Earl's Opening Statement

[Tom Westman]

Where Earl will post his opening statement.

[Earl Cole]

*Waves to the jury* Hey jury members it's nice seeing you all again and finally we're all back together

I came into this game with a personal agenda that I would do anything and everything to advance myself forward in this game. I did play a very selfish manipulative game at times but had I not taken that path then there is no way I feel I would be sitting in the final 2 right now. I lied to just about every single person in the game more then a few times where I have completely lost count, this was just something I HAD to do to where it was either "Kill" or "Be Killed." I wanted to be unpredictable as possible since the competition I was pinned up against was fierce and the prizes made this game extremely complicated where a prize could change the entire complexion of the game. I tried to play off that I would be the easy match up for anybody in the final 2 that way I'd keep advancing on and wouldn't ever be targeted. At the final 7 I even threw out the whole I despise the jury and hate their guts thing at tribal council which wasn't true and instead where I was trying to make it seem like even a better idea to keep me around. I managed to stay 100% loyal and true to the alliance I committed myself to at the merge with Brenda, Courtney, Chase, and Benry and never once wrote any of their names down. I did betray the Tiberius side I started the game with mostly because one of them tried hardcore to get me booted pre merge and the others were all together pre merge for a while and I was worried of a final 3 between Danielle/Gabe/Katie and didn't believe any of them would be 100% loyal to the end to me besides telling me "Tiberius to the end."

I started on Tiberius and made an alliance with Danielle and Gabe early, then added Katie in at the time since she was so killer in challenges. We never lost any tribe challenges and only had to vote out one person the entire time there and I decided to go with a Kelly boot since she appeared to have the self entitlement of being the "Tiberius Princess" and might create a lot of problems down the road.

Next was the swap to Livy where I was at for a few rounds. I had Danielle from my old tribe which was good and then a bunch of fresh faces I didn't know. I started talking with Sash and made an alliance with him quickly, however I didn't make all that much a connection with the others and thought I might very well be on the bottom of things. We finally lost immunity and everyone wanted to boot Sash, I decided to try and make a move to save him by going to Courtney and suggesting we could tie the vote with Amber where Sash could win tb challenge and then we'd be in control of the tribe afterwards. She informed me she had a grotto prize and I suggested we could make a huge power move and vote Spencer out since he was a huge threat and would possess lot of power at the merge and be rather impossible to get out later. This is also where I promised Courtney an end of game alliance and where I'd never vote her out.

After this there was another swap where I ended up on Suetonius. We were clearly the underdog tribe since the other tribe had all the challenge demons and I felt like I was the only person carrying weight. The first vote Sash ended up going, I would have saved him again had he not panicked way early and told everyone to vote him out. Would have been an easy Shannon vote off waiting to happen and he just gave in way too early. Next I voted out Shannon he was inactive and even without voting him he was going with the 2 self vote in a row rule. The trickiest round was the round before the merge where I managed to get on the chopping block. I wasn't all that concerned since I had Courtney and then Brenda who I made another end game deal with and was confident they'd come through for me and we voted out Amber. This also opened my eyes to where I was going to likely have to turn away from Tiberius come merge time when one of our own was already trying to get me voted off.

At the merge I had the option of going back to Tiberius + Dreamz/Peter if I wanted or try something different. I decided to try something different and knowing I was good with Courtney and Brenda starting talking with Chase and Benry and the 5 of us started to work together. The first 2 merge votes went exactly how I wanted with Dreamz leaving who I had never talked with and knew he'd be after Courtney who was a allie of mine. The next vote I voted Peter out and played both sides on this vote where I promised both groups I'd vote with them, Peter was way too big a wild-card and I had no idea where his true loyalty would stand and rather then take the chance keeping him I voted him out and I had an alliance with every single person besides him at the time. If there was any chance I would work with Tiberius again he would sure have to go first.

