GINDIN Tribe: JURY VOTE IS IN

[hoopsguy]

Had it played out the way you suggest, ML - getting down to us four and having to make a decision - I would have had no problem with it. It was clear with four people that we all couldn't make it to the end. I'm a big boy and accepting that possibility when entering into the alliance.

I just didn't understand how it did play out. I certainly did not make waves in our group, put forth effort for the team in my actions and in the contests, and felt like I was an asset to the team. Had you three determined I was odd man out from the start, or did you feel that I was "outperformed" by other alliance members?

ML, since you are responding to questions - you sent me a PM the day of the tribe merge that was pretty much a "don't stray from the plan" message. Did you know at that time you were going to vote me out (prior to heybrad and Darth) at the first possible opportunity? Or was that something that emerged afterwards?

[hoopsguy]

I guess chesapeake has decided he would prefer to answer questions tomorrow.

[Darth Vilus]

This is how Rocky would've felt if he was knocked down in the 14th.

[hoopsguy]

Darth, I was hoping you would win that immunity challenge. Don't know if you would have won the jury, but almost certainly would have had my vote. And I would have stumped hard for you.

[Darth Vilus]

Thanks Hoops, yeah I tried my best lol. Just fell a little short. Didn't think i would've won the jury vote but to make it to the finals woulda been sweet.

Almost went the distance

[chesapeake]

[quote=Racer;2307726]Chesapeake,

My first question is in regards to how you responded to the plan I proposed to you when there were nine left. I was clearly playing to win and the only way my alliance was ever going to become the power alliance is if we waited until there were eight left to use the idol.

Why didn't you lie to me and say that the villagers were planning on splitting their votes and you would go with us to vote out Hoops? You could have then had the villagers switch their vote to me and avoid the possibility of someone on your tribe being taken out by my idol.

Instead, you told me you couldn't vote with us. After that I actually considered pushing SnDvls and Danny to switch their vote from Hoops to you because to quote Boston Rob and Russell, “If you're not with me, you're against me.” So again, please tell me why you decided to somewhat tell me the truth when in my opinion it would have been a far better play to lie.

Finally, I want to know if you have anything to say to Brad. It doesn't bother me one bit that you strung him along. However, I think just about everyone on the jury would agree that you turned on him before he turned on you because you never had any intention on taking him to the final 3 whereas he did even if he did technically vote for you before you voted for him.
[\quote]

Lying is almost never the best play.

Especially in a game like this. When you lie to someone, they don't give you a second chance. And they probably are going to go for you head for the rest of the game. I didn't need that.

I think you are overthinking this a little. I still wanted to have the possibility of working with you. An obvious lie kills that possibility. Plus, instead of you & the wolves going after hoops, had I lied you probably would have come after me. It doesn't surprise me one bit that you were entertaining the possibility as it was, and I was nothing but honest with you, even if I didn't bare my soul.

Lying was also a poor short-term play for me, too. Based on the intel you gave to me and what I knew from the villager pms, the options on the table were Danny/Sndvls being voted off or Hoops. The only way Hoops was gone was if 1) you gave up your idol; and 2) you gave it to the right guy. That is a pretty low percentage shot. The downside, such as it was, was losing Hoops, which, from my perspective, probably had to be done at some point anyway. We still had numbers on you and Brad's idol, which I knew about.

You are wrong about Brad. Dead wrong. Until he voted to eliminate me, I was wide open to including him in the final 3. Wide open. Not because I love him or have a man crush, however. I'll tell you why.

Only now has Autumn indicated that there will be no more challenges. I have worked under the assumption that there would be a surprise challenge pitting the final 3 against each other. I suck at challenges. But I have a heckuva lot better chance at beating Brad in a challenge than either ML or Thomkal. Unless the challenge is making a campfire and sewing 20 merit badges on a sash. I'd rule that challenge.

Darth hasn't talked to me much this game, nor have I talked to him. But heybrad and I had looked out for each other. I kept his secret about his idol, he tipped me off that you were coming after me. I encouraged Thomkal to take him to the inn, although it was ultimately Thomkal's decision. The night he turned on me, I had just sent him a message asking him about that. I was pretty sure something was up when I got no reply.

In fairness, there is no guarantee that I would have taken him to the final 3. But it was a very real possibility.

[Poli]

As much as I'm happy my tribe made it through...I'm slightly disappointed racer and DV didn't somehow scrape through.

[Darth Vilus]

This isn't directed at anyone, just a question in general. Why did everyone get so paranoid when they didn't here back from someone via PM? We only had one PM a day people, relax and chill a bit. And the reason they didn't try to tip u off in the thread? They didn't want to make themselves a target by letting on that they have an alliance. Oh well, what is past is past I guess. Just saying, this seemed pretty obvious to me.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

I'm disappointed that I have to vote for one of you three backstabbers. Convince me why you should be the backstabber that I vote for over the other two.

You know how hard I worked for the villagers and for our group therein. That alone is a pretty good reason.

Here is why I inserted my dagger between your fifth and sixth ribs, from behind, of course.

From my view, either you or Maple had to go. You two talked to each other first, and Maple brought you into our cadre. It seemed to me that, when push eventually came to shove, you were more likely to vote with Maple, whom you chose to talk to first when the game started, and Thomkal, whom you know far, far better than me since I don't play much WW. Sure, maybe I could have persuaded you to keep me around with my clever japes; but it was much easier (and safer) to let Brad and Racer do my dirty work. My japes ain't that clever.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

I guess chesapeake has decided he would prefer to answer questions tomorrow.

