A Closer Look at SmORGon
| « Previous Article | Next Article » |
Art by Kiwi.
Ah, the early 2000s. While the hip youth were taking care of their Tamagotchis and intensely gaming on their Nintendo 64s, NBC was daring to answer mankind's greatest question since the dawn of television. What would happen if you stranded a group of strangers on an island and forced them to compete in physical challenges and vote off their friends? The answer: Survivor, perhaps one of the biggest and most culturally defining series of the last two decades. With 63 Emmy nominations and, as of this writing, 40 seasons over the last 22 years, Survivor has inspired the birth of another deep question within mankind… What would happen if I were stranded on an island and forced to compete in physical challenges and vote off my friends?
Unfortunately, not many have access to an island, the means for physical challenges or any friends. But, thanks to the internet, you no longer need to.
Our story begins, as many do, in Circus Maximus, where several Smogon users joined together to simulate Survivor over the Smogon Forums. Little did they know they were starting a community that would last more than half a decade, itself one subcommunity nestled inside a web strung by the most diehard of Survivor fans: the ORG community.
Let's take a quick step back.
How Does Survivor Work?
Despite being a reality show, Survivor's structure remains generally consistent, with some seasons changing up the formula in relatively minor ways. At the beginning of the season, the contestants are marooned on an island (or some other exotic, dangerous locale, like the Australian Outback, for example), where they are split into teams, referring to as tribes, and tasked with working together to build their own shelter, manage their own food and generally doing whatever it takes to not succumb to the elements.
The tribes also must compete against each other in two types of challenges. The first are Reward Challenges, where, as the name suggests, the winner receives some sort of tangible reward, ranging from extra food, water or trips away from their shelter to relax and unwind. The other type of challenges have much greater stakes: the Immunity Challenges. The losing tribe must attend Tribal Council, where each player must vote to eliminate another player from the game. While Survivor may seem like a brutish physical competition at face value, it's in the nuance of the Tribal Council votes that veils the true strategy of Survivor: backstabbing, social engineering and scheming alliances.
Eventually, the tribes merge into one. From that point on, every player attends Tribal Council, with only one player able to secure immunity. At the Final Tribal Council, usually hosted when there are two or three contestants left remaining, the jury, composed of players who were previously eliminated, decide which of the finalists should be crowned the Sole Survivor. Therein lies the balancing act of Survivor's gameplay: one must be thoroughly conniving in order to vote out their threats… without drawing the ire of the jury.
There are twists to keep it interesting, of course, like hidden Immunity Idols and tribe swaps, but the general concept of the game—to outlive, outplay and outplay—remains at its core.
Ok… So What is an ORG?
ORG stands for "Online Reality Game," and it's any organization online that attempts to simulate the structure of a reality show. ORGs are not exclusively based around Survivor; many ORGs focus on other shows, like Big Brother, The Amazing Race, The Challenge, or The Circle. In addition, some ORGs are designed from the ground up, with their own rules. In this case, however, we'll focus solely on Survivor.
As mentioned above, ORGs attempt to use social media sites—most commonly Discord, but also Facebook, Snapchat and Reddit—simulate, as closely as possible, the experience of playing Survivor. Obviously, this does not include the experience of actually being stranded on an island, but the entire structure of Survivor at its core is still there. ORGs are typically played in alternating rounds, Challenges and Tribal Councils, with each lasting 24 hours, to ensure players of all timezones can stay competitive.
At the start of the game, players are separated into tribes and must work together to compete in challenges against the other tribe. While in this stage of the game, you are permitted only to Direct Message your tribemates; cross-tribal communication is strictly forbidden, unless otherwise stated by the game's hosts. Generally speaking, ORGs forgo Reward Challenges, choosing to focus solely on the more critical Immunity Challenges. Like on the show, the tribe that wins the Immunity Challenge does not have to attend Tribal Council. Eventually, tribes will merge—reaching the Merge stage of the game is considered a great accomplishment!
Due to the online nature of the game, hosts usually have to get quite creative with their challenges! While some ORGs host "live" challenges, which are intended to be done quickly at a set time, most focus on challenges that can be completed over the span of 24 hours. Arcade games and puzzles are common, but so are scavenger hunts and endurance tasks.
