The Battle of Trafalgar

Decided schematic advantage:

On October 21st, 1805, the British Royal Navy under Admiral Lord Nelson engaged Napoleon's fleet off the southwest coast of Spain, near the town of Trafalgar.  Admiral Nelson devised a cunning plan of attack that utterly devastated the much larger combined forces of France and Spain that he stalked.

Pic Related.

The customary order of battle at the time required each fleet to lay broadside to one another, and then fire all guns and cannons before closing to board the opposing ships.  This type of battle, while bloody, was a superior plan over the previous custom of general ship to ship melee.  (It allowed signaling between command and the individual ships.  Where as, in a general melee, commands could not be trusted to be received once melee began.)

The British Admiral ordered his fleet into two lines and then penetrated the Franco-Spanish fleet's line at two equidistant points.  This rendered the ships not at the point of penetration largely irrelevant until they could be maneuvered into position.

In addition to the strategic advantage of this, it also allowed his ships to fire on from both sides for a brief period of time before steering left or right and firing broadside at ships that had all their guns pointing in the wrong direction.

The results were impressive.  Napoleon's fleet lost 22 of its 33 ships and an estimated 16,000 men, while the British had zero ships sunk and only 1500 casualties.

Decided schematic advantage indeed.

Charlie Weiss is a genius, except when he's not.

Conformity of thought yields no advantage.  Equilibrium in position yields no tactical or strategic advantage.  By the time of Trafalgar, advantage had yielded to conformity.  Everyone applied the same technique of counting on superior forces for a victory.  When the enemy held the numerical advantage, the only option was retreat. 

Admiral Nelson's brilliant ploy was innovation at it's finest.  He broke conformity to obtain temporary numerical advantage of guns and firepower. 

Or a paraphrase of lesson #3 says, a good wizard's motto is "CAST ALL THE SPELLS!!!"

 In Magic, we don't fire guns.  We fling fireballs.  Lightning bolts.  Invoke Damnation.

We don't fight from a Ship of the Line.  We summon a Force of Nature.

To "Cast all the spells", we need two things:  tempo and card advantage.  Admiral Nelson 2-for-1'ed his enemies ships by breaking their line at specific points.  We 2-for-1 our opponent whenever we Mindtwist his hand away.   Nelson had tempo by deploying his ships in such a way that his enemies' ships were in the wrong place, at the wrong time, moving the wrong way.  We out tempo our opponent with Noble Hierarch on turn one, and Cultivate on turn two.


In both advantages, the idea is to have accumulated material resources at a rate greater than our opponents.  In every play of every game, evaluate the board to see how you can deny your opponent the use of his resources.  Evaluate how you can most utilize every one of your resources.

Mana is the key to the game.  How much you have available, what you do with it, and the cost/benefit ratio of each expenditure are key variables that dictate how you play every game.

Deep thought issues within

Imagine we're playing a money game.  We're investing a certain number of dollars in the stock market, or the betting horse races, or buying lottery tickets.  Every turn each player gets a certain number of dollars to invest or gamble.  Turn 1, you get $10.  Turn 2, you get $20.  Turn 3, you have to flip a coin.  Heads you get $30.  Tails you get $20.  Turn four, you either flip again for $30 or roll a dice to get to $40.

Each turn, you invest your money.  But whatever you don't invest does not carry over.  So, even if you're buying a single share of Mom&Pop.com  for $29, you may as well spend the last remaining dollar on a lottery ticket.  It doesn't carry over.


Mana is the exact same way.  Whatever mana you don't effectively spend is wasted the next time you reach an untap step.  "Effective" is central to the idea.  If I spend 6 mana on a 2/8 spider with reach, I spent it.  But if my opponent spends his 6 mana on Dead Eye Navigator, I'm probably gonna lose.

Cast your spells.  Use your abilities.  Your mana doesn't carry over.

CAST ALL TEH SPELLZ!!!!111ONE1!!!111eleven!!!