I've given you some indication in my earlier answer. Let me be more clear and maybe that will help.

It had nothing at all to do with how much you contributed or how well you played. You were a great team player (ironic, given your teamwork skill) and an asset to the villagers and our cadre.

You recognize already that someone in our alliance had to go at some point. I've explained why, in my own mind, you were the logical person to eliminate. Between ML, Thomkal and myself, I believed you were least likely to ultimately side with me. Whether that is accurate or not, of course I can't say, and had the game played out differently, I certainly may have changed my mind.

But Racer came out after you with guns blazing when the tribes merged. So the decision to eliminate you was facilitated significantly by the ease with which it could be accomplished. I felt the eliminations needed to happen in a balanced manner so that the people I had the most confidence in -- Thomkal, ML and Heybrad -- could best control the board while minimizing the possibility of an opposing alliance forming. We'd just taken out a wolf, it made sense to me to take a villager next.

Because you have the strong relationships with other WW players, you were always a threat to form other alliances. Yours was the head offered up; I took it. Had Darth's been the one in play, I may well have voted to take his instead, but that is not how the game went.

[chesapeake]

Dola...

Bedtime for me. I'll try to get to any more questions tomorrow.

[hoopsguy]

chesapeake, that doesn't add up to me. Maybe you did think I was more likely to vote for the other two, but you had no basis for that assumption since you never contacted me within or outside the thread to try and take the temperature.

Given the amount of PMs that you were sending, based on second-hand accounts from others, I'm having a hard time figuring why you wouldn't talk to me rather than trying to interpret where I might go.

Also, if you three had your "alliance within the alliance" already set, then all you did was make life more difficult for your group down the stretch by sacrificing an asset. If you had reason to believe I was going to backstab our group, I would get that. If you didn't want me in the final three I get that although it sounds like that was worked out before I was ever contacted by Maple Leafs.

The fact that you aren't refuting ML's version of events (he didn't vote me out, you and Thomkal did) is making this a lot easier for me.

But there are still plenty of other votes out there for you to win, maybe they'll be more sympathetic to your overall game. I'm just having a hard time getting around this admittedly personal aspect of the game and looking at the overall picture. Which likely speaks, in part, to why I wasn't the threat in this game that everyone seemed to assume that I would be.

[hoopsguy]

Dola - Darth was in play if we stuck to our alliance. The vote ended 4-3 with two people from our four person alliance voting for me.

You would have then had a four person alliance to control all future votes, making partnership with the other side irrelevant. You didn't need to negotiate with terrorists ... err, werewolf tribe.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Racer

Thomkal,

Unless you blow me away with your answers, I'm not going to vote for you. From what I can tell, you just road coattails and let Chesapeake do all the work. Tell me why I'm wrong and convince me that you were an under the radar mastermind ala Amanda in Survivor China.

Moving on, you ignored Heybrad, Danny, SnDvls, and I while we were in the game. Tell me why anyone on the jury should vote for someone who ignored two-thirds of the jury over someone who got their hands dirty like Chesapeake.

Maple Leafs and Thomkal,

Part of the game is being able to read the jury and know who's a threat to win and who has little or no chance. Why did you choose to take Chesapeake to the final three over Darth Villus? I understand Chesapeake was part of your alliance, but in my opinion he is a far greater threat to win the jury vote then DV. I am probably voting for him and I know of at least one other person on the jury that is probably voting for Ches as well.

DV had zero chance of getting my vote because quite honestly I am a bitter he didn't align with Heybrad and I when in my opinion it would have been in his best interest to do so. I know of at least one villager who probably wasn't going to vote for him either and I would guess he probably wasn't going to get Danny's or SnDvl's votes either.

Well Racer, I appreciate the honesty, but I hope you will still keep an open mind as we go through these questions. If you could see our original Villagers thread and our PM's you would see that I rode on no one's coattails. My knowledge of Survivor served the Villagers quite well as I made many suggestions based on my knowledge of the challenges that turned out to work and gave us all those victories.

I was the one of my alliance that didn't want Hoops in the alliance, but we came to the agreement that we would keep him for numbers sake until we felt we could safely vote him out. (sorry Hoops). He was the biggest threat physically in the game and well known and respected for his skills in games like this one. None of the three of us would have beaten him in a Final 3. So all that posturing I did when you and Danny were pushing for Hoops to be voted out? That was to convince Hoops that our alliance with him was still strong and he had nothing to worry about. As well as let heybrad and Darth know that I wasn't coming after them either. And when we voted you out, I was the most skilled physically contestant left and would have won any challenge that was more physical in nature. Just like I planned from the beginning-get rid of those who could challenge me there.

As for ignoring some of you, (I did talk to heybrad while were in the Inn) I should have reached out to you but did not for a couple reasons. First I had a weakness that I did not reveal until the last day of the game-I would take double Health damage if there was not enough Food in camp. That really hit me hard late in the game-at one point I was down to 2 Health Points because of it. That forced me to use up all my daily actions on Forage and Recuperate just so I could get healthy enough to spend extra effort on challenges when I needed to. The couple times I got extra messages, I had to save them for my alliance members.

