Board Thread:Season 41 - Bali/@comment-27985501-20170701124819

Hello Jury. I guess I want to start off with thanking you all for competing and sharing this experience with me, it was honestly a pleasure to play with you all. Anyway I'm not going to sit here in the final 3 and claim I played this amazing, perfect game when that's far from it. I know my overall game had flaws, many flaws, but I do however think I'm still deserving compared to the two sitting next to me. I am aware I played very badly socially at the start of the merge, this was something I wasn't proud of at all. Social game is usually something I consider myself to do well at but Bali completely humbled me at the early merge. I won't deny that I was on the wrong side of many votes, but I still stayed in the game and did my best with the cards I was dealt. I started off this game on the Beauty Tribe, and I was able to make very close bonds with Jenna and Elmo, from day one I was planning to go to the end with them. I was also close with Emily and I originally wanted a four person alliance between us all, but unfortunately Emily didn't make close enough bonds with Jenna and Elmo for her to have their trust. I made many mistakes in this game as well which I won't deny, one being forgetting to submit for that third Immunity challenge and directly sending my tribe to tribal council. I knew I was in potentially hot water, but after speaking with Alexandra, Junior and Julia they all said to vote Emily. I tried to possibly save her with Jenna and Elmo but they just didn't trust her. At this point I knew Emily was going, but what I didn't know was that the vote was actually going to be split between myself and Emily. I made a mistake voting Julia along with Emily period, but I was playing with my heart, not my head and I didn't want to lie to Emily saying I was voting with her. If I had any idea the vote was going to be split I would've voted Emily to ensure my safety, however the vote being split was partly my fault which I'm not going to deny either. I hadn't built very good trust with Alexandra, Junior or Julia, leading to them not trusting me 100% which resulted in the vote split. After that first tribal council I tried to mend bridges with Julia but I knew any chance of building trust with her was gone and that we'd never be able to fully trust each other in this game after I voted her. When I got to the swap, I knew once I was stuck with Julia that I was in a potentially dangerous situation, which is why I made quick bonds with Nadine and Ting, and told them both a half lie about how I was at the bottom of my original tribe with Emily, and how the rest of the tribe split the vote between us, they bought it and trusted me over Julia so I knew I had the advantage. I always figured I had Elmo & Jenna trusting me, but the fact that I received votes at that tribal was a huge advantage and made it look as if I was the next to go when in reality there was a split Ayung. Heading into the triple tribal I wanted to make sure Julia lost Immunity so my target was vulnerable and I was not. I wasn't sure if Nadine and Ting had made really good bonds with Danielle at the time, and I didn't want to risk them not wanting to vote Danielle but me instead if Julia won Immunity. After my showdown with Julia with the Immunity challenge, which I surprisingly won, the plan to vote Julia was set in motion after my original lie about the Beauty Tribe and she was voted off. I do consider this a pivotal moment in my game as this was my first proper move I made, and despite it being based on a lie I was able to head into the merge with a very good relationships with Nadine and Ting. Then the merge happened, and I fully admit I played terribly at the start of the merge. I was a complete mess the first merge vote, and I almost went home for telling too many people that I believed Hannah was the vote. After my close call when Hannah was voted off I wasn't able to improve my situation as Ting no longer trusted me. At this point I knew I was a target and tried to lay low and do whatever plan I was told, and focus my game on making allies, not enemies. Despite surviving over Hannah, I lost Elmo the next tribal who was one of my closest allies. The reason this went down seemed to be because of his auction items and that Elmo had played a great game coming into the merge. The reason I never went home though, is because I had bonds, critical bonds in this game. With Jenna specifically, and this is why I didn't go home at final nine when the brawns and Ting completely didn't trust me. The brawns clearly had wanted me out and Ting no longer trusted me, but because Jenna refused to vote me out the vote was changed to Christina. That was an example of me being able to lay low and get the huge target off of my back with my social game. After this point though I did fall back into minority though, Jenna had been my rock in this game and when her and Alexandra turned against each other. What worked in my favour though was that I was still