I'm frantically rushing through work so i can leave early and go home to sit nervously and fret about results

DRACO

I have a ton of respect for him staying committed despite personal circumstances and I think he played a pretty solid UTR/CP game. He's frustrating to play with because he holds all information close to himself and collects it without sharing and that makes it hard to trust him or form a relationship that doesn't have more give than take. But it's a wise approach thay leaves everyone open to him as a peripheral ally.

I feel like he probably has a history of deep ORG runs and has played more overtly strategic before because he had good tactical instincts. Personal stuff kept him from being too active in the ppst-merge and inadvertedly gave him the CP pre-merge to UTR post merge edgic that is the sureest possible way to get to FTC (people have seen you strategize so they don't see you as unpredictable, but they know you are less active and won't be the one shepherding a blindside).

I was impressed by his FTC and enjoyed him when he was around at times when we could talk about nonstrategy. I don't think I could vote for the game he specifically played here but I don't think that makes him a bad ORG player.

I absolutely wish him and his family the best and hope we can play together again whenever he feels comfortable enough to return.

RON

I just wrote out about 700 words about Ron and then erased it. Now isn't the time or the place for that, I'm too emotional with this deadline coming up to write a coherent reflection that I won't regret tomorrow.

Suffice to say, I underestimated Ron every step of the way. He played a great game that probably faltered a bit around end-game and jury management, but should not take away from how perfectly he avoided being the target all the way. He deserves to get credit for that. And tbh I have mixed feelings about whether jury management should matter - I generally don't think jurors should be petty, but it's inevitable that some will be so players should plan for that. In terms of actual gameplay, he was right among there with among the best in this cast. I don't regret giving him a hard time at FTC, I felt that it was the right thing to do for my game and he gave a lot of people a much harder time, including that poor person whose laundry he soaked. So he needs to be able to take a few knocks if he's going to be dishing them out.

I think I'll leave it there. He played well, he was active, he helped me out more than he probably should have and he's doing some introspection at FTC, which I think is important and I don't think I need to pile on any more than the jury has. If he wins tonight, he probably won't give a shit about what any of these people said and he'll have earned the right to celebrate a game well played.

I'm actually gonna throw up