Also hijacking onto Stephen's trend and I'm ranking my Top 5 episodes this season:
#5 EPISODE #7 — CHASER BETWEEN SIPS Jack voted out 2-1
Okay this episode left me emotionally scarred, but I think in hindsight it was great to watch. I appreciate this episode the same way I appreciate the first 10 minutes of the movie Up. Obviously Lexi gives a bottom-tier performance in this episode and I was pulling my hair out with frustration over it, but seeing Jack and Naomi have to pay for their blunder and saying their goodbyes to one another was pretty sweet to watch. I've just never gotten to see a vote like this before, where two #1's have no other choice but to battle against each other to curry favour with someone who just royally fucked up. And the stakes were so high! Loser is a pre-merger and the others whole game gets rejuvenated as they make the merge. Tragic, but beautiful episode.
#4 EPISODE #4 — THESE COLOURS DON'T BLEED Jenn voted out 5-1
Operation Burn Clotho To The Ground was a staggering success dear god. This episode like Stephen says ranks up highly just for the quadruple Tribal Councils. We got to see Jack finally wake up, Devon get ruthlessly blindsided after Jessaca & Devon swore on each other's favourite books, Jenn get blindsided by her number #1 ally Chris lmao, all of the personalities on Nu-Lachesis' come together, and the rise of Naomi as a god damn mafia boss who runs Meleager with an iron fist. Great episode all around.
#3 EPISODE #10 — FREE UP THE GAME Alejandro voted out 5-4
This was by far the most chaotic round to ever see unfold. This episode solidified the cast as just messy messy messy as I don't think a single plan held together for more than 30 minutes at a time. This was #1 on the highlight reel for Danny too (which is saying something because Danny has been consistently amazing all season) and his plan to get Naomi to split her vote from her alliance was nothing less than masterful and one of the best dupes I've ever seen even if you count the actual seasons of the show.
Seeing Alejandro get voted out by Jessaca after he told her about the idol, told her about every single alliance she wasn't in, told her she should default out Anders, and stopped everybodies plans to vote her out in the Abby boot was actually really satisfying to see. I adore Alejandro, but he threw his and his allies game away for Jessaca and this was the perfect ending for his story arc.
This is where the Devon experience really hit overdrive. Aaron through a weird mix of laziness and cockiness rightfully rubbed everyone in the cast (and me) the total wrong way and no vote out was juicier or made me jump out of my seat more. Aaron could've been a season ruiner had he stayed and coasted on his pre-game connections while simultaneously not caring about the game, so having him booted right before the swap was perfect. Seeing Devon begin his arc from evil gamebot to playing with just extreme emotion began here too.
Obviously all the entertainment in this round came from the terrible plan to try to loop Jessaca in 5 minutes before the vote. We got to see Jessaca make her first blunder of the season and ohhhhhhh boyyyyy did she make sure she never made another one. This episode just brought out the best in Jessaca, Devon, Danny & Lexi all together and it was a delight to watch.
#1 EPISODE #13 — BAD PLAYER Chris voted out 3-2-1
Jesus fucking Christ. I'm still honestly just not over the glorious clusterfuck of this entire round. You'll notice in the recording of the votes I'm just so flabbergasted by Matthew's decision that I forget to press stop record so you get to see some of the fallout in the Producer Chat & Viewers Chat. This cycle is just honestly one of the funniest things I've ever seen and I can't believe it happened.
We get to see people like Chris & Bryce finally coming off of the high of managing to have a vote go their way, Matthew overconfident as always that he's now going to be able to run things, Jessaca & Danny scrambling, the majorities timidness to ever go after Jessaca's idol coming back to haunt them all, and just the Matthew experience™. Bryce, Chris & Sarena pull off an amazing blindside on Jessaca, only to have it thwarted by Matthew being fucking blindsided by his own fucking plan and flipping oh my god. Best Tribal reactions of the season too.
Throwing it out there, Jessaca is the best player I've ever seen play in an online game. Her laying out what she should do and who she should cut here is masterful and she's even throwing out ideas that I haven't even thought of — and I have a birds eye view of the game. She is fucking incredible.
Conversely I just wanna make another post about Matthew. I love him and he is PHENOMENAL to watch! But he's just messed this game up hardcore. We're going to be in for an amazing jury speech if he makes the finals because he's begun to list why he thinks he'll have a hard time in his confessionals. He's cited "people will be mad that I played the middle" and "people will be mad that I played so aggressively" which aren't the case at all, so I don't know how good his read on the game is right now — but he's also dramatically overstating his impact on the game too. He was in control of only two votes this season, the Lexi boot and the Chris boot. The Lexi boot was a missed opportunity to take out Jessaca (who he couldn't take out because he needed her) and the less said about the fuck-up the size of France he had with the Chris boot, the better for his chances lol.
