In post 114, Save The Dragons wrote:I like you both as people but feel like I just didn't interact with you guys the most this game compared to prejurors and other jurors.
Why should I vote for you? I dont care about strategy here or how you outlasted everyone, I wanna know why I personally should vote for you.
Oh and no words please. Please answer with three gifs instead of words. The gifs can have words. Thank you!
Hiya Mist and Vash,
As you might imagine, neither of you are someone I would like to vote for. I realize you approached this game as a challenge competition, and it might have just been meant as that, but I am very much a social-focused player. Therefore, I don't care much about challenge performance. This is also not really a question, but merely an explanation for my vote. As I cannot abstain, my vote will likely be for Vash.
What challenge do you think defined the game for you? Or, the one you shined the brightest at? Were there any tactics you used to get ahead that no one else thought of?
Vash sort of already answered this but I just want one example.
What challenge do you think defined the game for you? Or, the one you shined the brightest at? Were there any tactics you used to get ahead that no one else thought of?
Vash sort of already answered this but I just want one example.
I mean, for me this is a long answer for why. The short answer is the final challenge.
Prior to the final challenge I began keeping score of how everyone was doing in challenges based on their overall placement (this was cause I realized I'd done better than shadow in 6 challenges, Shadow had done better than mist in 6 and mist had done better that me in 6, so clearly head to head didn't explain everything about performance). Anyway prior to the final challenge the scores looked like this (note I used 2 methods but the point is the same):
Spoiler:
I was doing ever so slightly better than mist before the final challenge. So like for any argument for me being better at challenges to hold, I needed to win that final challenge. If mist wins it then they beat me on points and the head to head. Not only did I win but I blew mist away, leading to this.
Spoiler:
A very dominant performance overall. I also find it funny that Fen was so good during his time in the game he kept pace with the rest of us despite us playing 3 more challenges.
If you don't like looking at spreadsheets and numbers, I've also illustrated this with pictures of dragons.
As for special strategies, while I did go into everything with a strategy (well that I could) I don't think I did anything revolutionary, just executed strong strategies near their full potential.
What challenge do you think defined the game for you? Or, the one you shined the brightest at? Were there any tactics you used to get ahead that no one else thought of?
Vash sort of already answered this but I just want one example.
I mean, for me this is a long answer for why. The short answer is the final challenge.
Prior to the final challenge I began keeping score of how everyone was doing in challenges based on their overall placement (this was cause I realized I'd done better than shadow in 6 challenges, Shadow had done better than mist in 6 and mist had done better that me in 6, so clearly head to head didn't explain everything about performance). Anyway prior to the final challenge the scores looked like this (note I used 2 methods but the point is the same):
Spoiler:
I was doing ever so slightly better than mist before the final challenge. So like for any argument for me being better at challenges to hold, I needed to win that final challenge. If mist wins it then they beat me on points and the head to head. Not only did I win but I blew mist away, leading to this.
Spoiler:
A very dominant performance overall. I also find it funny that Fen was so good during his time in the game he kept pace with the rest of us despite us playing 3 more challenges.
If you don't like looking at spreadsheets and numbers, I've also illustrated this with pictures of dragons.
As for special strategies, while I did go into everything with a strategy (well that I could) I don't think I did anything revolutionary, just executed strong strategies near their full potential.
What challenge do you think defined the game for you? Or, the one you shined the brightest at? Were there any tactics you used to get ahead that no one else thought of?
Vash sort of already answered this but I just want one example.
As a kind of cop out to this answer, I don't think there was a single challenge that defined my game. My strategy was always perform well enough to stay out of the bottom, which I accomplish until the final challenge. I did have a great score for 2048 being the only one to get the titular score, which I was proud of. In terms of an attitude shift, I think the second half of the game was where I started feeling more competent in my challenge abilities and started turning things around. I knew I wanted to come into the finale and talk about challenge scores so I wanted to be the very best
like no one ever was
.
Some tactics I'd use, and tips I shared with Noraa when I convinced them to join, was always have two tabs open for your forms because the forms takes you to the last page and clicking to resubmit gets away from the information you needed. So having a second form helps keep the information on the page and you can prefill the submiting info because the only thing that's registered is the submit. Sure that saves a few seconds but that could be the difference between some scores!
