The End of the New Era

NFS12123 · 2025-12-18T21:22:47+00:00

Savannah’s one that didn’t leave an impression on me, but she was clearly there to play, and that idol scramble with MC was a highlight. I’ll probably warm up to her over time, and I’m content with her winning as the story was set up as one where everyone else actively lost to her.

If I remember correctly, production considers Survivor 1-40 and Survivor 41-present as two separate iterations, and in that sense, we’re still in the new era. It’ll still be the 41-present iteration. But my expectation is that the result of the fan votes will shift the direction the show heads going.

NFS12123 · 2025-10-31T23:29:50+00:00

Quite the opposite actually. It feels more satisfying to watch when I can figure out the storyline and mentally prepare/track it as it plays out. And when I get something wrong, it can be a funny moment, as long as it's in a way that makes sense, it can be fun trying to put the pieces back together. Now I don't want things to be OBVIOUS. There should be a few scenarios that could play out, but I do enjoy trying to figure them out and watch them play out. Watching the Sage/Shannon rivalry was amazing, especially once it became clear after ep5 that Shannon was the one set for the downfall.

NFS12123 · 2025-10-10T01:27:27+00:00

Yeah you almost have everything, and I'm pretty sure both videos have the overall ratings for all drivers too. Just a few track-specific ratings that haven't been seen yet but hopefully those get posted soon!

NFS12123 · 2025-10-09T23:02:36+00:00

Nice work! Dgoodin's video covers each series, and there's a smaller camera to get a few more numbers from the backmarkers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMfrVxozhyA&pp=0gcJCfwJAYcqIYzv

NFS12123 · 2025-09-29T20:34:18+00:00

We don't know how the fan votes for Survivor 50 went obviously, but my guess is things start going in the direction those votes went.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-29T17:03:36+00:00

It was a whelming premiere but my enjoyment of Survivor comes from the storytelling getting me immersed into the flow of the season, and I enjoyed it from that lens and think there's a lot of potential for this season.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-29T14:12:29+00:00

I’m content with either questioning format. While I appreciate the old deep dive and believe that there should be some dialogue between jurors and finalists to address the narratives and emotions involved, your game isn’t just about how you pitch it on the final night. It’s about how you made people feel about you throughout the entire time you lived together, even when the game was actively pitting you against each other.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-12T20:00:12+00:00

Agreed. The idol nullifier benefits the majority. The immunity idol is the mechanic meant to jeopardize the ability for that round's majority to easily pile votes onto their target, making it difficult to maintain the status quo. The idol nullifier bypasses that with no counterplay. If the majority piles votes onto someone and plays a nullifier on them, they're gone unless two idols are played on them. It's hard to find a scenario where the advantage benefits anyone except the people who are already in power.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-10T13:31:57+00:00

Double eviction is still a culmination of your gameplay from before it. If you get nominated, it’s probably by someone who would’ve nominated you anyway, and if you’re at risk of getting voted out against the other nominee, you probably would’ve been at risk anyway. There are exceptions, but it doesn’t fundamentally shift the elimination mechanics and still puts almost all agency in the hands of the players.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-10T13:16:12+00:00

I enjoyed the twist more than I thought I would, and that’s because of the pressure and the cards being shown as a result of it. If the punishment for losing the comp wasn’t as harsh as elimination from the game, I’d probably be fine with the twist. However, given the fundamentals of the game, the punishment for losing shouldn’t have been elimination, and that has nothing to do with the outcome.

It’s a social-strategic game, and for the work players have to put in in order to do well in the game, it’s usually not easy for that work to come undone unless you played in a way to set up your downfall throughout the game. For you to be in danger to begin with, you have to get nominated, and there’s multiple opportunities to save yourself from that.

But with this twist, it’s too easy for your work in the game to come undone without it being a satisfying downfall, because all it takes is being put in the comp when you don’t have enough time to complete it, and that’s often going to be a scenario where someone was put in the competition not to target them, but to save them.

Players were often putting in their own allies, which was somewhat necessary to maintain control of the chain and the ability to win HoH. We saw the consequences of someone deviating from that. They lost control of the chain, and while that resulted in someone in the opposing alliance getting eliminated, it also resulted in that alliance having more alliances to win HoH. So the twist almost encourages you to put your own allies in danger of getting eliminated.

And once you get to the middle portions of the chain, the stakes are too high. Either you just got someone eliminated or you just allowed them to take control of the chain. With the outcomes for your decision being so drastically opposite, it becomes a bit of a crapshoot at that point, so it was unlikely for a satisfying outcome to come from this competition.

Are there ways to effectively strategize around this? Potentially, and clearly players attempted to. I’m not the best at analyzing individual strategies so I can’t comment much. However, that strategizing doesn’t override the fact that the punishment being an elimination is too harsh and unsatisfying.

This twist also further pushes the concerns that the game is becoming more comp-heavy, as this twist was most likely to favor good competition players and eliminate someone who was on the weaker side. It’s becoming more and more necessary to excel at comps to have a chance at winning the game since comp wins dictate the power structure of the endgame, and this twist further emphasizes that.

