Brandon, Dee, and Kellie meet a legend

[Brian Smith]

Talk about a random occurrence. While they were in LA for Episode 6, Brandon, Dee, and Kellie met Danielle DiLorenzo. Nice of Danielle to introduce herself and nice of Kellie to post the photo. Is it just me or does Kellie look 15 years younger in that photo?

https://twitter.com/kellienalb/status/1738945872971399287

--
Brian

[Rick]

"Brian Smith" wrote in message
news:df15de59-49dd-46c7...@googlegroups.com...

Kellie definitely cleans up nicely, as they say.

TBH, I did not recognize Danielle. If she hadn't been identified, I'm not
sure I would have realized who she was. I don't think I've seen her since H
vs. V. In my mind, Danielle will always be the person who kept Terry Dietz
from winning because of that silly floating balance challenge in Panama.
If I'm remembering right, the hoopla over Terry's elimination caused them to
institute their first final three the following season.

--

[Brian Smith]

On Monday, December 25, 2023 at 11:04:16 AM UTC-7, Rick wrote:
> "Brian Smith" wrote in message
> news:df15de59-49dd-46c7...@googlegroups.com...
> >
> >Talk about a random occurrence. While they were in LA for Episode 6,
> >Brandon, Dee, and Kellie met Danielle DiLorenzo. Nice of Danielle to
> >introduce herself and nice of Kellie to post the photo. Is it just me or
> >does Kellie look 15 years younger in that photo?
> >
> >https://twitter.com/kellienalb/status/1738945872971399287
> >
> >--
> >Brian
> Kellie definitely cleans up nicely, as they say.

She looked good on the island as well!

> TBH, I did not recognize Danielle. If she hadn't been identified, I'm not
> sure I would have realized who she was. I don't think I've seen her since H
> vs. V. In my mind, Danielle will always be the person who kept Terry Dietz
> from winning because of that silly floating balance challenge in Panama.
> If I'm remembering right, the hoopla over Terry's elimination caused them to
> institute their first final three the following season.
>
> --

Do you recall any articles on them saying why they moved to a F3 for Cook Islands? I had always assumed it was to change things up and doing it that season where they started with four tribes made it look like they were really trying to throw the players off.

Concerning Kellie's post, did Brandon last in the game until Episode 6? I'm trying to figure out why they were in LA for that particular episode.

--
Brian

[Rick]

"Brian Smith" wrote in message

news:c05ec8c5-a9e7-44d7...@googlegroups.com...

The handling of Final 3 had been a problem almost from the start because the
winner of the F3 immunity got sole power to decide who was leaving since the
two non-winners could only vote for one another. This was all right if the
F3 winner was a major or well-liked player in the game, but it became a
problem when lesser players happened to stumble to a victory in F3.

This first became a problem in S3, where the dominant/popular players
throughout the end stage of the game were Ethan, Tom and Lex. Somehow a
minor player in the game named Kim Johnson managed to win the last two
immunities (one of which was tainted by its own controversy) and she got to
final two with Ethan. Ethan, of course, won pretty convincingly.

In S4 Marquesas, the somewhat unpopular Neleh won the F3 immunity and voted
out the highly popular and dominant Kathy Vavrick O'Brien, who many had
thought would win the game. This resulted in two very unpopular players -
Neleh and Vecepia - getting to final two, which is one of the reasons many
people don't like that season. I'm an exception - I actually think
Marquesas was pretty good.

In S6 The Amazon, Jenna Morasca won F3 and singe-handedly voted out Rob
Cesternino, who is widely regarded as the first really strategic and
analytical player in the game and who is now a well-known podcaster. Jenna
wasn't a bad player, but she was hardly in Rob's class, and she forced the
lesser player Matt into the final two where she beat him handily.

In S11, Danni Boatwright, who had not been a particularly dominant or
memorable player, voted out the much better regarded and strategic Rafe so
she could go up against and ultimately defeat the somewhat unpopular
Stephanie.

In S12, the dominant player was Terry Dietz who won several immunities, was
well-liked by fans, and was widely regarded by many as the likely winner.
Dietz lost the F3 immunity, which involved having to balance on a flotation
device, which gave the little-regarded Danielle the opportunity to vote him
out of the game and force a final two with herself and the somewhat
under-the-radar Aras. Nobody really liked that F2 and it's one of the
reasons' that's not a well-regarded season.

It was only after several seasons like this where an often little known or
little regarded F3 player got to single-handedly define who the F2 would be
that the producers switched to a final three, so that everyone could
effectively vote in F4.

>Concerning Kellie's post, did Brandon last in the game until Episode 6? I'm
>trying to figure out why they were in LA for that particular episode.

Brandon left in episode 2 which was day 5 in the game. But the post was
referring to the airing of episode 6, and I think it just means that they
must have all gotten together for the airing of the episode for some reason.
>--
>Brian


--

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

> The handling of Final 3 had been a problem almost from the
> start because the winner of the F3 immunity got sole power
> to decide who was leaving since the two non-winners could
> only vote for one another. This was all right if the F3
> winner was a major or well-liked player in the game, but it
> became a problem when lesser players happened to stumble to

> a victory in F3 [...]

Well, if that's the game, that's the game, it can be called
a strong finish just as well.

But how is it now, challenge at F4, the winner decides who
follow winner to the FTC, and the reaming two players do fire
for the third spot?

Is it true that since the introduction of the fire, this has
made for more close FTC votes? If so, and if they introduced
to solve the F3 challenge problem as you describe, they did
a good thing.

But weren't there fires before that as well?

--
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

[Rick]

"Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:875y0lv...@dataswamp.org...

