That’s not the calculation, though. You have to factor in both how likely you think you are to win the challenge if you don’t jump, and how likely you are to be voted off if you do. If you figure you’re not likely to win anyways, or that you’re safe at TC, then you may as well just wait for the right offer from Propst.
I was surprised when Steph jumped. I figured she couldn’t be sure enough of her place yet to take the chance, and it seemed like she agreed with my assessment when asked at TC. Tom’s no idiot - he knows that the alpha males usually get picked off. I suspect he’ll be putting out maximum effort in all immunity challenges. Coby, on the other hand, is just an idiot. He seemed to think he was playing anyone, but he was so bloody transparent. Scheming is good, but the point of your schemes has to be to make yourself the one critical person the others can’t afford to vote off. All Coby managed to do was make it perfectly clear that he wasn’t going to be a reliable ally, and hence that he was completely useless to any alliance.
Maybe it was just good editing on the producers part, but this played out exactly as it should have. Coby made a power play and lost. A classic survivor scenario. I was very suspicious when Steph jumped off the perch. She does NOT give up, and would not have traded immunity for pizza unless she was absolutely sure she had a place in the main alliance. Good ridance Coby-- you played a good game, but made too much of an issue of your “outsider” status.
The real fun will begin when the power players feel the need to turn on each other.
This is one of the best Survivor series ever. Can’t wait for next week.
note to watsonwill: Knowing that your ratings are a knock-off of Mullinator’s Raj Ratings doesn’t help. First of all, you’ve typed that before. Secondly, i haven’t ever seen the Raj Ratings, and don’t even know which reality TV series they are for. Thirdly, I do, mostly, understand what your ratings are supposed to represent- and refuse to pay enough attention to tribal scheming to figure out whether I’d place people in the slots you do.
note to Ms. LaGrossa:
The better answer to the question of “How worried are you that you are going to be voted off tonight?” would have been “Not worried at all. I’ve outplayed, outwitted, outlasted one entire tribe while this tribe outperformed us at reward challenges. If I go home tonight, I’m still a winner in my eyes. But I’m hoping I still have a role to play on the island.”
At least, some form of that is what I would have said. (We’ll ignore the unlikelihood of me being a player on a reality TV show, and the likeilhood that if I was, I’d have been sent home already.)
You saw grumpy, I saw “slightly hung over.” And you reminded me of another great bit from this week’s show, when Tom and Ian were alone, over by the outrigger:
Ian: That was pretty awesome yesterday. Tom: The fishing? Yeah, I know, I – Ian: I was talking about you getting drunk. (big evil grin)
So, in addition to being cute, Ian is also comedy freaking gold. The perfect man. Supernerd. I wonder if he has any idea how many women are basically his love slaves right now, at his beck and call? I’ve seen old pictures of him, and he has always been cute, but in the dorky sort of way. Now he’s gone all HOT on us. Seems he doesn’t even realize it yet. Could a man be any more, well, perfect?
Good heavens, I seriously haven’t crushed this hard since I met my husband. I probably need help, but I don’t want it …
When she jumped off, I knew that she was safe from the vote. My theory is that Tom spoke to her and let her know that Coby was going home. Remember, they (Tom, Ian, Katie and Stephanie) had a secret alliance from Day One. (Tom spoke of this alliance a few weeks ago when he was walking through the jungle with Ian. They were both relieved that (Ibrehem?) had been voted off because they wanted Steph to make it to the merge.)
Coby is the stupidest player ever. Not only did he have Tom’s trust (or at least Tom didn’t feel he was a big threat) but Gregg and Jen had entrusted him with their secret plan to turn on Tom and Ian at the last minute. That was a brilliant plan that should have worked had Coby not ruined it with his big mouth. Why he told Stephanie is a mystery because they didn’t need her vote. The “not-so-popular people’s alliance” had five votes (Gregg, Jen, Caryn, Janu and Coby) locked in.
I think Janu was surprised because Gregg went back on his word. Their initial plan, I’m sure, was to oust Stephanie. It was a logical choice and one that could have happened without major repercussions because she WAS an outsider. But when Stephanie told Jenn what Coby said, Jenn knew the gig was up. They’d have to come up with Plan B. I’m sure Gregg spoke with Tom and everyone (except Janu and Coby, apparently) agreed to let the boy whose mouth was five sizes too big take a long walk off a short pier.