Another tactic I used was keeping notes throughout the game, and sometimes making that a collaborative thing to establish trust. Notes on what people say and how they score, notes on dates and times things are posted. Memory comps get so out of hand because it's so easy to perform well with basic notes so you have to start keeping track of everything in one place. That didn't come in handy this game, but I got to create a sheet with Shadow which was fun.
And finally the last moment where I shined was finding the idol. I had been passively taking in the clues and discussing them with folks but not really diving deep to find it. But I always made it a point to be on at every challenge in order to get the next clue and look around a bit. That paid off when the last clue was extremely revealing and I beat the players that had been working a lot harder to find it to the punch.
So what defined my game was not exceptional challenge strat or beasting one type of particular challenge, but a general preparedness and always being ready for action!
In post 126, Ethel wrote:Hiya Mist and Vash,
As you might imagine, neither of you are someone I would like to vote for. I realize you approached this game as a challenge competition, and it might have just been meant as that, but I am very much a social-focused player. Therefore, I don't care much about challenge performance. This is also not really a question, but merely an explanation for my vote. As I cannot abstain, my vote will likely be for Vash.
I understand. You were amazing to play with by the way and I loved your stories. For me that was why I had to work against you! You were just so rootable and sweet that I knew you'd woo the jury with a story and the tale of how you got by through this game.
Thank you so much for your questions over the last 48 hours. Finalists will now have until tomorrow at 9pm EST/6pm PST to respond to any outstanding questions & submit a closing speech.
Please refrain from posting here unless you are a finalist. Thank you
In post 114, Save The Dragons wrote:I like you both as people but feel like I just didn't interact with you guys the most this game compared to prejurors and other jurors.
Why should I vote for you? I dont care about strategy here or how you outlasted everyone, I wanna know why I personally should vote for you.
Oh and no words please. Please answer with three gifs instead of words. The gifs can have words. Thank you!
Here we are! It's time for our Jury to vote! Before we do that though, our finalists have ONE LAST PITCH to say why they should be the winner of The Weakest Link Season 3. Before I post those, be sure to have your final vote in by tomorrow at 9pm EST/6pm PST. We will do a live reveal of the vote & follow-up Reunion approximately 30 minutes after that deadline and we do not anticipate it taking very long.
I have more things I'd like to say and thank you all for participating, but I'll save it after we crown a winner.
Here are the final pitches.
VashtaNeurotic:
Howdy y’all friends. First off, thank you for your questions and thank you to mist for being a lovely opponent. I’m just gonna break down the Challenge, Strategic and Social aspects of the game and how mist and I compare in case you are still thinking about your vote.
Challenges
So mist is really hanging their hat on their 7-6 lead being an objective showing that they won the challenge game. However, margin of victory clearly matters here. Gonna do a challenge by challenge but spoiler it for those of you not interested. There is a TLDR if you don’t want the exact examples.
Spoiler:
Challenge 1 Robot Unicorn: Yeah, so I got TRIPLE mist’s score here. This was a BLOWOUT WIN FOR ME.
Challenge 2 Phone Numbers: So I did a lot better than mist here but, mist had a ridiculously good time. Like if mist slows down a bit they could beat me. TECHNICAL WIN FOR ME.
Challenge 3 Majority Rules: A whole…minute and a half separate mist from me. This is a NARROW WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 4 Scattegories: Similar times and I scored 4 more points than mist here. BLOWOUT WIN FOR ME.
Challenge 5 Chain Game: I was picked far before mist. BLOWOUT WIN FOR ME.
Challenge 6 Alphabet: Oh mist had me here easily, I am not good at anagrams. BLOWOUT WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 7 2048: Mist said they won by a lot, this isn’t actually all that true. My actual submission was:
I was forced to up shift when I had a 1024, 512, 256 and 128 on the board, I was very close to 2048 but sometimes rng happens. Still mist actually got 2048 so NARROW WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 8 Binary Code: I was slightly faster, mist was slightly better on numbers. I’d say this is a NARROW WIN FOR MIST. Though maybe it might be closer to our situation for challenge 2?