The second reason was that I was very comfortable with my alliance. They were the two people I wanted in my alliance from the beginning based on my perceived view of their skills from their descriptions and their little knowledge of Werewolf and/or Survivor. I certainly considered breaking up the alliance at times, but I just felt I was in the right place. And to be fair, none of you reached out to me privately to gauge whether I would consider breaking the alliance, so you must have felt pretty strongly that I would not. And there's something to be said for that.

As for taking Chesa over Darth-I disagree that Darth would have had no chance. If he broke up the alliance that started on day 1 and held strong, that he would hold some merit with the jury I thought. The fact that he won a couple of Immunities there when he needed to also would have helped his cause. Just like you yourself Racer if you had got to the Final 3, you would have won. I also felt due to an agreement we made at the end, that both Maple and Chesa would vote for Darth if they were backstabbed and sent to the jury on that last tribal council.

Okay my novel is now bigger than yours I think I will be happy to follow up on my answers if you need more information/explanation.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

I'm disappointed that I have to vote for one of you three backstabbers. Convince me why you should be the backstabber that I vote for over the other two.

Because I was the one that stuck the knife in you. I didn't want you in the alliance originally, but was convinced to take you with the agreement that we get rid of you at some point where we felt safe to do so numbers wise. I was the one that continued to push for it, I was the one that finally convinced Chesapeake to do it at the point we did it. I have a lot of respect for your ability in these kind of games Hoops, and I know a lot of people playing in this game do too. That combined with your being a superior physical specimen than me, meant I had to get rid of you before you could dominate those kind of challenges.

My postings for when Danny and Racer were calling for us to vote you out were mostly for your benefit to let you know our "alliance" was still strong. Apparantly you bought it and never saw the backstab coming. So if you did your vote should go for the architect of your demise.

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

ML, since you are responding to questions - you sent me a PM the day of the tribe merge that was pretty much a "don't stray from the plan" message. Did you know at that time you were going to vote me out (prior to heybrad and Darth) at the first possible opportunity? Or was that something that emerged afterwards?

I knew you had a target on your back, but I didn't think it would be a problem yet. I assumed that at the very least we'd vote out all the Wolves before anyone was blindsided. Up to that point I'd always been able to convince Thomkal and chesapeake to go along with what I wanted, and I figured I'd be able to do it again when it came to keeping you around. But it turned out I was wrong.

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by Racer

Maple Leafs and Thomkal,

Part of the game is being able to read the jury and know who's a threat to win and who has little or no chance. Why did you choose to take Chesapeake to the final three over Darth Villus? I understand Chesapeake was part of your alliance, but in my opinion he is a far greater threat to win the jury vote then DV. I am probably voting for him and I know of at least one other person on the jury that is probably voting for Ches as well.

DV had zero chance of getting my vote because quite honestly I am a bitter he didn't align with Heybrad and I when in my opinion it would have been in his best interest to do so. I know of at least one villager who probably wasn't going to vote for him either and I would guess he probably wasn't going to get Danny's or SnDvl's votes either.

Sorry, realized I missed this the first time through.

Jury makeup is incredibly important and was on my mind almost from day one. But the way I looked at it, keeping chesapeake around was the better jury move.

Two reasons. First, if I blindside chesapeake I lose his vote for sure. At least with Darth, I'll have a chance to make my case.

Second, and more important: In Survivor, when a strong alliance emerges and controls the game, the jury will often end up resenting it, and only way to protect against that is make sure there aren't any other options. I felt like having Darth here as an "outsider" who broke up the alliance would make him a heavy favorite.

[Thomkal]

Catching on the other responses to Hoops now-Hoops one of the slogans for Survivor is to outwit your fellow contestants. You should vote for the one who outwitted you the most in your mind. I understand your anger over being backstabbed, but to vote for Maple simply because he didn't vote for you is not the right play here. Consider the bigger game here-why it was important to make sure you did not make the Final 3. Do you think you would have won or had a good chance of winning against any of us if you did like I did of you if you made it? Look at it from my point of view before deciding on your vote.

We can argue about the timing of the backstab, but remember we knew nothing about what challenges were ahead of us-if they had been more physical ones or physical enough for you to use extra effort to win them, you would have walked into the final 3 and a sure win. Sure it would have been better to wait, but I wasn't sure we would ever get another chance.

Edit: I also thought you might have a Food weakness like me, and were taking extra food from the rest of us. Given our lack of food at the end, I thought it better to get rid of you sooner rather than later.

[Racer]

Well thank you guys.

I think final jury performance is sort of like the final five minutes of a football game. I don't know who I'm going to vote for yet. I didn't like the answers I heard from the person who I planned on voting for coming in tonight while I thought the other two of you did an excellent job of articulating the reasons why you made the decisions you made.

[hoopsguy]

Thomkal, there is pretty much no chance that I would vote for you given that explanation. I understand that you are doing what you should do in a game like Survivor, and can respect you for doing that. But it is totally at odds with how I approach werewolf games.

A willingness to sacrifice for the good of the team is a core tenet of how I play as a wolf in these games and I certainly try to be a good teammate as a villager, albeit one with good information. Establishing friendly relationships with people within the thread is good for current games and creates a positive vibe for future games. I've always tried to be aware of that and not let my play, even when I'm competing to win, be a reason someone wouldn't want to play next game.

