Board Thread:Season 56 - Mongolia/@comment-25005834-20191227232355

Hello Jury! First of all, I hope everyone had an amazing Christmas and I wish happy holidays to all of you. <3 It honestly feels surreal to be in this position right now and with that, I have got to say a massive thank you to the hosts for running this season, and thank you to everyone, Jury included, for making this season absolutely spectacular! It has been an unforgettable, emotional, roller-coaster of an experience and it’s been great to meet so many wonderful people.

Before I begin, I’d like to outline that my opening statement will be structured initially with my journey in the game and reasoning of choices that I’ve made, followed by how I achieved the overall elements of the game throughout the season. I tend to write a lot for the sake of this game (my confessionals are around 40k words, 70 pages in total!) but I will try to keep this as concise as possible for you all. [Edit: It’s long, I’m sorry. Feel free to skim the ‘My Story’ part or find the part you need to save time, but I advise a complete read of the ‘Why Should You Vote For Me?’ and the conclusion. Thank you!] Now, onto the statement!

PRE-MERGE

The premerge portion of any season is pivotal in forming close and instant connections that would be incredibly vital for the rest of the game. And I have formed these bonds, even without needing to go to Tribal Council more than once. On OG Mori, I immediately formed a close pair with Patrick and another with Bradley. We formed an alliance of three but sadly Patrick had to quit due to unforeseeable circumstances. While this was a setback to having enough close relationships, I still had Bradley and our tribe remained strong as we continued to win every single challenge prior to the swap. I also formed a great trust with Tal, opening another door for me. And my relationship with him showed to be fruitful when reuniting in the merge, especially after the Bradley vote. More on that later.

Swapping on NuSarlag, I was happy to meet Logan C., Carlo, Randy, Ruth, and Kyle. Bradley and I managed to connect with Ruth and Kyle so closely that a “Lovers” alliance of us four was birthed. Our alliance worked together so well that we pulled off an amazing 4-3-1 move to blindside Logan A., in worry that he would change to work with OG Sarlag. I did feel bad for him but like many, it’s my belief to work with people we could trust. I calmly explained the vote with OG Sarlag who voted for me and who we also blindsided so that in addition to Bradley, Ruth, and Kyle, I was also able to work with them come merge.

EARLY MERGE

In this stage, I was hit with many votes that were undesirable to me. Yet I managed to solidify and expand my social connections to move forward. Once the merge hit, it was overwhelming talking to so many people, but a unanimous Randy vote was imminent. However Evan created a split vote plan involving everyone except OG Sarlag. Bradley and I stuck with it, but because I wanted strong connections with Sarlag despite them voting me, I secretly told Logan about the obvious plan and the OPPE alliance to get into his good graces. I was almost caught because I didn’t tell Carlo early enough, so he erroneously panicked to confront Evan, but Logan, Carlo and I managed to rectify the situation and I was cleared of suspicion of sharing the alliance. Therefore my options remained very open; I could work with Sarlag or with Tarvaga/Gatsuur.

The votes were weird next, with the target eventually settling on Evan and Kyle. I was pulled into a last-minute plan by Bradley to work with them to blindside Logan, but crazy idol plays led to an iconic Kyle boot. It seemed like we were all fooled by Logan’s idol play, but unfortunately I fell on the worst end of it. So I had to do some serious damage control with Logan, which worked as I was able to survive the next few votes. It could have been easier to avoid them, but no, I put in the extra effort to keep my options open. So apparently I heard a lot of misinformation with that vote, and Bradley, along with his two individual immunity wins, was seen as a strategic threat more than ever.

Now the Bradley vote was a turning point in my game. I won a difficult Jigsaw Immunity, but I lost my closest ally which was bound to happen sooner or later. I was the only one who voted with him, and almost everybody lied to me at this point to make me think the vote was Evan. Except I was perceptive and I knew that it wasn’t the vote everyone had me expect: I sensed Ruth’s behaviour to be substantially different from the usual, and Logan told me that everybody, including Megan, knew about the vote for Evan, except that Megan later claimed to me she didn’t know about the vote until I told her. This suspicious info led me to deduce that Bradley was the vote, and I got Logan to honestly confirm it with me. So even before the eight votes towards Bradley were revealed, I had already forged my path ahead with Logan and his alliance, while still having a trust with Tal. I was prepared. I integrated myself. I wasn’t the easy vote people may have thought I was just because I was no longer in a duo.

