The Art of War Chapter 9: The Army on the March
By Bryndon on May 14th, 2012 · Filed in Commander · Comments not available just now
It's like celebrating a birthday for a fleshy abomination who sits in your living room gurgling maliciously.
In less than a month, the Art of War and Magic will be two years old. I did not foresee this when I started writing it and I'm still not sure what to think of it. I'd like to take this moment to thank thorjy, who gave me a timely reminder to get this article out the door.
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1a. Sun Tzu said: We come now to the question of encamping the army, and observing signs of the enemy.
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In our preferred source, this verse is earmarked because it gives a good introduction to the theme of the chapter. Thus, the strategic content of this primer will be devoted to developing the idea of being able to understand the ways we advance our own plans and stymie that of our enemy. The literary content will be devoted to understanding context.
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1b. Pass quickly over mountains, and keep in the neighborhood of valleys.
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We are trained to think of mountains as a source of red mana, and the weakest colour in multiplayer. In that sense, you should quickly pass over any idea that ends in "... and I'll round out my selection of colors with red, because that is a pretty color".
For a better understanding of this verse, we need to think of a mountain not as a card, but as several tonnes of inevitability. Without the modern conveniences of fast cars and well-paved roads, a mountain pass is a guarantee that you're going to lose someone to exposure and bad terrain. We can not commit to any scenario in which we're consistently draining resources. Even unanswered junk like Cunning Lethemancer will eventually bring down a moderately-powerful deck. In this analogy, then, a valley is a place where we can find sustenance. Every effects nets us a card, or a permanent. Every permanent nets us an effect or a card. You can win a game just stringing together Nekrataals and Dismisses.
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2. Camp in high places, facing the sun. Do not climb heights in order to fight. So much for mountain warfare.
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I love the sense of finality when Sun Tzu provides a single line of text and then suggests that this is all you need to know about a certain way of thinking. Is it because that one line of text is so great that it trumps all other approaches, or is it because if you're engaged in mountain warfare, Sun Tzu thinks you're a sub-optimal scrub and washes his hands of you with some pithy adage? I favor the second interpretation.
In real life, camping gives you the line of sight and good lighting necessary to line up some killer photo opportunities. It also gives you breathing space that separates you from conflict. From this, we derive the knowledge that we can only spend our turns on ramping, card drawing and tutoring if we're not mired down in dangerous situations, such as 'Phase 2'.
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3. After crossing a river, you should get far away from it.
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In real life, you need to control the way that your enemy pursues you. You cross a river while you have a bit of a lead, and then you force-march away from that river, making up for lost time. Your pursuing rival makes chase, loses valuable time fording the river, and you're all the while you're increasing your chances of finding favorable terrain. I have to say, at first glance I disagree with this. It makes a certain amount of sense to park some archers at the river, but I assume they could have their own archers on the other side of the riverbank, and if someone's fording a river, they're not necessarily an easier target. The would-be pincushions are moving slower, but the water will absorb the kinetic force of any arrow that hits it, reducing the number of locations it's possible to score a hit in. What I need, here, is a platoon of Skyrim guards who don't mind being shot at for science to help us fully understand the dynamics of river crossing.
In Magic, we can put ourselves ahead in one resource, and supplement that by leaving everyone else in the river. When I play The Abyss, I want tokens to form the bulk of my sacrifices. I hate that the Abyss is always the first of so many of my examples, especially because the ridiculous price tag knocks it way out of my range of experience. If you have other good examples of situations that force other people to form your own personal staircase out of the quicksand, post it in the comments section!
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4. When an invading force crosses a river in its onward march, do not advance to meet it in mid-stream. It will be best to let half the army get across, and then deliver your attack.
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In our real life source, this refers to a specific, spectacular real life victory in which a river was penned up by an impromptu dam until juuuuust the right moment, when a wily commander ordered his troops to flood the enemy's position. In real life, the defeated general's famous last words are a good warning against hubris.
