is invalid and rather rude.)

TS: How close did you believe kloud and I to be throughout the game?

Whenever I asked one of you about the other the response was always positive and as though we were talking about similar things. We also voted in the same patterns most of the time. Really I thought that since I thought I had a very friendly connection to you both that you might have something similar to what you had with me (if not as strong perhaps? I don't know how often you talked really so I have no idea for sure. Maybe tighter since it can be hard to catch me at times due to timezones)

But yeah, if you were close then great. I sure love being close to Kloud and JDGA in my games and would certainly promote that experience.

This is actually what I meant, although the additional part was nice. Whilst your answer was detailed, it was, well, wrong.
kloud and I were "partners in crime" from Day 1, and whilst we never explicitly affirmed a F2 alliance until near the end, it was implicit throughout. Snakes was also first and foremost allied with us as well, and

especially

in the initial tribal phase (recall ani's intentions to give you second-last place instead of second) we held sway over the entire tribe. The reshuffle split us, but we each took the opportunity to contact the fans on our respective tribes, and ended up being able to similarly control the game post-merge. With Snakes co-operating with us in everything, it was us that sent out orc over you, it was us that sent out ani over you, and it was us that sent out Candi over you. The only reason why this ceased at F6 was because kloud, by his own admission, had a derpy mistrustful paranoia moment and turned himself against me; the fact that he fell immediately afterward when he had not even been considered a target by anyone before then affirms this. So I am sorry, TS, but before you attempt to claim that you controlled the entire game, you should first understand all the things of which you knew nothing, and this extremely close alliance, whilst it was a secret to everyone bar Snakes, is perhaps one of the most important things that you completely failed to detect. Had you showed in your answer that you did, in fact, know of our F2 plans, I would have thought more kindly towards giving you my vote, but between this and your toxic attitude towards kloud, my mind has been set.

[TS]

Being a focus of the game =/= controlling it. That would be silly. But I lived this long and outlasted those who had agendas of higher and more clandestine natures.

Great you had a secret alliance. Awesome I didn't know about it. But neither did Ceph. And I still outlasted as the ruins fell around me. Ceph was in his own bubble throughout the game. My attentiveness to alliances I should have no idea about isn't the focus of anything I did. You could have easily booted me before Cand, Ani & Co. but chose not to and, though that may well be a mistake on your own part, the greatest chess grandmasters may not always have the best moves themselves but sure know how to punish their opponents for making mistakes. That is what I did.

[kloud1516]

I do not see how I played in the dark at all. When a good proportion of the playerlist tell me everything that ends up happening I hardly call that the dark. No-one needed to tell me any of the times I was being considered for voting and they could have just let me be another TC fodder. But evidently I wouldn't let that happen and my connections saw me through to the end. Snakes and yourself could have ejected me, or even at the Orc TC or any other between then and F3 if I ever was truly in the dark.

You're right. I never needed to tell you, nor did I ever have to line up votes to keep you safe (much to the chagrin of Klick, xof, orc and ani). People kept you in the game because (1) you were a number in our corner and (2) I made other people look like bigger threats so you didn't take heat. To sit here and say you orchestrated all of that is amusing at best.

Even if it was only a possibility in your F5 plan, I don't see why you make out like I'm foolish for going with the info I got and decided to work with. It would be far more myopic to just ignore it. Snakes, Ceph, CC and you were all my allies at F5 and you couldn't all go to the end with me. Yes you left at that point but realise that word travels fast in these games and you evidently weren't as close to Snakes as I was (and you say my game is bad. Snakes and Ceph were my allies all the way.) I know Ceph would have voted you too had I asked him to.

Right, because me telling Snakes, "Oh, well TS considered voting for you next round and I might as well," would have been a great idea. If CC had gone and we had been in F4 with ceph winning immunity I don't think telling Snakes that he'd be my target would have flown. I don't take umbrage with you voting me. It was a game move that you and the others needed to make. What does irritate me is the fact that you're so reticent to play the "I've been loyal the entire game, bonus points plz" when no one besides maybe Candillan and Marquis can say they were wholly loyal to anyone. The fact that you even considered Snakes speaks to that, regardless of the outcome that followed.

And sorry, but Snakes kept you because he expected to obliterate you in an F2. You can rebut this all you want, but the truth will come out--it always does. I don't doubt Ceph would have voted me either, but he would have had every right to considering I made no attempt to hide that I thought he was a threat.

I can't be bothered to use your clichéd smear terms "I find it insulting" and all the rest back at you because it's just needlessly antagonistic and your final statement shows you have already made your mind up. I think you may be more suited to that fragrance line than myself.

You say you aren't a bitter juror as though that means everything before isn't bitter at all. I mean you didn't even ask a question just a bile waterfall. In fact you didn't ask Ceph a question either.

You may only make one

question

to each finalist[/align]

Get out your library cards because reading is fundamental.

Deliciously over your head

Not sure you understood the reference, but it was obscure so that's fine.

