Not another Critic...

Well congratulations to you all.

I would like to address the Nativity round where I went home. We were instructed to ensure that we should all keep our identities hidden. This is something that I worked hard on. It would have been tempting to hint at who I was so that I could rely on previous relationships I had formed as Margaret, but integrity of the game is important to me. I am questioning whether some of the Nativity actors were perhaps a little more transparent.

My question is this... did you base your decisions that round on the relationship you formed in the nativity episode or were they based more on utilising previous relationships and presuming you had guessed identities correctly.

Hello my dear Margret!

There is much to unpack on this question as to my thought process, but I can say without question that I did not want you to go home that round.

While I have made it very clear that my closest allies in this game were Scrooge and Diana, coming into merge you were a super important ally for me. It is clear I think from the speeches of my fellow nominees here and some of the questions already asked, that there were a lot of overlapping and interlinked relationships. I was fully aware of that and felt it had the potential to make the end game very prickly as people would have to show where their true loyalties laid.

From the fish game and into the merge, I felt that you were 100% genuine with me as to your desire to work with me. Now, I suppose there is a risk in saying that, because there is the possibility that you weren't being honest with me and I was being duped, but I have played this entire game putting trust in those I felt I could trust, and I fully felt I could trust you. I also felt that you were not as connected with some of the other players in the game as you were with me, which again made me value you highly in terms of someone I could rely upon at the end phases of the game.

To me you were a very genuine player who cared about my views and my feelings. For example, even when I told you that I was comfortable with Joe going in the merge round, I did really appreciate you double checking that I was okay with it, because it wasn't the easiest vote for me as you know. I did fear what Joe could do in the future with the Roberts and Deer Head. But equally, up until that point he'd been nothing but a solid friend to me, so it was a difficult round (not so much in hindsight, but you know, at the time it was difficult).

So on to your questions. As far as I know no one made the indentity known. I was hypersensitive to this being the returning player (or one of the options for such) it was essential that I not be eliminated. Although I suppose the same applies for anyone in that round. Max, DH, Joe and I had the chance to chat a little before the full rules were revealed, and we had considered that perhaps I could just tell my allies who I was in order for us to secure the victory. The HR came in quite strongly and told us that was not allowed. I note that Robert has suggested that keeping your ID secret was simply highly recommended, but IDK, it seemed from the rules at the time that there would be harsher penalties for just blatantly telling people your ID (i.e. similar to sending a missive when we couldn't etc). So I believe everybody played the round ethically and did their very best to obscure their ID.

As for how I played, I was legitimately trying to disguise myself, although I got a bit worried when someone in public compared the sexual antics of the Wise Man with that of Suchet. The characters I was playing were quite different in terms of the approach as Suchet was more about inuendo and double entendres where as Wise Man was almost straight up sexting which is not something I've ever really done in ORGs before but I saw it as an opportunity to try something different. In the end only 2 people ID'd me which we know from the fire-making challenge, so I feel I did a pretty good job of disguising myself.

And then on the vote, honestly, I felt everyone had done such a good job of disguising themselves. I guessed that maybe Herod was Diana but it was less on the missives quality and more that she was doing Joe's little yellow box/new post thing and I didn't think anyone else had spent enough time with him to think of doing that. But other than that I was lost on who people were (and I even switched to thinking Diana was Donkey when Donkey changed her shtick for like the third time), so I focused more on treating it like a brand new round/ORG and do my best to be the most active and most interesting and secure the immunity (especially given I had to also manage the battle back condition at the same time).

And as for you, I did not realise you were Gabriel. I thought it was a possibility but I had you more pegged as Chris the narrator. Even more so when you sent me those missives about 'having friends that you dearly miss'. That actually made me think you were Scrooge because he'd sent me all these little 'I miss you' notes in the fish game and I thought that could be a reference to that. But then I thought that I was thinking too much about it all and anyone could be anyone. So I treated it like a new round and in that regard I really clicked with Donkey, Herod and Mary. I didn't really get Dennis at all. I like Joseph but no one else seemed to. I felt Chris the narrator was fine but nothing special. As for you (Gabriel), you just weren't around a lot the first couple of days of the round and I felt it hard to make a new connection. Maybe that was because you were doing a different shtick and my different sex shtick wasn't meshing with your new one (while Suchet and Margaret had actually combined and meshed really well). I also appreciate that you might have made more of an effort in the last 24 hours of the round but as you likely know now from my opening or your time in the critics corner, I really had to check out of the vote so I could focus on getting back in the game in the battleback. At that point, I'd promised to give my votes to Chris and Joseph and decided to keep my word. The other potential returnees were also fine with that outcome, but equally we were not allowed to speculate in our thread as to who was who, so that did not form a part of our discussions either.