Challenge 9 Word Search: Mist beat me by a whole letter and 20 seconds. NARROW WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 10 Math: Mist was pretty good but I was 33% faster than them and it just required me to be a little more careful (which I was on the redux) for this to be a win for me. Reverse of Challenge 2. TECHNICAL WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 11 Jigsong: Mist did really bad on this, I did pretty well. BLOWOUT WIN FOR ME.
Challenge 12 Wiki Game: Mist’s time is insane here, I might have done really well on the retry but for the main challenge this is a BLOWOUT WIN FOR MIST.
Challenge 13 Logic: The one that matters most and….I did really well and mist got a score of 8. BLOWOUT WIN FOR ME.
So we have 5 Blowout wins for me, 2 Blowout wins for mist, 4 Narrow wins for mist, and a technical win each.
Spoiler: TLDR
When I was better than mist, I was far above their level, when mist was better than me they barely scraped by most of the time. Also as I stated before, in the Weakest Link, the weakest player in challenges was NEVER me, mist got last place TWICE.
If you think there’s any more nuance than straight win loss when it comes to challenge strength, I’m the clear choice here.
Social and Strategic Game
In all likelihood, you believe there’s more to this game than just challenges, otherwise there wouldn’t be votes or DMing allowed. Now I’m going to package together these aspects because there’s a significant aspect of social game that is just, “did you like talking to me?” or “did we connect as people?” which are questions I’d rather not speculate and argue about, you know the answer to those questions for yourself and can compare how mist and I hold up to that. However there’s also an aspect of social game that is getting people to ally with you and get people to not vote you, which I’m happy to talk about and is incredibly intertwined with strategic play.
In this game I didn’t talk to people often, lab work has become a lot more significant as of late and I’m writing a proposal this semester for my PhD. However, after a few early rounds of coasting and trying to get Noraa to improve at challenges, I talked where votes were relevant and tried to give people some idea where my mind was at, usually whoever was up (along with some side chatter sometimes). Some notable examples were talking to George and Meme at length during F10, and Shadow and Ariel at F6. Also, since my social game was somewhat aloof it actually gave me a lot of power, since I was in the middle I could conceivably vote either way at any point and justify it, even if it caused a little chaos in the process. Rather than just being irrelevant, my vote swap changed the outcome for multiple votes, and was the deciding one at F5.
I’m also very good at giving just enough people enough reason to keep me around, in previous games this has resulted in ties, but here instead of a revote, there was a rechallenge, so this skillset was very helpful to me as I was very confident in my ability on any reattempt at a challenge. At Final 6 I knew I just needed Mist and Shadow on my side, and at Final 4 I knew I just needed one of Mist or Ariel to be with me and I could do the rest. I gave my effort when it was truly needed and was whisked away back to my other responsibilities afterward.
Compare this to mist who did have strategic activity, but to my knowledge most of that was filtered through Shadow. Mist was never really a swing vote or courted during any vote to my knowledge (though there is probably some round I’m not privy to though) and mostly just wanted to have fun with challenges. There’s nothing wrong with that, challenges spark joy for them, but it is a less well rounded game than the one I played.
I hope this speech found you well, and once again, you’ve all been great, I hope to speak to y’all postgame and best of luck to mist!
mist7676
Hey everyone, I don't have much else to provide here since my argument for winning is just so logically sound. I out performed Vash in more challenges and this is a challenge game. Oh, you want more than just that...? Gosh I didn't plan that far. I guess all I can say is that both of us clearly put a lot of heart into this game and either one of us that wins deserves it.
Throughout this game, I do think I worked hard to establish alliances and connections so that I would have a potential fallback if my challenge ability fell through. Right off the bat, I established my alliances with Noraa and Shadow. One went on longer than the other but I knew both of those I could count on as we moved forward in the game. During votes, I would communicate with other voters as well as the player I planned on saving in order to establish a rapport and build up alliances. I think that most shined with my connections to Ariel and GeorgeBailey as both are players I never really worked with in the past, at least in nonanons, and these connections arose out of them being on the block and me being a vote that helped saved them (more than once).
