Pre-Game
I think
Holly's whole app speaks volumes about how highly she she rates herself, but her attitude coming into the game can best be summed up from this answer;
Which 3 "SURVIVOR" contestants match your personality the best and how?
I'll give you 4. Malcolm. Little bit cocky, more than capable, wise beyond his years. Todd. Always thinking, strategist. Ozzy. Again with the cockiness and ability. Heidk. Cold and calculated.
We have a little um, 'historic rivalry' between us already :P Suffice to say I've experienced the wrath of Holly firsthand and she needs to tone it down if she wants to go the distance here. When Holly is going out of her way to be charming and friendly she most certainly can be, but if she snaps at some point (and I fully expect her to) she can easily rub a lot of the cast the wrong way. Like, so much so that even if she got all the way to the end people might just not
not vote
for her, but actively vote
against her.
That said, When she is on form, she can be excellent. She
will dominate challenges. Not just speedy ones but logic based ones too. That has to buy her some cred with whatever tribe she lands on. She can be strategic too, so long as she keeps her head in the game socially. Look for her to be an early HBIC.
She has a fresh start here, and doesn't come with all the baggage that Duck is associated with. It's totally on her now to use that and not fall into the same old bad habits.
Prediction: Mid Jury, taken out for being too threatening in challenges as soon as the opportunity presents itself.
I don't think
Jane is what BP meant when he said women usually work better for him :D
What is your main motivation for playing?
I am not going to go with the typical overused statement to win or to have a good time. I just want to kinda take out my frustrations from the day on people. I mean I don't take anything personal so I hope they won't either (even though some do)
Jane will probably get in trouble early in the game, just by rubbing the wrong person the wrong way, she could very well leave the game early for it.
But if she wriggles out of that & gets over that initial hump of shock the other pllayers will experience, she can still do very well here. There is a little "meh, I'm not here to win" tone in her app but she
will get sucked into this whether she likes it or not, just watch.
The other part of her app that stands out to me is the harsh exterior/soft interior line. And it's true -
to an extent. I've played with twice, and hosted once and she
can be a fiercely loyal player to her allies, but the more I see her play the more cutthroat she's become. I'm not sure which player will show up here.
Prediction: Pre-Jury, Rubs the wrong person the wrong way and goes out in a gloriously bitter explosion.
First brand-new-to-me player, and from what I've seen in the Aussie Côte d'Ivoire, she will be just fine here. Still new enough that a lot of this will be brand spanking to her, but with half a game under his belt she'll hopefully not fall into any noob pitfalls like not understanding the importance of PMs or what have you. All that said I'm expecting quite a vanilla game here.
Jill will be a solid number in some alliance, but not the leader of. Decent in the challenges, but not setting them on fire. Very middle of the road, and I kinda expect to see that translate into a mid-game finish too. How exactly she fares will depend on who she allies with and who she is partnered to. I'm thinking the best we can hope for is she falls into some tight bond or fierce rivalry with one of the more batshit players and this jolts her into action and into a more dynamic/entertaining player than her app would promise. Seems to have a strategic bent, I'd like to see how that reacts when the pressure is on.
Prediction: Late Pre-Juror or early Juror. Taken out as a safe target of one alliance by another, while her more canny alliance-mates have bridges built on both sides.
You'd think with the amount of times I've seen, played with, and host Bloo, he'd be easy to write about
lolno. WendyJo is extremely hard to predict because she can be so vastly different from one game to the next. There are times when he can be just a flat-out strategical trainwreck, yet other times when he is actually
very savvy. What is odd about Bloo is that the harder he tries, the more confident he gets, the more he messes up :/ When he sits back and doesn't stress, he is typically better at the game. There is a running joke at ORGY that Bloo has ~a mind of his own~ , he can frequently push for things that don't make sense to anyone else,
or he will push a different direction from the groupthink just because. As you can imagine that's not really a winning strategy, but every once in a while it works out for him.
Whatever way WendyJo ends up playing this, what can be certain are a few things; she will suck at challenges and if the tribe are relying on her they will hurt for it, two or three tribe members might hate her specifically. On the flipside she will be extremely social and extremely well-liked by two or three members of her tribe. In his app he's compares himself to RC - and from what I've seen that is close comparison. WendyJo
will be one of the earliest to push alliances with people (you will at some point read a confessional post that is along the lines of "here are my 7 alliances and these ones are my favourites"), but she will also likely fall down on actually following through on more than half of them, or giving them the attention they need to flourish.
Instead she will limpet herself to the one to three players he gets on with the most, and swear loyalty to them before any others. This can be admirable if done right, and *some* players will love her for it, but whether it works out for her or not is totally dependent on who she clicks with, and how good they are.
Prediction: nfi 
Sorry if I'm hedging my bets on this one, but it's seriously unknowable. As much as I can narrow it down is that it won't be mid-game. First four boots, or last juror/finalist - mostly depending on who she picks as her *chosen* allies.
Yve is an old-school gamer, and not one I've any experience with directly. I did go and lurk the old threads of his latest game played (2nd of 18 open-ID), but there he was hated by the hosts for strategic blunders, and his single vote in the finals sounds like it was a little undeserved per his game, and more on account of the wrong player getting lucky at final immunity. His app comes across as a little arrogant - but in this case it seems justified, and he is self-aware enough to know he could easily give off that vibe if not careful. He's extremely experienced in ORGs - more than even any of the vets - and I think we'll see the same calm capable approach that Ami brought last Season from Yve - albeit with a little more bite.
Prediction: Endgamer - doubly so if she lucks into landing the right Veteran partner. I can't help but go back to all the hate for strategic blunders on the board I just read though, and I see her screwing something up strategically that sees her taken out in the 4th-6th range.
