Astervivor: All-Stars

***Astervivor: All-Stars*** (also known as *Astervivor: All-Stars - Ring of Fire*) is the fifth season of *Astervivor*.

Being a celebration of the previous 4 seasons of *Astervivor*, All-Stars had a lot to live up for. Originally only have 16 castaways and after the first Tribe Immunity Challenge, revealing eight more were playing, the fact that this was a celebration was shown in spades. Even with some slightly predictable votes throughout, All-Stars did not disapoint and is regarded as one of the best Astervivor seasons of all-time.

The jury vote ended in a tie between two players for the first time in *Astervivor* history, with Meg the Panda and Natkat receiving three votes each. The third finalist, CamBam, broke the tie in favor of Meg, making her Astervivor Royalty.

## Production

*Astervivor: All-Stars* was unveiled at the same time as the previous season: *Wadi Rum*, as a way to make players play harder for the rest of Season 3, as well as Season 4.

Letters asking if they were interested in playing *All-Stars* were sent out on December 30th, 2021, after the finale of *Marble Cave*. These were sent out to every single player in *New Zealand, Mediterranean and Marble Cave* who made the Merge segment of the game, with letters being sent out to *Wadi Rum* contestants on January 17th, the day of the Merge on that season.

Casting for *All-Stars* was extremely difficult due to the differing opinions of the hosts, but it was eventually decided on who would be returning.

Castaways were given a prep channel in which they were asked questions about the game, and helped the hosts in making their mangas to represent them throughout the season.

The twists for the season were decided upon reasonably quickly.

## Hosts

There are a total of 4 hosts in *Astervivor: All-Stars*.

## Format

* **Tribe Composition:** The 24 castaways were divided into 3 tribes of eight.
* **Alternate Tribe Composition:** The final 20 castaways were divided into 2 tribes of ten.
* **Swapped Tribe Composition:** The final 18 castaways were divided into 3 tribes of six.
* **Merged Tribe Composition:** The final 13 castaways were merged into one tribe.
* **Unmerged Tribe Composition:** The final 10 castaways were once again divided into 2 tribes of five.
* **Remerged Tribe Composition:** The final 8 castaways remerged back into one tribe.
* **Final Tribal Council Format:** Three finalists faced a jury of eight. The jurors all addressed the finalists.

## Features

### Changes

* **Hotels/Day Zero:** New to *All-Stars* is Hotels and Day Zero. There will be a Cast Reveal a day before Marooning in *All-Stars* and *Season 6*, allowing players to communicate before the game begins. They are not allowed to make any alliances with each other during their stay.
* **Reformatted Final Tribal Council:** During the Final Tribal Council, instead of jury members having their own separate channel to voice their thoughts, it would all happen on one channel, allowing the Jury to reply to each other.

### Twists

* **All-Stars:** For the first time, a season only had returning players. Sixteen former castaways from the first four seasons returned to have another shot or defend their title of Astervivor Royalty.
* **Hidden Tribe:** The tribe of Raksasa remained hidden in the game, participating in all challenges and competing against the other tribes. They were revealed after the second Immunity Challenge unless they went to Tribal Council in the first challenge, which they did.
* **Tribe Captains:** Tribe Captains are randomly given out to each tribe and are a lot less powerful than regular Tribe Captains, only being able to decide who goes to Volcanic Exile and who sits out in challenges.
* **Volcanic Exile:** Volcanic Exile is in play this season and is the only place for people to look for advantages. The Tribe Captain for each tribe will decide what player goes to Volcanic Exile anonymously and these players will be sent there. The same person cannot go twice until the rest of the tribe has been to Volcanic Exile. Inside Volcanic Exile, there is a idol grid resembling the "Sandscape" of Season 4, just slightly enlarged. Volcanic Exile is the only place for cross-tribal communication and cross-tribal alliances, acting similarly to the "Marble Cave" of Season 3.
* **Double Elimination:** On Day 7 of *All-Stars*, castaways on both Terbakar Habis and Raksasa had to vote out a member of their tribe.
* **Tribe Swap:** There were two main variations of the Tribe Swap in *All-Stars.*
	+ **Alternate Tribes:** On Day 8 of *All-Stars*, two new tribes were introduced: Leleh and Awu and the remaining 20 castaways were shuffled into 2 tribes of ten.
	+ **Original Swapped Tribes:** On Day 13 of *All-Stars*, Leleh and Awu were affected by a volcanic explosion and castaways had to move back into the Ingat, Terbakar Habis and Raksasa tribes.
* **Triple Elimination:** On Day 15 of *All-Stars*, castaways on all three tribes had to vote out a member of their tribe.
* **Unmerge:** On Day 27 of *All-Stars*, the Merged Tribe of Menghilang was disbanded, and the castaways were reshuffled back into 2 tribes of five.
* **Second Goes Tribal Council:** On Day 33 of *All-Stars*, castaways were told of the Second Goes Tribal Council twist, in which the player who had the second-most amount of votes would be eliminated.