Ruth didn’t explain to me her vote for Bradley until the day after and Megan left me on read for three days despite lying to me, so it was harder to work with them by default. I continued to vote with Logan, Carlo, and Ty for the next two Tribals and survive both of them even when losing Bradley. This was when barely anybody trusted Tal but because of my bond with him, which appeared secret to others, we stuck with each other to form the majority. Even though we were all shook at Megan’s idol, and Carlo’s observant idol play and lone valid vote that took out Jacob, we stuck together to vote Ruth at the next Tribal. Now Ruth left with fierce words and I comforted Logan who was clearly upset by them. She also directed some words to me, labelled “pathetic” for ‘following’ the people who have burned me before, and I understand that. It looked that way. But it was part of my strategy. I believed that it was not yet the time to make a move, but now that it was closer to the end, I willed myself to.

THE ENDGAME

So I did. On F7 onwards, I burst through the perception of being “pathetic” and being a follower under allies like Bradley and OG Sarlag, making decisions for myself which ultimately controlled most votes. Something I learned to demonstrate at this stage that I am not proud to do in real life, was to separate my personal feelings from the game’s strategy, leading me to make incredibly hard decisions in trying to win this game. One of which came in the Tal vote. I made myself open with Evan, Megan, and Ty to learn about Logan’s idol, which I then verified with him. So I voted for Logan, telling him to play it so it is at least flushed while I remain loyal to Tal, the secondary target. I later learned that there was a plan to vote Tal instead, but luck was on my side as if Evan or I did not vote for Logan then, we would have kept two idols in the game. So I still had great options having Evan’s trust in me, and with proper conversation I could continue to work with Logan and Carlo.

Because I managed to have relationships with almost everybody left at this point even when losing Tal, I was in a position where I was able to either easily join Ty, Evan, and Megan to vote Logan, or join Logan and Carlo to vote Ty, which required a lot more work as it would risk a tie. The decision to pursue the latter was not actually to keep Logan or Carlo until the end, but to prevent Evan or Megan or Ty for getting the credit of orchestrating a vote against Logan. I needed to make my move to control the game, and I did my carefully working both sides in order for Evan, Megan, and Ty not to see the vote coming.

I admit that I was blindsided by Logan’s idoling out of Evan next vote, but we were all fooled by it, except Logan who had another one up on us. But I did see through Evan’s messages about Logan’s “negative comments” about Carlo, Megan and I which convinced Carlo and Megan to vote for Logan, but I was the only one to ask Logan about it. This was because I knew it wasn’t like Logan to be as cocky as he appeared, and I learned not to trust information just because it was new (see: F11). I only voted for Logan because of his threat status of correctly playing two idols and voting correctly often, regardless of the rumour about him.

So I still needed to demonstrate my control in this game by taking Logan, who just increased his winning chances with the idol play, out despite our personal connections. And I did by winning the hardest, most important Immunity Challenge in the game, preventing a threat from reaching FTC, and allowing me to make my own move. The hardest decision in the game got harder when I was attempted to be persuaded by Carlo and Logan to vote for Megan because she was the bigger threat. But I resisted their temptation to flip and vote Megan out. I resisted the temptation to flip to the dominant duo who I know I’ve been perceived to be coat-tail riding. I had the mind of my own here – Megan did not even convince me – I stood for myself, as much as it hurt to vote out a friend. I made the move I always needed to do – cause the person who has survived three Tribal Councils, the person who has had close relationships with all three of us, the person who has voted correctly the most, to be eliminated once and for all.

I played the SOCIAL game.

I always consider myself a shy and awkward mess IRL so I wasn’t that high on my social game coming into this season. A lot of you know that I struggle to talk in large groups, and that I am afraid of calls. And this was not helped by the time zone this Aussie is in, away from the bulk of the activity. In spite of all this, I love this game and I knew the importance of communication, so I committed to talk with all of you, get to know your interests, getting up early, checking up on everyone, no matter how hard. So I felt like I have improved myself and I’ve worked my social life so much, and it shows – by me being at the end for my first time. On a side note, I sincerely apologise if any of my messages came out annoying/uncomfortable to any of you as it was never my intention to do so.

Moreover, I always attempted to explain to people, in a very calm manner and using my knowledge, the way the vote went down if they ever fell on the wrong side of the vote or if I voted in a way they didn’t expect. Similarly, I have always tried to make people feel better if I find that they are hurt by the game, like Logan after Ruth’s final words. It’s easy to forget that these are real people that we’re playing with and so I just need to fulfil the duty to ensure people are okay. And my very calm demeanour strongly helped me to be kept in the loop of most votes and work with many people, even those who I have voted against. For example, the F7 and F6 had Evan, Logan and more try to get me to vote with them, even though I have burned them both before.

One more thing, I am the only one here to make it to Final Tribal Council without finding an idol. I never got to exhibit the skill of using an idol, but rather I exhibited the strength of my social game – navigating this way to the end using many of my connections which I have tried hard to form, without the ease of any safety measures.