Well, next week we get to find out how much of a metrosexual Coby is.
I think Steph jumping off the perch was a good tactic for her–in spite of the big fish cookout the night before, she’d been fairly food-deprived for quite a while, and a third of a pizza would be a good meal which would help her keep her strength up. It would have sucked if she stayed in, won this immunity, and then was too weak to win the next one, only to get voted off because she’s too competitive…
It does make me wonder, though, if one of the three pizza-jumpers had stayed in, what was next on the food chain? They had to have at least a couple things left to go.
Coby may have been irritating, but I absolutely loved how he pegged Tom and Gregg as “sitting there, comparing the size of their fishhooks, thinking of all the fish they’re going to catch,” and they cut to camp and that’s exactly what they’re doing…
I was totally thinking of you when Ian offered to take his clothes off. I’m prepared to write an angry letter to Probst about his discrimination regarding nudity for chocolate.
Tom really did seem to be a lightweight, but I know I saw him take several good pulls straight from that bottle–I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt for now.
When Coby got up and said “good game” to the rest, I just completely lost it. I have an acquaintance who will wander around a party and smack each and every person on the ass, yelling “Good game!” when he has a bit too much to drink. Maybe it was only funny to me, but I still had to mention it. Coby tried to sound all gracious on his little exit interview, but you just know that as soon as he got back to the losers’ lounge, he threw a supreme bitchfit.
And could Jenn be any more jealous of Steph? With good reason, of course. Jenn is the least interesting person I’ve ever seen on Survivor–includING Amber. And is it me, or has Katie actually gained weight??
There were only two pizza jumpers…Steph and one of the other girls. I think four people jumped at the cookies, which was dumb IMO.
rockle, after apparently shampooing and losing the glasses (I guess they got too dirty? He must not need glasses that badly…) Ian is looking much better. I finally see the nerdly studleyness.
Coby was the biggest whiner I’ve seen on Survivor in a long time. His exit speech could not have been more ridiculous. A threat? He was totally not a threat. I was a tiny bit surprised that he went instead of Janu but I wasn’t upset. I thought it would be more important to get Coby out just so I didn’t have to listen to him anymore. He was completely delusional.
watsonwil, I enjoy your rankings very much! Keep up the good work.
Not really, because the four cookie-jumpers were Ian & Katie (both in a strong F4 alliance) and Gregg & Jenn (currently part of a strong majority alliance). As long as one person in either of those alliances stayed in, they all knew they were safe. And we all knew right away that Tom wasn’t going anywhere unless he keeled over dead (and even then, he’d probably do whatever he could to make sure he went into rigor standing straight up). Tom wants to win this bad, and I can’t really think of anything or anybody that can stop him.
Unless something happens to his family … which remains yet to be seen. I can’t call the boot order at this point (although I suspect Janu is next), but the only challenge I see Tom NOT winning from here on out MIGHT be the traditional “visit from home” RC (maybe in the next two weeks or so). And that would be because he’s so overwhelmed at seeing his wife / kid / brother / fire chief’s dog that he gets choked up and, well, chokes. And you know what? He’ll probably STILL get the reward, because you KNOW that whoever does win will pick Tom to share.
Wordy McWord. Coby thinks he’s Rich, but he’s really just Lex. He thinks he’s Brian H., but he’s really just Boston Rob (from the Marquesas season). In other words: Coby, darlin’, you fought the good fight and all, but … no, you really didn’t. But thanks for playing! I look forward to seeing your mohawk next week. Remember: You look good in pink!
I feel vindicated, that’s exactly what I asked last week.
I am surprised nobody mentioned what became my favorite Survivor moment for this season, when Steph split the coconut with one mighty blow and Caryn looked like she was gonna swallow her tounge. It was, for me, perfect.
You have to thank the editors for that. There is no guarantee that they were looking at their fishhooks at the same moment that Colby was doing his confessional. It might not have been the same day, even. Heck, it could have even been from a different show.
Reality show editors are famous for pulling footage from whenever they can find it and putting it together sequentially. Sometimes you can notice this in action. See if you can spot something about the person (an injury, hair style, clothing, etc.) changing inconsistenly during the course of a show.
