The history of Survivor has shown us that advantage plays can lead to shocking blindsides. Hidden immunity idols have taken out some of the best players in the game, while safety without power has completely shaken up the pecking order and even helped former winners navigate to the end. Extra votes and stolen or blocked votes have been used to swing alliance momentum one way or another.
Of course, these blindsides also require skill from the players. Advantages need to be kept quiet, as do plans. Advantages need to stay hidden, or at least kept within the player's closest circle of trust. The castaways in the majority have to truly believe that they are safe, and that nothing is going to be played against them.
This is why Shot in the Dark is so interesting. All players have one, and all players know about it. Therefore, the cast needs to be extremely careful about information, and who is aware of what before the tribal council. So far on Survivor 48, we have already seen Mary Zheng successfully play a Shot in the Dark to nullify votes against her, and she has since bounced into a much better position at the merge. However, with so many advantages out there, could the Shot in the Dark mechanic be a cause for concern?
Jeff Probst breaks down the shot in the dark mechanic
The biggest fear with Shot in the Dark is that too many advantages could be played at once, and negatively impact the game. The most famous example of this occurring is from Survivor Game Changers, where Cirie Fields was ultimately eliminated in the Final Six. She was not voted out, nor did she lose fire-making or even get eliminated by rocks. She lost without a single vote cast against her, because literally every other player in the game had immunity from some challenge or advantage.
This advantage-geddon was talked about ad nauseam at the time, and is still referenced today as a fundamental gameplay error by the producers. Knowing this, a fan wrote in this week to Jeff Probst and the On Fire podcast, asking about the mechanics of the Shot in the Dark, which, from a viewer perspective, appears to make available more advantages than the scrolls even account for.
The listener asked, "What would happen if more than six contestants chose to play their shot in the dark at the same tribal council?" According to Survivor showrunner and host Jeff Probst, the answer is a lot simpler than it seems.
"If there are one to six players, then in that bag, there will be six scrolls," Jeff explained. "One will be safe, five are not safe. So you have a one in six shot. If there are seven to twelve players, anywhere in there, then we increase it to twelve scrolls. So you will have two that are safe and ten that are not, but it's still one in six, that's two out of twelve. That's one-in-six odds."
"And then if you had a situation where you have 13 or more players, then we would increase it to three safe scrolls and fifteen not safe, that's three in eighteen," he continued. "But, it is still a one-in-six shot that when you reach in, you will grab a safe."
For those that are not as well versed in math, fractions, and ratios, the general idea of what Jeff is saying is that no matter how many people are in the game, they maintain the ratio of one safe and five not safe scrolls, while increasing the total amount to cover all the players in the game. Thus, at the absolute capacity of 13 players at a tribal council and at least 3 people playing their Shot in the Dark, the most that could be safe is three.
In the case of Cirie, it would have been a six-person tribe, meaning one safe scroll out of the six. That is more manageable. Of course, there is also currently the potential for 3 hidden immunity idols being in play, plus an immunity necklace from the challenge, so the numbers are still concerning. At least, though, the show has a plan to make sure all players who want to play their shot in the dark have the opportunity to do so.
Mary Zheng already succeeded with her Shot in the Dark play on Survivor 48, and Kaleb Gebrewold was the first player to successfully do so back in Survivor 45. While some fans may gripe about the continued dilution of the game with advantages and idols, viewers can at least rest assured that the game has a plan for multiple Shot in the Dark usages at a time, which is far to the individual players and the cast as a whole.
If only they made the game fair with the amount of advantages out there, as well.