The Best Survivor Tournament Yet

That's right -- tonight's Dank tournament at 10pm ET on full tilt (under the "private" tab, password is "vegas1" as always) will be easily the most exciting tournament to date in all of Survivor Poker. Sure, there have been some other fun ones, tourneys with fun immunity bounties, spots where one alliance's leader or the other was set to get voted out depending on who lasted longest, even ones that ended in ties and thus heads-up nlh matches to decide an elimination. But nothing is going to be as fun as tonight's Dank, where as I mentioned yesterday, any old shlub who shows up with $11 and signs up with the above password can make a big hand and cast a major impact on the eventual outcome of Julius Goat's brainchild, Survivor Poker.

As I mentioned yesterday, we are down to just the Final Three on Donkey Island: muchtim, veryjosie and smboatdrinks. Tonight in the Dank, whoever lasts the longest among those three will win immunity, and along with that, will win the right to decide which one of the two remaining competitors to bring along to the final two, which it has already been decided will come down to a heads-up vote among all of the Tribal Council as to who is most deserving of being the Champion of Donkey Island. So who finishes the highest of the three remaining Survivors tonight is going to play a huge role in what ends up happening in the end, and that's why any one of us mere spectators can exert a very significant influence on the overall outcome of the game. And with the way the game has been set up here, getting that immunity oneself is going to be the only way for anyone to be truly sure that they are safe heading into the final heads-up vote among all the Survivor participants.

I mentioned yesterday that I figured it was a safe bet that if either of josie or boat wins immunity, they will choose the other one to come along, perfecting an alliance that has seemingly existed right from the getgo of the tournament series. But as I have thought that over over the past 24 hours or so, I have realized how utterly unsure that conclusion really is. I mean, josie and boat have presumably been allied all along, and I bet if we went back and looked at the votes, those two might never have voted for a different person in any elimination vote all along the way through the series for all I know. Clearly, an alliance still in existence at this point would by necessity require that the alliance members are "supposed" to stick together here now and vote for each other to advance to the heads-up Survivor final. However, this is Survivor, and even our silly little bloggers version of it has been absolutely chock full of backstabbing and brazen dickovers in the name of self-advancement. So let's say Josie wins immunity tonight. Her agreement is I assume based on her last post about the game to stay with Boat and bring him to the finals with her. But what if Josie thinks Boat might have a decent chance of outvoting her among the Tribal Council members at the end? And what if Josie believes she can comfortably out-vote muchtim under the same situation? Then what is Josie to do? Keep the alliance, and face a possible second-place finish because she took the wrong guy with her to the final heads-up vote? Or end the alliance, choose muchtim to take to heads-up, and claim her spot as Queen of Donkey Island?

Similarly, what if Boat wins that immunity tonight. He has at least as tough a dilemma as Josie would. Bring Josie along as previously agreed to as part of their longstanding alliance, but then have to find a way to garner more Tribal Council votes than Josie in order to win the game? Or, alternatively, elect to bring Much along -- thereby stabbing Josie squarely in the vertebrae -- on the thinking that Boat has a better chance of winning that heads-up battle than he would against Josie.

And even Muchtim will face an interesting decision along similar lines if he manages to win immunity in tonight's Dank tournament, as I alluded to yesterday. Yes, josie and boat are allied, but one can only guess from Josie's recent posts that she and Much are not exactly on great terms at the moment. If Much wins immunity, does he pick Boat, continuing with what seems to be his recent history of voting against Josie over the last couple of elimination votes, and take his chances going heads-up against another blogger who is perhaps not as "out there" and well known of late as Josie? Or, does Much elect to make things up to Josie and take her over Boat down to heads-up if he wins the last-longer in tonight's Dank, on the thinking that maybe Josie has alienated enough Tribal Council members with her play of the game that Much might perhaps have a better shot heads-up against her than against Boat?

All of these things are very real considerations for the participants in tonight's Dank tournament on full tilt. And don't get me wrong -- of course Josie and Boat have told each other that they are allied and will vote for the other to survive if either of them wins tonight's crucial immunity bounty. That goes without saying. But what either or both of them does in reality when faced with the situation and the potential to alter their own ability to attain ultimate success in this game -- and how much they weigh that ultimate success against "doing the right thing" or "standing by your partner" -- is still very much up in the air the way I see it. I mean, sticking with your alliance partner is obviously a noble end to pursue, but this is Survivor folks, and we've seen time and time again that in the end people have been (and shoud be, really -- this is a contest, after all) choosing their own self-interest over perceived alliance ties over and over and over again. And tonight will have by far the most at stake of any immunity bounty, and of any elimination decision made by any individual in the entirety of the Survivor Poker series.

Who will win the all-important final immunity bounty on Donkey Island? Who will be the first of the big three to drop? How pissed will Josie be when I river her three times in the first hour tonight? Only one way to find out -- tune in and see for yourself.