laying low and not making enemies, Jenna was someone who was close to both myself & Tyler in this game and if Tyler, Jenna and Alexandra were able to get along I would've been screwed, but Tyler saw the solution as turning the two of them against each other, he was right in that it got rid of my ally, but the fact that he masterminded the vote also drew attention to him. This eventually led to the final six, where I completely admit I got very lucky. At final six Nadine was my only ally I really had left, and then she told me she had an Idol, because Ting trusted her, she was able to convince Ting to take out a brawn with us, this is when I was able to make my next move. Nadine and Ting wanted to vote David as they saw him as a bigger challenge threat, but I knew Tyler was 100% the biggest threat left in the game, and that he had ran this game all merge. Tyler himself had played me so many times, and I knew he was fantastic socially and at pitting people against each other. I made my pitch and I was able to convince Nadine and Ting to vote out Tyler with me instead of David. The blindside worked, and we'd finally taken the biggest strategic and social threat out of the game. It was a group vote but Nadine and Ting wanted to idol out David and I really had to put my foot down on that since while David was good socially and better at challenges, he was always riding Tyler's coat tails strategically and he was the first to admit this. Had I not convinced Nadine to idol out Tyler, I honestly think he would've won the game. This is where my game really started to improve and get back on track. At final five I told David and Danielle I'd flip and vote with them after they approached me, because as soon as Ting lost Immunity I wanted her out as she was the biggest challenge threat by far, she also hadn't really burned any bridges to the same extent other people had and she was very likable. I flipped sides and voted out Ting, as I knew she had a really good chance at winning at the end with her impressive physical game, and I didn't want to risk that and give myself my best chance to win the game. Again, if Ting stays in the game I completely think she deserves to win. Making this move at final five I thought it was going to be a tie at final four no matter what between Nadine/I and David/Danielle but I didn't want to risk Ting winning final Immunity and the game so I made it. In the final four I quickly mended my relationship and bond with Nadine, and I headed into that final Immunity believing it was going to be a tie most likely as I knew David had played the best social game out of all of us left and I wanted him gone. Nadine pulled it out and won the final Immunity, and I originally thought it was going to be a tie between myself and David. Danielle had approached me and Nadine about voting out David, but I originally didn't believe it because she had been with him since the start and Danielle clearly did not trust me for most of the game. I was pleasantly surprised when she went through with it and David went 3-1. Danielle & Nadine really had no reason to take me to the end because I burned bridges with them, but because I continued maintaining relationships with them, I convinced them to take me to the end over David. As you can all see my game hasn't been amazing, but I do firmly believe it's the most deserving out of the three of us sat here tonight. I was able to hang on in this game, I almost went home multiple times but I had the social relationships to keep myself from going. Over Emily, over Hannah and over Christina. and I still made key moves when I could, such as voting out Julia pre-merge, convincing Nadine and Ting to vote out Tyler over David at the Idol play in final six, and flipping, voting out Ting at final five, as well as managing Danielle & Nadine well enough to make sure they didn't turn on me, and voted out David who was a huge social threat. At the end of the day I fully admit my game has its short comings, I know my social game was lacking at the beginning of merge, and that I could've had much better and stronger relationships with people at early merge, but I believe I was able to turn my game around at the end of the game and make it to the end still making moves, NOT with a day one majority alliance of two very strong strategic and social players, I didn't have the option of riding with an alliance like Danielle did basically, and NOT with a lot of immunity wins and idol plays like Nadine had. I believe despite my poor positioning at times I played more observant than my competition seeing as I was the only one who was proactive at taking out all of the biggest threats in this game at the end, while having the social connections and seemingly non-threatening exterior to survive over my allies (Elmo/Jenna) when I didn't have the numbers. I hope you all see why I think I'm still deserving of your votes, and why I believe my overall game is the most deserving tonight. Thank you for reading, and I'll answer any questions you all have.  