My contribution to pop psychology is going to be the phrase 'Only Smart Person in the Room Syndrome'. It cropped up a lot while I was completing my IT degree, and it happens in Magic. Most of the people in both contexts are used to being a nerd when they're at school, or an outsider in whatever social environment they belong to. They saw the world differently, they were that little bit brighter than someone else, and it marked them as separate from other people. In time, that moved from a mark of shame to a badge of honor, and finally, to being an integral part of their identity. At this point, they no doubt graduated and moved on to university, where they picked a degree that would allow them to bring their mental powers to bear. Jump cut to the first day of orientation: all three hundred people packed into the lecture hall are earnestly convinced that they are and will continue to be the top of their class, and all these other slim shady's are just imitatin'. In Magic, remember OSPR Syndrome as you charge across the field, congratulating yourself on recognising your opponent's foolishness. They have probably rigged the kitchen table with sandbags, intent on flooding your house at the critical moment.
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5. If you are anxious to fight, you should not go to meet the invader near a river which he has to cross.
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It seems like such a noble goal: you want to stand on the river bank, pelt them with rocks and whittle them down before mopping up the demoralised remains on the other shore. You know that's the only way it could go down, but then, so do your erstwhile opponents. Whenever players find themselves a little bit behind, they're keen to catch up to the rest of the gang. They'll hold out for the Cultivate or a tutor, they'll pray that each new card is a playable creature. But if you make it clear that your army of dragons, demons, angels, elementals, avatars and Eldrazi are ready and waiting for the exact moment that they overcome that first challenge, they will quit in a heartbeat.
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6. Moor your craft higher up than the enemy, and facing the sun. Do not move up-stream to meet the enemy. So much for river warfare.
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There is a very definite strain running through this portion of the text that suggests you should never play catch up. Even if you do eventually 'catch up', what are you running towards? An encamped enemy, waiting for you to arrive. So, rather than say to yourself, "My opponent has more lands than I do, I should redouble my efforts to get more lands", we need to say "Where do I keep my copies of Dramatic Entrance? Can I lessen the impact that having lands will have in this game? Can I destroy some of his lands?". If our opponents all seem to play with Titans and foily rares, we can't say to ourselves, "What I really need is the willingness to spend money on acquiring new fatties". We need to say "I need wraths, mind controls and removal". So much for keeping up with the Robinsons.
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7. In crossing salt-marshes, your sole concern should be to get over them quickly, without any delay.
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There are situations in games of Magic when it seems like everything is going poorly for everyone. Everyone's land search, tutors and card draw have all nipped off to their local for a pint, leaving you to fend for yourself until they come back. Sun Tzu tells us that the best response is not to 'make the most of it'. Don't look at your mana dorks and decide to rejigger your overarching strategies towards cherry-tapping your opponents to death. You need to power on through this difficult place in your life, hopefully stabilising at a decent number of lands, cards and options.
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8. If forced to fight in a salt-marsh, you should have water and grass near you, and get your back to a clump of trees. So much for operations in salt-marches.
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I know I just said, 'don't look forward to fighting in Salt Marshes', but when I first started playing Commander one of my dreams was to build a Sek'Kuar's Abyss Filled Death Hug.dec and turn the entire game into a an endless expanse of symmetrical discards, sacrifices and Magus of the Abyss, because that flavour text is ballin'. To be fair, I had just built a super effective Pheldagriff deck, so the plan was for the two to balance each other out. Anyhoo: When you're dealing with decks and generals that delight in profiting from other people's misery, you need to know what resources you can still use (in this analogy, your still-useful resources are the water and the grass Sun Tzu is alluding to). Similarly, you need to construct a scenario in which the ground isn't crumbling beneath your feet (The trees in salt marshes make the nearby terrain less treacherous). With these two things, you can start to fight back.
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9. In dry, level country, take up an easily accessible position with rising ground to your right and on your rear, so that the danger may be in front, and safety lie behind. So much for campaigning in flat country.
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I don't have any military folks in my close circle of friends to question, but: surely modern artillery makes 'being encamped in an easily accessible position' the quickest route to joining Sun Tzu as ancient history?
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10. These are the four useful branches of military knowledge which enabled the Yellow Emperor to vanquish four several sovereigns.
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Interesting historical note: the text points out that the Yellow Emperor only defeated two people, not four. To my mind, that would suggest that only two of these strategies are likely to be valid and the other two are a clever decoy. But which strategies?
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11. All armies prefer high ground to low and sunny places to dark.