Dan can shine here. He is maybe the most experienced of the new players (i.e. the noobs minus Yve / WJ / Jane / Holly ) with five games racked up. Importantly, all five games are from differing corners of the internet, so I'm hoping this gives us a flexible & adaptable player. His app paints him as quite the middling personality - NB I'm not saying MOR - but rather, he is a bit of an everyman. He should gel well with the positive and the negative players, he should come across as a bit of a follower to the leaders as well as a bit of a leader to the followers. So long as his social game is up to scratch I think he can do very well here indeed. His all-round nature should see him get as far as the merge no matter who else steps up, and I'm thinking his most dangerous phase of the game is gonna be not getting too attached to one side or the other at that point.
My worry is that looking at his stats for other games, he is frequently the early boot so maybe that app is a far more idealized version of himself than the reality :/ Only one way to find out!
Prediction: Mid to late Juror, taken out for being an all round threat - too connected, too well set-up, too likely to win - and moved on before he locks himself into an unbreakable position.
Statistically, Draylen is currently *the* worst ORG player in Quid's ranking thingie. That doesn't bode well. However, I've gotten to know Draylen a little over the last few months and I could see why, so earlier this week I gave him a peptalk and a few pointers on where his game is lacking. I am hoping some of it will hit home and he'll do well here. Whether he actually will or not I just don't know yet.
His app is truthful in that he doesn't play these things for drama, or even to win (don't take that as he isn't here to win) but more for the social aspect of the things. A few pals of his play, so he thought he'd give them a go without ever being a Survivor fan. His biggest problem, and the reason he is so low in the rankings is that if he isn't into a game or he doesn't get a good start, he tends to just not care about the game. That won't be a problem here. His reaction to getting casted was along the lines of "OMG what? How the heck did I get picked??". I told him how that was out of twice as many apps as we had spots for and he is hyped up and eager to put in a good showing in what I've billed to him as the grandaddy of all ORGs.
He is hyperintellgent, and very capable of assessment and the best moves forward - but he will have a hard time getting his point across if people aren't working
with him. For him to shine here he needs to find his niche among the cast. If he feels like he is an outsider he'll get pushed and push himself further and further out, but if he can get himself tight with some good allies early, they will find him a dependable and intelligent ally all game long. Now that means his game swings on being social early, which is one of the biggest problems with his game right now. He needs to learn to fake it till he makes it with the people he doesn't connect with moreso than just the ones he does :D Playing
Jimmy J should kind of force his hand the right direction. Sure I don't think he's gonna be able to reel off sporting references, but if people start coming to him expecting coaching wisdom, he might just get the confidence to start giving it. It's not a role I think he'd gravitate to naturally, but he certainly
would be a great figurehead and challenge co-ordinator if he finds himself forced into that role.
Prediction: This is the game where it comes together for him. Gets in with the right people & partner early, and goes deep. Eventually taken out mid-Jury ish as he becomes more and more of a Jury threat to win.
Our first absolutely brand spanking new first-time-ever player :D Even with short and punchy answers, there is still a lot to be gleaned from
Jimmy T's app. If he lives up to his promise, he should be a little off-kilter, kooky and fun. I think in a lot of games that would hurt him but with this cast, not giving a fuck could actually work to his advantage. There are a few other players here who will positively thrive on the negative, and bitching with each other - he can really be a useful foil to someone else's more dominant cunty nature. My biggest fear here is keeping his attention, he is the biggest worry of an inactive/drift-away possibility in the cast.
Prediction: The above is kinda best case scenario for him. More likely he will be one of the earliest boots of the game, either through not commiting himself enough to the game or to PMing early, or just being booted for being too kooky :/ 
Marty is our other absolute first time player, as his prospects look a lot better. By my read I think that while
yes, he could end up quite the villain too, he will be a lot more subtle about it, and therefore, last long enough to get much more chance to actually be villainous. My worry here is that this reads pretty much like Caryn's did at the time but I have fingers crossed that he'll build a better network than she managed to. He has some self-awareness and smarts, and from seeing him round Sucks he certainly loves his Survivor - so I'm banking on him being the best of the noobs (not the new-to-Stranded players, but best strategically out of Jill, Dan, Tyrone & the two Jimmys). Can he turn that strategical promise into an actual better placement than them though? Of that I am less sure.
Prediciton: Solidly mid-Jury
Here he is <3 My must-cast. I lurked a game recently with a 90% non-ORGY cast and I knew we had to have him. He is the epitome of what I was talking about elsewhere in a player who just doesn't care if laundry needs to be aired in public - just fresh and different and controversial, and not yet in the ORGY zombie mindset of any particular way being "the best way" to play. I sold
Tyrone as a player to Jeff pretty much on the basis of this thread
http://z13.invisionfree.com/Survivor_Ca ... c=430&st=0 (he is the character Nikki Wong). I will be blunt and say I have little to no clue how he'll fare here strategically, but fingers crossed he lasts as long as possible and causes as much chaos as possible
If you follow that link it's worth checking out her confessional for such gems as this;
When it come to the game it best to know one thing - Don't look like a wimp to others
If they somehow find me a goat to use for votes, then I'm going to fuck them up, I plan on working my ass off to the jury if I somehow end up in the finale
Every second post is him bitching out some member of his tribe, or a host asking what the latest fight at camp was about. He really has the potential to be the stand-out villain of the Season, and that's saying something in this cast.
Prediction: I hope and hope and hope he gets a long enough run here to have a huge impact. My fear is he'll become the John of this Season though, and his negativity will catch up to him and he goes out early, just before Jury begins. :/
Brenda Lowe
Dan was my favo too.
