Structural

[Grouch Cop]

Oh I have opinions on this.

I think the best format is singular threads for each finalist. Then questions don't get asked multiple times, their opening and closing speeches can be put in the thread at the exact same time and not give either finalist even the slightest edge on that front, all information pertaining to someone's entire game is in a single place that you can much more easily find, finalists don't have to maintain attention on multiple threads, jurors don't either, jurors who don't have too many questions at all don't end up with an empty thread. It also puts the focus on each finalists specific game, and I think it makes our job as jurors much much easier without too much restriction.

I think this format is by and large the worst. I do have a difficult time trying to figure out where any of my questions should be placed because from my perspective all of these aspects are interconnected and you can't really ask about one without asking about the others. Also I don't like that it's so much easier for questions to be lost and forgotten when you have all finalists answering in the same threads. Also with the categories chosen, it feels like it's implying that those three facets are the only ones that matter and the only ways to play and win. And a lot of nuance is lost with the generalizations. Also it feels like FTC is giving focus to the mods of the game rather than the players or the jurors when you have a whole section that is geared towards that, and it kinda feels like an additional obstacle for everyone who played the game to have to overcome. And FTC is hard enough without adding in any sort of extra restrictions on top.

Jurors having their own individual threads is okay, but not great either. Yes it pulls the focus to be on the jurors, which FTC is just as much about them as it is the finalists, but it can put a lot more pressure on everybody. If you have jurors without many questions, they have empty or short threads. Jurors who want to do their due diligence then have a lot of threads they need to read to have any sense of what each person did, finalists have to keep on top of multiple threads and hope that things aren't lost. They also end up being asked almost the exact same thing in multiple places if a juror just hasn't read all the other threads before they ask what they want to know and having to refer people to other threads, which you also have to remember who asked you what, can be annoying. It's also a mess to read after the question phases have ended when you're trying to compare and contrast each person's game and how they answered everything against each other, and makes the jurors jobs harder imo, but also can make it so finalists don't get as much consideration as they would if there are jurors who just don't want to read 6 other threads.

This is also without adding in restrictions on how many questions you're allowed to ask. If you're limiting the questions jurors are allowed to ask, then 3 is equally solid to 2. But when it's a free-for-all, I much prefer 2.

[Detective Pikachu]

This is going to be a weird one.

The last Survivor game that was hosted had a metric fuck ton of items, if you paid attention to that game, how much did the thought of item fuckery make an impact on your game?

[Lucifer Morningstar]

Quick question to both finalists and the jurors: What’s your favorite FTC format?

1. One like this that’s defined by social, strategic, and structural?

2. One where each finalist has their own thread to talk and answer questions in so that they’re less likely to miss things.

3. One where each Juror has their own thread to personally address the finalists?

In my opinion, I’m a big fan of number three since it doesn’t restrict any questions to one of three categories, it allows jurors to feel like they have more of a stake in the end, and is easier for finalists to keep track of and respond to— not to mention nobody really talks over one another.

I'm really OK with any format and not too picky. I might prefer having one thread for each finalist though because I think that'd keep it the most organized and easy for me. I'm not a huge fan of these generalizations that come with three threads because I feel like they overlap a lot and aren't always that clear.

[Lucifer Morningstar]

I mean, I don't feel like I'm ever going to have a question and be agonizing over which thread to put it in, so that aspect of this format doesn't really bother me. The jury can do what they want with questioning, the same way they can vote how they want. It's not like there's going to be riots in the streets if I ask someone what their favorite immunity win was in the Social thread.

I'm relatively new so I haven't seen the per-Juror thread format but I'm not sure I'd care for that? I think that ideally, jurors pay attention to everything the finalists say, not just the answers to their own questions, and I could see hypothetical jurors easily just reading their own thread. Obviously people in any format can just skim over anything not directly pertaining to them, but I wouldn't want a format that optimizes for that.

I was considering asking the finalists to rate the social/strategic/structural format on a scale from 3 to 18 though.

If you want an answer to this: I'd probably give it like a 10 on that weird scale? I don't hate the format but I don't love it either.

[Lucifer Morningstar]

This is going to be a weird one.