Your game in a nutshell. Feel free to scribble over the history books as though I was "carried" like I was suppose to play this game without allies and win every TC sword in hand in a barefist combat but I couldn't care less what you have to say right now

A couple of things:

01. I received permission from Shii to submit the message I posted. If I felt I needed more clarification about either of your games I would have asked.

02. Needlessly antagonistic? I am both calling attention to what I feel are serious inaccuracies between what actually happened this game and what you perceived to happen. From my perspective, the Jury phase is meant to gauge how finalists respond to comments both benign and heated. Working under the pressure and/or in stressful situations is the name of the game, dear TS. How you respond to it is equally telling.

[TS]

fwiw I never was considering booting Snakes, that was only in the scenario where you were actually not lying to me from day 1. In which case there would be an equal claim upon first glance

At any rate I was never informed the jury would be deciding it's votes based on how much I knew about a failed secret alliance of 2 players that Cephrir hardly knew about either. At this point I really have better things to do than mess around with vitriol and watch as a very friendly and enjoyable game has a less than fitting ending from players who want to point out how I wasn't omniscient about things that evidently didn't matter (I made it here regardless) and other straw men.

I only respond in the manner to which I am asked. There are nicer ways to put things and more open ways to see.

Days fade, weeks meld.
Every night I set the two alarm clocks that run the same race
But that's the wonderful thing about time
It passes.

[Cephrir]

Cephrir: Talk me through exactly how my elimination happened, from your point of view.

Okay. I'll start with the likely irrelevant details. While ani was in the game, I was highly aware that he was the glue holding us together and knew he probably wouldn't make it through the whole game. Sure enough, when he left, you basically stopped talking strategy to me. So I figured you were probably gunning for me, though I wasn't sure. When I was asked what I wanted to do that round, I started floating your name around because I thought you'd be the easiest vote for me to make happen other than myself. Given that the responses I got were lukewarm until I won immunity, I can only assume I was supposed to go that round. Someone (I think kloud but could be wrong) at some point confirmed my suspicion that you'd been trying to get me out, and that was all I needed to hear. After that, everyone I talked to pretty much told me that was happening, and I didn't complain.

Cephrir:

What would you say if I asked you and TS to have a Pokemon battle for my vote?

Honestly, since it seems apparent that you weren't always as aware of what was going on as TS was, how would this game have gone if everything went exactly the way you wanted it to?

I won't deny that I wasn't as aware of what was going on as TS was. If each individual decision went as I wanted it to, I would not have voted ani out when he did go, so I probably would never have gotten the chance to get close to TS. If we assume that relationship never happens, I would have taken Candi all the way to the end and voted out Snakes relatively early. Once Candi was voted out, though, everything essentially went the way I wanted it to, with the exception of you getting voted out over Snakes. I didn't think you were connected to any of the three of us at that point, and I think going through with my desire to tie the vote and make you play a challenge against Snakes would have been a better move. Your heart wasn't in it anymore, though, so I suspect you would have lost. Although you not voting for Snakes would have made this rather unfortunate for me, as I would have antagonized TS (the only reason I didn't go through with it) without accomplishing anything.

Ceph: You didn't put up much resistance to the idea of voting me out, and I definitely was hurt when you decided to vote me out in the end. Why should you receive my vote when you clearly had other plans for F2, therefore betraying our deal?

I resisted, but it had been made clear to me for quite some time that at some point you and I were supposed to be sent packing. I truly wanted to rally votes to keep you, but there was nothing I could do to get anyone on board apart from CC (kloud never had any intention of keeping you). You were the only Final 2 deal I had until ani was voted out, at which point I basically panicked, allied with Snakes because he was online, and then my apology to TS for voting him developed into a beautiful butterfly. At that point, I was still convinced that I was likely toast if I didn't win immunity, and it would definitely be one of the two of us going out that round, because everyone basically knew that I was your only ally- it would be me or a move to weaken me for sure. I had to pull you out of your shell at the beginning of the game, and postmerge no one else was willing to go to the effort to be friendly with you, which really sucks. I didn't want to vote for you, but a protest vote only would have made it more obvious that I was on the outs. I'm sorry bro, for reals, you'll see in my confessional that I didn't want to, and I think it's pretty evident from our final Skype conversation.

Cephrir: I don't have much to say here - you won enough challenges for most people to immediately deem you as a threat, social game or no social game, but when you didn't win a challenges you weren't really gaining many votes. This speaks wonders to your social game, I believe. While winning challenges may not be a crucial part of the game in many scenarios, the aftermath of the challenges certainly can be, especially after an Immunity run. I think you handled it really well, all in all. My question to you is very simple - explain to me who, aside from you and TS, deserves to win the most, and why. And no, picking me because I asked will not get you bonus points.

