Board Thread:Season 12 - All-Stars/@comment-13794814-20140216144930/@comment-11497002-20140217065857

Hi Uli,

With all due respect I’m going to be blunt with you because I know you can handle it and you’d appreciate that more than sugar-coating or sucking up. If you underestimated or discounted me pre-merge then that’s your mistake and not mine. I didn’t want to be seen as a threat. Some people play big and showy, I decided for at least the early stage of the game I was going to play hard but hidden. I kept my cards close to my chest; I had secret alliances nobody knew about. I set others up as the figure head but was still keeping in control of the votes. On Mpilo after the switch I was at the centre of the tribe but I knew people regarded Hunter as a threat and big player so I dictated my moves through him. I decided who would go and then I’d tell him to tell Henry and Jhet. When people asked me how I was voting I’d say ‘oh Hunter says to vote for this person’. People saw me as a non-threat because that’s exactly how I presented myself.

I’m going to make a big call. You think my game was an easy one? That’s because I made it look easy. I really didn’t put a foot wrong pre-merge. I made sure to direct all votes away from me. I got people on my side – the power players – and I said ‘take charge; I’m with you all the way’. If they suggested a plan that benefitted me I went with it, if they suggested a plan that wasn’t in my best interests I devised a new plan. If they didn’t want to go along with that then I moved to a different alliance. It’s easy to set yourself up in a majority alliance during the Tribe phase and ride that through to the merge. I wasn’t looking to coast though. I was looking to storm straight through the merge to the end. So I didn’t stick with one alliance and plan like Gerda and Lloyd did. I actively sought the best option for myself. Andrei was a better ally for me than Kevin so I dumped Kevin and went with Andrei. Hunter wanted to get rid of Jhet but I wanted Jhet around so I got rid of Hunter. I was never afraid to go against my alliance. I took risks and they paid off. What risks can Gerda and Lloyd claim to have made? You might think I played an easy game but you’re about the only one here who would ever dare to attempt half the things I did in this game. You said two things to me I took to heart. ‘You either win or you suck’, and “It’s better to be clear in the minority than weak in the majority”. Gerda and Lloyd were weak in the majority. I was clear in the minority. They were in a majority alliance and still had no control over who was going home, who stayed and how the game played out. I survived the whole merge without a stable alliance yet still managed to control the game, with Adam’s elimination, Andrei’s and Taylor’s. When Gerda was breaking down, begging people and threatening to quit I sucked it all up and marched straight to the end.



''' I said that many people think they had a bond to you in Ponderosa. I don’t know how much of it is real and assumption… So at F7. After voting Adam of… Rank the other 6 players from how much you would have stuck to them, given the chance. '''

 From a personal/emotional standpoint disregarding strategy, the order of people I’d most want to stay true to or go to the end with would be:

 1. Lloyd

 2. Andrei

 3. Taylor

 4. Uli

 5. Zac

 6. Gerda

''' You never told me you had the hidden immunity idol… Therefore I assume it was just an emergency reaction as soon as you heard that votes were not in our favour. If you wouldn’t have had voted for Adam already. Would you have played the idol to get him out? '''

 Using my idol to get rid of Adam was basically my plan the second I won it. If he had won immunity I would have asked us to vote Gerda and I would have idoled her out. It wasn’t a last minute resort. I always waited until others had voted before casting my vote for this exact reason. I had wanted to get rid of Adam at final 9 but the correct opportunity did not present itself. After I won the idol I knew exactly what I was going to do. I didn’t tell anyone about the idol; no one knew I had it. That’s because I wanted to do exactly what I did with it: idol someone out who I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to get out at the time. I thought we might be able to get Lloyd or Taylor to vote with us and obviously I wouldn’t have had to play the idol then. When I found out they weren’t on board I decided I was still going through with the plan but would just have to resort to plan B: which was use the idol.

''' In case you go into a Final 2 against everyone in jury. Do you believe you could have beaten anyone? '''

I think I had a reasonable chance against anyone sitting next to me now or on the jury. There are people that would have been harder to beat and others that would have been easier but I think I could have put up a fight against anyone and I don’t think anyone would have annihilated me. The one person I don’t think I would have beaten was Andrei: I think he’s just too likeable and charismatic and would probably destroy any opponent.

''' What was the worst thing you said about me during the game? '''

<p class="MsoNormal"> Again, I’m going to be honest because I know you can take it. I’ll take a direct quote from one of my confessionals:

<p class="MsoNormal"> “ Who would have thought I'd come to respect Uli the most out of those left in this game? He's arrogant and abrasive but he's the only one who doesn't deal in bullshit.” That’s not so bad I guess but knowing you better now I’d change abrasive to blunt.