>
>Rick wrote:
>
>> The handling of Final 3 had been a problem almost from the
>> start because the winner of the F3 immunity got sole power
>> to decide who was leaving since the two non-winners could
>> only vote for one another. This was all right if the F3
>> winner was a major or well-liked player in the game, but it
>> became a problem when lesser players happened to stumble to
>> a victory in F3 [...]
>
>Well, if that's the game, that's the game, it can be called
>a strong finish just as well.
>
>But how is it now, challenge at F4, the winner decides who
>follow winner to the FTC, and the reaming two players do fire
>for the third spot?
>

Yes, it's funny how for years people complained about the F3 winner getting
the sole vote to decide who went to F2, but since S35 they've had a system
where the F4 winner gets to solely decide who goes to F3 by sending the
other two to a fire challenge.

>Is it true that since the introduction of the fire, this has
>made for more close FTC votes? If so, and if they introduced
>to solve the F3 challenge problem as you describe, they did
>a good thing.
>
>But weren't there fires before that as well?
>

Yes, because there were often 2-2 ties at the F4 tribal, so they made the
rule that a 2--2 tie at F4 would be resolved with a fire challenge. This
led to one of the funniest fire challenges I can recall, when Becky and
Sundra were tied 2-2 in Cook Islands and had to make a fire to settle who
would go home. Incredibly, neither one of them could make the fire using
flint, after working on it for a good hour or so. So incredibly, Jeff said
something like "We're going to go to matches." And he handed each a book of
matches to start the fire - and they still couldn't do it! Eventually,
after at least an hour with the matches, Becky managed to start the fire. I
don't think Sundra ever got a fire started.

--

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

>> Is it true that since the introduction of the fire, this
>> has made for more close FTC votes? If so, and if they
>> introduced to solve the F3 challenge problem as you
>> describe, they did a good thing.
>>
>> But weren't there fires before that as well?
>
> Yes, because there were often 2-2 ties at the F4

> tribal [...]

Ah, now I understand! At the F4 TC, there were often 2 strong
players and 2 weak. The winner of immunity would then join the
2 week players to get rid of the other strong player. This led
to FTCs not being exciting as 1 strong player faced 2 weak.

With the new rule, the 1 strong player winning immunity can
only bring 1 weak player to FTC and hope that another weak
player beats the other strong player making fire.

So with these new rules, while there can still be
a strong-weak-weak FTC, there is much higher possibility of
strong-strong-weak at FTC.

It's clear, only why can't all players at F4 be strong?
It doesn't seem to work like that.

[Brian Smith]

On Monday, December 25, 2023 at 9:07:58 PM UTC-7, Rick wrote:
> "Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:875y0lv...@dataswamp.org...
> >
> >Rick wrote:
> >
> >> The handling of Final 3 had been a problem almost from the
> >> start because the winner of the F3 immunity got sole power
> >> to decide who was leaving since the two non-winners could
> >> only vote for one another. This was all right if the F3
> >> winner was a major or well-liked player in the game, but it
> >> became a problem when lesser players happened to stumble to
> >> a victory in F3 [...]
> >
> >Well, if that's the game, that's the game, it can be called
> >a strong finish just as well.
> >
> >But how is it now, challenge at F4, the winner decides who
> >follow winner to the FTC, and the reaming two players do fire
> >for the third spot?
> >
> Yes, it's funny how for years people complained about the F3 winner getting
> the sole vote to decide who went to F2, but since S35 they've had a system
> where the F4 winner gets to solely decide who goes to F3 by sending the
> other two to a fire challenge.

With the "new" F4 system everyone gets two shots to make it to the end. Winning F4 immunity should count for something so I'm fine with that person getting to choose one person to take to F3.

> >Is it true that since the introduction of the fire, this has
> >made for more close FTC votes? If so, and if they introduced
> >to solve the F3 challenge problem as you describe, they did
> >a good thing.
> >
> >But weren't there fires before that as well?
> >
> Yes, because there were often 2-2 ties at the F4 tribal, so they made the
> rule that a 2--2 tie at F4 would be resolved with a fire challenge. This
> led to one of the funniest fire challenges I can recall, when Becky and
> Sundra were tied 2-2 in Cook Islands and had to make a fire to settle who
> would go home. Incredibly, neither one of them could make the fire using
> flint, after working on it for a good hour or so. So incredibly, Jeff said
> something like "We're going to go to matches." And he handed each a book of
> matches to start the fire - and they still couldn't do it! Eventually,
> after at least an hour with the matches, Becky managed to start the fire. I
> don't think Sundra ever got a fire started.
>
> --

LOL! That was an iconic Survivor moment.

Fire at F4 since S35 hasn't done anything to make the final vote closer. I believe the final vote has always had at least one person get either no votes or just one which is no different than the old F3 days.

It's too bad Survivor can't do what BB does at F3. BB does a three-part final comp which is three different comps held on different days. The first comp involves all three players, the second the two losers, and the third to the winners. The winner of Part 3 gets to decide who to vote out/who to take to F2. It's a pretty good system but the comps are held over a number of days which is why it wouldn't work on Survivor.

--
Brian

[Brian Smith]

More often than not it's two weaker players and one strong one at the end. This season was an exception.

We don't get all strong players at F4 because who wants to go to the end against people who might beat you? It's why Julie was taken out at F5. The goal is to be at the end with two weaker players, so you don't have to worry about a close vote and/r a jury member or two voting differently than you expected. Dee took a big gamble taking Austin to F3. Austin beating Jake at fire would have been expected so I doubt it would have helped him with the jury.

--
Brian

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

> With the "new" F4 system everyone gets two shots to make it
> to the end. Winning F4 immunity should count for something
> so I'm fine with that person getting to choose one person to
> take to F3.

Isn't that a good thing? Otherwise winning F4 immunity gives
too much power to that player. Because winning immunity should
only make you safe next TC, not virtually giving you the power
to win the game by setting up FTC.