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I'll take this moment to rhapsodise on some philosophy. I believe all players prefer the moral high ground. My Defense of the Heart for Terastodon and Phantasmal Image is essentially 'fair', even if I use it to hit your lands and then blow up the tokens before you can use them. Its fair, because you were about to use Tooth and Nail. As we all know, you always use your stupid Tooth and Nail for a dumb Platinum Angel and your smelly Leonin Abunas which might not be lethal by any stretch of the imagination, but is so annoying it should be considered cheating. There are also players who prefer to be seen as sneaky and conniving, but if you push them too hard, they'll mention that they've like, totally slipped the bounds of conventional morality, and so everything we think of as 'evil' is actually an arbitrary label, so there's nothing good or evil about what they're doing. But you still shouldn't attack them, because they're more 'not evil' than they are 'not good' and if you didn't get that, you'd definitely be ev-, that is to say, short-sighted.
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12. If you are careful of your men, and camp on hard ground, the army will be free from disease of every kind, and this will spell victory.
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In a purely practical sense: sleeve your Commander decks, keep them in a cool, dry place, don't foil out your decks if you live in the tropics and house-rule a ban against drinks on the table.
In a game sense, this is the 'don't-lose' precursor that lays the foundation for 'how to win'. Choose creatures that have Enter the Battlefield triggers, efficient power/toughness for their cost and add evasive creatures to attack and deathtouch creatures to block with. Don't play creatures that only fill out your roster. Make sure you have enough mana and enough ways to find mana that you never kill yourself via mana-screw. If you can do these things, you won't lose.
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13. When you come to a hill or a bank, occupy the sunny side, with the slope on your right rear. Thus you will at once act for the benefit of your soldiers and utilize the natural advantages of the ground.
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I guess... if you're playing outside, during the day, this is marginally helpful? This is really good real-world advice that doesn't work amazingly well with magic card logic.
I believe that earlier in this series we've discussed the idea of making sure each individual card works to the benefit of your deck's game plan. For example: Cultivate and its plainer sister, Kodama's Reach, are powerhouses, because they set you up with two cards and potentially two colours of mana. Yet, in a Damia deck, isn't that extra card in hand kind of a bother? You could be drawing a non-land card next turn. Harrow plays to her strengths better, as both cards end up on the board, and Damia will replace the sacrificed land during your next turn. Similarly, you could use Mulch and other blue-green 'mill yourself' cards to help power through the Mimeoplasm's library, stocking your graveyard with corpulent treats. This kind of thinking means you're not just using generically good cards because they appear in the top 50 lists, but because the result is a deck in which all your creatures have been carefully picked and the mana base gives you hard ground on which to build your plans. This the result that truly spells Victory.
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14. When, in consequence of heavy rains up-country, a river which you wish to ford is swollen and flecked with foam, you must wait until it subsides.
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Can you name something else that gets swollen and flecked with foam? It's People! Don't attack those people. They'll concede and throw their cards at you, which always feels as though you just wasted a turn. If someone is already tangled up in fights where their gigantic angel is facing off against a horde of demons, don't add yourself to the list of combatants. Let the swelling subside.
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15. Country in which there are precipitous cliffs with torrents running between, deep natural hollows, confined places, tangled thickets, quagmires and crevasses, should be left with all possible speed and not approached.
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Consider the following scenario: Player A has Manabarbs, Player B has Seizan, Perverter of Truth as well as Chains of Mephistopheles and Bottomless Pit. Player C has Jhoira of the Ghitu with Detritivore and Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre about to leave suspension. You're Player D. You're holding a few pieces of targeted removal and a selection of Gomazoa. What should you do?
I say, nothing. If one opponent wants to force you to play cards, another wants to encourage you to hold back, and the last is poised to destroy all you hold dear, there are too many variables to consider. To me, the whole point of a Gordian Knot problem like this isn't about "finding the sword", its about "learning not to waste time trying to untie a Gordian Knot".
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16. While we keep away from such places, we should get the enemy to approach them; while we face them, we should let the enemy have them on his rear.
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There's a lot to be said for the practise of keeping your enemy focused on a treadmill of ever-increasing terrible things. Did someone open with "Land, Sol Ring, Signet?". Whistle. When Jhoira/Rafiq/Zur hits the field, shake your head. When someone pauses to attack, helpfully remind them that they need to choose between taking out the Azami deck that has two-thirds of its combo, the Jhoira deck that's about to un-suspend everything, or the Rafiq deck before they can afford to re-cast their Commander. Somewhere in that list of priorities is you, but you're never quite the biggest threat. They can work on you after all the really dangerous stuff is taken care of.