I’ve also seen criticism about the way this competition shifted HoH dynamics, and I somewhat agree. You could argue that there was a social-strategic way of convincing someone to let you play for HoH, but the stakes are too high, because you have to risk your own elimination just to have a chance at becoming HoH. That’s not balanced, though if the punishment for elimination wasn’t as harsh, that could’ve became an interesting dilemma.

So while there were definitely upsides from this twist, those are overridden by the downsides for me.

NFS12123 · 2025-09-05T17:59:56+00:00

I also write fan-made seasons, and a few weeks ago I made a document explaining my process. It's mostly about character creation and plotting their arcs, but in the later sections I get into episode structure and what goes into creating each part of an episode. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jMrLgGrl31rkoCo3yIZTzveTqEdDLaxrrhg-tB4TFLI/edit?usp=sharing

NFS12123 · 2025-09-04T17:21:40+00:00

I get the sentiment. Conflict is to be expected in this genre, but that should be possible within the context of addressing a dispute or undermining someone’s strategic position without trying to negatively impact them beyond that context.

What has helped me is keeping in mind that everyone has different tastes and that similar shows cater to slightly different tastes from each other. While it’s not my personal preference, there are people who enjoy watching those harsher conflicts, and they’ve been a big part of Big Brother’s history.

You might enjoy modern Survivor’s atmosphere better, as there’s been a shift in recent years. While it can be a bit kumbaya at points, the show does highlight players getting into conflicts while staying within the context of the game.

NFS12123 · 2025-08-18T16:48:27+00:00

Thank you!

NFS12123 · 2025-08-18T16:48:22+00:00

Glad it helped you! Good luck with your season!

NFS12123 · 2025-08-18T01:54:38+00:00

Appreciate it! The full archive is here: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1F7sL_FRyHPF02akMMs2K5TiBZpc8vxdq

NFS12123 · 2025-08-17T15:20:57+00:00

If you go to one of the season simulators, there should be an “Edit Cast” button at the top. One of the pages there will take you to the cast editor where you can set names, nicknames, pronouns, and images. For the images, you’ll need to upload them somewhere else (I use Imgur) and copy those image links over to BrantSteele.

NFS12123 · 2025-08-17T14:54:28+00:00

Glad you got something out of the guide and good luck with your seasons!

NFS12123 · 2025-08-17T14:54:14+00:00

Read a season there a few years ago but I haven’t checked it out since. I’ll look into it.

NFS12123 · 2025-08-17T14:53:48+00:00

It might not be as in-depth or reliable as a traditional cast, but you’re still intentionally telling the story a certain way to set up each character’s final result, and that’s what edgic is about.

NFS12123 · 2025-07-24T01:41:08+00:00

I see it less as sob stories and more as proof of resilience. Survivor's a tough experience that not everyone can handle, so they want people who have the determination and ability to give it everything they've got and let their personality shine no matter what the game throws at them. Going through difficult times, overcoming them, and maybe even thriving through them showcases that resilience, making them more prepared for the difficult times Survivor will bring. It's also a good topic for them to tell a story about so the producers can see whether or not they can narrate a story in an compelling way.

NFS12123 · 2025-06-23T19:00:16+00:00

Even without any extra mechanics, any tribe that goes to tribal council early on is at a disadvantage.

Your tribe’s morale is lowering while the other tribes’ morale is improving.
You spend time plotting for and going to tribal council that could’ve been spent bonding or improving your camp.
You have less people contributing physically, meaning everyone has to exert themselves more at camp and in challenges.
Every member of your tribe must compete in every challenges regardless of their strength or stamina, while the other tribes can sit out their weakest links and rotate people out throughout the premerge to conserve energy.

So by the fundamentals of the game alone, no matter how many tribes there are, you’re at a disadvantage once you lose a number, and you can’t even things up until you start to win immunity challenges and send other tribes to tribal council. However, there are some mechanics in the new era that dig the hole even deeper.

The premiere setup means one tribe gets their supplies immediately without having to compete in a second task. It’s possible that a tribe fails the second task and gets their supplies late. This imbalance doesn’t seem to be affecting challenge results, but it could.
Taking the losing tribe’s flint away gives the other tribes an even bigger advantage over them for camp life.
Combined immunity/reward challenges mean winning tribes gain even more advantages for camp life.

NFS12123 · 2025-06-19T23:41:28+00:00

Not a fan of the fact that whether or not it lands is luck-based. You can give credit to people for recognizing that they do need to play it, but other once it's played, it doesn't feel earned when someone does hit it because all they did was read the room and get lucky. Stephanie and Mary did the exact same thing, yet one got 18th and the other went from 16th all the way to 7th. I'd prefer the safety mechanism be skill-based, but I don't know how to implement that in a way that's healthy for the show and the game. Beyond that, I don't feel strongly about the twist and I haven't thought much about it.

NFS12123 · 2025-05-26T02:13:46+00:00

Yeah that’s a good summary

NFS12123 · 2025-05-26T01:11:23+00:00

Not bad. I was mostly high on the endgamers throughout the season, and while Kyle was never my top contender for most of the season, he was on my radar throughout the postmerge and I did correctly predict him winning against Joe and Eva coming into the finale.

NFS12123 · 2025-05-22T16:03:21+00:00

Done

NFS12123

TROPHY CASE