Episode 04: The Broken Wing Display
The broken-wing display is a well-known and conspicuous deceptive signal used to protect birds' broods against diurnal terrestrial predators.
Day 8
A much quieter day compared to Day 7. Spent most of the day/afternoon offline and spent the evening talking to Deshawn and Xander. Deshawn and I were speculating tribe swap scenarios (he brought it up, I'm following my new rules to the T) and considered the idea of 3 tribes of 4 at 12 people left, and then a merge to follow at 10. Deshawn was hoping for maybe 2 tribes of 6 but I don't see that happening. Way too many places to hide and I know you game runners wouldn't find any fun in that! Xander and I mostly talked about travel. Like I said at the end of round 3, I'm going to take things slow again and allow others to bring their game talk to me. I really don't feel like I'm in a position to talk heavy game with people.
In the wild world of Stranded, emotions can run high. How have your emotions influenced your strategic moves in the game this week?
Wow, talk about targeted questions. Is everyone getting the same ones or is my meltdown the story of the week? You guys know what my emotions are doing to me in this game - fucking ruining it. I'm trying my best to not allow my emotions to effect things, but I still can't help but see Evvie and Shan as targets after everything that happened. Evvie ended our talk saying nothing has changed and Shan ended saying she trusts me more now. I don't believe either of them to be honest. Heather even said a line to me after the challenge - "Please never get down on yourself in regards to this game because you're honestly amazing
". The hell? How did she hear about what was going on? How did she get me being down on myself from 'the rain is making the day kind of depressing'? Sounds like she heard about what happened from someone else? Either Evvie or Shan. Anyway, my emotions did effect me for a little bit there and almost screw up everything I had built. I still don't think I have everything back to how it was, so I need to start building more with Deshawn and Sara. I hope that I could maybe take out Heather and Shan before Sara goes anywhere. At least that way, Evvie has nowhere to be but with Spiral Squad.
The HetDensa challenge scrambled more than just letters and tested your teamwork. Did each of your tribe members contribute equally? Any major gaffes? How well did your tribe perform as a unit?
Man I think we did an amazing job. The fact that we were done so quick and the other tribe had to cheat off us just to finish it all should show how good our teamwork was. Everyone was getting words and correcting mistakes pretty quick. I think we work together incredibly well. The only major gaffes were my fuck up of posting the answers in the tribe chat, but everything worked out well in the end. I did a much better write-up on this in my Day 7 confessional found
here.
Surviving week one in Stranded requires social finesse, strategic prowess, and strong competition skills. Which of these skills was your strongest this week? How did you wield it to protect your spot in the game? Which area is your weakest? What will you do to overcome it?
I honestly don't think there was anything special required to make it through this week besides winning challenges over the moron tribe. Most of our wins came from the research I did on past seasons. I did my best before the game started to read up on old seasons. If I was going to enter Season 42 of a game, there's no way I was just going to go in blind and not brush up on as much Stranded history as I could. Even today and tomorrow I plan to read more on past seasons just so we're ready for Sunday's challenge.
If we're talking about my weakest area, it's obviously managing paranoia and anxiety. I think there's something real about this game where any true fan of Survivor has these goals for themselves going in. Don't be first out, make the merge, get on the jury, make F3, win the game. The further we go and the smaller the group gets, the more anxiety and paranoia we're going to feel. We all want to stay here and keep playing. The problem is being able to manage your stress and believe in the relationships you've built along the way will get you to the end. The best way to overcome all of these stress/anxiety/paranoia related tribulations are to once again remember the rules I have for myself now and continue to follow them:
1. Rebuild relationships (Shan/Evvie/Xander/Sara) and have more conversations. No game talk unless I'm specifically asked.
2. Reconnect with Deshawn and make sure I have him with me the same way Evvie has Shan.
3. Reconnect with Evvie and Xander in the Spiral Squad chat and 1 on 1. I need them to see the old me again, before all this happened.
4. CHILL. THE. FUCK. OUT. STOP WITH THE PARANOIA AND ANXIETY. This is literally why I've gone home in all my past ORGs. When I managed my anxiety and was confident in my play, I won my first game.
As long as I keep following these rules and believing in my game, I'll make it to the end.
Please share an update (visually or in words) on your alliance situation or lack thereof.
Has anyone noticed that when you use the quote tags, the last quote tag you use always leaves a weird giant space at the end? Something for the admins to look into maybe.
Alliance Round-up
SPIRAL SQUAD
Pretty sure this is dead. That's my opinion at least. I just can't see a situation where Xander and Evvie will still want to work with me long-term, but I have to pretend I'm still Spiral F3 strong.
ANDEEZ NUTS
No updates for this group. The Sara vs Heather plan was still going to happen had we lost on Thursday. I think things are still going well with this group. My confidence in my alliances isn't very strong right now, so I can't really give a good in-depth look at them.
GIRL'S ALLIANCE / THE HIVE (POSSIBLY)
Pretty sure they're still working together and as strong as ever. Heather is never going to work with any of the guys long-term and I doubt Shan trusts anyone but Evvie / Heather right now. Evvie is also looking to find a way to jump ship and get out of the situation she's in being with Xander and Myself.
I don't think the previous chart I made has changed much, but here's what I think it still looks like. As always, this is just what I *think* may be happening, but who the hell knows how accurate it is.
All in all, you can see how pessimistic I'm feeling about everything. I just don't see any of my relationships being repaired for a while (if ever) and I just have to stay under the radar as much as possible outside of challenges. I'm not making any big game moves, alliances, strategies, etc. I'm leaving it all up to what Sara, Deshawn, or Xander want to do.
". The hell? How did she hear about what was going on? How did she get me being down on myself from 'the rain is making the day kind of depressing'? Sounds like she heard about what happened from someone else? Either Evvie or Shan. Anyway, my emotions did effect me for a little bit there and almost screw up everything I had built. I still don't think I have everything back to how it was, so I need to start building more with Deshawn and Sara. I hope that I could maybe take out Heather and Shan before Sara goes anywhere. At least that way, Evvie has nowhere to be but with Spiral Squad.
SPIRAL SQUAD
ANDEEZ NUTS
GIRL'S ALLIANCE / THE HIVE (POSSIBLY)