I completely understand that Survivor is not werewolf, even if we are playing it in the werewolf forum. And that a different set of skills are required for this game. But I'm having a difficult time making that distinction, because I went into our Alliance on good faith (you guys reached out to me, not the other way around) and did everything I could to see it succeed. To have you guys just toss that aside, especially in order to preserve a guy that wasn't sending in votes/orders no less, is mind-boggling to me.

Bottom line is that I'm annoyed/frustrated/hurt by this on some level that is kind of stupid for an Internet game. And that is my problem, not yours. I'll work on not carrying it over to future games, but it is almost certainly going to impact my vote today.

[hoopsguy]

You being the primary agent of my premature demise does not equal you being the primary driver of the faction getting to the final three.

Thomkal, my perceptions were that ML and chesapeake were doing more of the manipulating than you were. That was based on the fact that they sent the majority of the PMs within our group. If one of the other contestants wants to correct me on that, because there were clearly a number of telegrams I wasn't part of, feel free to do so.

[hoopsguy]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

A willingness to sacrifice for the good of the team is a core tenet of how I play as a wolf in these games and I certainly try to be a good teammate as a villager, albeit one with good information.

Should read "albeit one often lacking good information" ... don't know if we can edit posts at this point or not but figured I wouldn't chance it.

[hoopsguy]

The good news for ches/thom is that other members of the jury are likely to appreciate a good backstabbing a lot more than the person with the knife in the back. So best of luck winning those votes.

I'll work on trying to convince the swing voters to go with the person playing his first werewolf game that successfully blended elements of werewolf and survivor play - Maple Leafs. Who I also thought had a really terrific behind-the-scenes game in PMs and would love to have join us again for future games after this one wraps up.

[Racer]

I don't any more questions but I do have a few things to say.

Chesapeake, since Hoops has been the only other person to ask questions so far I thought I should tell you how you went from probably getting my vote to probably not getting my vote.

I think accounting for actions and playing the jury at the final tribal council is a pretty important component to the game of Survivor. I feel ML and Thomkal are doing both of these and that you are not doing either. Maybe you didn't know this, but the jury was allowed the to PM each other. Heybrad's one big hang up about voting for you is that you continue to insist that he turned on you before you turned on him. I was trying to swing his vote to you but I feel you completely whiffed on it. Maybe that's how you really feel, but I'm going to have a really hard time giving you my vote now after the way you answered that question.

I also kind of felt you were arguing with me with your answers instead of arguing for the decisions you made. I didn't feel that way with ML's or Thomkal's answers.


Feedback to the others:
Maple Leafs - I disagree with your refusal to lie to anyone in the game, but I love the way you are articulating why you made the decisions you did. I also like your defense of not getting back to me at six and that you brought up that your strategy of laying low help hide the fact that you were part of the power alliance.

Thomkal - I feel you have probably done the best job of answering questions so far. Your answer to Hoops's question isn't going to get you his vote, but you weren't going to to get his anyways. It might get you other people's vote now though such as mine. I also thought your response to my questions was excellent. The one big sticking point I have with voting for you is that I thought it was pretty obvious that you were in the power alliance although I'm not sure if Brad or DV realized that so that does weaken that point to an extent.

[Racer]

Just to add, I think in Survivor you have to be willing to make tough decisions. The one sticking point I have with voting for Maple Leafs is that he wasn't willing to go along with alliance to vote out Hoops. Hoops would have gotten my vote in the end and Thomkal and Ches voting him out when they did to ensure he didn't come anywhere close to facing the jury scores each of them a point in my book.

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by Racer

Just to add, I think in Survivor you have to be willing to make tough decisions.

Agreed, but they have to come at the right time. Leaving yourself with a three-man alliance when there's still six players left isn't the right time -- it was a risk we didn't need to take.

Like I told Hoops, I would have voted for him later in the game. But it was a mistake to do it that early, and we just got lucky that it didn't cost us.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

Thomkal, there is pretty much no chance that I would vote for you given that explanation. I understand that you are doing what you should do in a game like Survivor, and can respect you for doing that. But it is totally at odds with how I approach werewolf games.

A willingness to sacrifice for the good of the team is a core tenet of how I play as a wolf in these games and I certainly try to be a good teammate as a villager, albeit one with good information. Establishing friendly relationships with people within the thread is good for current games and creates a positive vibe for future games. I've always tried to be aware of that and not let my play, even when I'm competing to win, be a reason someone wouldn't want to play next game.

I completely understand that Survivor is not werewolf, even if we are playing it in the werewolf forum. And that a different set of skills are required for this game. But I'm having a difficult time making that distinction, because I went into our Alliance on good faith (you guys reached out to me, not the other way around) and did everything I could to see it succeed. To have you guys just toss that aside, especially in order to preserve a guy that wasn't sending in votes/orders no less, is mind-boggling to me.

Bottom line is that I'm annoyed/frustrated/hurt by this on some level that is kind of stupid for an Internet game. And that is my problem, not yours. I'll work on not carrying it over to future games, but it is almost certainly going to impact my vote today.

Okay then Hoops, thanks for the explanation of your mindset here. I am truly sorry that you are hurt by being backstabbed here. As I said before and said to Chesa and Maple privately, you are very well respected and liked for how you play Werewolf. That includes myself-I certainly try to play like you in Werewolf, and one of my first views for seer and other information views when I get that kind of role is on you because I know I will have a strong ally then. I hold nothing but respect for you.

