12th Archivist
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Indeed. Lots of people think that noma's method of getting to the end was cruel and brutal, but I'm starting to think that that is the final requirement for winning. Being successful at forming alliances and then breaking them is a good skill in this game that noma played well. Perhaps the game is meant to be played in this fashion.

TripleM didn't necessarily make any major alliances, he was just a follower of noma's alliance. Think of his cause in this way, we could send a mobster (TripleM) to jail because he followed the head of the crime organization. Think of it another way, we could also send a breadmaker (again, TripleM) to jail because he simply let his store get robbed, almost like he helped the robbers steal his money and wares by not interfering. I say that TripleM got lucky by not getting voted out.

Dex Stewart simply got lucky. He was the one Mud Member that was not voted out. Obviously, with noma's alliance, all the Mud Members would have got voted out first before the Tar Members did, but because Maroug perceived that plan early, he allowed Dex Stewart a "fighting chance" to stay on the digital island. The situation may have been conceived as an alliance, but since the main goal was to counter noma's alliance, it's not real alliance.

I may end up changing my vote because of this.

____________________________
It was going well until it exploded.
~Scott Manley

Check out the DROD Wikia project here!

noma
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Okay, I know we were just supposed to be making closing statements, but since 12th Archivist jumped in I want to clarify something he brought up.

Yes, I proposed the initial alliance between me, TripleM, Maurog, kie and mxvladi. After that... we were all "in on it", and we all had a hand in the decisions that were made. Maurog did not "perceive that plan early" : he was in on that plan from the very beginning. And although the initial proposal was mine, TripleM jumped right in and stayed on top of the whole strategy side of things, coming up with as many ideas, scenarios and possibilities as I did.

Just wanted to clear that up. And now, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

RoboBob3000
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Let's move things along. I will now begin accepting votes for a winner.

You can all feel free to continue your conversation here if you like, but please don't reveal who you have voted for, even if you're just bluffing. It sounds to me like this vote could go in any direction, and I want to preserve the suspense as long as possible.

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RoboBob3000
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PM me with your vote for the winner.

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http://beepsandbloops.wordpress.com/

TripleM
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An updated number-of-votes-received count so we can see how close we are to the great reveal would perhaps increase the suspense a little too

RoboBob3000
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TripleM wrote:
An updated number-of-votes-received count so we can see how close we are to the great reveal would perhaps increase the suspense a little too

Three votes to go.

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RoboBob3000
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Down to two.

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RoboBob3000
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1980
Registered: 10-23-2003
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One remaining. It looks like this is going to be wrapped up today.

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RoboBob3000
Level: Smitemaster

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Final Tribal Council

It's been nearly four months since we started playing the most epic of epic forum games. Fourteen players were stranded beneath the surface of the Eighth and were forced to eliminate each other one-by-one in order to become the last person standing. After eleven hard-fought challenges and subsequent eliminations, we reached the Final Three. These three epitomize the Survivor motto: "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast."

noma - Outwit
Credited as the mastermind of the game, noma initiated the five-player Tar alliance, which took control after the merge. As the game progressed, she was instrumental in pruning off her own alliance while still maintaining her majority.

TripleM - Outplay
Perceived as noma's right-hand man, TripleM was one of the strongest challenge competitors in the game. He was almost solely responsible for his tribe's pre-merge immunity victories. Though he only took home one individual immunity win, he played hard and was among the top in nearly every challenge.

Dex Stewart - Outlast
A dark horse candidate for victory, Dex Stewart made sure that he was the last surviving Mud Coordinator. He cut deals with the majority alliance to make sure everybody else was a target before he was, and his clutch immunity victory at the final four prevented a Tar sweep of the finals.



The power in the game has shifted over to the seven-member jury, who have cast their votes. What criteria did they use to determine the winner? Strategy? Gamesmanship? Strength? Loyalty? Were they vindictive? Were they forgiving?

One of these three players will win the title of DROD Survivor and an item of their choice from the Prize Pile. Who will it be?

I'll read the votes.

First vote...



____________________________
http://beepsandbloops.wordpress.com/

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[Last edited by RoboBob3000 at 05-19-2009 06:03 PM]

RoboBob3000
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As promised, here is the full ruleset we were playing with.