He's really pushing a narrative that this post-merge was about him though which it just flat-out wasn't. It was about Jessaca.
I guess I'll give my thoughts on the game and all. First of all, looks like I might have won fantasy survivor with my complete phone-it-in picks of the people that I already knew, which highlights how well they've all done I guess. Jess is doing as well as I would have expected but Matt and Naomi were way beyond my expectations for their performance and their character as well. So I'm proud of them all, although I hope Matt doesn't brag in our discord post-game too much.
Matt: Matt started up in an awful position at the merge and here he is at the final four. He's a charismatic guy that could have had an underdog story were he not...Matt. Matthew has randomly flipped for no reason more than once, including on the people that went to rocks for him (#justicefornaomi) a single round later. He has also been a complete meme, winning little despite claiming multiple times that he played optimally and could never lose. I really hope he goes to the end with Danny and wins, because that would validate all of his random garbage, and I am here for it.
Jess: I guess in the early merge people were like "maybe Jess is in a bad spot, maybe she shouldn't be sticking her neck out for Matt and Danny, maybe she shouldn't give Serena immunity". Well that's the final four. It's ridiculous that she was never targeted despite her idol being completely public knowledge, she's won two challenges in a row, she could easily take a third and win it. I hope she loses to Matt or Danny at the end though because I prefer meme outcomes to outcomes that make sense. I actually believe that she's been a really really good character as well, there's been some really compelling, emotional confessionals and storylines, not a boring character at all.
Danny: Danny and Matthew have basically been our comical relief through the merge and to see them both in the final four is priceless. However, I'm personally a player without any social skills at all, and I therefore really admire some of the ways Danny's hustled throughout the game in a pure strategic sense. I don't want to offend Danny after the game or anything but he seems like a genuinely strange guy. I love him to pieces as a character and given that Matt and he take each other (if they don't mess up), I think he might be the favourite to win this season?
Sarena: Great confessionals, great player, UTR most of the time to the three massive characters above (and Chris, Bryce, Alex etc) but always a fun character. And given how much these other three people have messed up during the game (not that Jess's were super super her fault but the others's really were), she easily could have won the whole thing. Robbed assuming she goes, I've not watched whatever Matt's posted recently yet.
Overall I've enjoyed watching this game way more than I ever would one of the normal games I play in or spectate. The characters in the game are on video and that makes it more real, you get a sense of who the person is unlike in anon games for sure. I would never be cast and I didn't have time but I would love to play a game such as this some day. Sorry for slacking and not keeping up recently Uhhhh I'm running a game on mafiascum in January, come down there. Peace.
I want to say thank you for this experience. I've watched a few other Skype ORGs before because MafiaScum people have been on it, but I've never stayed as engrossed with a game as this one. It's been fascinating from start to finish, and I love how organized and well put-together it is. I use Google Chrome and right now Endure is my top-visited website on my homepage. I'm going to miss spectating this when it ends though I guess it'll free up some time. It's been so great to talk about this season's fascinating characters with really cool people. I want to say all this because I'm about to say something about this game which I feel very strongly about, and I feel like this is a very me thing to do, but I want to get it out there. So if this is goodbye, goodbye!
Anyway, for a season that has been full of great challenges, this final challenge is very bad to me. I've seen a fair share of this challenge being used among many forum games and such; I think in the search to emulate an endurance challenge, it ultimately fails.
The description for this challenge says something like "who wants it most?" but could it be any more clear at this point that each of these Final 3 would want to win? Most any player who has made it to this point wants to win. They have already given so much to this game for a month. So to tell three people who've essentially compromised and sacrificed aspects of their real life for weeks that their ability to control their fate rests on them wrecking theoretically a day's worth of real life, sleep schedule, and just general health just doesn't work. It's now a battle of: who's going to stay at home all day? Who's going to luck out and not have to work? Who's going to be willing to skip out on work for this online survivor game?
"But Joe," you ask, "do you have similar issues with the F7 immunity challenge?" and I don't! Because this is a Skype game, that ability to literally create an endurance challenge was there, and it was executed, and yes probably 5 of those 8 hours were dreadfully boring, but it was simulated. Every castaway could look at and talk with every other castaway and consider how they were doing in this challenge, whether it was worth going another few minutes, whether they could win. This Final Immunity Challenge doesn't have that, and I think that's where it struggles. You're just asking people to post once every ten minutes with no idea of how the other two are doing or how they are going to do. It's why you get people going for hours more than the other two needlessly because they made simple mistakes.
I'm just kind of disappointed to see such a creative, innovative game end in one of the simplest variations of this posting challenge. I've seen tribal iterations of this where it forces people to be on call with one another for hours and bond. I've seen variations where you at least have to write various sentences to add some element of talent to it. This is so basic, and I get that that can make it seem like it's so "pure and raw and real" but I think it ultimately fails.