Other alliances that I built up as the game went on were with Kdowns and Vash. Both players I had worked with in the past and was excited to work together again. I got to a point in the game where I felt comfortable with the people I was talking to and working with. I felt like if I ended up on the block, I would have a great support net set up as well as avenues to form new alliances if necessary. Depending on who I was up against, I doubt it would have been an uphill climb. It's hard to talk about these alliances in the abstract because I never had to rely on them to keep me safe. The moments that I can point to where I used those alliances and connections that I had would be working to keep kdowns safe by pulling Shadow in to that voting block. Additionally, using my #socialgame to try and force as many ties as possible. I was always on the lookout for where people were voting and trying to see how split down the middle things could be. More challenges in the challenge game is always a net positive.
Love you all, vote w/ your hearts, and thank you for everything <3
FROM THIS POINT ON PLEASE DO NOT POST PUBLICLY IN THIS THREAD UNTIL AFTER RESULTS ARE OUT.
Welcome to the live reveal! We'll get started in a couple minutes, but first I wanted to reveal the Sia Fan Favorite Award winner.
Spoiler: Who was it?
It was a tie between these people:
Ariel
Silverclaw
Xalxe
Shadoweh
Ethel
VashtaNeurotic
BipolarChemist
CaptainMeme
Noraa
Save the Dragons
Cheery Dog
GeorgeBailey
mist7676
Aronis
kdowns
Spoiler: First Vote, now that the fan service is over
You know what? I fully intended to vote for Vash here but all my votes are cast on vibes and IDK, the vibes for Mist are just....right. I can't explain it beyond that and I might regret it tomorrow but here we are!
It has been said that history is written by the victors. Here, though, I believe that history will be written by the robbed goddesses1. Our chosen winner will be the one that best represents us. Though our protagonist, the young heroine, fell short, the one we will crown tonight still proved to be admirable and untouchable. Both finalists have outdone themselves and outlasted the rest.
I gave the final two a final chance to prove themselves to me. This test was designed in light of the mod's intention that this experience only be based 30% on social ability. Without further rabbling, let's see who came out ahead.
1 of varied genders
Let us start at the end:
3) What number corresponds to the letter E in this cryptogram puzzle?
* Please note, I do not want you using cyptogram solvers, search engines, or other nefarious tricks.
Of course it was about my arch-nemesis. Both finalists answered correctly.
1) For any two of the following rounds, who did Ariel vote for? (Round 1, Round 4, Round 7).
(Here is an example answer format so that it's clear what you mean- Round 1: Malkon, Round 4: D3f3nd3r.)
I actually had meant to ask about Round 8 instead of Round 7, so this ended up only being about my votes or lack thereof on Ethel. Oh well. Controversially , I voted for Ethel in Round 1. I voted for Silverclaw in Round 4 and then for Xalxe in Round 7.
Vash correctly provided my votes in Round 4 and 7. Mist, on the other hand, was only correct about my vote in Round 1. Vash takes the lead 2-1.
I also asked them to complete a simple equation:
2) What is X divided by Y plus Z? Where:
X = The number that would correspond to "effervescent" per the translation rules of the Round 2 challenge.
Y = The number of letters in the last name of the person credited for composing the "original recording" of the jigsong.
Z = The number of animated gifs D3f3nd3r posted in #general of the discord prior to Vash's vote lock message.
* Please note, I do not care if you use "outside resources" for this.
Did I ruin one of my favorite words for you?
E
F
F
E
R
V
E
S
C
E
N
T
33
333
333
33
777
888
33
7777
222
33
66
8
X = 333333333377788833777722233668
Y = 4 (The last name is Goss according to the YouTube description)
Z = 0
Vash provided the answer of 8333333334444208444430558417.
Mist provided the answer of 8.3333333e+28.
Now, you might be asking yourself, why is there a letter in the middle of Mist's answer when I asked for a number? Are these answers equivalent? These questions, in fact, have answers. As it turns out, if you format Vash's answer in scientific notification (in the same format Mist presumably copy-pasted from Google) would be 8.3333333e+27. But more importantly, what was my answer?