So if my explanation of why I lead the charge to backstab offends you, all I can do is apologize. I thought given your WW experience that you would understand the reasoning behind making a power move like I did and respect it. The last thing I want you or anybody to do is see me in the signup list in one of these games and not play. I get so frustrated that people never seem to like or trust me in Werewolf when I try so hard to be the kind of player you are. And to my credit, I did hold true to my core alliance for the entire game, which should be something you can respect given what you said here.

But as you said this is Survivor not Werewolf. Let's be honest here, I would never win against you in a Final 3. You know it and I know it. It's why I didn't want you in the alliance in the first place. Not because I hate you, because I don't-its because your better than me in these kind of games. Please understand that the backstab came as nothing but with respect to a player and person of your ability. I did what I did because I thought it was a move that would be respected by those playing/voting by Survivor rules and gameplay, not Werewolf play. I hope that you and I can work together successfully and happily in many more games down the road.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

You being the primary agent of my premature demise does not equal you being the primary driver of the faction getting to the final three.

Thomkal, my perceptions were that ML and chesapeake were doing more of the manipulating than you were. That was based on the fact that they sent the majority of the PMs within our group. If one of the other contestants wants to correct me on that, because there were clearly a number of telegrams I wasn't part of, feel free to do so.

We left you off the PM's when we were discussing you, but I think that was the only time we did so unless Maple or Chesa correct me. I sent a lot of PM's to the group and was right there in the middle of it discussing strategy from day 1 forward.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Racer

Thomkal - I feel you have probably done the best job of answering questions so far. Your answer to Hoops's question isn't going to get you his vote, but you weren't going to to get his anyways. It might get you other people's vote now though such as mine. I also thought your response to my questions was excellent. The one big sticking point I have with voting for you is that I thought it was pretty obvious that you were in the power alliance although I'm not sure if Brad or DV realized that so that does weaken that point to an extent.

Yeah I didn't do a good job of hiding that at the end at least, I don't think Darth or Brad knew for a while that Maple, Chesa, and I were in an alliance together, though probably that I was in some kind of alliance, please correct me if I'm wrong. But I'm not sure its a negative point especially when we got down to smaller numbers. They had to know there was always going to be a voting bloc against them, even if they didn't know who exactly was in the alliance. Knowing that I was in it, perhaps made it less likely they would go after me either in tribal council vote or secret PM's to get me to break up the alliance.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

The good news for ches/thom is that other members of the jury are likely to appreciate a good backstabbing a lot more than the person with the knife in the back. So best of luck winning those votes.

I'll work on trying to convince the swing voters to go with the person playing his first werewolf game that successfully blended elements of werewolf and survivor play - Maple Leafs. Who I also thought had a really terrific behind-the-scenes game in PMs and would love to have join us again for future games after this one wraps up.

I want to second this. As I said earlier, I was happy to be in an alliance with two people who didn't have the experience that I did in this kind of game. Both played very well, and I would certainly be happy to see them both in future games.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by Racer

I think accounting for actions and playing the jury at the final tribal council is a pretty important component to the game of Survivor. I feel ML and Thomkal are doing both of these and that you are not doing either. Maybe you didn't know this, but the jury was allowed the to PM each other. Heybrad's one big hang up about voting for you is that you continue to insist that he turned on you before you turned on him. I was trying to swing his vote to you but I feel you completely whiffed on it. Maybe that's how you really feel, but I'm going to have a really hard time giving you my vote now after the way you answered that question.

I also kind of felt you were arguing with me with your answers instead of arguing for the decisions you made. I didn't feel that way with ML's or Thomkal's answers.

I've never watched a show of Survivor, nor do I play a whole lot of werewolf. So it doesn't surprise me that I not doing either to anyone's satisfaction I don't know if there are any Diplomacy players on the jury, but FWIW that is the game I know and the one I draw from most as I play this game.

I think I see what you are saying about my earlier answer. It comes off as cantankerous. I have been up with my baby most of the last two nights, helping her sleep and managing her high temperature. Indeed, I am an idiot for staying up as late as I did working on those answers; I should have doubled my sleep total for the night and waited to answer until today.

I hope, at least, that you understand why I interacted with you the way I did that day. Lying burns bridges, and I still wanted to work with you, knowing that I would probably need to before the end of hte game.

I'm still going to come off as grumpy here, but I will always believe that I did right by Brad this game. Your contention that I never intended to make him part of my top 3 is absolutely false. As I have said, he was neither completely in nor completely out of my top 3. My last message to him was taking his temperature on Thomkal, to see 1) what they had talked about at the inn; and 2) to see if that final 3 was possible.

Hoops talked about taking some of this personally. For some reason, I take this point very personally. If it costs me every vote in the jury, so be it. I'll get over losing an imaginary $1,000,000 sooner than I would with this perceived accusation against my integrity. Apologies -- I know I am blowing this out of proportion, but this is how I feel. I'll try to be more balanced on other questiosn.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

chesapeake, that doesn't add up to me. Maybe you did think I was more likely to vote for the other two, but you had no basis for that assumption since you never contacted me within or outside the thread to try and take the temperature.

Given the amount of PMs that you were sending, based on second-hand accounts from others, I'm having a hard time figuring why you wouldn't talk to me rather than trying to interpret where I might go.

Also, if you three had your "alliance within the alliance" already set, then all you did was make life more difficult for your group down the stretch by sacrificing an asset. If you had reason to believe I was going to backstab our group, I would get that. If you didn't want me in the final three I get that although it sounds like that was worked out before I was ever contacted by Maple Leafs.