The last Survivor game that was hosted had a metric fuck ton of items, if you paid attention to that game, how much did the thought of item fuckery make an impact on your game?

I didn't really pay any attention to the last game, so it didn't really come to mind much. The fact that this game had a standard classification made me feel like it was probably going to be less heavy on items and very different from a game like that where there were lots of items. I was aware of the possibility that there were probably idols and played around it a little bit. The possibility of double votes or a more basic item like that was also something I considered, but it never ended up making a significant impact on my game.

[Scruff McGruff]

To Lucifer:

How exactly did you leverage challenge wins to get what you wanted? I know you said that you did— but I haven’t really seen any specific examples of how you used immunity to your advantage beyond not being a target. In what vote(s) did you use being immune to your biggest advantage? Also, despite having the ability to force fire with pretty much anyone you wanted, how did you lose the person you wanted to go to the end with to a direct vote in the final four? How did that play out from your perspective?

[Hercule Poirot]

This is going to be a weird one.

The last Survivor game that was hosted had a metric fuck ton of items, if you paid attention to that game, how much did the thought of item fuckery make an impact on your game?

I did pay attention to zat game, but as M. Morningstar says, zis game did 'ave a standard classification so I wasn't too terribly concerned. Also, zis may sound arrogant, but even if zere were idols or items, I always felt reasonably confident zat I 'ad positioned myself well enough zat other people would get eliminated by zem before me. So par exemple, M. Blart played an idol to take out Mlle Macer and zere was some concern about 'im aving a second idol, but I maintained a strong relationship and was one of ze only people who kept talking to 'im up until ze end, so 'e actually left on relatively good terms with me, and if 'e 'ad a second idol, I don't think I would 'ave been ze victim of eet.

Similarly, at ze F5 I was concerned about Mlle Garcia 'aving an idol because eet was ze last round to play zem, but I made absolutely certain zat if she did 'ave one, she was not going to vote for me, and she promised me zat if she 'ad an idol, she wasn't idoling me out, so I did everything I could to keep myself safe in zat event. Ze M. Grouch vote also 'ad to be a blindside in case ze other side of ze game 'ad an idol, because M. Grouch getting idoled would 'ave been horrible and would 'ave made ze game 4-4.

Idols and items, including ze mysterious corporal advantage, were discussed and speculated about throughout ze merge, but other zan ze idol zat took you out, none of our plans involving idols and items mattered zat much.

[Rust Cohle]

A question for both finalists.

Did you take the board statistics and individual player profile statistics into account in making game decisions?  If so, how?

[Hercule Poirot]

A question for both finalists.

Did you take the board statistics and individual player profile statistics into account in making game decisions?  If so, how?

Zey definitely did to some degree. Like I 'ave said previously, I was very aware of ze fact zat I was ze player with ze most time online, and I intentionally at some points would try not to refresh ze page in ze middle of ze day when I knew no one was online if I could 'elp myself. M. Briscoe zen surpassed myself in total amount of time online, where 'e remained until 'e was eliminated I believe. Once 'e went 'ome, I eventually retook ze lead, but amount of time online shows roughly ze amount of time ze person 'ad and was willing to commit to ze game, and zat was something zat could inform some decisions.

I also frequently would check profiles to see when ze last time someone was online was. Zis was especially crucial on ze few occasions where I typed up a PM to someone, sent eet, and zen later deleted eet before zey could read eet. If zey 'ad not been online since I sent eet, I knew zat zey could not 'ave read eet, so eet could safely be removed. I did zis maybe 3 times maximum throughout ze whole game, and usually only did eet when circumstances changed and I didn't want someone knowing something zat originally eet was fine for zem to know.  But eet was an interesting component of my strategy and ees a good example of 'ow careful I was in controlling ze flow of information to make sure zat I was giving people enough information, but not too much.

[Lucifer Morningstar]

A question for both finalists.

Did you take the board statistics and individual player profile statistics into account in making game decisions?  If so, how?

I never used the statistics to independently justify a decision, but I do think it indirectly played a role a little bit. Like the fact Penelope was the top poster had a strong correlation to the fact that she was a challenge threat and very active in challenges in my opinion. I would also check when people were last online/how often they were online, especially in the early game. Like at a tribe swap it was helpful to see how much someone had been online and their post count, because I think there was a decent correlation between online time and how strong and social of a player they were likely to be.

