Board Thread:Survivor: Isla Del Sol (Season 10)/@comment-5098907-20150725050503/@comment-24776269-20150725225543

BLAINEY! *hugs* Okay let's do this.

1. If I had had my way from Day 1, Cobo would have dominated the game from the get-go, since it's easier to work with existing relationships then forge new ones. You, Blake, and I would have dominated post-merge and gone on for F3. However, that would have been absolutely impossible. My other ideal plan would have been to get you back come the merge and go to the final four with you, myself, Grace, and Trace, knocking Trace out at F4 and honoring my deal with you. Basically I wanted to keep what I saw as a commitment you and I made with Murokata pre-merge and ride that to the very end. And it turns out that almost happened in a roundabout way. Most of the TC's ended up working to my advantage, even if they didn't go exactly as I planned. I was able to turn negatives into positives, more so than I think I've ever done.

2. That's a good question. I think my toughest obstacle this game was really stretching myself and seeing how far I could bend my moral compass. Outside the game of Survivor, I consider myself a very loyal person, almost fiercely so. In Survivor, that can work to your advantage, but it can also be a huge hindrance. I got really paranoid about this when the merge happened. I second-guessed everything and wondered whether I had become TOO loyal. So I wondered whether it would be easier just to team up with Andrei, Minke, and Jake. I had a moment where I was looking out for myself, when my natural instinct is to look out for others. It was weird, out of my comfort zone, and I knew if I was making this decision I had to go all out. So I voted for you at that Tribal Council. And I instantly regretted it when I learned I was never a target, when you had never lied to me. I felt like shit. I knew it would be a long time before I could earn your trust back, if ever. So the last time I ever lied to you was when I voted for Casey because I was afraid she had replaced me. That was as far as I was willing to test our friendship. After that, I knew we could ride it out to the end.

3. Okay this one is tricky.

1. BLAINE - Obviously I was with you the longest, we had our major ups and downs but when it comes down to it I genuinely wanted you and I to be in the finals together. I made that promise to you and I wanted to keep it. Tom's idol had other plans.

2. GRACE - I liked keeping Grace close as an ally because I could read her pretty well. I knew I could work with her without having her fly off the handle. That worked like a charm when it came down to voting with the majority on the Casey and Ivan votes.

3. TRACE - There was a time when I really didn't trust Trace. But when the merge happened, I knew things would be different. We weren't separated by tribal boundaries. At first I didn't know if we were going to fall on the same side of the numbers but then he approached me, we had a conversation, and promised not to target one another for the remainder of the game. (I'm paraphrasing of course, since that didn't happen over one convo but over a longer course of time.) After that I knew he and Grace would vote pretty close together, and when I could guess Grace's head, I could probably guess Trace's as well. That was really helpful later on.

4. IVAN - I knew I needed to have a backup plan in case the entire world blew up in my face. That backup plan was Ivan. I absolutely adore Ivan, he and I have talked outside the game before, and I knew that we naturally connect. He trusted me and I trusted him. That made his vote the hardest of the whole game for me. We had been talking and I had to get him to believe I was going along with his plans, even though after the Minke vote I knew he and Tom were toast. It really sucked voting him out and hurting him like that because we had worked side by side for the first half of the merge.

5. TOM - I know this will come as a shock, but near the end Tom and I got along. Jake, Will, Andrei, Minke, and Casey ultimately were accountable to other people. I couldn't predict them. It made it hard to forge working relationships with them because I didn't know who was leaking information and who was actually helping me out. Tom was at the top of that list for a long time because he was playing a really hard game and getting on my nerves for the most part (no offense). But once I figured out that Tom's biggest ally was Ivan, I was able to guess where the two of them would vote every round. By compartmentalizing these voting blocs, I was able to correctly guess where the next few votes would land. That made Tom an asset to me those last few votes.

There you go, thank you for the great questions. I'm so glad I got to play with you. <3