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17. If in the neighborhood of your camp there should be any hilly country, ponds surrounded by aquatic grass, hollow basins filled with reeds, or woods with thick undergrowth, they must be carefully routed out and searched; for these are places where men in ambush or insidious spies are likely to be lurking.
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Whenever you're plotting a course of action, you need to know in your heart: where is the removal hiding? Who is holding a wrath? Which to people are likely to galvanise their position by teaming up against your inevitable rise to power?
As a side note, I've just started playing Diplomacy online. At the time of writing, it's the most mind-warping and engaging game I've played. In the hands of good friends and boon companions, ordinary words turn into twisty snakes. They promise that your eastern border is safe from them. But what if they come at you from the North? They say they'll help you invade France. But will they also help Austria invade you? It's the weird gaps that the ordinary use of the English language leaves in your sentences that stops you from ever sleeping peacefully again.
If you believe that multiplayer is something you can cross-train, you should play Diplomacy. If you do play Diplomacy, you will know that alliances in multiplayer games are twisty, twisty snakes. Give them a definitive end-point: "We won't attack each other for two turns", or in the case of an indefinite alliance, work out whether your opponent is willing to go all the way with you, or if they're a "this game is about back-stabbing" kind of person.
This is one of my holiday snaps. I'm Germany (yellow), in the midst of what I hope will be a three-way draw with Austria (red) and Russia (purple). At the time of writing, England and Turkey have both fallen and Italy is the lone holdout.
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18. When the enemy is close at hand and remains quiet, he is relying on the natural strength of his position.
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There comes a time in life when trickery is no longer how you approach any given game. This can happen during a single end-game state, or by virtue of the meta-game making you the best deck at the table. As your share of the total percentage of power at the table approaches 1, your ability to be the insurgent decreases. You've become "the institution". You can't be as underhanded as you used to, but you can rely on brute power and awesome synergies to win you games.
This can happen in-game: You have the board position, you have the recursion. Your opponents have nothing and they don't pack enough graveyard hate. You don't need to force people to declare 'beginning of combat step' so that you can hold them off. One opponent is looking for obscure rules that might tangle you up,
the rest are teaming up so that you can't just annihilate them piece by piece.
In a meta-game sense, this happens when you've decided to allocate more of your time and money to Magic than the rest of your friends do. Your friends look at Llanowar Wastes and they say, "Wow, this is Bayou, but for $2! A few points of damage is nothing, and it's not like I'm a fancy man who needs fetch-lands to win". You look at your Overgrown Tomb and say, "Wow, this is a good companion to my Bayou and Verdant Catacombs," and take it out of the folder you use for storing your foil Ravnica duals.
Stony silence is generally a sign that the player you're playing with is following a path that will lead them to victory, unless you can work out what it is and find a way to interact with them. I've picked up this habit during games of Dominion*. Whenever I can, I like to buy the Duke card, which gets astronomically better for each "Duchy" you have. If you can focus on buying the Duke cards to the exclusion of all the other Duke cards, you can get a ridiculous number of points, but its easily disrupted if more than one player tries to do the same thing, or if other players buy out the rest of the Duchy cards.
Consequently, when I attempt to corner the Duke/Duchy combos, I do so very quietly. I don't partake in much banter, I don't build up large chains of cards, I don't announce my plans to the world. Similarly, in Magic, when I am activating looters and tutoring for individual combo pieces, I am silent as the grave. Only when I've finagled each piece into my hands do I explain that the combination of, say, Basalt Monolith, Power Artifact and Goblin Cannon have combined to win me the game.
*Dominion is a game in which players take turns to buy cards which give them either special effects (drawing cards, playing more cards, etc), or Victory Points (no in-game effects, but increase your score at the end of the game). It's also the precursor to Ascension, which was made by some Magic superstars who won a Pro Tour and wanted more out of life.
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19. When he keeps aloof and tries to provoke a battle, he is anxious for the other side to advance.
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If your opponent wants you to attack, they are holding a combat trick. But you knew this already!
In such a situation, we need to assess the power of the unknown trick. Is it worth just drawing it out? Can we pick off their blockers? Do we have our own combat trick that they aren't aware of? Best case scenario: can we force a discard?
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20. If his place of encampment is easy of access, he is tendering a bait.