[Lucifer Morningstar]

To Lucifer:

How exactly did you leverage challenge wins to get what you wanted? I know you said that you did— but I haven’t really seen any specific examples of how you used immunity to your advantage beyond not being a target. In what vote(s) did you use being immune to your biggest advantage? Also, despite having the ability to force fire with pretty much anyone you wanted, how did you lose the person you wanted to go to the end with to a direct vote in the final four? How did that play out from your perspective?

So at F6 the vote was between Judy and Penelope and I was able to get Judy eliminated when Hercule/Leon seemed to want to vote Penelope. And the F3 vote is obvious enough- I took Rust out. I think winning so many challenges also indirectly boosted my game early on- I think it helped that I had connections with a lot of players on the Strike Team and coming into merge I had met everyone except Leon so far and so I think that gave me a slight advantage over other players who hadn't met as many people.


So going into F4 I knew I wanted to target Rust or Hercule. Early on, I actually considered giving Leon my immunity necklace since I thought I had much better odds winning a tiebreaker challenge in the event it was necessary (I wasn't sure it was at that point) and wanted to keep him safe, but after some of the stuff I heard I decided I was firmly against that, because I wasn't that convinced he'd vote with me if I was vulnerable- I felt like having leverage in that situation was important for me. Personally, I was leaning towards Rust, but I knew Leon really preferred getting Hercule out and I was prepared to go with that if I needed to.


So at the start of the TC, we kind of agreed to vote Hercule- but then a few hours after it started- Leon decided to pitch the idea of tying the vote between Hercule and Rust and forcing the two of them to do a firemaking challenge. I was strongly opposed to this, I wasn't certain they were voting Leon at that point, but I was suspicious about it and even if it was possible from a strategic perspective it didn't make a lot of sense to me. I felt like we needed to try to take out the bigger threat and forcing a firemaking challenge seemed like a no decision and I thought that was a pretty bad idea, so I told him I really didn't want to do that. Then early the next morning he sent me a message about still wanting to vote Hercule, but a couple hours later- before I could respond, sent me a message that he'd changed his mind and was OK with Rust. So we agreed to vote there and I thought things were set. I did get a message from Rust saying that the jury was 'a lot more pro-Leon than I realized' or something along those lines about 20 minutes before TC ended, which I took to mean Hercule and Rust were voting Leon, but I felt OK about it since there should've at least been a firemaking challenge. Obviously, it didn't work out and I'm still not exactly sure what happened since I haven't heard from Leon since- I don't know if he was trying to force a 2-2 tie and didn't realize they were voting for him or hoping for a 2-1-1 vote where Hercule went. It didn't make a lot of sense to me.

[Grouch Cop]

I'm not sure where else to put this question, so it can go here. For both of you, what do you think each juror is looking for from you in order to give you their vote? Do you think you've done enough to show that for each person? If you were on the jury, what criteria would you be using to vote and in what ways does the game you played fit that?

[Hercule Poirot]

So going into F4 I knew I wanted to target Rust or Hercule. Early on, I actually considered giving Leon my immunity necklace since I thought I had much better odds winning a tiebreaker challenge in the event it was necessary (I wasn't sure it was at that point) and wanted to keep him safe, but after some of the stuff I heard I decided I was firmly against that, because I wasn't that convinced he'd vote with me if I was vulnerable- I felt like having leverage in that situation was important for me. Personally, I was leaning towards Rust, but I knew Leon really preferred getting Hercule out and I was prepared to go with that if I needed to.