The fact that you aren't refuting ML's version of events (he didn't vote me out, you and Thomkal did) is making this a lot easier for me.

But there are still plenty of other votes out there for you to win, maybe they'll be more sympathetic to your overall game. I'm just having a hard time getting around this admittedly personal aspect of the game and looking at the overall picture. Which likely speaks, in part, to why I wasn't the threat in this game that everyone seemed to assume that I would be.

I do not refute that I voted to send you off the island. My first answer to you I thought took responsibility for my action there.

I did send a lot of PM's, but as you know, they had to be constantly budgeted because they were often not enough.

Hoops, by the time it came to the point where I was ready to vote you off the island I already had 3 other guys, Thomkal, ML and heybrad, whom I felt pretty confident about. Sorry to be callous, but taking your temperature at that point with limited pm's had almost no value -- I needed to cut the number of folks in my 'inner circle' rather than add to it.

I feel your pain about the personal aspect of this. You feel like you played as well as you could with what you had and you lost, based in no small part, because of your WW reputation. That frustrates you because it is true.

[heybrad]

Good morning everybody. Congratulations on making the final three. To toot my own horn first, this was my first time in a social game on FOFC and I think I did pretty well. I can see now though, that my slow reaction to starting communications with people right at the beginning of the game was ultimately my downfall as it's clear alliances were in place well before I said anything to anybody. Also, I just want to let Autumn know that this was a blast. Now, onto questions...

Chesapeake... It appears to me that you were the mastermind behind your alliance. Of the three of you, you were the one that I communicated with the most. I think it's fair to say that you were the one who had to get your hands dirty the most. As you know, I reached out to you once I found the immunity idol and it took you a couple of days before you actually responded to me. I believe you told me you had board problems and couldn't respond. Knowing what I know now, I wonder if your delay in responding was by design as you strategized with your alliance. Is that the case? Also, was your delayed response to my PM telling you that I felt I needed to play the idol by design as well or just luck? Your non response pretty much forced me to play it which was a critical error on my part. I'll be honest, for the benefit of the other two in your alliance... right now I'm voting for you as you seemed to play the game the most of your 3 based on the interactions that I saw.

Maple Leafs... You revealed your alliance to me in a PM yesterday. Did you specifically do that thinking it would help you get my vote? Also, I guess I'd like to hear from you why I should vote for you over Chesapaeke. As I said above, it appears to me that he was left to do the dirty work. Did you figure that helped your chances with getting votes from the jury?

Thomkal... Thanks for taking me on the reward challenge. Why me? Was that specifically to get my jury vote? Outside of that, I don't think we communicated directly once during the game, so you get the same question as ML... why should I vote for you? There does seem to be a bit of coattail riding on your part.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by Maple Leafs

Agreed, but they have to come at the right time. Leaving yourself with a three-man alliance when there's still six players left isn't the right time -- it was a risk we didn't need to take.

Like I told Hoops, I would have voted for him later in the game. But it was a mistake to do it that early, and we just got lucky that it didn't cost us.

I had some knowledge you didn't. Heybrad and I were still friends at that point. I felt I still did have 4 votes. To me, the time was absolutely right.

[hoopsguy]

For the three who are still in it, if you weren't going to get the vote then who would you prefer to see win it? I think that others have asked questions that somewhat alluded to this, but I'll go ahead and ask it directly.

Please "show your work"

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

For the three who are still in it, if you weren't going to get the vote then who would you prefer to see win it?

Do you mean out of the three of us? Or out of everyone who played?

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by heybrad

Maple Leafs... You revealed your alliance to me in a PM yesterday. Did you specifically do that thinking it would help you get my vote?

The way I saw it, I had three options at that point. I could tell you I was going along with plan and then blindside you. That had a certain appeal, but it would probably cost me jury votes. I could ignore your PM, but that would make it seem like I wasn't paying attention at a crucial point in the game. Or I could just be honest: that there was astrong alliance and that you and Darth would need immunity to stay in the game.

It wasn't really a grand strategic move, it just seemed like the least bad option.

Originally Posted by heybrad

Also, I guess I'd like to hear from you why I should vote for you over Chesapaeke. As I said above, it appears to me that he was left to do the dirty work. Did you figure that helped your chances with getting votes from the jury?

It's tough to explain some of the dynamics since everyone other than Autumn only ever got to see small pieces of the big picture. But I'll put it this way: chesapeake wasn't the leader of the alliance, or the mastermind. He did his share and he played a good game, but that's about it. Each of the three of us took the lead in certain situations or discussions, but I don't think there was an overall leader and it definitely wasn't chesapeake.

In your case, chesapeake spent a lot of time talking to you (which I'd seen, by the way, because I "watched" him a few times during the game to see what else he was up to). But then he'd come back to the main group, tell us what the conversation was, and then we'd move ahead with the plan.

Honestly, I don't think he was doing any dirty work beyond trying to keep you on his good side as a potential jury vote.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by heybrad

Chesapeake... It appears to me that you were the mastermind behind your alliance. Of the three of you, you were the one that I communicated with the most. I think it's fair to say that you were the one who had to get your hands dirty the most. As you know, I reached out to you once I found the immunity idol and it took you a couple of days before you actually responded to me. I believe you told me you had board problems and couldn't respond. Knowing what I know now, I wonder if your delay in responding was by design as you strategized with your alliance. Is that the case? Also, was your delayed response to my PM telling you that I felt I needed to play the idol by design as well or just luck? Your non response pretty much forced me to play it which was a critical error on my part. I'll be honest, for the benefit of the other two in your alliance... right now I'm voting for you as you seemed to play the game the most of your 3 based on the interactions that I saw.

