#keep having ideas beyond my skill level and id like to write something dumb and sweet for a bit. the timeline would even line up over the

[youssefguedira]

what if i made a bunch of carefully curated chapter playlists with a specific vibe including story progression for the silly little joenicky coffee shop au i daydream about while doing the dishes at work instead of writing the damn thing

[survivorisladelasmunecas-blog]

James’ Jury Answers

LIL AJ -

"Directed to you all, give each juror one positive attribute and one negative attribute regarding their game." lil aj - I think that your premerge journey was pretty hectic and to come so close to returning from that is commendable. Unfortunately being voted off premerge is a pretty big knock against you. Jay - For a positive i think he was very well connected within his alliance and a very well setup. In terms of a negative he made himself a big threat and left himself vulnerable to a "worst case scenario". Matt - I think his funny and easy-going personality made it easy for people to view him as genuine and want to work with him. As a result he was never targeted until his self vote made him an easy vote-off. Austin - When he wanted to get something done out of everyone in the game he truly WENT FOR IT no matter what it took which I find to be very ballsy and admirable. However this also is a negative because his execution led to finding himself on the bottom (although to be fair it wasn't all his fault as the matt self-vote really did him in) Billy - I think he was very genuine as an ally to those he was fiercely loyal to. However to those he wasn't as close with he didn't do the best job at deceiving them and/or working with them (I am not just saying this because of the semi-argument we had) Andrei - I think Andrei is someone who is just fun to talk to and has a very approachable quality to him which lends itself well to the game. As a negative id say getting rocked out premerge is a pretty big blow and once he returned to the game his close bond with Renee and Eva was kind of out in the open. Renee - A bit of a restatement but I think Renee was one of the best relationship builders making strong bonds with people she didn't HAVE to make bonds with. These bonds also paid dividends with the idol Austin gave her. I think her weakness similarly to Andrei was that these alignments weren't necessarily kept secret and so it allowed the cast to play around it. Bodhi - Bodhi I view as one of the best strategists of the cast and he had a really good grasp on the numbers while at the same time maintaining great relationships. I think his weakness was underestimating me and AJ's relationship and everyone's ideal path to the end and so the game kinda slipped from under him at the last second. AJ - As a strength I think AJ was the most well-rounded player as you could had a little bit of everything you need and I truly believe he would be winning if he wasn't voted off last round. I think his weakness at the end of the day was how big of a threat he was and Eva winning immunity at final 5 in hindsight was probably worst-case scenario for his winning path to the end.

Jay -

"Maybe finding one or two more, but you had SO MANY OF THEM! And it’s not like you put in any sort of skill to earn them either. You answered dumb questions like “2+2” and “Who’s hosting this season?” to earn, what, six idols? I truly do not know how many you had, and therein lies what the problem with your game is to me. When deciding whether to vote for you or for someone else, it became a counting game. I had to get on calls multiple times and COUNT OUT the number of idols you had and what you may or may not have done with them and how many more you had." At merge I had 4 idols which I used one after the other. From final 10 onward I was on my own with no advantages. I think it could also be argued that I earned the advantages. Yes there was luck involved in me answering the correct questions but the questions that I did answer that gave me the advantages were head to head against other players who had just as much opportunity to earn them as I did. Eva herself was one of those who was vying for the advantages on almost ever question and earned 3 herself. The difference between me and her however is that I played mine in a way that benefitted me, whereas Eva gave her 2 idols away in a way that didn't benefit her almost at all and then exposed her legacy advantage to the entire cast which allowed for everyone in the game to play around it at final 7 and 6. Yes on a certain level I got lucky but I don't think its completely fair to say I got handed them on a silver platter and relied on them to make it through yet praise the person who got voted out WITHOUT using hers and then in part caused her alliance's demise because she messed up her execution with her last advantage. "Being given so many idols and when you ran out, winning most of the immunities, is not a strategy. It’s pure luck. And while I respect that luck plays a part in Survivor, your entire game boils down to the fact that you had no game, everything you did was because you got insanely lucky." While I agree just plainly having idols and winning immunities isn't a strategy in itself, boiling my game solely to those two is, in my opinion, selling myself short. To me I viewed it as the hand I was dealt and how to best play with those hands. If I was simply playing idols and winning immunities and nothing else then how am I the one among the final 3 with the most votes go through? If I was just sheeping and putting 0 effort into the game besides idols and challenges (which your post suggests) then I would have just did whatever AJ told me every day and called it a day but the fact that I voted you already contradicts that. Also I am a big proponent of "playing with the cards you are dealt with" and when you start playing the "what if" game when you say "if you didn't have idols then you would have gone home x amount of times" then that opens up all the "what ifs" that might have happened with me not playing my idols. My rebuttal to that is if I didn't have idols then I would have played the SITUATION completely different. I played under the radar BECAUSE I had idols, which paid dividends when I survived over Austin. After that I was able to turn the game completely around to the point where I was able to survive WITHOUT immunity when according to your post that is all my game had left at that point. I know you probably don't take me seriously because we never talked and your hatred of idols but if you are going to boil my game down to solely "advantages" while simultaneously praising someone for playing their situation horribly with advantages well then Monica is gonna hip bump you back.

