Brian's Bamboozling Decision Time

[briansback]

Congratulations to all three of you making the finals. It is no easy feat, so props are in order. Now, it's time for a few critiques on your opening statements.

1. LJ, I knew you didn't trust me following the Teresa vote thanks to my man Austin.
2. Katie, it wasn't you who came up with the plan to vote out Austin, nor did you "convince" Kass to do it. It was you, until I reminded Kass of her double vote, then we planned on targeting Yul until she wanted to switch it to Austin.

Question time.

Candice, your gameplay is hilarious and infuriating at the same time. Being borderline inactive is a great way to get booted very early, or go very far and it paid off. However, that strategy made it almost impossible for you to win, because you had no social game. Why should I vote for you, who didn't make many bonds, over Katie and LJ?

Katie, your gameplay is marked with social unawareness and strategic unawareness until the F8. After that, you played strong strategically. You said in your opening statement that you were in danger constantly, which shows off how little you were focused on this game. On Athena, and correct me if I'm wrong Teresa/LJ, but I don't recall you ever being targeted. On Hades, Sabrina was more likely to leave as per Austin, and then come the merge you were only in danger when the Austin vote went down. The basis for your opening statement made it seem like you had to overcome a ton of hardships, but those hardships never existed. My question for you is, why did you only start playing strategically (albeit, strongly) at 8?

LJ, your game was noble and honest, but also kind of boring. There's nothing wrong with playing a social UTR game, and you did it better than Candice did because you actually talked to people more frequently. If your strategy from day one was follow the strategic players and then let them decimate each other, you did an exceptionally good job. However, it didn't seem like you made any moves in the game besides be a nice person. My question is, if you did make any moves, what were they?

Now, this one is for all of you. I want each of you to choose a Survivor winner to describe your gameplay, and then describe the other member's gameplay as Survivors who lost at the end. Good luck to all of you, and I'm excited to see your answers.

[katiecollins]

In response to your critique: The reason Kass switched to Austin was because I logged on AIM and convinced her that voting Yul with the double vote would be a stupid plan when Austin had an idol. So yes it was a Kass decision but I had major sway in it.

You say those hardships I cited never existed, but they did. On Athena it's true I wasn't the next target or anything, but I also wasn't part of the alliance at any point so I would have been undoubtedly been picked off by you guys at some point. That puts me in a vulnerable position, and I had no way to know who you guys were targeting. And in Hades being the second in line to be booted is just as terrifying and to be honest I'm not sure they would have even kept me over Sabrina anyways. And if they had kept me over Sabrina then I'd still be stranded on a tribe without a lifevest. And the merge was also a great hardship because I was on the outside and didn't even know it so there's that. My game definitely had some hardships regardless of how you look at it.

In response to your question: It's not like I only decided to start playing strategically at the final 8. I just never really had the opportunity to play a strong game before then. The earlier round I only went to tribal twice and both of those times saw inactives picked off so it was no big thing. Then the merge came around and like you said I was socially unaware, so I had no idea about that giant alliance so I thought I was playing a stronger game than I really was. It's true my game got so much better at that point, and it's mostly due to the fact that I learned to take almost no one at face value, which in turn put me in the position to make a bunch of strategic moves in the late game.

[briansback]

Thank you for your answer.

[LJ McKanas]

Thanks Brian. To answer your question, my main role throughout the game was basically be a wallflower meaning I observed, I listened and I talked to who I think had the most power, who I can get to flip and who can be a good asset to me down the line but also not be non existent. I would say the plan to get you out was in part set in motion because I decided to talk to Katie. It is such a feat considering I wrote her name down the round prior and I wasn't even sure she was going to do it. If I had not made that move, by the way you were telling me that I needed to win the next immunity, it would have meant I would have gone home if I just went with the plan in voting out Yul. In essence, I would have been the deciding factor in that case because I could have just easily switched my vote to Yul just to be done with it. This is of course in my perspective alone. Also, I have always took the noble route and stayed loyal to those I said I would be loyal to and only broke my loyalty to you when I knew you were playing with Kass and not for the Athena anymore. And lastly, I played this game alone from the beginning, meaning I did not knew anyone coming in. People kept telling me who knew who but I have no idea who you guys are or what relationships you guys have outside the game. I did not have that coming in to here and I believe that my relationships were all built from scratch and if that didn't kept me off the radar with anyone then I don't really know what did. I have also downplayed my strength in puzzles because if I had an amazing score like Julie had I'm sure people will think twice to not take me out earlier. Yes, it may seem I was just sitting back and letting you guys take each other out but that doesn't mean I wasn't constantly gathering information and thinking about which route was best for me. As Sandra always said, as long as it's not me going home then I'm good.

As for your second question. I would liken my gameplay with Sandra, she was never talked about, she was never the vote but she kept moving forward. She was not responsible for most of the jury being voted out which was similar to me since I was not a part of most of the vote out. And like I said, as long as it's not me, I know I live another day in this game. Only difference is I did win a challenge that was basically my only way to get to the final 3 since I had a feeling no one else was going to keep myself safe.

I would liken Katie and Candice's gameplay to Becky. They were just there floating by and waiting for the world to happen. They couldn't even cook the rice properly. I swear some burnt rice is still stuck between my teeth up to this day.

Thank you for your questions Brian and good luck with your decision

[katiecollins]

First off, can I just point out that I approached LJ for the Brian boot because I thought he was my biggest threat? Let's not get this twisted here because I approached LJ for that one and not the other way around.

Anywho, it seems I glossed over the final question for everyone so my bad i'll answer that now.
Wow it's actually really hard to choose a winner that I played most like but looking at the list of winners I'd have to say Tony, but with the caveat that I didn't have any immunity idols. He had a subset of people (Trish, Woo) who he was always loyal to but he flipped back and forth between his own alliance and the other side to eliminate potential threats before they popped up, and that's really what I feel like I did. (In this scenario, Kass is Trish putting out some of my fires in the game and Candice is Woo).

For Candice, I'm going to say Natalie Tenerelli because they were both sexy and made the final 3 while having minimal impact on the season as a whole. For LJ, I would say Ozzy (in CI) because he was very well liked socially and able to pull out a key immunity win, but ultimately was not a strategic enough player.