Strategic Overview of Survivor, Episode 7: Girl Power!

Liz’s departure shows it’s one thing to bring all the tools to the game to succeed, but it’s another thing to put them into operation. All of her tribe except for Russell sleepwalked through the first part of the game in terms of strategizing (and it can be said they all pretty much were sleepwalking through the challenges by their record), and by the time Liz woke up, the trend was irreversible. She might have stood a chance had she laid some groundwork earlier, but for her it was too little, too late.

Now it appears the merge is on, and not a moment too soon for the remainder of her tribe – nor for the audience interested in strategy where, to date, this series has been as dull as the all-time low way back to Survivor: Outback. The chances for its former members not named Natalie are fairly dismal.

As noted last week (although assuming a merge would happen closer to 10 than at 12), with the former Galu having a four-body advantage it makes rather enticing the temptation to pick off a couple of the former Foa Foas before proceeding to fratricide. Worse, of the four ex-Foa Foas left, three are considered stronger males and therefore magnified as targets for all of the ex-Galus.

Of the ex-Galus, Erik and John seem to control it in a sub-alliance, and they have created a classic 2+1+2 formation with Brett and Dave being the other dyad and Shambo being the singleton jury fodder. The idea to foist leadership onto Shambo in fact appears to be excellent, as it appeared to solidify her with them and alienate her from the other women.

All they must do is keep that triad of Kelly, Laura, and Monica under control long enough to prevent them from making a meaningful defection over to the others, which, all things equal, means two more boots of ex-Foa Foas. The men will have going for them that the triad is three women who would be welcoming three guys and another gal to make a majority. The triad’s members might not like the idea of competing against three stronger guys, and also they would be the minority in any grand coalition. Then again, the gals would be against four guys and be a minority in a coalition if they stuck with their former tribemates, so these options may net out with advantage to none.

Whether the dominant coalition can do this is another matter. Laura’s trip over to the other tribe could encourage bonding with those ex-members. Deadliest of all for the dominant bunch, she seemed to get along well with Natalie and Russell. This could precipitate the triad’s peeling off to make the dominant alliance the ex-dominant alliance.

Such a move would make the most sense if the women let a tempo move go by, allowing a male ex-Foa Foa to be pared off, then go in at three-all with the design of swinging Natalie to their side. They, Laura especially, should realize any blandishments they get (such as she got from Russell) need to be used against the males.

This requires some thinking ahead that, frankly, none of the three have shown any real ability to pursue to this point, but the capacity could be there. That move would create two groups of four after bouncing a male ex-Galu, with the two ex-Foa Foa males the swing group. If they gals cannily keep Natalie’s defection a secret, the six have maximal chances of staying together until the ex-Galus are gone, and then the women lower the boon on the males to reach endgame.

This puts the ex-Foa Foa males in a bad spot, but the alternative isn’t much better if all efforts to dislodge enough of the ex-Galus fail. They could hope for a chancy subterfuge, trying to bait the ex-Galus into sending off Russell and then have him play his hidden immunity idol – assuming it does work for him despite being found by him at his old tribe’s location, as the information on whether it’s valid in such a situation is conflicting. But no one will know that and so he would operate under the assumption that it is. To bring this off best, Jaison, Mick, and Natalie will have to pretend they are tired of Russell and will go along with his sending off, creating a pretense of this not-uncommon occurrence from past editions of unanimity to eject a tiresome tribemate. Given Russell is Russell, this tactic would not lack credibility.

Unfortunately, this strategy alone adds very little to their chance. Supposing it did work, after which either Erik or John should be the blowback target as one always should go for one’s strongest enemy at the first chance, and he was ousted. But then, the remaining one simply cultivates a new fifth wheel from among the ex-Galus (or even Natalie) and things have changed only for the slightly better for the ex-Foa Foas, such is their numbers disadvantage. At best, this tactic only buys an extra turn to try to separate the triad from the dominant coalition.

Plus, Russell may not want to surrender his idol so soon, hoping he can get farther if possible before its use. And the dominant group may suspect something is up and with such superior numbers split the ex-Galu votes to make sure one of the ex-Foa Foas goes home. Let’s say they go four for Russell, four for Jasion, while the ex-Foa Foas all vote against Erik. After idol presentation, the revote happens with Jaison and Erik, and in that scenario, Erik isn’t going home. So for all intents and purposes, the ex-Foa Foa males must crack the hold the dominant coalition has over the ex-Galus and do it in a way where they somehow can get the upper hand in a new alignment, and do it now, or none of them has a decent shot at making it to endgame.

By contrast, Natalie’s chances continue to improve. If the triad will defect, she then can make a choice about which three horses bring her to endgame (as noted above, she would be better off with the women). Thus, she joins Shambo as one of the two likeliest to make it in front of the jury.

Of course, also as noted, the presence of not just Russell’s but Erik’s hidden immunity idols can introduce all sorts of permutations into the game. But all other things equal, very interestingly power has shifted where all the women now have a better shot to go farther in the game than all of the men – if they realize what power they have, and know how to use it.

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When not watching for strategic elements in Survivor, Jeffrey D. Sadow is trying to teach about strategies inherent in international relations, diplomacy, governance, political campaigns, and lots of other neat stuff as an associate professor of political science at Louisiana State University Shreveport.

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