Things began to unravel at the final 9. I was planning to possibly switch back to Tiberius at the time this round and promised them all I would do so. We had a group chat about who we'd vote between Benry and Chase and I wasn't getting positive vibes in the chat so I decided to bail on the vote Chase plan like they were all saying. Later on I talked to Chase and he said they were voting Courtney and I could see I was going to be setup rather easily and doomed the next vote. Then Gabe won immunity, Katie protected the entire alliances with immunities and gave Danielle an idol which I highly suspected she had. I wanted to go with a vote Chase plan just in case with Brenda, Courtney, Benry, and Myself but they all believed Danielle didn't possess an idol and we all voted her and Brenda ended up idoled out.

The final 8 round I thought again about flipping back since the alliances were even 4-4 at this point and I possessed a grotto reward to cancel a vote. I thought I could actually wait another round before I flipped if we could get someone like Katie off first. Things should have actually tied this round and made for an interesting tb but Chase self voted and sort of screwed me and the alliance in the process where we were clearly on the outside of things at this point. The final 7 round was a bust where I attempted to either get Danielle or Boo to flip to our side, no luck there and I knew it was Courtney or Myself leaving. This is where I decided to make my fake "I hate the jury" and "I despise the jury" answers at tribal that way if there was any thought of voting me that very well could end it. I ended up self voting at the tribal on purpose for a few reasons. I made a deal with Courtney to never vote her and didn't, I didn't want to keep voting Tiberius members and try and integrate back in, and Danielle/Gabe were so worried Courtney had an idol, so I offered to say I'll self vote and take the fall if she does.

The final 6 was the life saving round. The echallenge came at a perfect time and it was endurance something I was good at. I knew Benry would go a long time and he'd be safe, thats all I needed really and he already had an immunity from grotto and long as one of us won it was final 4 for both of us. He went an incredible amount of time and just in case he made a mistake he didn't catch I made sure to be second in line that way one of us was guaranteed to have immunity for the next tribal matter what.

At the final 5 I didn't have to anything since Benry promised me his grotto immunity reward and gave it to me. I thought long and hard about breaking up Danielle/Gabe at this point since I knew they would never vote one another and Boo was a perfect person to keep for a final 4 tb scenario. When Danielle lost immunity and Benry wanted Boo gone, I consulted to him to put personal feelings aside and the benefit of keeping Boo 1 more round where he was an easy tb opponent compared to Danielle or Gabe the next round. So the vote changed and Danielle ended up going instead of Boo.

At the final 4 the plan was vote for Boo no matter who won immunity. After Gabe won immunity that complicated things a little where instead of having the vote 2-1-1 we'd likely have a tie and tb challenge. This was a big reason why I wanted to keep Boo for this exact type of situation. Even with the pressure from Boo this round to vote Benry I didn't give in because I knew likely if Gabe or Benry won final immunity I'd go to the finals either way. So I voted Boo it tied, Benry won the tb easily and that put me in the exact position I wanted.

The final round I was confident I was going to the finals either way. I wasn't going to throw immunity, I never want to do that in a final challenge situation. I wanted to make sure Benry or Me won that way we could vote Gabe out, he would have clearly won since he had a lot of jury supporters and when Gabe went first out of the challenge Benry and ME were final 2 bound.

I'd like to point haven't won an immunity challenge since the final 17 of this game surprisingly. That's quite a few tribal councils I attended consecutively without any sort of immunity protection and I managed only to accumulate 3 votes the entire game and none in the merge. This shows my ability to not only survive but also how much I relied on my own strategic ability then winning challenge after challenge.

I apologize for the length of this opening statement but it's been a long game and a lot has happened. Please ask me anything you have questions about and I will answer everything to the best of my knowledge since I know you all want answers about certain things. From this point forward, I have absolutely nothing to hide anymore and no reason to be dishonest anymore, so I will be 100% truthful about how I played the game and with every single thing I did.

Special thanks to both Tom and Natalie for hosting this awesome game, you both did a terrific job and made it one enjoyable experience. Benry you've been an amazing allie and best of luck to you!

[Boo Bernis]

HOLY BALLS!!