I seem to be thowing away votes every time I give honest answers to things. But, at the risk of alienating another vote, I'll tell you the truth, too.

IIRC, the switchover of the board on the OS servers happened during the early stages of this game. That may have been the issue there. I don't remember precisely. It seems more likely to have been that I wasn't expecting a PM from you and didn't have one to send back until the PM clock restarted.

I didn't tell my alliance anything specific about my relationship with you until the day we voted Hoops off, I think, and even then I kept most of what we said between us. Our discussions, and your idol, were too important to share with them until I felt I had to.

It is possible I let drop that I had casually talked to you earlier than that; I was constantly worried that someone would be following me during the day -- including ML and Thomkal -- to find out who else I might be in cahoots with. A throwaway disclosure to them that I had briefly talked to you would have mitigated some of the fallout from that.

I may be losing your vote by admitting this, but the night you used the idol was bad luck and not a machiavellian scheme on my part. I head home at 6 EDT and, like Autumn, I have to put the kids to bed, eat and spend some time with the wife. Then I can get back on at about 9:45 or so. Sometimes I can do a quick check while dinner is cooking, but not usually. This was one of those nights I couldn't. IIRC, I responded to you with my last PM to the villager group the second I got the message that you were worried.

The only real underhanded thing I did with you was deliberately trying to keep you seperate from my other alliance mates. You were much more valuable as an independent player open to working with me. If things went bad with the alliance I had, I felt I could rely on you to provide a plan B.

I encouraged Thomkal to take you to the inn for a reason. I knew Thomkal hadn't been talking outside our alliance because I had followed him a couple of times. So I believed he was honest when he said he intended to stick with me to the end. I knew that Maple Leafs had been talking to others, both because he admitted it and because I followed him, too.

Trust but verify.

My last PM to you was gauging your reaction to Thomkal for the purpose of adding you at the end and dropping Maple Leafs. Not to say that I had decided to go that route; I hadn't. But I wanted it available as an option. When you voted to send me off, of course, I had to stick with what I had.

I'm answering questions you didn't even ask. I should just shut up.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by Maple Leafs

But then he'd come back to the main group, tell us what the conversation was, and then we'd move ahead with the plan.

I just reread all of my PMs to this group. This statement is 100% not true. I don't even mention that I had a conversation with you in any of my PMs; rather, in reply to suggestion that someone talk to heybrad and Darth, I volunteer to ping heybrad. I had already been talking to him for 2 days at that point.

So, Maple Leafs may well have known we were talking by following me (and he was wise to follow me at least once), but I did not discuss the substance of my conversations with Brad at any time. Brad was much more valuable on the qt than in the open.

I did disclose the conversation I had with Racer -- after he had stopped replying to me. It may be that Maple is misremembering here.

[hoopsguy]

Originally Posted by Maple Leafs

Do you mean out of the three of us? Or out of everyone who played?

Of the three left, since anyone else is kind of inconsequential at this point.

[SnDvls]

Hello all,

As the first Jury member I have a unique perspective on this as I got to see ti all play out and got to "see" every new jury member join me with a bit of a bitter taste in their mouth. I too was a bit bitter about getting voted off at first, but have let the stewing rest. (beyond the problems I have with the ruleset and the game itself which will be brought up in the thread roundup/conclusion)

To all -
(1) Why should the other player win over you? (I won't accept a "they shouldn't either) I want to know what they did that makes them deserve the title of Survivor.

(2) What move in this game do you feel progressed you the furthest along?

(3) What move that you did do you regret the most? What would you have done different looking back now?

(4) If you were a woodchuck how much wood would you chuck?

(5) Pick a number 1-20?

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by heybrad

Thomkal... Thanks for taking me on the reward challenge. Why me? Was that specifically to get my jury vote? Outside of that, I don't think we communicated directly once during the game, so you get the same question as ML... why should I vote for you? There does seem to be a bit of coattail riding on your part.

Heybrad, you're welcome. The alliance discussed it and it basically came down to you and Darth. I chose you basically because I hadn't spoken to you all game, and I wanted to see if I could rectify it if I could. I asked Autumn if I could have PM rights with you while we were at the Inn, but of course that's the weekend you were off in Vegas so we didn't get to talk much. I wanted to see where you stood in regards to Racer-trying to urge you to get rid of him, and if there was anyway we could work to the Final 4 together-just trying to have some kind of backup plan. I actually had a "gentleman's agreement" with Darth early on in the game to not vote for each other, but he (I think, may have missed it) didn't respond to my follow up on it later in the game.

I certainly should have contacted you earlier, especially given our days in the FOBL together, but I got so comfortable with the alliance plus Hoops, I felt safe even without talking to you. But you never came to me with any offers of alliance either, so I figured you had alliances of your own and didn't need me to be a part of them. I should have tried with you though since it looked like for a long time you would be on the jury and would need justification to vote for me. But I also didn't betray you in the end because we had no agreements. So I can't blame you really if you felt like I did nothing to work with you in the game.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

For the three who are still in it, if you weren't going to get the vote then who would you prefer to see win it? I think that others have asked questions that somewhat alluded to this, but I'll go ahead and ask it directly.

