Thread by @JasonILTG

Random thought from some Discord discussion: one problem with how some people use 17lands data, that has existed before 17lands though things like hypergeometric calculations, is that people like quantifying things, but often don't actually connect numbers to actual meaning. 1/x

Example: let's say I'm trying to decide whether to keep or mull a 2 land hand, and calculate that I have an 85% chance of drawing my third land by turn 3. One might say "85% is pretty good, I'd keep". But an annoyance I have is that I don't really know what this means! 2/x

How do you know that 85% is "pretty good"? Sure, it's a relatively high number, but I'd bet most people who might make such a statement don't really think through what the number means, and just like that it's high. At what number would you mull the hand? 80%? 75%? 70%? 3/x

Is a 15% chance of missing my third land drop an acceptable risk, better than the risk of mulling? Did you take into account the situations where you hit your land drop only one turn late? What about if you hit your third land drop, but miss your fourth? 4/x

My point here is that Magic is extremely complex and intractable, so it is often very hard to calculate anything of strategic value. The best you can do is usually through comparison - for example, Karsten's charts of how manabases relate to castability of spells. 5/x

But even that can often fall short. Instead, strategy is developed through intuition and practice - people try things, and see what works. People don't keep hands because the chance of hitting their 3rd land is 85%, they keep because they've had success keeping those hands. 6/x

This is not to say that simple models and data are useless - in fact, they can still be very useful! Calculating metrics through which to categorize different situations can be very helpful in helping develop strategy - maybe 85% *does* mean something to some people. 7/x

"Card advantage" is one of the simplest and best examples of this. I can calculate how many cards my Arcane Infusion draws on average given 10 instants and sorceries in my deck, and I can use past experience to know that drawing 1.4 spells on average is a pretty bad rate. 8/x

But it is very important to recognize when you're actually properly using numbers to your advantage, and when you're just recognizing big ones. And it's important to be able to communicate this. 9/x

Conclusion: Magic is an extremely complex game, so don't expect to be able to glean useful direct strategy from straightforward models and calculations. Instead, use these simple models and data to compare and categorize situations, in order to help develop your strategy. 10/10

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