So at the start of the TC, we kind of agreed to vote Hercule- but then a few hours after it started- Leon decided to pitch the idea of tying the vote between Hercule and Rust and forcing the two of them to do a firemaking challenge. I was strongly opposed to this, I wasn't certain they were voting Leon at that point, but I was suspicious about it and even if it was possible from a strategic perspective it didn't make a lot of sense to me. I felt like we needed to try to take out the bigger threat and forcing a firemaking challenge seemed like a no decision and I thought that was a pretty bad idea, so I told him I really didn't want to do that. Then early the next morning he sent me a message about still wanting to vote Hercule, but a couple hours later- before I could respond, sent me a message that he'd changed his mind and was OK with Rust. So we agreed to vote there and I thought things were set. I did get a message from Rust saying that the jury was 'a lot more pro-Leon than I realized' or something along those lines about 20 minutes before TC ended, which I took to mean Hercule and Rust were voting Leon, but I felt OK about it since there should've at least been a firemaking challenge. Obviously, it didn't work out and I'm still not exactly sure what happened since I haven't heard from Leon since- I don't know if he was trying to force a 2-2 tie and didn't realize they were voting for him or hoping for a 2-1-1 vote where Hercule went. It didn't make a lot of sense to me.[/size]

I know zis wasn't a question for me, but I just want to clarify. Zis was my most impressive round of ze game and zis post tells me zat M. Morningstar at least still does not understand what I was did. I 'ave to assume zat some Jurors who weren't even zere might not understand either.

First of all, I will say zat M. Morningstar giving up 'is Immunity necklace to M. Kennedy would 'ave been an incredibly impressive move, even if eet might 'ave led to 'im going 'ome. I think zat was ze winning move for 'im zis round.

So M. Kennedy was telling me prior to ze vote zat 'e wanted M. Morningstar out. I still don't know if 'e truly wanted me or M. Morningstar gone 'ere if 'e 'ad ze choice. I was clearly ze superior move, so if M. Kennedy was planning on booting M. Morningstar at 4, zat ees a 'uge failing on M. Morningstar's part where even though eet was in both of zeir interests to work together, M. Kennedy still wanted to take 'im out. I 'ope zat M. Kennedy can come to FTC and give us some clarity on zis.

At ze beginning of ze round, 'e ees right zat M. Morningstar and M. Kennedy were both voting for me. Ze moment I saw zat M. Morningstar 'ad Immunity, I knew zat zey probably would, and I pressured both of zem into confessing eet to me.

When M. Kennedy sent you zat first message suggesting a firemaking challenge, zat was as a result of hours of work on my part convincing 'im zat sending me to a firemaking challenge was better for 'is game. 'E was not going to outright vote to keep me because 'e thought eet would ruin 'is relationship with M. Cohle, but I did convince 'im to send eet to a firemaking challenge, which of course I knew would send 'im 'ome, but 'e didn't know zat.

But M. Morningstar smartly would not do zat, so I 'ad to change tact. With zose double messages zat you received ze next morning from M. Kennedy, M. Morningstar, did you not wonder why M. Kennedy 'ad changed 'is mind? Zat was ze point where 'e started lying to you, and 'e started doing zat because I convinced 'im to. 'E was unwilling to vote for M. Cohle, but 'e was willing to lie to you to get you to vote for M. Cohle, because I told 'im zat unless I got a chance to make fire, 'e was never going to get my Jury vote, and I explained to 'im zat without my Jury vote, 'e 'ad truly no 'ope of winning. Lying to you was from 'is POV ze only way to force a tie without voting for M. Cohle, so zat was what 'e chose to do, and 'e told me zat 'e was going to do eet. 'E trusted me so much, even while 'e was telling me zat 'e was voting me out.

Eet seems to me like M. Morningstar 'ad all of ze tools at 'is disposal to prevent zis vote. 'E 'ad a suspicious message from M. Cohle. Why did M. Kennedy not know about zat suspicious message? You absolutely could 'ave made 'im realize what a mistake 'e could be making. 'E 'ad M. Kennedy changing 'is mind seemingly without being convinced to by someone else. When 'as M. Kennedy done zat ze whole game? 'E would change 'is mind, but usually only after 'e 'ad a conversation zat prompted 'im to. I knew from ze beginning zat M. Kennedy was probably voting for me once M. Morningstar won without 'aving to be told. M. Morningstar's reads zis round were bad, and what good reads 'e did 'ave, 'e did nothing about. If 'e suspected zat M. Kennedy might be getting votes, zen why didn't M. Kennedy?

Zis round was not M. Kennedy just doing things without any reason. 'E did 'ave a reason. Zat reason was me. Zat reason was ze hours of work I 'ad put in all game building up our relationship, and ze hours of work zat I put in during zis round to make sure zat 'e did what I needed 'im to do to keep myself safe.