Full rules http://forum.caravelgames.com/viewtopic.php?TopicID=28109&page=0#274177)

14-player revision http://forum.caravelgames.com/viewtopic.php?TopicID=28109&page=2#275444)

Notes about rule exceptions/hiccups:


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RoboBob3000
Level: Smitemaster

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File: history.xls (28.5 KB)
Downloaded 61 times.
License: Public Domain

Here's a chunk of data that you might find useful. This spreadsheet includes the entire voting history of the game.

The power alliance of noma, TripleM, and kie voted exactly the same every time up until the final four, when they were forced to turn on each other. Every vote they cast prior to then was an eliminating vote.

Maurog, interestingly enough, decided to vote for himself at the final five.

Dex Stewart was responsible for breaking both ties.

Although not reflected in the spreadsheet, two players exercised their right to change their vote before a Tribal Council was read. In the first vote of the final six Tribal Council, both larrymurk and Dex Stewart had voted for eachother. They both then changed their vote to noma.

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http://beepsandbloops.wordpress.com/

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[Last edited by RoboBob3000 at 05-19-2009 06:02 PM]

larrymurk
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Rank Points: 1917
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Robobob, Great job!! You put in a lot of effort and I think the game went great!

As far as the game play.. I'm glad to see some people actually played the game as Survivor (with alliances). Kudos to all and I am glad I'm on the same team with all of you in real life. DROD is real life, right?!!

NiroZ
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Interesting. I haven't paid much attention to this thread, but I did read the start of the final vote. How did Noma win the votes? She started off very unpopular, but it seems like only the other two contestants didn't vote for her in the end.

Or did everybody realise that in a contest like this, the master manipulator should be rewarded. Lets just hope she doesn't try to take over the rest of the forum.

Nuntar
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NiroZ wrote:
Interesting. I haven't paid much attention to this thread, but I did read the start of the final vote. How did Noma win the votes? She started off very unpopular, but it seems like only the other two contestants didn't vote for her in the end.

Only the seven jury members voted. Not the three remaining contestants.

____________________________
50th Skywatcher

Dischorran
Level: Smitemaster

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NiroZ wrote:

Or did everybody realise that in a contest like this, the master manipulator should be rewarded.

Not everybody.

____________________________

Dex Stewart
Level: Smiter
Rank Points: 355
Registered: 01-19-2007
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Here's a listing of all my relevant PMs. The time each of them was sent should be self-explanatory.

noma
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1594
Registered: 11-22-2006
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Wow, thank you! It was a long slog for all us and I certainly had a lot of help getting here. So thanks very much to everyone. I especially want to thank kie and TripleM, who made this game so much fun to play. And of course RoboBob3000 deserves major kudos, high fives and showers of mod points for all the work he put in to organize and run the game. Mark Burnett may be calling! I'll be putting together some of my PM's and will post them once I've got them organized. Thanks again!

NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
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Registered: 02-12-2006
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Well someone likes him, he got a +20.

Damn those 'people who can break the system'...

Do tell me if you ever feel like running a contest, Robobob. Doesn't have to be as mammoth as this one.

12th Archivist
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 789
Registered: 12-07-2008
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I believe this information regarding the winner of the Survivor game should be on the next Illumination!

Plus, noma should claim her prize for winning probably the greatest game ever hosted on the forum. Too bad you don't win a million dollars. However, the other reward should be just as satisfying. Good job and good playing.

Also, good job to RoboBob3000 for organizing and hosting this game of the century! Do you have any plans on making a DROD Survivor 3?

____________________________
It was going well until it exploded.
~Scott Manley

Check out the DROD Wikia project here!

Sillyman
Level: Smiter

Rank Points: 339
Registered: 09-08-2006
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I think I might be able to wrangle an Amazing Race thingamabob... maybe?

____________________________
Who, me?
FNORD

zex20913
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1723
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Thanks, all, for such an intriguing game! It was fun to watch the games being played.

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kie
Level: Master Delver

Rank Points: 221
Registered: 02-26-2005
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Congrats noma! It was really fun playing with you, and I am glad I was in an alliance with you even if it was semi-fake!