> Fire at F4 since S35 hasn't done anything to make the final
> vote closer. I believe the final vote has always had at
> least one person get either no votes or just one which is no
> different than the old F3 days.

One could examine the votes at FTC to verify if it gets closer
or not. My impression is they are closer now but I didn't
examine the data.

BTW can't we have a system to get FTC with 2 players?

And 2 strong players, not 1 champ and 1 weak (the so called
goat).

> It's too bad Survivor can't do what BB does at F3. BB does
> a three-part final comp which is three different comps held
> on different days. The first comp involves all three
> players, the second the two losers, and the third to the
> winners. The winner of Part 3 gets to decide who to vote
> out/who to take to F2. It's a pretty good system but the
> comps are held over a number of days which is why it
> wouldn't work on Survivor.

Okay, but why can't it be done over a number of days
on Survivor?

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

> We don't get all strong players at F4 because who wants to
> go to the end against people who might beat you? It's why
> Julie was taken out at F5. The goal is to be at the end with

> two weaker players [...]

This is the goal from the individual player perspective but
the rules should be set up so this is very hard to accomplish.

Not sure what rules would maximize that but my impression is
the new rules with the fire makes for more even FTCs, at least
between two of the three players.

Optimally it should either be close between all three, or one
should be dropped before FTC so it would be close between the
remaining two.

I'm sure they have had many discussions how to achieve
super-dramatic and close FTCs and this is the best they have
come up with this far. It would be interesting to compare data
of "FTC vote balance" before and after they introduced
compulsory fire at F4 TC.

[Emanuel Berg]

> It would be interesting to compare data of "FTC vote
> balance" before and after they introduced compulsory fire at
> F4 TC.

OK, got some data.

We see that 50% of the first 10 seasons [1] were as close as
it gets at 4-3, which is 57% of the votes for the winner.

S01 4-3 57%
S02 4-3 57%
S03 5-2 71%
S04 4-3 57%
S05 4-3 57%
S06 6-1 86%
S07 6-1 86%
S08 4-3 57%
S09 5-2 71%
S10 6-1 86%

5/10 at 57%
3/10 at 86%
2/10 at 71%

Mean: 68.5%

Conclusion: First 10 seasons had very close FTCs!

[1] https://www.goldderby.com/gallery/survivor-winners-list

[Emanuel Berg]

> S01 4-3 57%
> S02 4-3 57%
> S03 5-2 71%
> S04 4-3 57%
> S05 4-3 57%
> S06 6-1 86%
> S07 6-1 86%
> S08 4-3 57%
> S09 5-2 71%

> S10 6-1 86% [...]
>
> Mean: 68.5%

S11 6-1 86%
S12 5-2 71%
S13 5-4-0 56%
S14 9-0-0 100%
S15 4-2-1 57%
S16 5-3 62%
S17 4-3-0 57%
S18 7-0 100%
S19 7-2-0 78%
S20 7-2-0 78%

Mean S11-S20: 74.5%

[Emanuel Berg]

Okay, I was dead wrong. The game has not been getting more
exciting at FTC since its golden days, actually the opposite
has happened.

Here are the number of votes and percentage of them cast for
the winner season by season.

By far the best period was the first five seasons, S01-S05.
Four out of five FTC were close (score 4-3), and the season
that wasn't close (S03) was only a single vote away from
close (5-2).

Why was it so close in the early days? Probably because people
focused more on the survival part, building the shelter, camp
life etc, so strong guys and girls, not weak players, went on
to the FTC. After that period, people realized the game works
the opposite, those strong rivals are the guys you want to
get out, not keep.

Now we haven't had a close season since S36 (6-5-0), and
before that: S21 (5-4-0).

Anyway, here is the data.

this file:
https://dataswamp.org/~incal/data/survivor.txt

source:
https://www.goldderby.com/gallery/survivor-winners-list

compute with:
https://dataswamp.org/~incal/emacs-init/survivor.el

S01 4-3 57% *close*
S02 4-3 57% *close*
S03 5-2 71%
S04 4-3 57% *close*
S05 4-3 57% *close* [S01-S05 mean: 60%]

S06 6-1 86%
S07 6-1 86%

S08 4-3 57% *close*
S09 5-2 71%
S10 6-1 86% [S06-S10 mean: 77%]

S11 6-1 86%
S12 5-2 71%

S13 5-4-0 56% *close*
S14 9-0-0 100%
S15 4-2-1 57% [S11-S15 mean: 74%]

S16 5-3 62%
S17 4-3-0 57% *close*

S18 7-0 100%
S19 7-2-0 78%

S20 7-2-0 78% [S16-S20 mean: 75%]

S21 5-4-0 56% *close*
S22 8-1-0 89%
S23 6-3-0 67%
S24 7-2-0 78%
S25 6-1-1 75% [S21-S25 mean: 73%]

S26 8-0-0 100%
S27 7-1-0 88%
S28 8-1 89%
S29 5-2-1 62%
S30 6-1-1 75% [S26-S30 mean: 83%]

S31 10-0-0 100%
S32 5-2-0 71%
S33 10-0-0 100%
S34 7-3-0 70%
S35 5-2-1 62% [S31-S35 mean: 81%]

S36 6-5-0 55% *close*
S37 7-3-0 70%
S38 9-4-0 69%
S39 8-2-0 80%
S40 12-4-0 75% [S36-S40 mean: 70%]

S41 7-1-0 88%
S42 7-1-0 88%
S43 7-1-0 88%
S44 7-1-0 88%
S45 5-3-0 62% [S41-S45 mean: 83%]

[Brian Smith]

This is exactly what I told you. F3 has always had at least one finalist get either no votes or just one. Fire at F4 has not helped to make the final vote closer. They need to go back to F2 at the endif the goal is to have closer votes. S41 to S44 had the exact same 7–1–0 final vote. So predictable!

