Patrick:
“High Risk, High Reward”
So last time I checked in, Nopalito and Brian were sitting on the block, and I feel that we’ve definitely had a whirlwind of events since then. Nopalito was evicted, which wasn’t a huge shock, and that gave Sagar an immunity pass, and made Chili his new target. I wasn’t shocked about the vote and glad that I voted him out - Nopalito was just too big of a threat and him going was definitely best for me.
So, at the HoH, I flopped early on, but Chili won, though Brian almost did, and I felt like this was a solid win for me. Wasn’t ideal, but she would be able to take out someone for me that I wouldn’t necessarily want to nominate myself. I thought this would be an easy week, until I learned that Chili would want to nominate Lake and Lee, two of my stronger allies in this game.
Immediately, I figured that I’d have to try and throw that off, so I pitch targeting people from the Season 3 group. I knew that this could risk Red going up, but one person that I’m close with going up is better than two of them. Initially, I’m not sure that Chili had bought into this, but once Sagar agreed that it was best to go after Season 3 simply because of sheer size, Chili agreed.
Once settling on Grace/Alex, I really was happy because it would allow me to continue to protect numbers that I have on both sides. I’m really sitting well at this point, I feel. I know that if one of the two nominees comes off, Red/Lee are probably the strongest renom possibilities, but I’m gonna do what I can to play in the POV.
Waking up that morning, we learned the news that due to extenuating circumstances that Madi was leaving the game. I definitely felt bad for her on a personal level and hope that she’s doing okay now that she’s outside of this game, but I gotta say that overall it was a net positive. Madi was a strong player in terms of her social connections and very likely would not have touched the nomination block anytime soon. However, one thing did worry me about this and I mentioned it to my alliance of Red/Lee/Lake - with Madi now out of the picture and Season 3 cut down to only three players, they’re no longer the biggest threats here and I could see Chili attempting to backdoor someone like Lee.
At the veto challenge, I get picked to play, and what a doozy. It involved four different elements: spamming a poll, sending mails, completing a puzzle, and compiling a list of Big Brother players. With this set-up, some players would definitely excel in some categories, while not scoring as well in others due to time constraints. At least, that’s what would normally happen - but not with Chili.
Chili literally dominated in 2 of the categories, and getting 2nd in the other two and did so within the same time constraints as everyone else. It’s absolutely unbelievable her skills in these challenges and sometimes she’s just unbelievable and not beatable. It’s insane.
Initially, Chili had wanted to use the veto to take Grace down and put up Lee, so that people wouldn’t “waste” a vote on Grace to prevent Brian from getting another Immunity Pass (since we know his new target is Alex, now that Madi is gone). However, I was able to convince her out of this decision due to no guarantee of who would leave and that making unnecessary targets wouldn’t help anyone. She ultimately decided not to use the veto and worked to insure the votes to take out Alex, a strong threat to her game.
However, Alex being a strong threat to Chili is definitely beneficial for me - Chili is a threat whose blood I don’t necessarily want to get on my own hands, at least not yet. Chili is the strongest in challenges and if Alex is able to win and take Chili out that would be definitely good for me. Chili thinks that she has secured votes in Brian/Josh/Sagar/Nick/myself, which is nothing else, would guarantee a tie which she could break and send home Alex.
I immediately make sure the votes are locked down with Lake/Lee/Red, which gives us 4 votes against Grace, knowing that we’ll need a solid 6. I reach out to several other players, like Josh, Keizo, and Roman to attempt to secure votes. Ultimately, votes came out to be 8-2, with Brian/Nick evicting Alex, but myself, Red, Josh, Lake, Lee, Keizo, Roman, and Sagar evicting Grace. Apparently Sagar attempted to change his vote, but it was too late, but him even trying was enough to win back Chili’s favor. I talked to Nick about the vote before it went through and he spilled to Chili before te vote and Chili’s reaction was so over-the-top, including leaving our alliance chats and calling us “bitches” and “cunts” for not voting her way. I attempted to do some damage control, but there wasn’t much to do.
Prior to the HoH beginning, I talked to Nick about his intentions if he won HoH, and he told me that as of that moment, if he were to win, Red and Josh would be his nominations. That was definitely not in my best interest as they are two players that I do have a great rapport with so far.
Even though I initially was not attempt to win (or even compete) for HoH, I figured that with things coming hot from Chili and with no telling what would happen, I decided that. It may just be best for me to play and to attempt to win if the challenge was something up my ally. Well, the competition initially didn’t start well for me, but I was able to quickly catch up and able to take the lead, but watching the scores, I noticed that Red was catching up and almost was able to win. I was hoping that Red was going to be able to take the win, but finally, in Round 14, the score came to be where Sagar, Red and myself were all within one question to get the win, which made things in a rough position - as much as I’d just like to let Red win, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to take the chance on Sagar getting the win and nominating people like Lake/Lee/Red. So, I went out and was able to secure the HoH for myself.
Immediately after I won HoH, Chili sent me some more messages about how winning was horrible for me as it would secure me becoming a bigger target than her and her staying here long than me. I’m not quite sure what she’s trying to do, but that doesn’t seem like the best play to someone that you already made some shitty comments to. I knew that I was playing all sides and besides Brian, wasn’t quite sure who I wanted to piss off. I’m sensing Brian figured this and decided to play his Immunity Pass to keep himself safe which makes sense and I’m glad that he played it now, making it easier for me to make a move.