Thank you soooo much to RoboBob3000. As others have said, this was the best forum game I have played and I can only imagine how much time you must have put in to it.

Also thanks to all the other players and to the rest of the forum for forgiving us during the 'Distasteful' challenge

@Sillyman - yes, please!

____________________________
cheers, kie

Sillyman
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Hmm... well, how would that possibly work?

Perhaps a collaborative effort from a series of architects, each building a hold to represent a city?

Or mayhaps using existing holds?

Hmm... pehaps...

Ah, of course. Yeah, make it a live event, with several holds whose creators have granted permission being played through with particular challenges!

____________________________
Who, me?
FNORD

NiroZ
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The best I can come up with is a race though architecture holds. find a bunch of peopl who haven't played X, Y and Z, get them to race each other to finish all the holds, giving off the first two letters of the element on x square of x room on x level to make sure that they completed it.

Sillyman
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Ah, that sounds like a good verification idea. Though perhaps completing a hold might not be necessary, especially since I'd have to throw in the detours and the roadblocks.

And it'd still have to be live...

____________________________
Who, me?
FNORD

TripleM
Level: Smitemaster
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File: survpm.txt (72.1 KB)
Downloaded 53 times.
License: Public Domain

I've enabled guest access to the Tar forum we used: http://tartechnicians.getforum.org/

I've also included a very lengthy list of all PMs I sent/received attached to this post if anyone is interested in reading through them. (Were far too many to put in the post).

Some thoughts..



Thoroughly enjoyable game

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[Last edited by TripleM at 05-20-2009 08:15 AM]

RoboBob3000
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1980
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Assorted, unorganized thoughts:

Thanks you guys for posting your PMs. They definately make for an interesting read and tell the story of the endgame well. I'm pleased as punch that so many players took a deep dive into strategy. Thanks also to Maurog who organized the tie vote at Final 6. Without that move, the endgame would have been a dud.

I'm humbled by all the praise! We should absolutely make sure that DROD Survivor 3 happens. I believe the next round (when we get to it... we should take a breather first) should be a collaborative effort. I'd love to continue administration in an advisory role, or maybe even have a chance to play. Having 2-4 people on the staff goes a long way towards alleviating the workload, which is how I had hosted these games on dedicated message boards in the past. I entirely approve of reusing challenge concepts that we've already established with tweaks to make them unique. Challenges that can/should be reused include all of the TCB challenges (Survival, Architecture and Race, but with different holds/goals), King of the Hill, Broken Mirrors, Survey, and Assorted Games. That's half a Survivor replay right there. Then, of course, we'd need a bunch of new challenge ideas, which I'm sure you guys are good for.

I like to categorize Survivor players into two categories: Naive and Collusive. In the first season of the show, every player was naive, voting off who they thought was the worst player. One player was collusive - the eventual winner Richard Hatch. He assembled an alliance of four, and all four of those players became collusive. They picked off all of the naive players until only the collusives remained. Sound familiar? In this game we had many naive players and one player who introduced the virus of collusion - noma.

My point? There aren't going to be any naive players in DROD Survivor 3. It should be very interesting.

I had a tribal swap planned for this game, which I abandoned when we shrunk from 16 to 14 players. Tribal swaps do a fantastic job of convoluting alliances, and I would recommend doing some form of pre-merge swap if we have enough players.

Re: The Amazing Race: Every time I talk to someone about Survivor, they inevitably bring up The Amazing Race. Like clockwork. Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges. The Amazing Race is a fun game, yes, but it's not a social game in the same way Survivor is. That said, I think it could still work on the forum - just operate it similarly to how I ran the last challenge here. The key, I suppose, would be generating several holds beforehand so you had a backlog to work from. And I can't stress enough the importance of strongly defined rules! If people are going to be playing a game for a long time, they're not going to be pleased if you're forced to make a judgment call you weren't prepared for that results in their elimination.