You might be asking yourself, what happened to that 7 digit that should be in Vash's answer? I don't know the answer to that one, but it's unfortunate!
As for the scientific notation, I see no reason not to count it. We are tied 2-2.
So, it comes down to time. Part of being the strongest link is efficiency, after all. I will be casting my vote for the player that answered two questions correctly in 17 minutes and 25 seconds, which was 3 minutes and 5 seconds faster than their competitor.
Both of you made me laugh. Both of you saved my dumb ass when I very nearly got eliminated by literally clicking one wrong button. Both of you pushed me to do better so that I might best you.
One of you I suspect is the most responsible for my best bud's demise. You then used your item against me and were extremely close to getting me eliminated with it. The other pretended they were too tired to allow me the same opportunity they had had to survive through challenge prowess. They then stole my joke, used it as the thesis of their opening speech, and added insult to injury by stretching the truth.
This game reminded me why I dislike non-anon games. Vash, I really should not have believed you when you never acted in my interests even though I put decent effort into getting me/you/mist/ariel to the finals. You're probably winning this too but it certainly won't be with my help.
##Vote: Mist thanks for the blackmail materials bby
being good at challenges and forcing everyone to promise you f2's and votes is a pretty good strategy huh :V
I HATE YOU SO MUCH PLEASE GO JUMP INTO A FREEZING LAKE - Mr. Freeze
And this was like me realizing that you were a serial killer. - Hathor
"but I must declare my love to Edelgard here, i offer you the treasure I stole from Raphael, an idol LOL" - Shamir
I'm spending time with a friend. Sorry I wasn't around for the fun and festivities. I want to give a hearty congratulations to VashtaNeurotic for coming out as the victor of TWL3. It's hilarious because apparently in order for you to win a game I have to be the one running it
This was quite honestly a terrific season filled with terrific characters and you all made it exciting to watch. With more ties than any TWL game prior, close votes, lots of fun rivalries, and really just a nice, low effort way to spend time. I had a blast with everyone who played and it was a real treat from start to finish.
A few fun things of note:
-Vash becomes the first person to both win the final challenge and the game.
-Vash becomes the first person to participate in more than one tiebreaker & win more than one tiebreaker.
-mist becomes the first two time finalist of the series.
-mist has the most collective votes of any finalists in the series. (3 from this game, 3 from season 2)
-mist is the first person to lose more than 1 final.
-Ethel has tied the record for the most times being on the block (with DV at 5 in season 2)
-this season is the first season to feature more than 1 tiebreaker challenge
I'm sure there are more things, but really everyone this season had a story and a point to the overall plot. It really was exciting and dynamic to see.
First to the players: Thank you so much for playing. You all are incredible and I'm so thankful we got enough interest to even have a third season. I appreciate you all taking a chance to try this game in a long term format and I think with a few minor exceptions, it went really well! I really think we did a pretty good job with the golden links, the challenges, and trying to make reasonable and sound calls as the season went on. Nothing is ever perfect, but for the first long term version of the game, I'm super pleased.
To my cohost: D3f3nd3r was seriously so awesome. He just picked up on things I still can't wrap my brain around, he was always there for me when I needed him, and he put up with my neurotic and sometimes scattered personality. I had such a blast hosting with you and thank you for taking the leap when I approached you to host this. I asked a lot and you not only delivered, but you quite literally kept me sane and kept this game on track. Thank you for having my back and helping me run this whole thing.
To xof: meh <3
To the spectators: Although it wasn't the most lively spec lounge ever, the ones who were there were lively and animated and helped keep the conversation going the whole time. Thank you for helping share the laughs and theories in the games, I had a lot of fun with you all <3
And so we conclude the first ever long-term form of TWL. I need to do some thinking to determine whether or not there will be a 4th season and whether I prefer running this live or running this long-term, but if this season showed me anything it's that it can exist in both worlds which is awesome! Thanks for doing "all those word" challenges and keeping me on my toes the whole time. I had a blast.
, I voted for Ethel in Round 1. I voted for Silverclaw in Round 4 and then for Xalxe in Round 7.
