Let's Study Games - Final Tribal Council

[Drench]

in the face of 'it depends on the circumstances' i don't think there is much else to say—it's the right conclusion. what i would say is:
a) agreed with ceph's point on the 'gap' between items and ftc. it's my preference (not because i think it's 'better' but because i like it) that the gap be as large as is reasonably possible, eg items expire at f6 with a f2, leaving a gap of three cycles (f5, f4, f3);
b) i think there is something to be said for building mechanics with as few exceptions as possible. 'keep voting people out until you can no longer do so' is more minimal in its intervention than 'keep voting people out until there are three people left', and if everything else were equal i think it would therefore be preferable to go for the f2. however it's a minor point if anything
c) i have never really fully bought into the argument that players should be told in advance what the ftc is. controversial! i think there is something to be said for rewarding the player who is flexible and can maintain a strong position in the face of two very different endings. but in the current climate, where there is an expectation of disclosure, you have to give the players what will be fun for them, and so i think you really do need to disclose until such a point as the playerbase is more comfortable with non-disclosure (which i think would be a cool and fun thing).

[Drench]

Also the idea that "relying on challenges" is inherently bad is flawed. Challenges are, a part of survivor,

[Drench]

If anything, a point that F2s have going for them is that they more readily emphasise challenge ability, which otherwise is significantly undervalued in an online setting

[Drench]

it doesn't move mountains but it's something

[Drench]

it's like, as i said in #11, it depends on the circumstances. but i do think that you will have slightly more challenge flavour if you have a f2 vis a vis a f3, if that's what you want. it won't radically change things up on average (although you could imagine a challenge run argument may have significantly more weight if in a f2 environment—or significantly less weight, jury dependent, but that's just a guess and really relies on what happens during the game itself, not what happens in its design)

[Drench]

presenting categories inevitably leads people to think along those lines even if they reject a particular weighting. it also lends credence to the idea that a jury's vote should be entirely logical, which quite frankly undermines the entire point of survivor

[Drench]

my solution is that we shouldn't post any threads at all. jurors get free rein to do whatever. i will take no questions

[Drench]

have always found the bbcan approach of making part three of the final hoh entirely based on game events/knowledge really compelling, but i don't know how well that translates into a setting where you can keep records of game events fairly easily (unless of course people don't know it's coming—but that i think defeats the purpose by turning it from skill to a crapshoot, and you may have people preparing just in case anyway)

the bbus approach of juror statements is not good. that's not in issue here but i just wanted to make that statement

[Drench]

my solution is that we shouldn't post any threads at all. jurors get free rein to do whatever. i will take no questions

how bad could it be. let the jurors figure out what they want from their ftc and let them do it

[Drench]

i do think it has a better than even chance of being terrible but—crucially—it would also be fun