--
Brian

[Rick]

"Brian Smith" wrote in message

news:ddc3f0cf-41c8-4007...@googlegroups.com...

I agree that an F2 is much better than an F3, and I would love to see the
show return to it.

As I said in another post, the original perceived problem with F2 is that
the winner of F3 immunity got to make a unilateral decision on who would go
to the finals. This put a lot of power in the hands of one person who was
often a marginal or under-the radar player who just got lucky in the F3
challenge. They tried to solve this by replacing the F2 with an F3, but
maybe a better solution would be to eliminate the F3 vote and go to a system
where the top two finishers in the F3 immunity challenge go to the final two
and the person who comes in last in the challenge gets eliminated. This
could even be a fire-making challenge where all three players have to make
fire and only the top two finishers go to the finals.



--

[Brian Smith]

Sounds good to me! This is basically what they do premerge where the first two tribes to finish are safe and last place goes to TC. At F3 the loser would go to jury. You should mention this idea to Dalton and ask him to sell it to Jeff. The only issue I see with your idea is that they would need either one extra day in the season or one more cycle where two people get booted. I'd also be in favor of 16 person casts.

--
Brian

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

> I agree that an F2 is much better than an F3, and I would
> love to see the show return to it.

Yes.

> As I said in another post, the original perceived problem
> with F2 is that the winner of F3 immunity got to make
> a unilateral decision on who would go to the finals.
> This put a lot of power in the hands of one person who was
> often a marginal or under-the radar player who just got
> lucky in the F3 challenge.

Well, the F3 challenge should be designed so you cannot win it
by getting lucky.

> They tried to solve this by replacing the F2 with an F3, but
> maybe a better solution would be to eliminate the F3 vote
> and go to a system where the top two finishers in the F3
> immunity challenge go to the final two and the person who
> comes in last in the challenge gets eliminated. This could
> even be a fire-making challenge where all three players have
> to make fire and only the top two finishers go to
> the finals.

I agree that would be better at F3 but I think the challenge
should be more exciting than just 3 guys making fire.

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

> F3 has always had at least one finalist get either no votes
> or just one.

There has been 30 seasons with three players at FTC. Of these,
the 3rd finisher has received one vote five times (S15, S25,
S29, S30, and S35). This is the best the 3rd player has ever
fared so I don't know how much sense it makes to include him
or her, since the stats seem to indicate this player will
never play any role at FTC.

That said, 3-player FTCs has seen four close seasons:

S13 (5-4-0)
S17 (4-3-0)
S21 (5-4-0)
S36 (6-5-0)

So 13% of the those seasons have been close.

> Fire at F4 has not helped to make the final vote closer.

Did you say it was introduced at S35?

If so, there has been just one close season (S36, 6-5-0) of
eleven, so 9%.

> They need to go back to F2 at the end if the goal is to have
> closer votes.

There has been 15 seasons with two players at FTC. Of these 5,
or 33%, have been close. So that's much higher than with three
players (again, 13%). However we see that this high percentage
is almost entirely built on the early days - take a look at
this sequence, what such seasons were close:

S01 (4-3)
S02 (4-3)
S04 (4-3)
S05 (4-3)
S08 (4-3)

To further exemplify, the last two seasons with 2-player FTCs
were S18 (7-0) and S28 (8-1).

> S41 to S44 had the exact same 7–1–0 final vote.
> So predictable!

Yes, but this season, S45, is tricky. Votes are 5-3-0 which is
62% of the votes cast for the winner. Since two votes separate
the winner from the 2nd player, we can't say it is close using
that definition. But with just one vote not for Dee but for
Austin, it would have been a tie 4-4-0, i.e. the first
50% ever!

Too bad it didn't happen. Because Dee would have won anyway :)

[Emanuel Berg]

> There has been 30 seasons with three players at FTC.
> Of these, the 3rd finisher has received one vote five times
> (S15, S25, S29, S30, and S35). This is the best the 3rd
> player has ever fared so I don't know how much sense it
> makes to include him or her, since the stats seem to
> indicate this player will never play any role at FTC.

Verified, there isn't a single season where votes cast for the
3rd player would have tied the game if cast for the
2nd player.

It would have made one season, S15 (4-2-1) close tho (a
hypothetical 4-3-0). But then it should be noted that that
season was very close as it was, with only 57% of the votes
cast for the winner.

But in a way this whole reasoning is bogus since obviously and
by definition voting for the 3rd player will never influence
the game since the battle is between the 1st and 2nd player.

[Emanuel Berg]

> Yes, but this season, S45, is tricky. Votes are 5-3-0 which
> is 62% of the votes cast for the winner. Since two votes
> separate the winner from the 2nd player, we can't say it is
> close using that definition. But with just one vote not for
> Dee but for Austin, it would have been a tie 4-4-0, i.e.
> the first 50% ever!

No, we had that, I remember now - "Ghost Island"!

That season is not just close, it is the closest ever with
just 55% of the votes for the winner.

S36 (6-5-0) 55%

[Emanuel Berg]

If anything in the 60s (i.e. less than 70% of the votes cast
for the winner at FTC) is "great", and anything in
the 70s (70-79%) is "good", and then ditto 80s "OK", 90s "bad"
and 100 "awful", then we get this history for mean values
computed with seasons grouped into groups of five:

S01 - S05: 60% great
S06 - S10: 77% good
S11 - S15: 74% good
S16 - S20: 75% good
S21 - S25: 73% good
S26 - S30: 83% OK
S31 - S35: 81% OK
S36 - S40: 70% good
S41 - S45: 83% OK

If you think 69% is generous for a great season, think again,
as a perfect 4-3 season is already at 57%.