Kloud, not close. His social game was light years ahead of everyone else's and we all knew it. If I don't win immunity at F5, I think he probably still gets booted simply because everyone knew we had no chance against him whatsoever in final tribal. Even if that's not the case, it really should have been. It was perfectly intelligent for him to target me and I don't hold that against him; I was his only remote chance of losing FTC (and even then he would still have thrashed me). I know I would have voted in his favor over any F6 player other than TS, including myself, and in that scenario I'm probably the only vote TS gets. Kloud was the only player in the game to ever be voted out for being too good.

[kloud1516]

fwiw I never was considering booting Snakes, that was only in the scenario where you were actually not lying to me from day 1. In which case there would be an equal claim upon first glance.

Yet you claimed I flipped on you? No, until F5 I was transparent with you to a fault. Time and again I took out people because they brought your name up, which put me at risk because I was blatantly pushing for your safety. Like I said in my first post, I was not an angel, but I left this game doing right by you. That is where our paths converge. To sit in the F2 and base a secondary argument on the fact that you "remained loyal to those who were loyal to you" -- on a lie -- begged for jury rebuttal.

I can't speak for the other jurors, but I'm not contesting your merit on the grounds that you weren't omniscient. I am not weighing options personally either. Beyond the confines of this game I still think both you and Ceph are wonderful people. I am looking at gameplay. Your argument that you "directed" actions in this game was a lofty one to make, and I admire the tact. But given the fact that you are speaking to a jury comprised of Summertime's playmakers, I unfortunately think that your contention isn't holding up.

With that, I will shut up so that you both may enjoy the FTC.

[CuddlyCaucasian]

TS: How possible is it that the only reason you made it to F2 is because Cephrir and Snakes both dragged you,

with both of them thinking either of them could easily defeat you in a jury vote?

As you indicate in your question "how is it possible" it evidently isn't possible and I agree with you. Therefore I am not being taken to F2 as a sheep but as a partner with every chance of winning. I like to think again that is due to my golden social game.

Your answer has been noted. But reread my question again to discover I did not ask "how is it possible," I asked "how possible is it." Those are two very different things; I'm obviously aware that you would make it to the F2, because hey, it happened! I hope your aches of delusion aren't preventing you from functioning with elementary reading skills.

All joking aside, I do think both of you played very good games. But I will say now that I was completely opposed to voting for one person before FTC started, but now my opinions have changed to the exact opposite. CC out~<3

[Snakes]

TS

, congratulations on making it here. I think that your game is being very underrated by the jury. Having played with you for almost the entire game, I don't see you as being carried. Although your game may not have been perfect, I think it was pretty strong. But there is something that I'm curious about. Before he voted me out, Ceph told me that you would have taken him to the end over me. Is this true?

Also, to clarify on the F5 round, my decision to keep you wasn't because I thought I would easily beat you in the end. I kept you for a combination of social reasons (I felt the closest to you out of everyone left) and strategic reasons (If you left, then Ceph was the likeliest to win immunity, and I was worried that Kloud and CC would vote me off, and I wanted to avoid this).

Cephrir

, I think that you played a good game, and you would have survived even without your challenge wins. You got to the Finals in your first game, which is something not a lot of people can say. But at the same time, I don't feel like you

did

that much in this game. I can't think of any vote that you orchestrated, which is shown in your answer to JDGA. Tell me that I'm wrong.

[Cephrir]

Cephrir

, I think that you played a good game, and you would have survived even without your challenge wins. You got to the Finals in your first game, which is something not a lot of people can say. But at the same time, I don't feel like you

did

that much in this game. I can't think of any vote that you orchestrated, which is shown in your answer to JDGA. Tell me that I'm wrong.

I realize you probably mean recently, but I instigated the SleepyKrew vote as well as the Keybladewielder vote (yes, she went kinda inactive, but that was my ultimate goal from the moment the tribes shuffled and it would've happened if she was active). Postmerge, no, I didn't have much influence. Coming in down in numbers and having to scramble every round just to try to survive will do that. I tried to push for a JDGA vote, but I don't believe my efforts were ultimately relevant. Oh, and I also voted you out, in case you've forgotten.

That said, I am not expecting your vote, nor did I think there was any chance of me getting it in any F2 whatsoever. You can keep it.

[TS]

Thankyou Snakes. You were a pleasure to have around

you and Ceph are real five star allies so I would have hated to vote either of you off. I really don't know what I'd have done if I won at F3. I'd have probably just tried to pretend it wasn't happening and go back to sleep. All a bad dream. Wake up to another day. No hard decisions. I may haven sent myself home or just ran away. I hate to choose. I admit I semi-threw the challenge at F3 because I knew both of you would take me to the end and I didn't have the heart to win immunity and send a golden ally and partner home.

I think you were both like brothers to me this game. It was good we had something lovely but didn't have to be all super secret "ha you never guessed our alliance no FTC vote for you!" kind of style. I may take a break for real after this game. Survivor isn't as fun as it once was. MS is a bit claustrophobic at times and my throat is so sore.

[CuddlyCaucasian]

I will confirm that Ceph was the bees knees on the Fans tribe

[Candillan]

I will confirm that Ceph was the bees knees on the Fans tribe

[Marquis]

page grab!~