I was ze only one zat round with all of ze information. I knew exactly what was 'appening every step of ze way. I engineered zat vote, and in my opinion eet ees one of ze most impressive things I 'ave seen in a game in a long time. If you 'ave any specific questions about what I did or 'ow I did eet, I would welcome zem, but you should not accept zat zis was just M. Kennedy doing random things in a way zat none of us could 'ave predicted when one of us consciously set zose things up.

[Detective Pikachu]

*sniff*

I smell a good level of bullshit

[Lucifer Morningstar]

So going into F4 I knew I wanted to target Rust or Hercule. Early on, I actually considered giving Leon my immunity necklace since I thought I had much better odds winning a tiebreaker challenge in the event it was necessary (I wasn't sure it was at that point) and wanted to keep him safe, but after some of the stuff I heard I decided I was firmly against that, because I wasn't that convinced he'd vote with me if I was vulnerable- I felt like having leverage in that situation was important for me. Personally, I was leaning towards Rust, but I knew Leon really preferred getting Hercule out and I was prepared to go with that if I needed to.


So at the start of the TC, we kind of agreed to vote Hercule- but then a few hours after it started- Leon decided to pitch the idea of tying the vote between Hercule and Rust and forcing the two of them to do a firemaking challenge. I was strongly opposed to this, I wasn't certain they were voting Leon at that point, but I was suspicious about it and even if it was possible from a strategic perspective it didn't make a lot of sense to me. I felt like we needed to try to take out the bigger threat and forcing a firemaking challenge seemed like a no decision and I thought that was a pretty bad idea, so I told him I really didn't want to do that. Then early the next morning he sent me a message about still wanting to vote Hercule, but a couple hours later- before I could respond, sent me a message that he'd changed his mind and was OK with Rust. So we agreed to vote there and I thought things were set. I did get a message from Rust saying that the jury was 'a lot more pro-Leon than I realized' or something along those lines about 20 minutes before TC ended, which I took to mean Hercule and Rust were voting Leon, but I felt OK about it since there should've at least been a firemaking challenge. Obviously, it didn't work out and I'm still not exactly sure what happened since I haven't heard from Leon since- I don't know if he was trying to force a 2-2 tie and didn't realize they were voting for him or hoping for a 2-1-1 vote where Hercule went. It didn't make a lot of sense to me.

I know zis wasn't a question for me, but I just want to clarify. Zis was my most impressive round of ze game and zis post tells me zat M. Morningstar at least still does not understand what I was did. I 'ave to assume zat some Jurors who weren't even zere might not understand either.

First of all, I will say zat M. Morningstar giving up 'is Immunity necklace to M. Kennedy would 'ave been an incredibly impressive move, even if eet might 'ave led to 'im going 'ome. I think zat was ze winning move for 'im zis round.

So M. Kennedy was telling me prior to ze vote zat 'e wanted M. Morningstar out. I still don't know if 'e truly wanted me or M. Morningstar gone 'ere if 'e 'ad ze choice. I was clearly ze superior move, so if M. Kennedy was planning on booting M. Morningstar at 4, zat ees a 'uge failing on M. Morningstar's part where even though eet was in both of zeir interests to work together, M. Kennedy still wanted to take 'im out. I 'ope zat M. Kennedy can come to FTC and give us some clarity on zis.

At ze beginning of ze round, 'e ees right zat M. Morningstar and M. Kennedy were both voting for me. Ze moment I saw zat M. Morningstar 'ad Immunity, I knew zat zey probably would, and I pressured both of zem into confessing eet to me.

When M. Kennedy sent you zat first message suggesting a firemaking challenge, zat was as a result of hours of work on my part convincing 'im zat sending me to a firemaking challenge was better for 'is game. 'E was not going to outright vote to keep me because 'e thought eet would ruin 'is relationship with M. Cohle, but I did convince 'im to send eet to a firemaking challenge, which of course I knew would send 'im 'ome, but 'e didn't know zat.