### Powers

* **Hidden Immunity Idol:** Found somewhere on the map during a specific portion of the game, Hidden Immunity Idols, when played, would negate all votes at a tribal council. These were valid until the Final 6.
* **Super Idol:** Found somewhere on the map during a specific portion of the game, Super Idols, when played, would reset the vote and force a revote, with the person who played it being immune. It can be played in different ways than a normal Hidden Immunity Idol, and were valid until the Final 7.
* **Fake Idol:** Found somewhere on the map during a specific portion of the game, Fake Idols, when played, will not negate any votes towards someone at a Tribal Council. When found originally, the person who finds it will be told that this idol is fake and to give it to someone else in the game. These were 'valid' until the Final 6, just like a normal Hidden Immunity Idol.
* **Selfish or Selfless Advantage:** Found somewhere on the map during a specific portion of the game or from a challenge reward, the Selfish or Selfless Advantage would force the player to either play it on themselves, making them leave Tribal Council and unable to vote, at the expense of being unable to voted for and avoiding stuff like Rock Draws, or play it on two other people that weren't themselves. It would expire the first Tribal Council they could use it.
* **Juror Removal:** After winning an Immunity Challenge at the Final 6, Shane was able to remove one player from the jury. That ended up being Hades.

## Season Summary

Sixteen past castaways rejoined to play again. Past bonds were remade, especially those between Karmynn and the rest of the *Marble Cave* cast, however, there was one thing clear: This was going to be a tough game regardless. With the announcement that the game would last 42 days, many were curious on a potential return on the Edge of Extinction twist in *Mediterranean*. Some wondered why certain characters that were worthy of the title, such as Treyvor in *Wadi Rum*, Lefteri in *Marble Cave*, Sheep in *Mediterranean* and George in *New Zealand* weren't returning. What they didn't know was that they were playing in the secret tribe of Raksasa, which also featured those that probably wouldn't have been the first pick to return, like Ariana or Tonio.

The first challenge was quite the gauntlet, however Raksasa, the Hidden Tribe, lost the challenge, revealing themselves to all the castaways. This shocked many as with 24 players playing, there was no returning back into the game. If you were voted out, you would be out for the rest of the game. Dan was voted off first, with many more to come.

Ingat lost the next challenge before winning immunity at the next, which happened to be a Double Elimination round where a player from Raksasa and one from Terbakar Habis had to vote someone out. A tribe swap happened afterwards; every player was divided into two tribes, Awu and Leleh. Awu never went to Tribal Council in that round, forcing Leleh to go to Tribal Council twice, where they cut down on Raksasa members.

Another tribe swap happened, beginning with a Triple Elimination round, the first in *Astervivor* history, which eliminated the remaining players from *Mediterranean* as well as Ray, the winner of *New Zealand*. There was two more rounds during this swap section of the game, where both Tonio and Brett from *Wadi Rum* were eliminated, the first times a player from *Wadi Rum* was eliminated in All-Stars.

After the Brett elimination, the two tribes merged into one single tribe, that being Menghilang. Some extreme tribal councils happened that changed the flow of the game, with big players like Sun and Noah being eliminated from the game. The jury also did start at this point of the game, with Hades and Noah making it to the Jury.

The big surprise twist of *New Zealand*, the Unmerge happened unexpectedly, and with it, only two tribes of five happened and with the Volcanic Exile twist still in motion with it being the Unmerge, this meant that Tribal Councils only had four people voting. It was said that if they tied in either of these Tribal Councils, they would be going to rocks, and nobody would be immune. Of course, the first vote was a 2-2 tie, however Meg had the powerful Super Idol advantage in her pocket, forcing a Rock Decision. In the end, Poteet was eliminated after the castaways went to another revote, and Lefteri was eliminated soon after. The tribes merged back at the Final 8, creating an interesting endgame.

Big players that were going to win the game if they got to the Final Tribal Council, Karmynn, Ryder, Treyvor and Zach were eliminated, creating a Final 4 of Shane, Meg, Nat and Cam. During this, Shane managed to get an advantage to remove one jury member, creating massive fights in the Jury chat onto who should be eliminated. In the end, Hades was eliminated due to being the first Juror. Both Meg and Nat had equal chances of winning the game, however Shane was the clear frontrunner to win. This resulted in an extreme Final Immunity Challenge, where Shane just lost, dooming him to be the Final Juror.

At the Final Tribal Council, Cam was criticized for although doing some moves of himself, mainly following the pursuits of the bigger players to get himself to the end and Nat and Meg were criticized on not playing massive games and both equally giving some under-the-radar performances, although Nat was praised for creating an over-the-top character and staying it whilst also avoiding votes, and Meg was praised for her attempts to flip the game and moves of self-preservation. Nat and Meg, after 42 days, both got 3 votes from the jury, whilst Cam only got 2 votes from the jury, forcing a tie at Final Tribal Council, a first for the *Astervivor* series. Cam was now the sole decider of who gets Astervivor Royalty, in which he chose for Meg to win the game, making her the winner of *All-Stars*.

## Trivia

* This is the first season to fully feature returning contestants.
* The "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast" slogan was replaced by "Return, Revenge, Redemption" for this season.
* This is the first season to see a tie in Final Tribal Council for the winner.