Needless to say, as pleased as I was to get back in the game after such a tough round, I was very sad to see that you had been Gabriel and I'd not realised or been able to do something about saving you. It would have been my preference for anyone else (other than Scrooge and Diana) to go there instead as everyone else seemed to be aligned with many people, but you seemed to have a particularly loyalty to me (and perhaps Diana?). So if I had known you were Gabriel, I would have switched my vote off of Joesph but I didn't know so I just stuck the word I had given to people that round.

Hi Margaret

Just and addendum to my prior answer, I had a shower thought this morning that perhaps the reason you were asking about whether people revealed IDs in your round was linked to the formation of Herod's Harem.  In that, perhaps you are wondering how we formed an end game alliance in that round if we didn't know who each other were?

As I said above, I had no idea who anyone was other than a strong suspicion that Diana was either Herod or Donkey.  Initially it was an alliance formed for that round to ensure that the 4 of us survived which suited that round format.  Then once that had worked successfully (in that Donkey and I were deemed most holy and immune and we had our lists set up to save Herod and Mary from the vote) there was discussion amongst us 4 about moving forward together.  We were all in agreement on that, but still I had no idea who any of these people were.  But frankly, it didn't matter.  It was fortuitious that the Harem ended up consisting of my two best allies.  The same would seem to apply to Robert who viewed Scrooge and Diana similarly.  But it would have been equally as fortuitious if the Harem had been Diana, you and Camille, or Scrooge, Annie and Richard, or really any combination of people.  It was just a conduit to further relationships and create an alliance which could be relied upon for the next round or the one after.   I am not saying that a different grouping would have ended up as the final 4, and that was really the result of us being lucky in who was actually in the Harem, but any alliance formed in the closed ID round was critical for that round and going to be useful to some extent moving forward and that's why, in my view, it was made.

It may be that this wasn't a concern of yours at all and if so my apologies for the additional post in your thread, but I thought it might have been a relevant factor/query for you.

It was day two of the dreaded Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society acting workshop and festEVIL, and once again Aunt Diana's iPhone began ringing, as per the usual and stated several times, her beloved niece Sandra had rang her up and asked for an even bigger favour. This was not a simple request to Narrate the next shitty Play of the Week, but a look back on plays of past. Where both Sandra and her Aunt Diana played different roles, both breaking the mold of gender roles and switching it up by playing as the opposite sex.. wait, is calling it "sex" appropriate these days, thought Aunt Diana? The last thing I need is a witch hunt from the non-binary folks for ignorance about terms these days. But I digress, another call from Sandra and this time to answer questions about the fateful episode where her dear niece's role in The Goes Wrong ORG was complete. And this is where my answer begins....

Sandra as Margaret  before I get any further, dear. But I must apologise on the delay at getting to you. Believe it or not yours was the first question I meant to answer last night, but I searched my confessional for my original ID guess list and couldn't find it anywhere and thought I'd finally gotten to the point where my old age and brain had devopled dementia or some such nonsense. Then I FINALLY remembered I'd made my original ID Guesses as Herod, and it all clicked. Other than that, I just have been very detained, love. So excuse my absence, I'll be getting to everyone in the next several hours of course.

That being said, I also want to say that I wish you told me of Joe's plots the round we sent him to the Critics, that ate me up inside for so long, dear. I kept pondering why you didn't tell me he was trying to plot against me. But I didn't hold it against you, I just found it shocking. But in hindsight, I've realised your schedule was just a bit different those last couple of rounds, so no big deal in the end. Now then...

My question is this... did you base your decisions that round on the relationship you formed in the nativity episode or were they based more on utilising previous relationships and presuming you had guessed identities correctly.