Matt -

I think my opening speech is pretty much what you are looking for, if you want read that and through some of my responses and you could get a pretty good idea of what you are looking for.

Austin - 

"I want you guys to write a few sentences, paragraphs, or however long you think you need to diss the other 2 people sitting next to you." With Eva I feel she lacked a real direction and clear goal in the game. While she had the social bonds set up to potentially set herself up as well as advantages (2 idols and legacy), the execution and decision making was lacking. The first example of this would be after I used my exile ticket, yet she didn't think to play her idol when the red flags were there (why would I use an exile ticket when Tyler had an idol?). Then on the lagoon she gave you not one but TWO idols and upon return to the game... sided with completely different people??? And then during the Jay vote where they split between us two she knew how many advantages I had and also knew you had a second idol but just went along with it? To me this all shows a lack of foresight to certain scenarios and a less than perfect read on the dynamics of the game. Once the end-game hit she flat out had very little power in the game. She essentially set herself up to have to put her trust in other people instead of the other way around. She told you (and others too) about her legacy advantage which at final 7 gave me the opportunity to play around it and flip the game on her. Whereas I think my strengths were more keeping my cards to myself and acting in my best interest in scenarios I could take advantage of I think Eva, in contrast, kinda laid it all out there in a way that lacked tact and really sapped her of potential advantages and "leg up"s she could have had on other contestants. Not to mention her time on the lagoon in the early merge was beyond uneventful. With Brandon I similarly question his decision making at certain points in the game and how effective his relationship building was since he was voted off when the cast had to choose between himself or AJ, myself being among the deciding votes behind his vote off. While he had some ideas and plans in the game he rarely had the execution to really go through with it. This was evident in the Billy vote when we talked and we were apparently on the same page to get Bodhi out but then decided with others to vote out Eva (his apparent final 2???) without my input or really discussing it with me almost at all and expected to get it through with only 4/8 votes. I think that was a huge moment of underestimating me as I was able to flip the game in that moment. Another quintessential example of this was the next round when Brandon wanted to vote Bodhi (for real this time apparently) and his execution was just nonsensical to me. He went to everyone individually and from what I gathered everyone just said yes to him while not taking it seriously and as a result he was the sole vote for Bodhi while completely in the dark to the actual events transpiring. Also Brandon hints that he had more of a role in the Connor vote than I think he realizes when he says "However, this worked out in my favor, as I was able to blindside Connor after warning James about his impending blindside." That round I knew from AJ that I was being voted the moment it started happening and so me and AJ were the ones who made the final decision whether I should vote with Brandon to do Connor and hide our relationship or if we could vote for whoever we wanted separately and risk being exposed. I eventually decided on Connor because in PMs because he was a solid part of the opposite alliance, to keep my bond with AJ secret, and because I thought it'd be extremely ironic after Connor pm'd me how he'd be "highly appreciative" if I didn't vote him when he was already a solid vote on me.