Here are the 10 best seasons ever according to this method:

1. S36 (6-5-0) 55%
2. S13 (5-4-0) 56%
3. S21 (5-4-0) 56%
4. S01 (4-3) 57%
5. S02 (4-3) 57%
6. S04 (4-3) 57%
7. S05 (4-3) 57%
8. S08 (4-3) 57%
9. S17 (4-3-0) 57%
10. S15 (4-2-1) 57% [not close]

[Rick]

"Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:87jzoys...@dataswamp.org...

>
>Rick wrote:
>
>> I agree that an F2 is much better than an F3, and I would
>> love to see the show return to it.
>
>Yes.
>
>> As I said in another post, the original perceived problem
>> with F2 is that the winner of F3 immunity got to make
>> a unilateral decision on who would go to the finals.
>> This put a lot of power in the hands of one person who was
>> often a marginal or under-the radar player who just got
>> lucky in the F3 challenge.
>
>Well, the F3 challenge should be designed so you cannot win it
>by getting lucky.
>

Well a purist might say that nothing is more fair than having to build fire
where everyone has the exact same raw materials to start.

>> They tried to solve this by replacing the F2 with an F3, but
>> maybe a better solution would be to eliminate the F3 vote
>> and go to a system where the top two finishers in the F3
>> immunity challenge go to the final two and the person who
>> comes in last in the challenge gets eliminated. This could
>> even be a fire-making challenge where all three players have
>> to make fire and only the top two finishers go to
>> the finals.
>
>I agree that would be better at F3 but I think the challenge
>should be more exciting than just 3 guys making fire.
>

Australian Survivor (and, more recently, Survivor UK) likes to do the
classic challenge from US Survivor 1 (Borneo) where you have three people
with their hand on a statue and it's strictly longevity, who can keep their
hand on the statue the longest. Whether that's more exciting than three
guys making fire is a matter of opinion, but I don't think either represents
luck. One measures fire-making skills and the other the raw determination
and physical stamina to keep your hand on an idol for several hours. Either
works for me.

--

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

>>> They tried to solve this by replacing the F2 with an F3,
>>> but maybe a better solution would be to eliminate the F3
>>> vote and go to a system where the top two finishers in the
>>> F3 immunity challenge go to the final two and the person
>>> who comes in last in the challenge gets eliminated.
>>> This could even be a fire-making challenge where all three
>>> players have to make fire and only the top two finishers
>>> go to the finals.
>>
>> I agree that would be better at F3 but I think the
>> challenge should be more exciting than just 3 guys
>> making fire.
>
> Australian Survivor (and, more recently, Survivor UK) likes
> to do the classic challenge from US Survivor 1 (Borneo)
> where you have three people with their hand on a statue and
> it's strictly longevity, who can keep their hand on the
> statue the longest. Whether that's more exciting than three
> guys making fire is a matter of opinion, but I don't think
> either represents luck. One measures fire-making skills and
> the other the raw determination and physical stamina to keep
> your hand on an idol for several hours. Either works for me.

Agreed!

In an ideal world, luck should be completely removed from the
game. This isn't hard to do either, as all such instances can
be solved by challenges. If there is no time or imagination to
do a proper Survivor-style, well-thought and original one, one
can always resort to a fire or something up that alley.
That would always be OK IMO.

Also, two players at FTC is also more dramatic, more of
a duel, than three players. It doesn't have to be close every
season, but it should also not be "hero vs goat" too much.

But as we have seen, three players at FTC and the fire-making
twist has not solved the one-sided problem, so the studio
should once again try to come up with modifications to make
the game more fair (less luck) and more exciting (less
one-sided FTCs).

I think the fire making contest at F4 is _perceived_ as making
the FTC more exciting as there are two "strong" ways to enter
it. Either winning the immunity challenge, _or_ making the
fire. So this is probably not a bad idea, even tho the stats
at this point won't support the notion that FTCs have become
more close because of it.

We also saw it in the "Survivor Capitalism" season that some
dude won the challenge, but also took upon himself to do the
fire challenge - and won the game. I.e., a super^2 way to FTC
for him. Din anyone else do that? If so, how did that go?

And, what are the stats now, is it better to make fire at F4
and win, or is it better to win immunity and make it to FTC
that way, i.e. without making the fire?

I now recall, it was you who compiled stats for this a couple
of seasons back, right? Do you still have the file? If not, it
should be in the archives for this group, alt.tv.survivor.

[The Horny Goat]

On Thu, 28 Dec 2023 12:47:32 -0500, "Rick" <ri...@nospam.com> wrote:

>Australian Survivor (and, more recently, Survivor UK) likes to do the
>classic challenge from US Survivor 1 (Borneo) where you have three people
>with their hand on a statue and it's strictly longevity, who can keep their
>hand on the statue the longest. Whether that's more exciting than three
>guys making fire is a matter of opinion, but I don't think either represents
>luck. One measures fire-making skills and the other the raw determination
>and physical stamina to keep your hand on an idol for several hours. Either
>works for me.
>

UK Survivor 1 + 2 had the pole standing challenge - one lasted for 23
1/2 the other 24 1/2 hours.

One can readily see why production hated it though they got some VERY
good shots of those who had 'fallen' early arriving back at dawn (with
lots of fruit from breakfast) and being staggered the remaining 3 were
both going strong.

Survivor South Africa (season 1 or 2 can't remember) had an extremely
muscular black fellow with superb social skills who everyone thought
would win but he momentarily blacked out on the F4 challenge and since
the challenge was also F3 (e.g. first off was automatically gone while
the winner of F3 chose who went with him/her to F2. Given how this
fellow had dominated post merge play it was a truly dramatic moment
when he fell.