There are many different types of ORGs, run by many different types of people. Each ORG runs in "seasons," like the show. Each season is typically given a theme that the entire game is centered around. SmORGon, as one would expect, is themed around Pokemon, hosting seasons like Crown Tundra, The Great Marsh and Seafoam Islands. There are also Speed ORGs, which run through entire seasons in a just a few hours.
Of course, one cannot forget about the spectators! While ORGs may not be broadcasted on TV, the nature of social media allows viewers to tune into the action as it happens! Most ORGs maintain some level of spectator interest, with "specs" often competing against each other in prediction games. Unlike the show, ORGs can be followed live, with spectators getting to view the action as it happens!
A Retrospective of SmORGon's 20th Season
SmORGon has been around for a while; most ORGs don't even come close to hitting 20 seasons (and counting!), but SmORGon just wrapped up its latest season: The Cobalt Coastlands. With an unusually massive 30-person cast, it was also one of the biggest in SmORGon history.
The season started with contestants split into five tribes: Magby, Burmy, Buizel, Drifloon, and Togepi, eventually swapping into three: Empoleon, Gastrodon, and Lumineon, and then again into two: Dialga and Palkia. Several players struggled to navigate this level of swapping. In the words of the season's eventual winner, Fish,
Once a swap comes, the game really kind of restarts in a way. Sure you may have some buddies, but so does everyone else. Really it almost does become a numbers game where you will see people being targeted for being perceived as too strong. The best thing to do here in my opinion is to try and quickly assess your position and then try and find any gaps you can use to better yourself.
One of the most standout events of the season was the Final 11 tribal council. According to the runner-up contestant, Kingboo,
[At] the Final 11 vote out I had to find the numbers at the 11th hour to betray one of my closest, original allies in order to further my own game.
This ally was a player named Platty who, according to one of the season's hosts, Gocubs, had it coming,
A few people decided it was time to get Platty out, as Platty had been an outward threat for much of the game.
Meanwhile, Platty wanted to target Fish. As Fish recalls,
I knew it was going to be my name on the chopping block, and I had hoped that by keeping up my relationships with everyone that anything could come my way, but the writing looked to be on the wall. [The number one target] had immunity, so it was going to be me. I did try and talk to Platty to see if he would vote with us, and we actually had a really fun conversation that went past the game. I thought there was a chance he might vote with me afterwards, but I still wasn't totally sold.
However, shortly after that conversation I heard that if there was any hesitation on not voting for me before, that was squashed because Platty wanted me gone. Platty was playing the middle, and he was playing it well. My suspicions were right, I couldn't trust him, the problem was I had no idea at that moment who I could trust.
Thankfully, my saving grace did come slightly in part from my social game, but more in part from my #1 ally, Mai. She had heard that it was likely going to be me, but she had also heard that [her closer ally] was being targeted as the next to go after me. Not wanting to lose their close allies, they got together and formed a group to go against Platty. Work with anyone when it makes sense.
Fourth-place contestant Ian remembers this moment as one of his favorites from SmORGon history, saying,
My favorite SmORGon moment was the Platty blindside where a long-standing, but untested alliance that nobody expected led the vote out against the most prominent player left in the game.
Recalling the moment from the perspective of a spectator, one of the season's co-hosts, Zach, says,
From a spectator perspective it was really exciting because for a while the question of the game was, was everyone gonna just let Platty steamroll t? It was exciting to see the status quo be finally shaken up. Platty was definitely this huge dominating presence in the game and the fact that he might go was super exciting for everyone.
Fish's place in the game would further be questioned at the Final 6 Tribal Council. As Zach explains,
[An alliance between] Ian/KingBoo/Mai were still sticking together, and they decided they wanted to get out Fish. However, it wasn't a feasible plan to try and get either of the other players, Dino or Chrxnic, to vote for Fish. So they decided to try to pull a 3-2-1 vote, with Fish being the 1 on Chrxnic, and Dino and Fish voting Ian, so that their alliance had the majority. Fish thought that it would be 4-2 on Chrxnic while Dino and Chrxnic thought it would be either a 3-3 tie or a 4-2 on Ian. However, Kingboo, who was planning to flip on Ian and Mai in the upcoming votes, decided to try to keep Chrxnic's trust in order to make him a more reliable number for those next two votes. He told Chrxnic the truth of what was happening and that Fish was going home.