____________________________
http://beepsandbloops.wordpress.com/

Sillyman
Level: Smiter

Rank Points: 339
Registered: 09-08-2006
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RoboBob3000 wrote:
Re: The Amazing Race: Every time I talk to someone about Survivor, they inevitably bring up The Amazing Race. Like clockwork. Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges. The Amazing Race is a fun game, yes, but it's not a social game in the same way Survivor is. That said, I think it could still work on the forum - just operate it similarly to how I ran the last challenge here. The key, I suppose, would be generating several holds beforehand so you had a backlog to work from. And I can't stress enough the importance of strongly defined rules! If people are going to be playing a game for a long time, they're not going to be pleased if you're forced to make a judgment call you weren't prepared for that results in their elimination.

The funny thing is, I already knew all those points. Heh. So, some rules that might work:

1. Holds will be prepared beforehand specifically for the race. These holds will contain "standard" rooms, as well as several particular elements. All holds will be released to the players under Only You edit mode. Holds are likely to be prepared by people other than the administrator.

2. Players will be organized into teams of 2. These teams must play through the hold together.

3. All players will meet at a designated time for the race. They must have CaravelNet chat enabled, and announce their presence in chat before a specified check-in time.

4. The hold shall begin with a timedelay gate, which opens with a code, which shall be announced by the administrator in a whisper to each team. This serves two purposes: to ensure the players enter the hold blind at the time of the race, and to maintain the relative standing of each team from the last leg of the race.

5. Players may assist each other through the holds freely, regardless of whether or not they are on the same team. The only things that should not be shared are codes.

6. At some point during each leg there will be a "Detour". A "Detour" is a choice between two paths. A scroll at the beginning of the detour shall very briefly (and vaguely) describe each path, and the teams must each agree on a path to choose. They must announce their choice to the administrator with the name of the path, and the administrator will provide them with the code to enter that path. Then they proceed as normal. They may not switch paths in the middle of a "Detour".

7. At some point during each leg there will be a "Road Block". A "Road Block" is a task which only one team member from each team may perform. A vague question shall be asked in a scroll. The team must agree on a member to undertake the task, and announce this choice to the administrator along with the question asked. The administrator will then provide the chosen member with the code to enter the "Road Block". Upon completing the "Road Block", the chosen member shall find a code which they shall whisper to the administrator, who shall relay it to their partner to allow them to continue the hold. They may not switch chosen members in the middle of a "Road Block".

8. At the end of the hold associated with each leg of the race, teams shall find a "Pit Stop". When they reach this "Pit Stop" each team member must PM the code they find there to the administrator. As soon as both members of a team have reached the "Pit Stop", that team has completed the leg of the race and will be told their position. First place teams at each leg shall receive one mod point. Last place teams at each leg shall be eliminated from the race.

9. The race shall continue until all but three teams have been eliminated, then one more leg shall be held, the winner of which wins the race. The team who wins shall receive a prize To Be Determined.

10. All codes shall be 10 digits from 1-9 (such that they may be easily entered by typing on the numpad in answer to question scripts), randomly selected for each element, each player, and each leg.

Edit: Also, I may want to add in elements such as the Fast Forward, the Yield, and the Non-Elimination Leg (held either by Marking For Elmination or Speed Bump), though perhaps these would be better suited for later iterations?

____________________________
Who, me?
FNORD

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[Last edited by Sillyman at 05-20-2009 08:50 PM]

noma
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File: Nomas Survivor PMs.rtf (329.3 KB)
Downloaded 57 times.
License: Public Domain

Okay here it is, finally. OMG, that took a long time. (I just know someone is going to post with an easy way to export your PM box. Argh.)

So I had already started this document when Dex and TripleM posted their copies of PM's, and there was some duplication of messages. I deleted the duplicates but then decided to put them back in. (Part of the reason this took so long.) It keeps the flow going and, as well, I had added some commentary.

Just letting you know: it's a long document. I saved it as an RTF to preserve the formatting, so if someone needs plain text, let me know.

TripleM
Level: Smitemaster
Rank Points: 1377
Registered: 02-05-2003
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Sillyman wrote:
all sorts of things about Amazing Race

This should probably be moved to a new thread, but can I point out that this immediately rules out anyone who doesn't have caravelnet enabled, like me, so any way of running it without that would be much appreciated