[Emanuel Berg]

Yeah, as a nod, we had it in Swedish Survivor as well, before
anyone else :)

But here I am unsure - doing such a thing with no water, no
food, no sleep, and the overall very stressful situation that
is Survivor, and the state in which you are in mentally and
physically at the very end of the game - I don't know if
that's a good idea.

I'm not a medical professional or anything but to me it
strikes me as too dangerous?

[Brian Smith]

On Thursday, December 28, 2023 at 10:47:35 AM UTC-7, Rick wrote:
> "Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:87jzoys...@dataswamp.org...
> >
> >Rick wrote:
> >
> >> I agree that an F2 is much better than an F3, and I would
> >> love to see the show return to it.
> >
> >Yes.
> >
> >> As I said in another post, the original perceived problem
> >> with F2 is that the winner of F3 immunity got to make
> >> a unilateral decision on who would go to the finals.
> >> This put a lot of power in the hands of one person who was
> >> often a marginal or under-the radar player who just got
> >> lucky in the F3 challenge.
> >
> >Well, the F3 challenge should be designed so you cannot win it
> >by getting lucky.
> >
> Well a purist might say that nothing is more fair than having to build fire
> where everyone has the exact same raw materials to start.

Seat location seems to be factor at times as the direction of the wind can impact one player more than the other. This happened to Katurah at the start of fire this season.

> >> They tried to solve this by replacing the F2 with an F3, but
> >> maybe a better solution would be to eliminate the F3 vote
> >> and go to a system where the top two finishers in the F3
> >> immunity challenge go to the final two and the person who
> >> comes in last in the challenge gets eliminated. This could
> >> even be a fire-making challenge where all three players have
> >> to make fire and only the top two finishers go to
> >> the finals.
> >
> >I agree that would be better at F3 but I think the challenge
> >should be more exciting than just 3 guys making fire.
> >
> Australian Survivor (and, more recently, Survivor UK) likes to do the
> classic challenge from US Survivor 1 (Borneo) where you have three people
> with their hand on a statue and it's strictly longevity, who can keep their
> hand on the statue the longest. Whether that's more exciting than three
> guys making fire is a matter of opinion, but I don't think either represents
> luck. One measures fire-making skills and the other the raw determination
> and physical stamina to keep your hand on an idol for several hours. Either
> works for me.

I'll take fire any day over keeping your hand on a statue. At least being able to start a fire is game-related.

--
Brian

[Rick]

"Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:87y1deq...@dataswamp.org...

OK, here are the stats on the F4 Fire-making challenge, which has been in
place since S35 (11 seasons). Essentially, there are seven possible
outcomes:

Case 1: F4 winner selects two other players for fire - F4 winner goes to
finale and wins
Case 2: F4 winner selects two other players for fire - F4 winner goes to
finale and comes in second
Case 3: F4 winner selects two other players for fire - F4 winner goes to
finale and comes in third
Case 4: F4 winner takes self to fire-making and wins fire challenge - goes
to finale and wins
Case 5: F4 winner takes self to fire-making and wins fire challenge - goes
to finale and comes in second
Case 6: F4 winner takes self to fire-making and wins fire challenge - goes
to finale and comes in third
Case 7: F4 winner takes self to fire-making and loses fire challenge - does
not go to finale

Here are the results:

Case 1: Has only happened twice: Nick (S37) and Dee (S45)
Case 2: Has happened four times: Chrissy (S35), Domenick (S36), Natalie
(S40), Cassidy (S43)
Case 3: Has happened three times: Noura (S39), Xander (S41) and Romeo
(S42)
Case 4: Has famously only happened once: Chris (S38)
Case 5: Has also only happened once: Heidi (S44)
Case 6: Has never happened
Case 7: Has never happened

Not sure we really have a big enough sample to draw any conclusions, but
maybe the most interesting result is that seven times out of the eleven
seasons (nearly 70% of the time), the F4 winner chooses two other players to
make fire and then ends up not winning the game. It's also interesting that
aside from Chris, who won S38, Heidi is the only other player to take
themselves into the fire-making challenge (and she, of course, did not win
the game).

And of course the fact that only three of the F4 winners ended up winning
the game (Nick, Chris and Dee), that means in eight out of the eleven
seasons, the winner of the game did not win the F4 challenge. For the
record, those non-F4-winner game winners are: Ben, Wendell, Tommy, Tony,
Erika, Maryanne, Gabler and Yam Yam.

Let the conclusion-drawing begin...












--

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

>>> Well, the F3 challenge should be designed so you cannot
>>> win it by getting lucky.
>>
>> Well a purist might say that nothing is more fair than
>> having to build fire where everyone has the exact same raw
>> materials to start.
>
> Seat location seems to be factor at times as the direction
> of the wind can impact one player more than the other.
> This happened to Katurah at the start of fire this season.

One can think of several ways to deal with that.

1. Build a little booth to take away the wind. (Ikr? Overkill.
And what happens if they put the whole booth on fire?)

X. Put the players in an open field at a certain distance from
each other, so one player cannot block the wind from
hitting the other. (Should be enough.)

2. Compute who played the best Survivor game up until that
point based on some metric - say the number of challenges
won - that player gets to choose fire-making station first,
and so on. (Only that process shouldn't be shown on TV
since it is a formality.)

Note that the wind, and sometimes temperature and other such
factors of nature, are indeed factors in some professional and
Olympic sports. They have methods and rules to deal with it.
No one is complaining they lost because of the wind. (That
happens in Survivor.)

[Emanuel Berg]

Thanks, king!