But M. Morningstar smartly would not do zat, so I 'ad to change tact. With zose double messages zat you received ze next morning from M. Kennedy, M. Morningstar, did you not wonder why M. Kennedy 'ad changed 'is mind? Zat was ze point where 'e started lying to you, and 'e started doing zat because I convinced 'im to. 'E was unwilling to vote for M. Cohle, but 'e was willing to lie to you to get you to vote for M. Cohle, because I told 'im zat unless I got a chance to make fire, 'e was never going to get my Jury vote, and I explained to 'im zat without my Jury vote, 'e 'ad truly no 'ope of winning. Lying to you was from 'is POV ze only way to force a tie without voting for M. Cohle, so zat was what 'e chose to do, and 'e told me zat 'e was going to do eet. 'E trusted me so much, even while 'e was telling me zat 'e was voting me out.

Eet seems to me like M. Morningstar 'ad all of ze tools at 'is disposal to prevent zis vote. 'E 'ad a suspicious message from M. Cohle. Why did M. Kennedy not know about zat suspicious message? You absolutely could 'ave made 'im realize what a mistake 'e could be making. 'E 'ad M. Kennedy changing 'is mind seemingly without being convinced to by someone else. When 'as M. Kennedy done zat ze whole game? 'E would change 'is mind, but usually only after 'e 'ad a conversation zat prompted 'im to. I knew from ze beginning zat M. Kennedy was probably voting for me once M. Morningstar won without 'aving to be told. M. Morningstar's reads zis round were bad, and what good reads 'e did 'ave, 'e did nothing about. If 'e suspected zat M. Kennedy might be getting votes, zen why didn't M. Kennedy?

Zis round was not M. Kennedy just doing things without any reason. 'E did 'ave a reason. Zat reason was me. Zat reason was ze hours of work I 'ad put in all game building up our relationship, and ze hours of work zat I put in during zis round to make sure zat 'e did what I needed 'im to do to keep myself safe.

I was ze only one zat round with all of ze information. I knew exactly what was 'appening every step of ze way. I engineered zat vote, and in my opinion eet ees one of ze most impressive things I 'ave seen in a game in a long time. If you 'ave any specific questions about what I did or 'ow I did eet, I would welcome zem, but you should not accept zat zis was just M. Kennedy doing random things in a way zat none of us could 'ave predicted when one of us consciously set zose things up.

I applaud you for making a big move, Hercule- but there's a few things I want to clarify here.


First off you claimed that you had to pressure me into telling you I was voting you at first there- that's false. You may have had to pressure Leon, but to say you had to pressure me is a fundamental misunderstanding about how I was trying to play those final few rounds. I considered everyone in that situation to be my friend and an ally at least at some point during this game and with no idols in play, I was being honest. I delayed telling Rust in particular that I was voting him until late in TC, because it was a fluid situation and even when I told him I wasn't certain he was going home- but I had no qualms about telling you, Penelope or Rust what was happening and being transparent. I simply wanted to make sure that's what I was doing before I revealed it.


You also talk about how I could've easily prevented this and I want to respond to this as well. First off, Rust sent me that message with minutes left in TC and by the time I saw it there was even less time left. If I recall things right, I don't remember Leon being online during that period until after results occurred either. What I presented Leon with during that tribal council and what I told him throughout was completely honest on my part, I told things how I saw it and never deliberately withheld information from him at that F4. You may have lied to him numerous times at that tribal council, but please don't paint me as a liar too. I valued my relationship with Leon and was honest with him.


About Leon changing his mind- That situation was unique. I don't recall another situation where Leon was in a position like he was there. He was an important swing vote. The fact that the decision there required him to think through things more thoroughly than past decisions made perfect sense to me and I think you're underscoring the fact that we had discussed the pros and cons of this vote the night before and he gave me a disclaimer that he was half-asleep and wanted to rethink things later. It didn't seem far fetched to me that he had genuinely changed his mind. Furthermore, if the mistake I made in that situation was trusting Leon, then I'm OK with that. My path to get here was built on trusting my allies and I was happy to do that time and time again. Leon had been honest with me and given me no serious reason to doubt him, so I wasn't going to. Trust was and is important to me and I tried to keep and maintain it whenever it was possible.


Congratulations on making the move you felt you needed to in that scenario and thank you for providing more insight into what happened, but your assumptions about my behavior were fundamentally wrong and presented from an egocentric point of view and that needed to be cleared up.