Welcome to my new series where I analyze Survivor strategy. The goal is to post more and in engage with the show in a more thoughtful way. This series is about my Survivor strategy hot takes, hopefully it will be cutting edge stuff.

We are six seasons deep into the new era. Each season has had three tribes of six, they merge in the same way, there’s a double boot, and there’s forced firemaking at the final four. The format is consistent, and of course, that breeds consistent strategy. We’ve all been watching this New Era meta-game evolve, and there's distinct patterns forming.

Want to win New Era Survivor? Turn your pre-merge tribe into a cult. Everyone needs to genuinely love everyone. Bond with them harder than you’ve ever bonded with anyone. Tell them your secrets, promise them friendship after the game, and invite them to your future wedding. If you’re gonna win, you need to be locked in with your OG homies.

That’s the easy part, making friends. Everyone does this. It’s what we call “Survivor Kumbaya”. The distinct period before bloodshed, when everyone still wants to get a tattoo after filming ends. We see this crumble every season. Staying loyal, that’s the hard part. Pre-merge is only about keeping the most loyal of your starting tribe, and spending every minute enforcing the idea that you’re getting to the end together.

The merge is the real test. Your fellow castmates will say crap like “tribal lines are gone, the game is fluid”. Don’t believe that garbage. Tribal lines are still there, the game is not fluid. Stay loyal, stay strong, don’t budge. If you did the proper groundwork earlier, your alliance members will stay with you. Watch the two other tribes collapse and scramble. They may have been feuding, or maybe they’re just antsy to make moves. The guarantee is that they will crack before you do.

One of my biggest Survivor Pet Peeves is people betraying their number ones for zero reason. Season 46 has a lot of this. Tevin votes out Soda, Tevin goes home in the next episode. Q wants Tiff out, Kenzie wants Tiff out. It's all so unnecessary and only worsens their position.

This is a lot of theorizing, so let’s talk about examples. Look no further than the Reba Four in Survivor 45. Dee, Austin, Drew and Julie were rock solid. Locked in as early as day 3 and they never looked back. Voted out J Maya and Sifu at the merge because even though they were Reba numbers, they weren’t Kumbaya numbers. They exploited Belo’s dysfunction, a tribe that had no loyalty to each other at all. All four of that alliance made the final six and Dee won the game.

What about the Tika Three from Survivor 44? Carson, Carolyn and Yam Yam locked in basically on day one. They saw their entire tribe get decimated, but at the merge they never wavered from each other. They played the middle of two feuding tribes and the three of them made the final 4, with Yam Yam winning. Survivor 42 had the Taku Four, all four of them made the final six with Maryanne winning. Survivor 41 had the Luvu Four, less official, but all four of them made the final six with Erika winning.

Four out of six new era seasons had a winner from a rock solid Kumbaya alliance. And I would argue the two outliers, 43 and 46, only prove my theory further. These seasons had zero attempt at a Kumbaya. Both are messy, all over the place, and kind of clumsy. It's no surprise someone like Gabler own 43, and I wouldn't be surprised if 46 had a similarly bizarre winner. If any of these starting tribes stayed loyal, everyone else would be easy pickings. These are just seasons where the dysfunction didn’t get exploited.

I acknowledge that I'm disregarding 99% of the nuance that goes into Survivor. Your starting tribe has to be willing to play ball, they have to be cool, and they have to actually be good at the game. You can't win with a Kumbaya if you're with terrible players. This also disregards the end game. What if you can't beat your tribemates at final tribal? There's still a ton of room for nuance and strategy, but that’s for another blog post.

This is post is more so an observation of how the meta-game is evolving. The pre-merge is simply bolstering and preparing for the merge. And the merge is about patience, loyalty, and never flipping.