> Not sure we really have a big enough sample to draw any
> conclusions, but maybe the most interesting result is that
> seven times out of the eleven seasons (nearly 70% of the
> time), the F4 winner chooses two other players to make fire
> and then ends up not winning the game. It's also interesting
> that aside from Chris, who won S38, Heidi is the only other
> player to take themselves into the fire-making challenge
> (and she, of course, did not win the game).
>
> And of course the fact that only three of the F4 winners
> ended up winning the game (Nick, Chris and Dee), that means
> in eight out of the eleven seasons, the winner of the game
> did not win the F4 challenge. For the record, those
> non-F4-winner game winners are: Ben, Wendell, Tommy, Tony,
> Erika, Maryanne, Gabler and Yam Yam.
>
> Let the conclusion-drawing begin...

Those stats are all over the place by just by intuition after
reading what you said, I'd say the conclusion can be, every
Survivor player who plays to win should practice making fires
every day at home, and with as close a kit as possible, from
the day they get the message they will play.

After winning F4, if that's what happens, one should only go
directly to FTC if one is _very confident_ one has an edge
over every other player still in the game.

If there is some sort of threat just below, don't let him or
her shine winning the fire in front of the jury. Instead,
bring him or her instantly to the FTC, then pick the worst
fire-maker and beat him or her convincingly yourself.

[ There is also the possibility to bring the perceived #2
threat (assuming you are #1 after winning F4 immunity)
directly to FTC to not let him/her shine - and let #3 and #4
do the fire since they are hopeless anyway. And maybe this
is what Dee did this season! ]

The allure of doing the fire yourself after winning F4 is - is
you win it, and still don't win the game, hey, what more could
you have done? - and if you loose you loose on your own terms
which is probably more easy to handle mentally even tho
you lost.

[Brian Smith]

The obvious conclusion so far is that winning F4 Immunity isn't as big a deal as many think it is. It appears to be a liability. It would be interesting to know how many times the F4 Immunity winner has not gotten the vote of the firemaking loser.

Winning fire at F4 probably makes a positive psychological impact on the jury because they get to see it play out. Winning F4 Immunity probably doesn't have the same impact because they have no idea if the winner was dominate, lucked out, etc.

Another obvious conclusion is that players should come prepared knowing how to make fire as quickly possible.

--
Brian

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

> The obvious conclusion so far is that winning F4 Immunity
> isn't as big a deal as many think it is. It appears to be
> a liability.

Okay, we need simplified stats. How many times did the F4
immunity challenge winner beat the fire-making champ at FTC to
win the game? And how many times did the opposite happen?

> Winning fire at F4 probably makes a positive psychological
> impact on the jury because they get to see it play out.
> Winning F4 Immunity probably doesn't have the same impact
> because they have no idea if the winner was dominate, lucked
> out, etc.

This seems to make sense but there can be other reasons as
well. The guys in the jury might have lost immunity challenges
to the F4 winner and that resulted in them not going far in
the game. Thus they identify with the "underdogs" doing
the fire.

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

> Essentially, there are seven possible outcomes [...]

OK, so I renamed the 7 cases into short codes.

F4W is for "final four immunity challenge winner" (all cases).
O is for "other players make fire", S is for "self". The digit
is either 1, 2 or 3 (win the game, 2nd and 3rd at FTC). L is
for "loose the fire".

Conclusion:

If you win F4,

- you have a 22% shot at winning if you select other players
to make the fire;

- you have a 50% shot at winning if you make fire yourself.

F4WO1: 2 22%
F4WO2: 4 44% -> 4 + 3 = 7
F4WO3: 3 33% -> 7/9 is 78%
---------------
9 100%

F4WS1: 1 50%
F4WS2: 1 50%
F4WS3: 0 0%
F4WSL: 0 0%
---------------
2 100%

[The Horny Goat]

On Thu, 28 Dec 2023 19:49:06 +0100, Emanuel Berg <in...@dataswamp.org>
wrote:

>Yeah, as a nod, we had it in Swedish Survivor as well, before
>anyone else :)
>
>But here I am unsure - doing such a thing with no water, no
>food, no sleep, and the overall very stressful situation that
>is Survivor, and the state in which you are in mentally and
>physically at the very end of the game - I don't know if
>that's a good idea.
>
>I'm not a medical professional or anything but to me it
>strikes me as too dangerous?

I saw Swedish Survivor offered for d/l but passed as I had already
seen one of the Israel Survivors and my non-command of Hebrew made it
impossible to follow (other than the interesting difference that they
did Tribal Council at "high noon")

[Emanuel Berg]

The first couple of US seasons were pretty similar to the
original Swedish Survivor. It stands out today as being much
more of an expedition and adventure and less of a competition
the way they edited it.

The camp is also different, a lot of gear everywhere and
products that remind us of home - like cans with beans,
construction/carpentry tools, and stuff they would never show
on US Survivor today, as that would break the illusion and
perfect Survivor picture.

But in an expedition, is is completely normal to bring such
items, so back then no one reacted to their presence.

A lot of the time on TV people didn't talk about the game or
talk strategy at all, instead they complained who didn't work,
who was trying to flirt with who and that was soo annoying,
a lot of meaningless gossip of that kind that would be
considered "unrelated" in modern seasons.

_Why_ someone was voted out was always a big issue, people
explained in length their reasoning, often in terms that
didn't relate to the game. Today that is a non-issue since
that is the goal of the game, everyone understands that.

They also put in subtitles sometimes mocking the castaways,
"Here we see <some dude> making a pathetic attempt at
understanding what two women are talking about", and such
comments, that was very fun IMO :) For sure, the political
correctness of 2024 sure didn't exist back then.

Some challenges were cool tho and truly original, some were
clearly improvised and are more like kids or drunk people's
games by today's standards.

[Emanuel Berg]

Thank for letting me re-live those memories.

This show has meant a lot to me :)

[Rick]

"Brian Smith" wrote in message

news:f6286b48-e3f8-4896...@googlegroups.com...

The answer is 10 times out of the 11 seasons they have done the fire
challenge. Only F4 winner who got the vote of the fire-making loser was Dee
who got Katurah's vote.