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Baits in Magic can be Planeswalkers, a board that only has a few non-creatures, one of their pet cards, or one of your pet hates. Low life totals and a full hand are a bait. Ghostly Prison isn't a bait - it's a leading cause of oversight in otherwise competent players. When you find a bait, you can attack by all means, but you should attack with your second-best creature.
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21. Movement amongst the trees of a forest shows that the enemy is advancing. The appearance of a number of screens in the midst of thick grass means that the enemy wants to make us suspicious.
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Card draw and ramp doesn't attract aggro. Tutors attract an "ohhh, I wonder what they're looking for?". None of them attract the proper response - a massive attack for double digits of damage. Compare how angry you get when you see Syphon Mind is being used on you, to the complete lack of attention you pay when Cultivate or Demonic Tutor is cast. What do you imagine they're searching for? Kill them now and you'll never have to find out.
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22. The rising of birds in their flight is the sign of an ambuscade. Startled beasts indicate that a sudden attack is coming.
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Watch for changes in body language, people looking at their cards and dropping a hand or fist on the table, eyes widening, eyebrows raising. Watch for people who stop playing creatures, or people who change volumes. All these are signs of a coming paradigm shift - be it a board wipe, a primeval titan, or massive card advantage.
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23. When there is dust rising in a high column, it is the sign of chariots advancing; when the dust is low, but spread over a wide area, it betokens the approach of infantry. When it branches out in different directions, it shows that parties have been sent to collect firewood. A few clouds of dust moving to and fro signify that the army is encamping.
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Ask yourself a question, and then answer it as best you're able: "What are my opponents doing?". The chariots Sun Tzu is referring to is a sort of "One Big Fattie" approach, like you might see from Reanimator, Control, Eldrazi, or a Show and Tell effect. Edicts are a great answer. Where Sun Tzu suspects that the opponent is using infantry, we suspect that our opponents are using tokens (or Exalted triggers). These are things that die to board wipes.
Sun Tzu thinks that firewood is fuel for keeping friendly troops warm, but we know that firewood is fuel for burning opposing players and creatures. In the era of Sun Tzu, fire was the 'combo' attack of warfare. There was no counter to it - infantry and cavalry alike aren't much good against setting the ground alight. When you see someone going through complex card interactions that feature phrases like "Draw 3, discard 2, top once, draw one, discard one, shuffle, top, put a card in my hand...", you need to consider your options for disruption. For this reason, you should always have access to a Jester's Cap.
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24. Humble words and increased preparations are signs that the enemy is about to advance. Violent language and driving forward as if to the attack are signs that he will retreat.
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Sun Tzu makes it sound like the only correct move is to smash anyone who isn't maintaining perfect emotional equilibrium. If you're not in a position to attack a guy who is playing it cool, try offering to team up and split the victory. At the very least, you'll make a new friend!
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25. When the light chariots come out first and take up a position on the wings, it is a sign that the enemy is forming for battle.
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What betokens the beginning of combat in Magic? What signs indicate that a game is going to feature a strong aggressive start? I believe hasty creatures, Forsaken Wastes and Neverending Torment are a sign that the elusive mono-red aggro is rearing its head. The first flier on the field. Equipping any creature with any thing. All these actions create a state in which your opponent needs to attack profitably, or pass the turn knowing in their heart that they aren't doing anything with their turns.
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26. Peace proposals unaccompanied by a sworn covenant indicate a plot.
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From the outset, remind yourself that all games of Commander end with one winner. Even the draws end with a "but no, seriously, in two turns I could have wiped you out". If someone proposes peace, use your empathy (the art of insidiously invading and individual's inner soul to infer imminent invasion information) to work out their every motivation. How much does an alliance with integrity benefit them? Are they fishing for a ceasefire that will give them enough time to backstab you? If they've just asked you not to attack 'this' turn, how close must they be to a combo, or a lockdown? Are you prepared to give them that much quarter?
That said, remember the Men in Black quote: "There's always an Arquillian Battle Cruiser, or a Corillian Death Ray, or an intergalactic plague that is about to wipe out all life on this miserable little planet", and the only way to win is to direct them all at someone who isn't you.
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27. When there is much running about and the soldiers fall into rank, it means that the critical moment has come.
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The moment comes after excessive scrying, after carefully arranging permanents to reduce any confusion, double-checking that you're fully stocked with overruns, plague winds and disenchants, running a weather eye over the game state and finally a state of hyper-vigilance ("How many cards in hand? Who has priority? How many lands do you have untapped? What about now?").