As a new prediction writer who has never applied for Endure, I'd be hesitant to apply for this game seeing this because I know this is a challenge I'm never going to win. I wouldn't want to play through an already stressful dozen or so rounds to end at a challenge I have no chance -- or no real desire -- to win, and one that I can't in any way gauge whether my effort is far too much. I've also been a juror when some version of this has been the FIC, and it almost defaults me to the person who didn't win, because I really don't care to enable someone who is willing to go to unhealthy lengths to win a game like this.
So yeah, that's my stance. Sucks, but I want to be someone who says something when I think something's not right, and this is me saying something.
Kilby, 2:52 PM
From Anders: "These players are TRASH socially"
Stephen, 2:53 PM
yeah matt didn't tie it?
Stephen, 2:53 PM
I hate this reservation he has that he gets 2nd no matter what like
Stephen, 2:54 PM
yeah own you played shit but who the fuck plays for runner up, like at least bring the person you have the best shot with and go for it -- and for him it's sarena
Stephen, 2:54 PM
but
Stephen, 2:54 PM
he's doing what he thinks is best
Jayden, 2:56 PM
i think sarena wouldve killed him at the end
Paige, 2:58 PM
I thought matt was so set on making it a tie, what happened? I slacked this round
Jayden, 3:00 PM
i think he just changed his mind
Paige, 3:01 PM
oh ok
Jayden, 3:07 PM
From Anders: "Sarena please tell me you're not rooting for Jess"
Jayden, 3:07 PM
anders literally every single time someone joins jury
Jordan, 3:07 PM
we love a bitter juror
Paige, 3:08 PM
wow anders
Kilby, 3:08 PM
hes the worst juror i h ave ever seen by a decent margin
Kilby, 3:08 PM
its actually embarassing
Nick, 3:09 PM
Who's the front runner to win?
Sam, 3:09 PM
jess lol
Sam, 3:09 PM
everyone just ignores anders
Jayden, 3:09 PM
I don't think so
Jayden, 3:10 PM
I've heard lots of pro-Danny stuff
Jayden, 3:10 PM
Bryce is pretty anti-Jessaca for voting him out
Jordan, 3:10 PM
2018 is a weird simulation
Sam, 3:10 PM
alex lexi and anders are pro-danny
Jayden, 3:10 PM
And Chris
Sam, 3:10 PM
chris thinks he's fake af
Jayden, 3:10 PM
Chris put Matt before Jessaca in terms of people he'd vote for
Sam, 3:10 PM
i think danny will shit the bed at ftc
Jayden, 3:10 PM
I just did Chris' exit interview sam
Jayden, 3:10 PM
I think Danny is 3rd honestly
Nick, 3:11 PM
How badly is Matt going to get dragged at ftc
Jayden, 3:11 PM
Jess will win FIC and had said she's leaning on taking matt
Jayden, 3:11 PM
Which is the right call imo
Jayden, 3:11 PM
Honestly no matter how hard he gets dragged its not hard enough lol
Sam, 3:11 PM
i think either option is safe for a jess win tbh
Sam, 3:11 PM
neither matt nor danny have to social skills
Sam, 3:11 PM
the* not to
Paige, 3:12 PM
will danny vote jess even if she takes him out?
Kilby, 3:12 PM
who knows
Sam, 3:12 PM
i think one person yells at danny and he's done for the night
Nick, 3:12 PM
How in the world did Jess get to a final 3 with Danny and Matt
Kilby, 3:12 PM
anders is sort of proving that if you repeat something 4000000 times people start listening
Paige, 3:12 PM
i think one person yells at danny and he's done for the night
typical danny
Kilby, 3:13 PM
realistically i do think jess wins anyway
Kilby, 3:13 PM
sarena/lexi/alex/(whoever is booted)
Sam, 3:14 PM
most sensible people throw bitterness out the window when they realize a winner is someone who represents your season
Jayden, 3:14 PM
I just legitimately feel gross in anticipation for whatever bullshit Anders is going to scream at Jessaca at FTC
Kilby, 3:14 PM
^
Kilby, 3:15 PM
at the top of his lungs
Nick, 3:15 PM
How is he still mad 3 weeks later
Jayden, 3:15 PM
I honestly don't think he's mad.
Jayden, 3:15 PM
He's DM'd me saying that like, he's trying to manipulate the jury.
Jordan, 3:15 PM
i want his face to get red again
Sam, 3:15 PM
do you want the nice answer or the mean answer
Jayden, 3:15 PM
He's in a state where I think he wants to be like some iconic bitter juror and have an impat on the season.
Jordan, 3:15 PM
both
Jayden, 3:15 PM
I want the mean answer.