I played the STRATEGIC game.

With this game rampant in strategy, I demonstrated my own strategy throughout the game by not appearing a threat in the beginning. I didn’t submit overly high scores in challenges, nor have I spearheaded votes early so I wouldn’t be disliked or seen as a strategic threat. Instead I aligned with threats who would be targeted before me, including Bradley who was voted out due to being a physical and strategic threat, and Logan, who had relationships with all three of us here and who flawlessly protected himself from three attempts to vote him out, with three idols.

My communication with others about the vote helped me to keep close with a lot of people and be in the loop of many votes. I was not limited from working with anyone after voting for them. I worked with Logan and Evan even though they have voted for me and vice versa. My options were maximised, and that enabled me to make it further into the game.

But I changed. I knew my under-the-radar approach was not enough to increase my chances of winning. Especially with Ruth’s words to me. Thus I made an effort to control votes in the end where I am less likely to be targeted, by forming a blindside at the Final 6 and by successfully forcing a fire-making challenge to get what I want in eliminating the threat in Logan. This was my strategy to at least get me here to this point with enough moves on my side, and it worked in this crazy and unpredictable season.

I played the PHYSICAL game.

I know many people underestimate the physical element of the game, but I believe it needs to be viewed fairly, as it is a testament to people’s endeavour to win in this game, and it’s also the mechanic to avoid the very thing which needs to be avoided, being Tribal Council. I managed to avoid it every single time in the pre-merge sans the mandatory Double Tribal Council, and this manifests in my hard work, wanting to help me and my tribes of OG Mori and NuSarlag be safe from danger. Not only was I safe, but I helped our OG Mori be the most dominant tribe pre-swap, the only tribe to never get below second in both Immunity and Reward challenges. However, I understand that there needs to be a balance, as dominant performances in the pre-merge can paint a target on you. So I demonstrated restraint in one challenge (not the one where we sold fruit lol) – Four-Second Frenzy. I submitted a score of 397, but my highest score was actually 826, 398 points more than the highest score obtained by Bradley, which would surely out me as a physical threat, and I avoided that. Here’s proof of which I saved for this moment:



Furthermore, I am the only one here who has won at least two Individual Immunity Challenges, including all of the mini-challenges in that really stressful, arduous FIC. Mind you, these were not challenges which had luck as a major element, but challenges that required extremely hard work and various skills to win. The Jigsaw Puzzle, the Axon flash game – all needed many monotonous attempts. I dedicated a lot of time to this game by posting every 30 minutes for 33 long hours to conquer the Endurance trial. But I’m by far most happy to prevail in the Tribe Flag trial. I am honestly proud to create the flag that would represent all of us here right now in this grand season! We are Ulaan Chono forever:



I also consider that the physical aspect of the game indicates one’s effort to try hard in the game despite any adversity. While I did sit out at a pre-merge challenge because it was a requirement, I am the only one here to have never abstained from a challenge nor self-voted at Tribal Council. I have always tried my best, submitting before the deadline, even when the results yielded are futile. And with my Aussie time zone, I had to try wake up early every day to be able to maximise my time to talk to all of you. So overall, I think I’ve proved that I have tried extremely hard in this game, and I hope it will be rewarded.

Overall, I must mention that my game was flawed. It wasn’t perfect. I knew I was too emotional at times, breakdowns, but that’s my personality inevitably making it into the game. I lied when I had to, and as a person I’m not proud of it. My game wasn’t one of total dominance, but it wasn’t of total coat-tail riding either. ''My overall game was this special story of being someone who was perceived as a follower despite making many social connections under the surface to avoid being targeted, turned into someone that controlled the votes and made moves for themselves in the end when it was most important. Someone who was elite in all the physical, social, and strategic aspects of the game, and that’s worth giving a winning vote for.''

Jurors, thank you for reading and considering my statement, even though it is long, and for that I’m sorry. But since my game consisted of many details that needed to be clarified, I hope the length is excused. Now good luck to my fellow finalists, Megan and Carlo. All three of us have made a great achievement by reaching Day “39” through undoubtedly many struggles in such an iconic but tumultuous season. I know each one of you on the jury have different criteria on who to vote, but I trust that you will choose who played the best overall physical, social and strategic game to win.

I understand that I have irritated some of you throughout the game, so I’m ready to answer any of your questions, from why I did something at a specific point in the game, to what I think of my fellow finalists, and even to whether I think pineapple belongs on pizza or not :P. Even if it’s just to correct me on anything I may have gotten wrong in my statement because all of us have different perceptions that create, I’m open. I love you all and I hope to give many of you closure and peace as this season comes to a close. Thank you!

- Jerome <3  