Fun Gorilla Club

The **Fun Gorilla Club** was a dominant alliance in the BUAK: The Quadruplicate Quest merge.

## **Pre-Merge**

The alliance was created by Crossword and Star Point early on in the game, and Smartcar was added shortly after in an attempt to have an easy backup plan to eliminate Urinal if Mazuat Is Kinda Hot ever went up for elimination. This proved not to be the case though, as MIKH was never up for elimination during the team phase.

After the first team swap where Smartcar switched teams with Otomatopoeia, the alliance was no longer a majority alliance on MIKH and the previous elimination target, Urinal, was added in order to make this the case. A plan was hatched to eliminate Otomatopoeia with Crossword's Aftertaste Token. Around this time, Biggie Berry, Stormy (who was removed shortly after his addition) and Kirb were added to the alliance in an attempt to expand to other teams, which proved to be a mistake as Biggie Berry had connections to other alliances and would be a crucial component in the instability that plagued the alliance after merge.

The alliance lay dormant as Mazuat Is Kinda Hot remained safe through the team stage, and at the first "merge" elimination the alliance targeted QVTWT members Quicksand and Cheeseball, since they had an obvious strong alliance that people did not want to worry about in the merge.

## **Early Merge**

At the merge, it became clear that the SHUTUP Alliance led by This would target many of the other members in merge that were without a strong alliance. This led to a frantic scramble by Crossword to add new members to the alliance, which resulted in the additions of Adapter, Pineapple Apple, and the previous elimination target Otomatopoeia.

The first big elimination for the alliance was the final 14 elimination between the two alliance leaders, This and Crossword. Although the alliance had the majority for the vote and was expecting an easy elimination, Biggie Berry voted with the SHUTUP Alliance which resulted in a deadlocked tie vote between the two alliances. Biggie Berry denied the accusations of betraying the alliance which were backed up by his secret ally Star Point. Thankfully for the alliance, the revote went to plan with the alliance eliminating This in a 7-5 vote. Despite the success, this would set a precedent of instability for the alliance.

The eliminations between the final 13 and 11 were detrimental for the Fun Gorilla Club, as none of them went to plan thanks to token plays from the SHUTUP Alliance. Star Point and Adapter were both blindsided due to token plays from the other side, and the final 12 elimination's intended target, Ness Cap, was saved by a smart Lemon Token play, resulting in the unintentional elimination of Crippling Depression Book, who was only eliminated due to a penalty vote acquired due to performing poorly in the challenge. Kirb also voluntarily left the alliance around this time.

The final blow to the early merge phase of the alliance came at the final 10, when Otomatopoeia and Biggie Berry switched alliances, which resulted in the blindside of one of the most influential members of the alliance, Smartcar. This left the alliance with only 3 members remaining, those being Crossword, Pineapple Apple, and Urinal. The alliance was then disbanded as the remaining members agreed that only having 3 votes would not be enough to make a big impact on the game and save themselves, but made a pact to agree not to vote each other despite the new alliances the remaining members decided to join.

## **Late Merge**

At the final 8, Crossword and Pineapple Apple were notified of a plan hatched by Stormy to eliminate Urinal and flush out Otomatopoeia's Lemon Token. Crossword and Pineapple Apple told Urinal and Otomatopoeia of the plan and the four created a new plan to blindside Stormy using Urinal's Vomit Token, which was successful.

The four decided to stick together as a new majority alliance (named Fun Gorilla Club v2 because of the previous alliance the four shared) and successfully planned and executed the eliminations of Kirb, Biggie Berry, and Cloudy Cand. This left the four remaining Fun Gorilla Club members as the final 4 of the season, after which the alliance disbanded by default since voting was no longer an aspect in the season.

The reformed alliance received criticism from spectators and eliminated contestants, who believed that the strong nature of the alliance made the game boring with the expected eliminations of some of the most popular contestants.

## **Trivia**

* Only 4 contestants in the merge were never part of the Fun Gorilla Club, those being This, Crippling Depression Book, Ness Cap and Cloudy Cand.
* Star Point was the lowest placing member of the alliance at 13th, and either Crossword or Otomatopoeia will become the highest placing member of the alliance depending on who wins the Quadruplicate Quest finale.