That clip of them with the fishhooks may have been taken right when the Paluan was showing them how to tie fishhooks.
But it was still fun editing. I’m willing to allow them a bit of license when it comes to non-critical footage like that just for a good laugh.
Coby is just plain delusional. You’re absolutely right, rockle, that he’s just Lex when he thinks he’s really Colby. He completely shot himself in the foot by his actions. And I can see why he’s an outsider – he makes himself into one. I started off liking him, but by being such a complainer, he just got tiresome. Which I’m sure is why he was voted out, they were all sick of listening to him or even watching him. He could sure put on a great sulk.
Not voting off Janu was almost as satisfying, however. Did you see how horrified she looked at the realization that she was not going to go? And she can’t just give up next week, either, since in the promo Jeff said the first person to give up in the challenge will be sent off to live by themselves Robinson Crusoe-style. I have to say that if it is indeed Janu, could it be more perfect?
This is turning out to be a great season, and just when I was about to give up on Survivor altogether.
Hmm … they’re at Day 24, right? And I think they still have one more person than normal at this point (because they started with like 800 people, none of whom were me, thankyouverymuchBurnettyouBITCH!) Maybe (if there is a God, and he isn’t busy interfering with the voting on “American Idol”), just maybe, Janu will be gone before they even get to that particular challenge, because her sorry skinny ass will up and quit. They’ve already had more than one person leave in a single episode twice this season – what’s one more?
Sounds like someone’s yearning to be stranded for about a month on a tropical island with Ian. I have this funny feeling that the “going for water team” would pretty much constantly be rockle and Ian. And ONLY rockle and Ian…
Watsonwil, keep up the ratings. I, for one, look forward to them. The only change I’d suggest is retitling the lowest ranking from “FORGOT TO FILE A 1040” to “HONORARY ULONG” in tribute to the worst Survivor tribe ever.
Coby - He was acting like he was the secret master, but he really wasn’t doing anything. He had a loose alliance with Janu, Caryn, and Willard - big deal. It wasn’t so much an alliance as it was the people who got left out of the real alliance. Coby’s game winning strategy was entirely based on Gregg’s decision to approach him with a plan for a secret alliance. Gregg could have equally well chosen any other player for all that Coby brought to the deal. Hell, Gregg could have formed an alliance with the Scope bottle if it had a vote. So while Coby was bragging about his brilliance, throughout the entire game he was merely the passive recepient of other people’s plans.
Tom - I don’t think the rum thing will hurt him. In fact, I think it could help. It reduces the image others have of him being invulnerable and makes him seem less of a threat.
Ian - While I personally had no desire to see Ian drop his drawers, I knew from this board that Jeff was way off base when he said nobody else would be interested.
Donuts - Sure, some people thought they were safe (although they were wrong). But why jump off for donuts? Hang around and wait for the better offers.
Well, duh. Although I did actually send in an audition tape to be on this current edition. No, seriously, I did. But I’m pretty much a lametard with not much excitement in my life except, well, this board, so there you go. Apparently mentioning in your audition tape that you are a Charter Member of the SDMB doesn’t carry the sort of weight with producers that it ought to.
In any event, if a tropical island suitable for stranding should become available, and Ian is not (boo-hoo!), I would gladly settle for (in no particular order) Tom, Gregg, Burton, Ryan O., FBI Agent Brady, Colby, Ethan, the Brothers and/or Uchenna from TAR7 … hell, I wouldn’t even mind being stranded with Probst. (Although not for long: only one of us gets to be Queen Bitch, and it’s ME.)
And for the record, I was a competitive swimmer in high school and college. I swam the distance events (everything over 400m/500yd), and I still occasionally swim in open-water mile races for charity. I don’t win, but I haven’t drowned yet. So I would be able to pull my weight in challenges, and I really think that Ian and I would make an excellent water team. So pfbbt.
No, I meant because cookies aren’t really something I would want to try and eat after having little to no complex sugar for 28 days. I think the pizza, which would probably still upset the tummy, might not be quite as much of a shock to the system. And as we all know, the first rule of Survivor is that ithe longer you hold out, the better the reward.