"Multiple times you were vulnerable, and if people make you out to be SUCH a threat then why didn’t you leave any of those votes? What was it about your game that made you such a huge bull’s-eye, yet people wanted you around still? Could it be that people are holding a bias against you? I want your take on it." I think when I made merge my idols were a bit of an elephant in the room, combined with my more reactive/under the radar approach early on at the merge kept my name an easy one to bring up. Yet at the same time I was also simultaneously underestimated and I think some people sort of saw me more as "along for the ride" which helped me survive the round where they ultimately decided to vote you off over me for example. This is what I was going for because as much as I wanted our plans to go through and supported them (even though one of them might have worked if Matt didn't self vote) I knew there was a big possibility that eventually a vote was going to come down to you or me and that you were probably a bigger target than me. I also think that as you and Bodhi worked together less and less that kinda built up towards the target shifting off of me and more on to you. I don't know if I am answering the question exactly how you were wanting it answered but you definitely pose an interesting point since the whole "relying on advantages" is an easy talking point to Yes, I used advantages to my advantage but I am a big proponent of playing based on the situation one is in. I played that way at the start of the merge BASED ON the fact that I had idols. Furthermore, there were rounds where I was vulnerable yet there was always a bigger target (Matt with the self-vote and you) and then by that point I seized control of numbers to where the immunities weren't as crucial after final 8. I can't say for sure because depending on who won them it the whole game could have changed but I think I stood a decent chance of making it to the end without the immunities starting at final 7. "Explain to me your game outside of what we accomplished. I’m already aware of you/AJ, so refrain from that. What did you, James the individual, do on your own?" Well for one I was a big part in the eliminations of both Eva and Brandon. Eva was eliminated from me giving Tyler an idol which she clearly was no expecting at all. Then with the Brandon vote it which you could argue had to do with AJ was ultimately my own decision deciding who I felt were the best allies for myself going forward. The Jay vote is also one that I made without AJ. Yes that one was more of a joint decision between us two but if it were up to AJ then I would have voted for someone completely different. In terms of decisions that were 1000% solely ME the go-to is definitely the final 8 vote. After I learned Billy and Brandon made their own decision without my input after telling me a different story I knew that the best thing for my game was to take matters into my own hands. Without discussing with anyone what the gameplan was going into it, I went straight to Eva and explained the situation and how she was being lied to. From there the other decision that was not more of a collaborative effort was the final 4 vote. Going into tribal Brandon wanted to vote Eva and for a while I was conflicted because me and AJ definitely got close but at a certain point I looked at the jury and just thought "okay wow there's no way I can win against him, if I were to lose to someone I would rather lose to AJ but at the end of the day I am playing to win" and so at that point I told Eva I was doing AJ which set things in motion. Yes, AJ was a close ally in the game but my actions in the game show that at the end of the day I was playing an independent game. If it were AJ's first choice, Connor/Jay would not be the people idol'd out of the game, if it were AJ's choice Eva would have went home at final 8 and not his ally Billy, if it were up to AJ he would have made finals and (probably) win but instead I was making my own decisions independently, essentially working against his alliance for a large portion of the game, and yet still foster that relationship where he did not doubt my loyalty to him.

Billy - 

"Please explain to me literally ANYTHING that was entirely your move." I have explained my thought process to other rounds in my opening speech but for the sake of answering this I will start off with the final 8. I was down to work with you and you told me you were down to do Bodhi. However, when I found out you lied to me and your alliance's plan depended on me throwing my vote I went to Eva without telling my closest ally AJ about voting you out knowing Andrei was afk while voting you. You can ask him yourself we told each other EVERYTHING up to that point and when you got 4 votes he was genuinely shocked. Another move that involved 0 collaboration was my decision to vote off AJ at final 4. Like I mentioned he was my closest ally throughout the game so I was conflicted in my choice but I think my decision to vote him off supports that idea that I am/was truly playing to WIN and willing to make the right decisions to put myself in a better position. I also would argue that in many other rounds I had a BIG role in who went home (brandon/Jay/Connor/renee boots) but those rounds did involve collaboration so I guess they don't exactly fit your criteria. "How did you view me as a player this season? I would like a description, not a sentence." I viewed you as a fiercely loyal player. As someone who found who knew who they were sticking close with and going to bat for them. My evidence for this was at final 8 where you lied to me about voting Bodhi and then went to him and made a separate plan with him. AJ always had good things to say about his bond with you and based off our heated conversation you definitely value and enjoy getting to know the people you are playing the game with. I think this opens you up to a lack of foresight at times as your plan at final 8 included only gathering 4 out of the 8 people in the game to vote together.