Seizing on the critical moment is exactly like the fundamental turn as laid out by Zvi Mowshowitz. Read all the theory.
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28. When some are seen advancing and some retreating, it is a lure.
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If someone is holding back a Titanic Angeldrazi D(emon/ragon), or they're attacking into blockers, or pretty much anything beyond "Swing for 40, you lose" happens during the combat step, something is going on.
(Has anyone ever tried co-ordinating a pattern of attacking into blockers with no loss of creatures on either side to throw people off the possibility that you might be on the same side? If not, that seems like a brilliant idea).
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29. When the soldiers stand leaning on their spears, they are faint from want of food.
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When your opponent starts leaving perfectly good attackers at home, they're out of the spider type removal cards and they no longer believe that they can rely on their rattlesnakes to deter would-be aggressors. Keeping a big bad attacker at home to defend is the opposite of a good defence. It's proof that you're in a position to be hurt, badly.
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30. If those who are sent to draw water begin by drinking themselves, the army is suffering from thirst.
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If someone just isn't keeping up with the big boy plays, get them to do some dirty work for you in exchange for a Trade Secrets, or offer to give something as simple as a good Fact or Fiction split.
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31. If the enemy sees an advantage to be gained and makes no effort to secure it, the soldiers are exhausted.
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If you're open, and you make contact with your biggest rival's eyes, and you can see in those hellish orbs that he knows you're open, but he passes the turn anyway... he's out of gas too. If you can't capitalise on his weakness, let another player know how juicy a target they are. "Oh hey, Rival," you might say nonchalantly. "Why don't you and I attack some other guy together? It could be fun."
"My name is Steve," they'll say. "And no, I can't do that. All I have is this full-art foil zendikar land that could buy me a meal at this restaurant in hand, so I won't be doing that."
"Did you hear that, Little Minnow?" You say, winking at someone else conspiratorially. "He's got nothing."
"My name is John, and I think it's really awful that you come here all the time but you don't know our names."
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32. If birds gather on any spot, it is unoccupied. Clamor by night betokens nervousness.
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People who talk frequently are not confident. People who are very silent are the ones to look out for. Ergo, if they're boasting that they can destroy you, the reverse is true.
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33. If there is disturbance in the camp, the general's authority is weak. If the banners and flags are shifted about, sedition is afoot. If the officers are angry, it means that the men are weary.
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You can use this passage as inspiration for using your opponent's emotions as 'tells', in the poker sense. Joke-y players don't have enough invested in the game to warrant paying attention. Anything they do, they'll do 'for the lulz'.
If a player is rearranging the cards in their hand purposefully, they're plotting a combo and trying to work out how best to play their various "Draw X, Discard One" instants to assemble all the pieces.
A player who yells out "Everyone just shut up and play!" isn't a threat. They're a broken, defeated man too bitter to resign.
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34. When an army feeds its horses with grain and kills its cattle for food, and when the men do not hang their cooking-pots over the camp-fires, showing that they will not return to their tents, you may know that they are determined to fight to the death.
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'A fight to the death' in the real world is analogous to any high-stakes gambit in Magic cardboard land. (I always assume that 'gambit' and 'gamble' were entirely synonymous. They are not! In your face, eleven year old me). Left unanswered, they will win. Appropriately countered, you will win. Or at least, not-lose, which is the first step towards winning.
In addition, common gambits have counters, which you should start to consider when choosing reactive cards. Some are expensive, some are 50c.
Overruns and Titanic Ultimatums are countered by Rout or a counterspell or a Parallectric Feedback or a Moat.
Insurrection is countered by a Fog effect.
Playing Blue is countered by discard and Pyroblast.
Three-card combos are countered by Jester's Cap. You should play more of that card. In 60 card games, you can't remove 'all of their threats'. In Commander, you can remove Reveillark, Melira, Sylvok Outcast and Mikaeus, the Lunarch from a deck. That's three different high-profile combo pieces.
I'll admit: my Commander playing has slumped slightly since Dark Ascension (I'm working on designing and releasing a new game!). In the future I hope to create and maintain a list of high power gambits and good cards that counter those gambits. You'll see the beginnings of this effort in the next chapter, and you may even hear whispers of progress made in games design.