Please "show your work"

I knew somebody was going to ask this lol. No offense to Maple, who played well, but I give the edge to Chesapeake over him. He was our tribe leader early on, and generally did a good job of it. Kept the discussions going, kept us on task, and made some decisions when were split on what to do.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Maple Leafs

It's tough to explain some of the dynamics since everyone other than Autumn only ever got to see small pieces of the big picture. But I'll put it this way: chesapeake wasn't the leader of the alliance, or the mastermind. He did his share and he played a good game, but that's about it. Each of the three of us took the lead in certain situations or discussions, but I don't think there was an overall leader and it definitely wasn't chesapeake.

Just wanted to say that I agree with this. Chesa may have been the tribe leader, but we were equals in the alliance. We all came up with ideas and strategies and shared what we knew of the other players when it was a good move for the alliance to know it.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

Of the three left, since anyone else is kind of inconsequential at this point.

Tough to answer. I feel I did so much in this game to guide it to where I wanted it to be, I don't know that there is another reasonable way to vote. Not that the others did nothing. Both made great contributions throughout.

Early in the game, I led the coordination so that the villagers consistently won the challenges and ended up in a dominant position over the wolves. That position was key to being able to get votes that protected my interests.

After the merge, I was the one that reached out to Racer and, even if it was not necessarily my primary intent, caused enough uncertainly on the wolf side to get him to give up the idol and got it out of the game. Racer may well have ended up in the top 3 had that not happened. I may have benefit from an unintended consequence; but it was still a consequence of work I did.

And, on the Hoops thing, I was the one that directed the votes such that our alliance looked like 2 and not 3. As Maple Leafs noted, he was reluctant to vote for Hoops, but said he would if I sided with Thomkal. I was the one that pushed him to stick with the Darth vote, specifially to hide our numbers. And I was pretty good about working it so that everyone thought I had an idol, even though I didn't. Had either not happened, Racer, heybrad and Darth almost certainly would have concentrated their votes on me and forced a tiebreaker v. Racer, the result of which couldn't possibly have ended well for me.

After that vote, the end game was simply coloring by numbers. There was no good reason for any of us to stray.

As to which of my companions I would vote for, I can make excellent cases for both. As I said, both had significant contributions and we wouldn't be in this position without the work done by each of us.

[Maple Leafs]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

For the three who are still in it, if you weren't going to get the vote then who would you prefer to see win it? I think that others have asked questions that somewhat alluded to this, but I'll go ahead and ask it directly.

Please "show your work"

I'd say either one, since I always saw them as a pretty solid pair and nobody in the alliance really stood out in terms of strategy, which is what I'd probably base my vote on.

But I know I won't get away with a non-answer, so I'll say Thomkal. He was the guy I approached for an alliance at the beginning (at the same time I approached you) and he never gave me any reason not to trust him.

And also, while neither of them won any immunity challenges, Thomkal at least won a reward. So he gets the edge in the "outplay" part.

[Darth Vilus]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

You didn't need to negotiate with terrorists ... err, werewolf tribe.

Lol, I'm pretty sure terrorists would've been able to build a decent camp

[Danny]

I don't have any questions as I've decided who I am voting for already based on what has been asked and answered.

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by SnDvls

Hello all,

As the first Jury member I have a unique perspective on this as I got to see ti all play out and got to "see" every new jury member join me with a bit of a bitter taste in their mouth. I too was a bit bitter about getting voted off at first, but have let the stewing rest. (beyond the problems I have with the ruleset and the game itself which will be brought up in the thread roundup/conclusion)

To all -
(1) Why should the other player win over you? (I won't accept a "they shouldn't either) I want to know what they did that makes them deserve the title of Survivor.

(2) What move in this game do you feel progressed you the furthest along?

(3) What move that you did do you regret the most? What would you have done different looking back now?

(4) If you were a woodchuck how much wood would you chuck?

(5) Pick a number 1-20?

My daughter has a temp of almost 103, so I will have to bolt soon to take her to the doctor. It is unlikley that I will be back on. Sick kids are a hands-on experience.

1) Both played excellent games. You want me to pick -- I'll take Thomkal. He better recognized what needed to be done when it needed to be done and then did it. But, again, Maple made outstanding contributions to our overall success.

2) The two biggest points in the game, from my perspective, were Racer giving up his idol and the vote with 6 left that led to Racer's departure. I had the larger hand in how both of those played out, by talking to you and then Racer directly and by working to obfuscate the true size of our alliance.

3) My first reply to Racer early this morning. Not being a Survivor watcher, (and being really, really tired) it took me until about an hour ago to get a read on this particular exercise. Had I better understood what Racer was asking, I would have answered more in line with this.

4) As much wood as a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.

5) 4

[chesapeake]

Originally Posted by Maple Leafs

And also, while neither of them won any immunity challenges, Thomkal at least won a reward. So he gets the edge in the "outplay" part.

Heh. This is a very fair criticism, although there was nothing I could do. My only above average skills were Camping, Food and Calm. It made more sense to me to conserve my energy and health on challenges since I didn't have a legitimate chance to win a challenge. I would then use the points I saved by not needing to recuperate for helping the tribe, messaging and following. It seemed the best use of my limited abilities.