As Fish explains,
The group of three strong players I had agreed to work with to target the weaker player all decided to flip the vote on me and take me out in a very smart 3-2-1 play. However, one member made a critical mistake and in an attempt to garner jury favor reached out to the weaker player and told them that they were voting me out. I will never not be thankful of that mistake being made, nor for that player for coming to me and letting me know that something fishy was going on. I was able to confront that player about what had been said to me, and then I decided to flip my vote to realign with the majority as a failsafe in case the strong players did target me. The larger group of three wisely got together and decided to change their votes once again to target the weaker player, and the votes ended up being 3-3, but none of them on me. It was there that I knew I couldn't go to rocks, so I flipped once more and took out the weaker player who had just saved my life. Was it kinda fucked up? 100%. Was it going to lose me their vote? 100%. But did it save my game and put me on a path for victory? 100%
Of course, The Cobalt Coastlands was just one season in a long history of intense Survivor gameplay. According to SmORGon host and Smogon mod, ajhockeystar,
SmORGon started as a game based on the Smogon forums, with chats happening in a public thread and group DMs. In Season 4, we moved to a hybrid between Smogon and Discord, and from Season 6 onwards we have been using Discord only! Back in the day the players in each game overlapped a lot due to our community size, but for Season 11 we decided to advertise in the PS! news. We ended up having over 400 applicants due to this happening right at the start of the pandemic, and since then we've had a huge community and a lot of new players each game—I can't be more thankful for how we've grown!
Of course, SmORGon is deeply intwined with Smogon itself, designed with competitive Pokemon as a focus. Some challenges even take place on Pokemon Showdown! As Kingboo explains,
One of the great things about SmORGon in particular is that most people here share a love for Pokemon and the competitive aspects of it, which leads to fun times of playing each other on Showdown to bond with one another.
One of the most celebrated aspects of SmORGon has been its rich spectator community. According to ajhockeystar,
More than anything, our spec community is great. In many other ORGs, people who don't get into the game don't pay attention unless they have a friend there. For us, we have a large group of people who just love watching Survivor and talking about it with other spectators, and it's really awesome to have so much interest—especially from a player's POV!
And Fish,
Since playing in SmORGon I haven't really been a part of too many other ORGs, I mainly just spectate Koolvivor S4 and am actively working on creating an org with S20 players (Snackvivor - Check it out and apply!) but I have also loosely spectated some other ORGs people have told me about. The things that I feel really set SmORGon (and Koolvivor) apart from the other ORGs I have seen are the dedication, organization, and passion that the host team and community have. Everyone is so engaged and tries to be as involved as possible even when they aren't a part of the season in any capacity. I loved being able to go back after the S20 game was over and read the spectator chat and see where everyone thought the game was going, who was doing good and who was doing bad, who they rooted for, who they hated, etc. It really felt special to have people you had no idea about rooting for you. I don't think other ORGs have that level or passion and dedication that I saw on SmORGon and Koolvivor.
How Do I Join?
SmORGon hosts new seasons periodically, which are often advertised both in the Circus Maximus forums and on Pokemon Showdown! Prospective members are always encouraged to join the Discord server.
ORGs may seem daunting, but there are plenty of ways to get in and enjoy yourself. As Kingboo says,
My advice to others who want to get into the ORG community is to just go for it. It's an absolute blast the entire way through. Even though I didn't win my season and even made quite a few enemies throughout my stay, I am now friends with all of them! You have absolutely nothing to lose and with the big group of people in ORGs you are bound to find at least one person who you enjoy playing with. If for some reason you can't or don't have time to play in a game or just want to test the waters, spectating is just as fun. Having a eagle-eye view on each of the players is a great way to familiarize yourself with the game!
ajhockeystar corroborated those thoughts as well, saying,
If you're on the fence, just play! It'll give you memories you'll never forget and friendships you'll have for a long time. It's well worth it.
| « Previous Article | Next Article » |