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35. The sight of men whispering together in small knots or speaking in subdued tones points to disaffection amongst the rank and file.
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If people are whispering between themselves at the table, or even showing each other their hands, they're definitely in cahoots and you should beat them.
Don't let people whisper too much at the table. It's bad manners.
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36. Too frequent rewards signify that the enemy is at the end of his resources; too many punishments betray a condition of dire distress.
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If someone offers out of the blue to pump your guy with Kessig Wolf Run, or to give you a 5-0 split on a Fact or Fiction, or something more at home in a Magic: The Puzzling exercise, you should take it as read that they are too low on their own resources to be able to do anything for themselves.
If someone threatens to rain down disproportionate retribution, they a) can't back it up and b) will waste everything they've got trying to prove the opposite to themselves.
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37. To begin by bluster, but afterwards to take fright at the enemy's numbers, shows a supreme lack of intelligence.
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Sun Tzu speaketh to n00b and to scarred veteran alike. Heed now his words.
If your deck is truly amazing, it will show everyone at the table by its wordless actions. There is no need to spoil a potentially surprising fundamental turn with hype.
No talking about the game after the game, except by prearranged agreement. If you do, make sure its to complement other people on their tight technical play and inevitable victory, not berate their relentless top-decking and fluky fluke-flukes.
Never, ever gloat. If your win was truly one for the history books, someone else will tell you. You won't need to say a thing.
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38. When envoys are sent with compliments in their mouths, it is a sign that the enemy wishes for a truce.
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I feel this art is way ahead of its time in
depicting orcs as being literate beings
capable of masterminding truces. Bravo!
Each player should benefit somehow. It's ok if one benefits more, but they should both benefit.
Truces are stronger if they have a pre-defined ending condition. "We'll stick together until so and so is dead", or "We'll stick together for two rounds, and then revisit this agreement", is way better than "We'll stick together", followed by a "Waaah! You attacked me when I was the only other person still left in the game!".
Truces are non-coercive. A lightning bolt revealed to a player on two life doesn't make an ally, it makes a slave. Slaves revolt.
If you don't want a Truce, you should say so. This goes doubly for slaves. It is infinitely better to die as a free Magic player, than to be ridden by some other ingrate who discards you at the finish line.
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39. If the enemy's troops march up angrily and remain facing ours for a long time without either joining battle or taking themselves off again, the situation is one that demands great vigilance and circumspection.
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Sun Tzu is clearly referring to the 'weird situation'. The rules and strategies I lay out here are designed to serve you in playing ordinary games of Commander using the base rules and the standard deck construction against high-powered decks with players who have some notion of how game theory works, no 'allied victory' and no cards that entirely destroy normal game states or blow holes in the structure of Magic's rule system.
Weird situations occur where any of these things stop being true.
If you see a weird card that you had never thought of as being worth a slot in a Commander deck, consider capping or duressing the player. They may have some kind of tech and that would be bad for you.
If someone has a creature that is completely outclassed by one of your creatures and that creature has any non-keyworded ability, they may be goading you into something deadly!
If your opponent is known to be a competent player, but they're playing a very strange deck that you don't recognise, there's a few possibilities: They may be waiting on a winning card. They may have convinced themselves that you are 'always' holding a fog or a counterspell and are waiting to see you spend it. It may be a week after a pre-release that you didn't attend. It may actually be the first time that they've reached the endgame alongside you. It's your duty as someone who reads fancy shmancy articles about multiplayer strategy on the Internet to make the experience as unpleasant as possible for them. I think I can trust you. You seem solid.
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40. If our troops are no more in number than the enemy, that is amply sufficient; it only means that no direct attack can be made. What we can do is simply to concentrate all our available strength, keep a close watch on the enemy, and obtain reinforcements.
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Sun Tzu returns to some concepts with alarming regularity. Once again, he's harping on a specific point that I think you must be aware of by now: You should never, under any circumstances, ever, attack into blockers. even if you think it might work this time, because you might be the chosen one. It's just a Bad Thing.
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41. He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them.
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I feel as though this is just wishful thinking. It is a common fallacy to believe that the kids who made fun of you in high school are going to have terrible jobs while you become rich and powerful and successful. In actual fact, many of the kids who taunted me had family connections that guaranteed a life of privilege, and one of them successfully framed me as a Bonapartist sympathiser. I was in the Iffy for ten long years, and eventually befriended one of the old inmates there. The rest was set down in my biography. I can't remember the title, but I remember snickering because the author's surname was "Dumas", which totally sounds naughty. But anyway, it's a good read.
