Previously on Survivor Hamilton: Old Meets New
Nevala put up a good fight, but once again, exceptional teamwork from the Kobara Tribe continued to outclass our roster of new players at the Immunity Challenge. This has been a rough 2.5 weeks for Nevala, and it was back to Tribal Council where Nevala would vote out their 6th player.

From the earliest stages of planning, this season of Survivor Hamilton was always going to primarily be about Old vs New. Returning players vs new players. A mixture of old and new rules. Embracing video in new and exciting ways. And so from the beginning, it was assumed that there would be a period of time when the veterans dominated the newbies. I expected that to be about 4 challenges. We’ve had 7, but it’s now 6-1 for Kobara in the head to head rivalry.

It’s actually not much of a rivalry at all. While Nevala has slowly improved their communication and coordination during Immunity Challenges, Kobara is practically OCD about never losing. The Kobara Tribe took what they knew from past seasons, then adapted quickly to the new rules of this season, and their open communication during challenges has allowed them to quickly pivot each time there are slightly different instructions.

The same level of aggressive continuous improvement cannot be said about Nevala. Five players down, and the same problems have continued to haunt them. Ian and Jon, Nevala’s most consistent “point-getters” in Immunity Challenges, had recently told me that rules and steps were put in place to ensure that everyone is helping eachother, that wrong answers aren’t submitted before rigorous vetting, and that the instructions are followed to a “T”.

But in the last Immunity Challenge, the 3rd challenge in a row that Nevala had a real chance of winning, those self-imposed rules were nowhere to be seen. Sharon and Dave worked alone on their challenge when they should have been getting everyone ready, with Sharon even looking outside of her tribe to assistance. Ruth and April, with 2 VERY DIFFICULT questions, either didn’t ask for help, or none was provided.

Jon and Ian, fortuitously paired together by Kobara, came away with a point for Nevala, but they worked with a smaller group, not including everyone. It wasn’t until Shareed received his difficult question, in the 4th of 5 matches, that the question (and requested help) was posted in the group chat for the entire tribe to assist with. By the time we got to Jim and Sasha’s question, half of the tribe was engaged and trying to help, and the other half was nowhere to be seen.

All of this rhetoric isn’t to pile on the misery, because I want Nevala to win (and knock Kobara down to size) as much as they do. This description is to define the key difference in strategy between Kobara and Nevala at this still-early point in the game. The returning players send hundreds of messages back and forth during Immunity Challenges. Maybe that’s overkill, but that’s the reason they are winning and Nevala is not. We are only 20% of the way through, and at some point players from both tribes will need to work together. So which lessons can these new players (still only 3 weeks into their Survivor Hamilton careers!) continue to learn from these losses?

And what will they base their votes on tonight? I understand there are lots of discussions on the weekly statistics that I post, and that they be used as a barometer for success moving forward. I’d argue that all they are is a representation of which players have scored more points for their tribe SO FAR, and because Nevala have not been helping eachother the way that Kobara has, everyone on Nevala looks worse than reality.

If you WERE going to use the stats to determine top and bottom performers, you’d see that there are 3 tiers, and not much to separate players in each of them. As mentioned you have Ian and Jon, both of whom won their matches in two challenges in a row, and have limited incorrect answers. You then have Sasha, Jim and Ruth who won their matches last week, but came up short this week. The larger group, still looking for consistent success are Andre, Shareed, Dave, Sharon and April. Two weeks in a row of wrong answers have pushed them ALL to the bottom, but again that’s because Nevala is not supporting eachother enough.

Going to Tribal Council over and over makes building relationships hard, and creating enemies easy. It’s possible that the consistent trips to the voting block have simply created a negative energy around Nevala that they can’t seem to shake. Only time will tell if tonight’s vote can help dig them out of the hole they are in, or if the only hope for our rookies is a major game twist. But who’s game will end before the rest of Nevala can find out?

Watch out live Tribal Council video below, or read on to see the votes revealed.

So now we’ll get to a reading of the votes. Talk had continued all week about who had the Hidden Immunity Idol, and if it would be played tonight. An idol can have a huge impact on the outcome of a vote, and we are about to find our answer…

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Nope. The answer is nope. Let’s get to the votes.

here

we

go

First Vote:

Second Vote:

That’s 1 vote Jim, 1 vote April.

Third Vote:

That’s 2 votes Jim, and 1 vote April.

Fourth Vote:

We’re tied again, 2 votes Jim, 2 votes April.

Fifth Vote:

We’re now at 3 votes against Jim, and 2 against April.

Sixth vote:

But we’re tied again, 3 votes apiece for Jim and April.

Seventh Vote:

Jim’s back in front of April, 4 votes to 3.

Eighth Vote:

And we’re TIED AGAIN! We have 4 votes against Jim, and 4 against April. There are only 2 votes left…

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Ninth vote:

Ruth? Well, with only 1 vote remaining, the votes now stand at 4 vote Jim, 4 for April, and 1 for Ruth… Talk about a nail-biter.

one

vote

left

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Last Vote:

And so by a vote of 5-4-1, Jim “Fedora” Hamilton becomes the 7th player voted out of Survivor Hamilton: Old Meets New!

The Nevala Saga continues with another huge vote at Tribal Council, as we watch one of the game’s early threats eliminated. Jim played the whole game with a target on his back. As a leader of the “family”, Jim had some built-in allies on both tribes, but that level of security was joined by a level of scrutiny that he had to deal with from the beginning. After biting the bullet and voting out his stepson Ross, Jim was able to wrangle the numbers to his side to vote out David M. – a vote he would later regret.

When Jim voted out Wayne, unfortunately he alienated a handful of players that had voted with him just days before; and once those players switched sides, the writing was on the wall for the “family” on Nevala. Jim played the game with integrity, focused on building trust with a small group, and on continually improving their Immunity Challenge performances. At the end of the day, he lost the trust of the swing votes, and that was too big a hole to dig himself out of. By manipulating the votes tonight, Jim was able to leave the game on his own terms, and we can definitely respect that! Thanks for playing Jimbo, it was a blast to share this game with you.

As for the remaining 23 players left in the game… There will be another Kobara–Nevala battle for Immunity tomorrow, and we’ll be taking a trip back to easy-town, where speed is everything. Good luck!

And check out tonight’s interview with Jim on PLAYED! with Meg & Mike – a lot of great insight in this one.

MH

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