Nick, 3:15 PM
Mean
Jayden, 3:16 PM
And I think he sees that if he costs Jessaca the jury vote that makes the season's arc about him.
Sam, 3:16 PM
he realizes he had literally zero impact on the game and is holding on to what little he has
Kilby, 3:16 PM
^
Nick, 3:16 PM
Jayden nailed it too lol
Kilby, 3:16 PM
hes not mad hes just pathetic
Sam, 3:16 PM
boop
Sam, 3:16 PM
just like dustin
Kilby, 3:16 PM
yea
Sam, 3:17 PM
if jess lost in that regard it wouldn't be about him anyways
Sam, 3:17 PM
it would be on her mistreatment of chris and bryce
Kilby, 3:17 PM
you being shitty isnt a narrative about you lmao
Jayden, 3:17 PM
Yeah agreed sam
Sam, 3:17 PM
but i think the way danny treated people is definitely more prevelant
Sam, 3:18 PM
esp when you look at like sarena and naomi
Sam, 3:18 PM
danny was actively a sociopath where jess just ignored people
Sam, 3:18 PM
so it's kind of which type of jury management you prefer
Nick, 3:19 PM
I always think the best jury speeches are from the people who aren't trying to be iconic
Kilby, 3:19 PM
^
Kilby, 3:19 PM
every "im gonna be iconic" jury speech is sad and like a old sad man yelling into his newspaper
Sam, 3:19 PM
my biggest pet peeve will always be people who think them makinng big moves on the jury will make them memorable
Kilby, 3:20 PM
^^^^^
Kilby, 3:20 PM
you lost your job is to pick the winner thats it
Sam, 3:20 PM
like at the end of the day even if you manipulate the vote to a worse winner, that winner will be remembered over you every time
Sam, 3:21 PM
so it's like, if danny or matt win over jess, like anders tribal council will still just be a blip on the map
Kilby, 3:21 PM
yea
Sam, 3:21 PM
episodically it wasn't even that exciting compared to every post-abby tribal
Kilby, 3:21 PM
and now any good will anders had is like
Kilby, 3:21 PM
"oh hes the guy who shouted nonstop for 3 weeks, yikes"
Kilby, 3:22 PM
yea
Kilby, 3:22 PM
it was one of the least interesting episodes
Kilby, 3:22 PM
of the post merge lol
Sam, 3:22 PM
it'll be clay jordan winning instead of brian rip
OMG I slacked this weekend but I will try to give a few quick thoughts. Well rip Sarena with getting 4th but congrats to her on improving so much and being the last standing of the returners. I really hope Jessaca wins, she has played a great game, had a lot of confidence and was willing to take risks. She gathered people together that she saw would benefit her game and basically made them work together. If Jess isn't in the end I want Danny to win, he was able to make himself safe for so many round of this game, he did rely on Jess a bit but i think they worked well together, he will have a tough road if he makes the final tribal. and then their is Matt, who a lot of these last few rounds happened because of mistakes he made/him flipping but i think he will end up shooting himself in the foot if he makes tribal with saying how he had so much control and different things. I really hope Anders isn't bitter but I think Jess can still pull off the win even so. This challenge will be interesting to see how each of them do. and congrats to nick for finally having a friend lost in the maze with him
Jessaca winning is definitely my first preference as of the moment, but I would really love a Danny win too. A Matthew win I'm sure I'd eventually ironically love, lmfao.
Matt has officially started the challenge. I'm surprised Jess or Danny haven't yet. This is one of those that if you wait too long to start and someone keeps going then you really don't have a shot to win
Hi guys welcome to today's episode of wat the fuk is matt doing/talking aobut
Matthew, 8:42 AM
So I'm basically just posting on the switcjhc
Yeah I'm not looking at the forum
I'm at work
So the system I have in place basically makes it very easy for me to post at basically the same time every time
Thanks board clock for being 15 seconds ahead of Apple
Because if it were the other way it'd be much weirder
Matthew, 9:27 AM
Man I lost my bot-ness
I need to tinker with my timer setting a bit. 10 minutes isn't quite right
--
I do not understand what is so difficult about setting a timer to post especially when the rules are:
Quote
t does not have to be exactly ten minutes, meaning the seconds don't have to match. If your first post is anywhere in the 8:00 minute, your next post must be anywhere within the 8:10 minute. So if you post at 9:00:08, you don't have to post again right at 9:10:08, it just needs to be within that minute for it to count. If you post early, you may delete it and post at the correct time, but if you post late and miss the minute you're supposed to hit, you're out of the challenge.
Danny just threw this challenge lol. He has been blind and following an assumption that “Jessaca will never turn on me” all game which has never been true, and Jessaca per her confessionals is absolutely planning on taking Matthew to the end. Throwing is so dumb and I kind of hope Jessaca wins and cuts Danny because it’d just be funny after this overconfidence.