Andrei - 

LIL AJ Opinion of me: We hit it off for the few rounds pre-merge we were together even though it never really panned out with the tribe swaps I am going to go with a slight positive lean. Jury vote: I think there's a chance he votes me if he respects my game but it depends how thoroughly he and Eva bonded on the lagoon. For the sake of not giving a cop out answer I will say myself though. JAY Opinion of me: I don't believe he respects me. In general he has something against advantages in the game and so I am the quintessential example of everything wrong in the game to the point where he will praise someone for wasting their advantages because he hates advantages so much. That combined with our limited communication makes it easy for him to assume I had no game. Jury vote: I would say he is leaning Brandon after reading his jury speech. MATT Opinion of me: Either neutral or a slight positive lean. We were together almost the entire premerge and talked on and off in group settings and I was a part of the vote to save him so I don't think he has anything against me. Jury vote: I was always paranoid he was closer to Eva pre merge so that is what I'm leaning towards. AUSTIN Opinion of me: I think he is the one person on the jury who really got to understand my thought process from the point where I felt hopeless and then was able to see me turn it around. I think he is rooting me on and shocked but not fully surprised I made it to the finals. I remember in one conversation he had when we were talking about how screwed we were he was like "I already know what my jury speech for you is going to be" and I responded along the lines of "omg stop that is like impossible I am not even beginning to think about making it to the end right now" and so I think Austin probably looked back at that conversation too and thought "wow he really did it". Jury vote: I think he is voting for me which was kind of explained in the above answer, we worked together closely and I think he sees the strengths of my game. BILLY Opinion of me: moderately to slightly negative. We had a conversation which got slightly heated over whether or not our 6 line convos were pointless since neither one of us was giving each other any info. Yet I was truly genuine about working with him at final 8 when he approached me so I think there's a slight chance he knows I didn't have anything against him and was just being blunt which may have translated into a slightly aggressive tone (but its a pretty slim change). Jury vote: I would guess Brandon since he had favorable things to say about him in his jury speech. ANDREI Opinion of me: I think you probably understand where I was coming from with my moves in the lategame. There may be a chance you think I am a hypocrite since I ranted to you about others in the cast being "opportunists" when that is essentially what I morphed into and I will own that. However, from our conversations you seem really chill so I'd say your opinion of me is slightly positive. Jury vote: I would lean Eva since I know you two worked closely in the game together and bonded so you may have been rooting for her after you got voted off. RENEE Opinion of me: I am somewhat sure that I was the one you were referring to in your comment about ghosting you after you got voted off so probably slightly negative. I think there's a chance once she got to jury that she sort of saw where I was coming from since she doesn't seem to be the type to hold a grudge though. Jury vote: Probably Eva since they worked together closely when Eva came back from the lagoon. BODHI Opinion of me: I think he can recognize the strengths of my game and my thought process but since he places a lot of weight on the social game so from his perspective in the game he didn't really respect me for a large portion of it and that may hold true now as well. Jury vote: I think he is probably waiting for the jury questions to make a decision and this is probably the person who I am least sure of who he is voting. Once again for the sake of not copping out I will say Brandon though. AJ Opinion of me: I don't think he is bitter (or THAT bitter) towards me. Based on his reaction from me blindsiding him at final 8 with the Billy vote and essentially going "surprise! =D" after it happened I think he can see from my perspective what I needed to do. Jury vote: I think he is a solid vote for me, we bonded a lot through the game and we had a lot of fun maneuvering together and based off our relationship we formed I don't think me voting him off will affect it too much.

"Finally, I also have a trick question for you… Or rather, a request: go through your fellow finalist’s ROP, call out any statement that you feel is bullshit, and tell us why you don’t believe what the statement isn’t genuine." This is all Brandon everything Eva said was fine. tyler: " you didn’t talk fucking game with anyone" is not true since me and AJ talked game with him before his medevac on two different tribes. austin: "However, at the point of your vote out you just lost trust with everyone, which is why you got voted out. Although I didn’t vote for you that round, I tried to spare you from that vote" He didn't lose trust with everyone as I had trust in him and if Brandon REALLY wanted to save Austin he would have voted with us (and actually sided with Austin in the process) instead of copping out as a cog in a split vote.

Renee -

What would u do with the virtual $1,000,000 if you were to win? The first thing I would do is pay my debt from school hehe. I'd probably splurge on myself and buy some video games, (a ps4 in preparation for kingdom hearts coming) and spend some on travelling. London is a place I've always wanted to visit since I have never been there besides being born there and I haven't visited family in Mexico in a while so there's that. I would then give some to my Mom since she a mess with her finances lol. Then probably give some to charity, the first that come to mind would be like environmental causes but that would take a bit of research to find something legit. Also what’s one song I absolutely NEED to have on my New Years party playlist? Becky G "Mayores" is my JAM right now but if you aren't into Spanish music then Hilary Duff "One On A Million" is a song of hers I always come back to.