I will admit I "thought" I knew who 1-2 of the others were in that round, but I did NOT base my decisions or previous relationships on anything having to do with the previous round. I am aware and thought I'd be easily ID'ed because of my schedule and affinity for theatrics with social flare and such (The images and shtick, I felt like it might be too Diana coded.) but I hadn't seen the Nativity episode until right after I saw the twist and watched it before I began posting and took screencaps to use during it. And found my part to be such a bit role, I felt like everyone else might bond over being more prominent so I wanted to be big, flashy and add that Joe flare to it all because it was appropriate. 

Anyways, from my end of that round I just had the best messages with Wise Man and Donkey to start, Chris was also extremely fun because he was playing as the Narrator and giving me shite and vice versa, the rapport in messages was fun because of the back and forths and such. Same with the rest the cast, even Joseph who I know didn't jive with others but our missives made me laugh as we fought about me asking him to ditch the Christ child and him refusing. And with you, we just didn't get into the game part where by the next day others began giving impressions and working deals. And my chain with you wasn't going anywhere game wise, no offense. I now know by your own admission that the role wasn't as fun or easy for you to deal with. But honestly, I did NOT know it was you at all. In fact, I thought you'd been the one eliminated during 90 Degrees. Since you chose to go last, and I wondered if scheduling had been bad for you and picked that position for such reasons, because that whole order seemed odd to me.

But back on my points, the group came together proposed by Donkey I believe and Wise Man discussed it too simply with regards of safety for the round itself at firstt, they preferred to add Mary to the safe list if we ranked them high, and when I brought it up to her, she said to my face something like "We haven't really talked much yet, but if those two want to protect us why not?" that's not verbatim, but it's just true I hadn't spoken to Mary as much as I did the other women in that group. Then AFTER results were up and the girls won the Holy roles and saved us, Donkey sent me a missive about how she and Wise Man would be seen as threats, as would Mary and I for being safe, and that we should form an alliance for after the round. Like I mentioned in my speech, I wasn't sure that talk was even allowed, but of course I agreed with it. And by then Mary and I actually talked a lot more, and she was in too. I honestly had NO idea who I was truly playing with.

I thought Donkey was Sir David, because of the threats thing and being a little paranoid about player status. But for the record, as Herod these were my actual guesses.

Annie as Donkey is... Sir David Suchet

Robert as Gabriel is... Robert as Trumpeter

Dennis as Innkeepers is... Annie as Wimblegate

Max as Joseph is...Chris as Scrooge

Sandra as Mary is... Max as Crocodile

Chris as Narrator is... Chris as Prince Richard

Vanessa as Wiseman is... Vanessa as Camille

I thought that you were eliminated in 90 Degrees as I said, since I wasn't aware of your actual challenge prowess or request to go last, and if you recall I wondered why Max and Joe were in the "Actors" group that day too. So I thought perhaps he returned. I also took Head Righter's note about actors possibly being the same as it might happen. I picked Trumpeter as Gabriel because some of the shorter messages. But then I also thought near the end that perhaps he ID'ed me, because when I logged in you had sent me messages upon messages before I could even respond to the last and I was like what is going on? Then I thought it might have just been the returnee and Joe or someone, I don't know. This is all stream of consciousness as I type this, sorry for droning on. 

What I will say is that I did not expect the Herod's Harem alliance to in fact come together once we knew the IDs. Mostly because I was well aware of David not caring for Robert and Robert not caring for David. I knew either would come for one another eventually and that that alliance wasn't going to go far. For MY game at a certain point it did make sense, as I knew I was Robert's closest Team Rigg ally, and Scrooge was his other mate. So that helped that Scrooge and I were able to pivot him into the end, where I know both of us hoped/expected he'd stick with us over David at least or maybe even one another.

Anyhow, sorry for the tangent, my dear. Point blank, no I didn't base that alliance during that round who I thought people were. But it did have lasting effects in the end of course.

And I just want to say it's nice to see and hear from you again, I know I didn't focus on our relationship heavily as I could have in my speech, but you were a true partner and confidant for me for many a round, dear. And I think you know that, or at least I hope you do. Thank you for always plotting with me and being one of my first strategic relationships on Team Rigg  

And I know you were close to the three of us in various ways, so I don't envy your position with this vote, my dear.

+1 on the desire to be at the end of the chain. 8th position was the safest position in my opinion, and 7th was only a little less safe.