For the 11 seasons from S35 to S45, the losers of the fire challenge and
whom they voted for in the finale are as follows:

S35: F4 winner was Chrissy - fire loser is Devon, who voted for Ryan
S36: F4 winner was Domenick - fire loser is Angela, who voted for Wendell
S37: F4 winner was Nick - fire loser is Kara, who voted for Mike
S38: F4 winner was Chris - fire loser is Devens, who voted for Gavin
S39: F4 winner was Noura - fire loser is Lauren, who voted for Tommy
S40: F4 winner was Natalie - fire loser is Sarah, who voted for Tony
S41: F4 winner was Xander - fire loser is Heather, who voted for Erika
S42: F4 winner was Romeo - fire loser is Jonathan, who voted for Mike
S43: F4 winner was Cassidy- fire loser is Jesse, who voted for Gabler
S44: F4 winner was Heidi - fire loser is Carson, who voted for Yam Yam
S45: F4 winner was Dee - fire loser is Katurah, who voted for Dee

>Winning fire at F4 probably makes a positive psychological impact on the
>jury because they get to see it play out. Winning F4 Immunity probably
>doesn't have the same impact because they have no idea if the winner was
>dominate, lucked out, etc.
>
>Another obvious conclusion is that players should come prepared knowing how
>to make fire as quickly possible.
>
>--
>Brian

--

[Brian Smith]

Wow! No wonder F4 Immunity winners often seriously consider doing themselves. Choosing two others to do fire seems like a good way to lose a vote. Dee was lucky Emily chose her and Katurah to go on the reward Emily won.

--
Brian

[Emanuel Berg]

Brian Smith wrote:

>>> It would be interesting to know how many times the F4
>>> Immunity winner has not gotten the vote of the
>>> firemaking loser.
>>
>> The answer is 10 times out of the 11 seasons they have done
>> the fire challenge. Only F4 winner who got the vote of the
>> fire-making loser was Dee who got Katurah's vote.
>>
>> For the 11 seasons from S35 to S45, the losers of the fire
>> challenge and whom they voted for in the finale are as
>> follows:
>>
>> S35: F4 winner was Chrissy - fire loser is Devon, who voted for Ryan
>> S36: F4 winner was Domenick - fire loser is Angela, who voted for Wendell
>> S37: F4 winner was Nick - fire loser is Kara, who voted for Mike
>> S38: F4 winner was Chris - fire loser is Devens, who voted for Gavin
>> S39: F4 winner was Noura - fire loser is Lauren, who voted for Tommy
>> S40: F4 winner was Natalie - fire loser is Sarah, who voted for Tony
>> S41: F4 winner was Xander - fire loser is Heather, who voted for Erika
>> S42: F4 winner was Romeo - fire loser is Jonathan, who voted for Mike

>> S43: F4 winner was Cassidy - fire loser is Jesse, who voted for Gabler

>> S44: F4 winner was Heidi - fire loser is Carson, who voted for Yam Yam
>> S45: F4 winner was Dee - fire loser is Katurah, who voted for Dee
>
> Wow! No wonder F4 Immunity winners often seriously consider
> doing themselves. Choosing two others to do fire seems like
> a good way to lose a vote. Dee was lucky Emily chose her and
> Katurah to go on the reward Emily won.

So only 1 out of 11, or 9%, the F4 winner got to collect.

So this is the answer then. Why do you loose when you let
other players do the fire? One, you make the opposition look
good in front of the jury, and this is the last thing that
happens; two, you loose one jury vote.

But why doesn't the fire loser vote for the F4 winner?

[Rick]

Well the obvious answer is that it's payback for being selected to make the
fire instead of being brought to F3. This may, for example, have been the
reason why Jesse refused to vote for Cassidy in S43 and voted for Gabler
instead. There are also alliance-related reasons like Sarah voting for her
long-time ally and fellow cop Tony to win S40 and Carson who voted for his
alliance member and original tribe mate Yam Yam in S44.

Similarly, you had Heather refusing to vote for Xander (who most players
thought was too young and hadn't really been strategic enough to win the
game) and voting for fellow female Erika. Then you have the case of Rick
Devens, who in addition to possible sour grapes over Chris effectively
ending his game, may have felt (like many fans) that Chris didn't serve to
win the game due to his having effectively been out of the game for several
episodes when he was in exile.

--

[Emanuel Berg]

Rick wrote:

>> So only 1 out of 11, or 9%, the F4 winner got to collect.
>>
>> So this is the answer then. Why do you loose when you let
>> other players do the fire? One, you make the opposition
>> look good in front of the jury, and this is the last thing
>> that happens; two, you loose one jury vote.
>>
>> But why doesn't the fire loser vote for the F4 winner?
>

> Well the obvious answer is that it's payback for being
> selected to make the fire instead of being brought to F3.
> This may, for example, have been the reason why Jesse
> refused to vote for Cassidy in S43 and voted for Gabler
> instead. There are also alliance-related reasons like Sarah
> voting for her long-time ally and fellow cop Tony to win S40
> and Carson who voted for his alliance member and original
> tribe mate Yam Yam in S44.
>
> Similarly, you had Heather refusing to vote for Xander (who
> most players thought was too young and hadn't really been
> strategic enough to win the game) and voting for fellow
> female Erika. Then you have the case of Rick Devens, who in
> addition to possible sour grapes over Chris effectively
> ending his game, may have felt (like many fans) that Chris
> didn't serve to win the game due to his having effectively
> been out of the game for several episodes when he was
> in exile.

Yes, but first you say there is an obvious answer, then you
go on and give several others?

[Rick]

"Emanuel Berg" wrote in message news:87tto0i...@dataswamp.org...

I'm saying the obvious answer may not tell the whole story.

--