Initially, my nominations weren’t so easy to think through. I could put up two people like Keizo and Roman - this would upset literally no one and they aren’t power players that would be coming after me, but how far would that get me? My most “core” alliance of Lake/Lee/Red moreso wanted me to nominate Chili/Sagar, which makes sense since I spent the last few days just burying Chili/Sagar to them… But this was a move that I knew I couldn’t make lightly. I needed some soldiers on my side if I was about to march into war. And since Sagar chose to NOT play the Immunity Pass that he has? This is the perfect time for this.
Firstly, I approach Nick. I consider him one of my closer allies but also I know that he’s friends with Chili, so I would want him to know what I was doing before I did it. Nick was so averse to this, even with everything Chili had done. I believe that Nick would have some control over Chili to an extent, but I also know that keeping Chili is horrendous to me - Chili is nearly unbeatable in challenges for me, and Chili would prioritize Sagar/Nick and maybe even Josh over me, not even considering any other social ties that he may have (though from what I’m hearing, he’s not doing super well socially). Nick would not be on my side to take out Chili later, so I know that taking him out while there are other options as far as allies go is what’s best for me right now.
After talking with Nick, I approach Josh about making this move. We discuss how Sagar was on board with me nominating Keizo/Roman (most likely just due to him not wanting to be the one to cut ties with S2 and have that target on his back). I mention hearing Chili/Sagar and how it may be a truly viable option for us. He was definitely against this, saying that it’s only Final 12 and that the timing just may not be right. He mentioned how even if Chili was acting out that Sagar was still talking about us being a F4 together. I mention how they wouldn’t go to F4 with us, because Nick is here and they would choose a F3 with Nick. He mentioned that maybe going after Nick is a viable option for us, though I know that that may be slightly sparked by Nick being his target and this being the last week to earn an Immunity Pass, but he did say he was open to whatever and that we just wanted to make sure that we discussed it before making any decisions.
I asked him if he had worries about how we navigate after losing Chili and Sagar and his worry was that the S4 alliance was really the only “solid” alliance in the game, everything else was mostly just discussions. So this is when I knew that I could hook Josh into an alliance if he would be willing to work with some people. I’m not super keen on Alex as someone that I can trust long term, but I know for now that we at least have similar goals and targets, and I know that Josh had mentioned him before, so I’m remembering that as I continue to talk to him. He then starts more of a moral dilemma as he told them he would stay loyal to them and he didn’t want to go against that. I was able to remind him about how we went against them in the vote and how that would really keep them upset.
Josh is down. I message Lake/Lee/Red about how I’ve been talking to Josh about the alliance that would include us four, plus Josh and Alex, and they were down. I know that the other group is my planned F4 (for now) but that Josh/Alex need a secure alliance and that this may be the best format for us. I quickly throw Alex’s name to Josh and he was down. I mentioned it as us three + Lake/Lee, as well as Red. He could be just pacifying me, but the more I talked to him, the more agreeable he seemed to be about it.
I talked to Alex and he was down instantly. So I knew that I wanted to get moving, and formed the 2+2+2 alliance - myself, Josh, Lake, Lee, Red and Alex - with two representatives from Season 1, two from Season 3, and two from Season 4. There’s an interesting mix of social and competitive strengths, as well as just the good mix of social dynamics that I think benefits me in this group as of now if everyone is down. This is a fine group that I think could get to the end together, but I am mostly just looking for a couple of rounds - to insure the votes against Chili or Sagar to go if one of them wins the Veto after I nominate them, and to help get rid of the other one and Brian as well.
This is just the perfect opportunity to make this move right now. It would free up Nick as my number one ally right now so that he’s not playing double duty with Chili as well. It helps secure more of a long-term plan that doesn’t just involve trying to play all sides strategically that could collapse on myself within just a couple of rounds. It also is the best time since Sagar chose not to play his pass and I still have my Immunity Pass to play should the survivor of this week go on to win HoH.
My plan is to nominate Chili and Sagar as close to POV time today as possible - both to catch them off-guard and hope that it either throws them off or maybe even prevent them from attending the challenge at all if they hadn’t planned on it originally. I most likely will not be able to participate in the veto challenge which is unfortunate, but I have to hope that someone like Red or Josh gets picked so we can have someone on our side win the POV. If Sagar or Chili come off the block, Roman is going to be my replacement - Keizo is Chili’s target and I don’t want him obtaining an Immunity Pass if something tragic happens with the vote. Roman is also Nick’s target so, worst case scenario, Nick can have himself an Immunity Pass, which he may need if someone from my side wins HoH.
Ideally, someone from my side wins POV. If so, the best person to go this week is actually probably Sagar and not Chili - Sagar is better socially, but more importantly, he has an Immunity Pass that can keep himself safe, but also, Chili is his target - if Chili leaves this week, Sagar will have two Immunity Passes, not just one. Going. Into the F11, that’s definitely far too dangerous. Sagar would be able to manipulate his way of out situations much easier than Chili could.
I really want to help secure this new F6 to go deep. Nick is still a top ally of mine, but our interests and loyalties just aren’t lined up right now and that’s making this extremely difficult. As of now, he may still be my top individual loyalty, with my core four of Lee/Lake/Red being my top group priority, with 2+2+2 coming right after (AKA just meaning that Alex/Josh are more on the outs of that group, though I want them to think that it’s more of a 3+3 than a 4+2).
I’m definitely teetering on a tightrope in this game right now. With my first week of power, I made safe moves that mostly just guaranteed myself to stay safe and to get myself my emergency pass that may come into play next week, but now I’m making a move that I feel like is being done at the perfect time to propel myself deep right now. I’m not ignorant to the fact that winning this challenge made me a threat to other players, but that’s why I have to secure as many loyalties right now that I can. I’m here for blood and for the win and hope that I’m in a position right now where I can acheive this goal.