Bodhi - 

"Why didn’t you ever message people first? In my eyes, this is a social game above all else, and you failed horrendously in that aspect." I think its no secret the social game at the beginning of the merge was a weakness of mine. I think a few factors go into it the main one being in games I tend to put more focus on members of my alliance/people I am directly working with and then from there I analyze the situation and go from there. At the merge those people were Jordan/AJ/Brandon and 2 of them went home within the first. When Austin and me connected that bond was definetly a two-way street instead of only Austin approaching me and from there. For me the merge was a bit of a gradual progression where I originally was relying on my direct alliance and until I no longer could and the first moment I got the opportunity I flipped it to where people needed to depend on me as their direct alliance. For someone who had a weak start at merge I think the growth of my social/strategic game as the game progressed is something that Brandon and Eva cannot say they achieved. Also specifically at final 8 I went to Eva and Renee to get Billy out. Also at final 7 I would have also went to you first but when you approached me I was still in the stage of sorting out my thoughts and the exact angle I was going to approach which is why in those first 10-20 minute of conversing my mind was a bit all over the place as I was deciding if I was going to discuss with AJ first or just lay it all on the line (and decided on the latter on the spot without his approval). That combined with the 2-way communication with AJ, Brandon, Austin and spurts of game talk with Andrei, Billy (I was being genuine with him at final 9 and final 8 before I found out he was lying to me) and Matt (him more in group settings) adds up more of a social game than the "nonexistent" presence some people took me out for/labelled me as at because of my quiet beginning. "Now to all of you: rank the jurors AND FINALISTS in terms of who would���ve been most deserving of winning the game, and give brief reasonings. Include everyone on the jury along with the three of you." AJ: He had info from every corner of the game at all times. His social game had a VERY strong start peaking early merge as evidenced by the 4-3 vote he survived over Brandon and the last minute fashion/unplanned way that vote came about really hammers that in. Very well rounded player who came very close to winning I think would have won against anyone in the final 3. Bodhi: I saw you as a very influential figure within your alliance. One of the smartest people in the cast with a very good sense of tactics and running scenarios yet at the same time maintaining strong bond with lots of people who never wanted you gone until the very end. Renee: A very well liked figure who in my eyes was the best relationship-builder in the game. Well integrated early merge yet maintained close bonds with Eva/Andrei after they returned from the lagoon which was tactful as well as a strong enough bond with Austin to get him to give her an idol. Myself: I believe I played a solid game. Despite being a more quiet presence early merge the growth to eventually being a leader/strong force of the late game is something Eva and Brandon cannot attest to. Billy: Playing a solid game and had very solid allies and connections up to the final 8. However I think that round he misplayed it a bit and approached the situation without much tact which led to his boot. If he played it differently I think he could very well be in the finals with a shot to win. Eva: Misplaying her advantages (all 3 of them) I would argue is a bigger knock against her than me correctly playing (4 of) mine at merge is. While her strategic impact wasn't as strong especially in the latter half she did do a good job re-integrating herself from the lagoon until she fell out of the loop. Returning from the lagoon also knocks her down. Austin: I think he had the potential to play a solid winning game if he survived the final 9 vote but the way he went out kind of puts a different spin on his story. The passion (for lack of a better word) he had when playing the game was commendable but his moves pissed off potential jury votes while simultaneously setting himself up for demise. Andrei: Being voted out really knocks him down, after returning he had a solid allies and had a path to win but as it stands the potential in his game (postmerge) says more than the accomplishments. Brandon: I feel like he had pretty poor execution of his ideas and him being the 1 vote in the 3-3-1 vote at final 7 is just the quintessential example. His social game also was not up to par as he was voted off when his social bonds were in the position to deliver when the last minute him vs aj vote happened. Jay: I think the reason he is down here has less to do with how he played but more how much he didn't play. He was in a good position but the whole merge played out without him so its hard to say if he is deserving. lil AJ: Got voted off premerge and never really got to showcase what he had in the merge phase. Matt: I think the way he self-voted himself out of the game is something you can't really come back from, even if it wasn't necessarily his fault. "Do you believe that Connor and Jordan belong in the pre-jury? Or was it an unfair twist that put them there." I think in general the lagoon people not being on the jury was probably the safest thing, especially with the potential for pre-jurors to be on the jury and cause a China-level mess (hey lil aj). At the end of the day though it did screw Connor in particular over since Jordan was the merge boot and those are a tossup to be on jury so the argument is there for Connor but I would argue more strongly that lil aj doesn't deserve to be on jury if that makes sense.

AJ - 

James: Why does Eva deserve to win the game? I think Eva deserves to win because of the bonds she made with people. While she may have not had control of the votes at times she put in time to really connect with her alliance. And while she may have found herself on the lagoon she didn't give up and always had a level of fight in her.