Anyhoo - you want to think that the people who don't think very much about the games that they're playing are going to hoist themselves on their own petard. Life isn't that kind. In practise, it's accepted that a little bit of thought beats out purely chaotic playing. Lots of thinking can run circles around someone who has dedicated less time to pursuing strategic thinking. However, an absence of strategy is still better than the greatest depth of thinking. It forms a neat rock-paper-scissors.
So, beating a chaotic thinker only takes a little bit of thinking. You, plus any other player at the table, gang up on them. Beat them down and kill them. Resume normal gameplay. But if they're still chasing 'randomness' in the next game, try to understand them. They're after the visceral thrill that Magic can bring. They need the rush of feedback from new formats. Commander is amazing for that, but they also want to play it with Emperor, or Planechase, or Archenemy, or any one of a dozen things. If you can't beat them, join them on a rollercoaster ride to happy fun times.
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42. If soldiers are punished before they have grown attached to you, they will not prove submissive; and, unless submissive, then will be practically useless. If, when the soldiers have become attached to you, punishments are not enforced, they will still be useless.
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This verse can be treated as a reference to the Prisoner's Dilemma, the classic minigame that governs the likelihood of people betraying you. You need to forgive your first (inevitable!) betrayal, on the understanding that the reprisal for the second betrayal will be harsh. You also need to follow through on any retribution you promise. Forgiving the faults and failings of others is a noble value espoused by the Christian faith and the faiths of many other world religions. It's an amazing tool for social justice. In-game, forgiving someone seventy times seven times is a great recipe for being a shock wench in every game you play. Strive to live in a world where you can be all-forgiving, but don't play cards that way.
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43. Therefore soldiers must be treated in the first instance with humanity, but kept under control by means of iron discipline. This is a certain road to victory.
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He's repeating himself! Fortunately, I planned for just such an occurrence. In the last passage, we discussed how to deal with conflicts between friends and allies, but it also applies to how to treat enemies. In the first instance of conflict, always show that you understand your opponent's reasons for targeting you. Perhaps you're the only one who can answer their signature threats, or your threats are something they can't answer. This is as far as your mercy and understanding needs to go - you can expect your rival to respect your sense of maturity and level-headedness. Empathy means never demanding that people agree to house-rules that ban their deck. Your rivals should expect a measured counter-attack from you, in proportion to their own efforts. This is an excellent way to build a reputation as a fair, solid player. With that reputation, you can almost always convince an opponent to agree to a cease-fire to take on a third player who is threatening to overwhelm you both.
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44. If in training soldiers commands are habitually enforced, the army will be well-disciplined; if not, its discipline will be bad.
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If you plan on playing a team format, experimenting with the Archenemy format, need to find allies to survive a large game, or just find yourself needing to co-ordinate an attack on the 'best deck', you need a plan. If you and a friend are planning to take on an entire table at a games night, you should co-ordinate your efforts! If secrecy is a must, text each other. If you feel that table talk is somehow 'cheating', arrange everything before hand. Or play a non-political format, like solitaire.
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45. If a general shows confidence in his men but always insists on his orders being obeyed, the gain will be mutual.
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First principles - never declare yourself the 'general' of your friends and peers at the kitchen table, and don't follow up that gaffe with an insistence that the guy on your right is your majordomo while the guy on your left is the 'shifty vizier' and that they need to refer to themselves by these titles.
What I do like about this passage is that it highlights the importance of good communication between allies. What should each of you promise each other? What things will you achieve together? How long do you intend for your alliances to continue? There's no optimal answer, but if people know what they expect from each other, a successful alliance is more satisfying while a betrayal is made more identifiable and dramatic by being so unambiguous.
As a side note, you might have fun trying a game where you can't share information about your hand with your ally, or a format where you can't ally with people sitting right next to you. Both would develop your ability to plan, communicate and forge alliances with new and interesting people.
We made it! That's the end of Chapter 9. At the current rate of progress, I'll return in 2014 with an explanation for why Chapter 10 is late. Stay strong and keep Commanding! In the mean time, know that I am labouring tirelessly, and I labour for you.
By Bryndon on May 14th, 2012 · Filed in Commander · Comments not available just now
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