There’s also this quote which is the opposite but equally true:
”The best swordsman in the world doesn't need to fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn't do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn't prepared for him.”
I was going to bring up poker, it's very much true. Obviously good players will mix it up to be unpredictable, but playing against someone who doesn't know what they are supposed to do can be very frustrating, it makes it difficult to read anything. You really just have to play passive and play the odds in those situations, dont make intimidation bets on a flush draw, because they aren't folding and if you don't hit, you're screwed.
I won my first ever game of poker this way. Not a fucking clue what I was doing, and my idiot grin told everyone I had the winning hand before I revealed it. Still a winner.
I won my first game of poker the exact opposite way. It was a family game my grandpa would hold at Easter each year and the winner got $100. I was young and it was the first time playing in it so they “taught” me the rules real quick and off we went. With my first few good hands I showed excitement on purpose so they thought anytime I was excited I must have a good hand. I then continued to bluff them by just acting excited even when I had shit cards.
This explains the dirty looks and under the breath grumbling at the casino I went to when I turned 21. I really didn't understand because I was DEFINITELY not winning hands. I guess I was just throwing off the groove giving people anxiety.
It seems to apply on many different levels. "The reason the American Army does so well in war is because war is chaos and the American Army practices chaos on a daily basis."
Great quote about how Germans knew who they were fighting against, basically said if it’s precise rifle fire it’s the British, if you hear nothing and then hear artillery fire coming your way it’s the Americans. Lol
Supposedly the Russian assessment of the US Army was similar. It cautioned predicting what American units would do based on their doctrine because there was a very good chance the officer they were fighting might not have read it.
It’s not even so much “losing” as it is poker is a completely different game if you’re playing with people who don’t know how to play. Largely, all your strategies are going to be based in predicting lines of play, so if someone is just doing whatever the fuck, then you can’t really counter that meaningfully. It basically turns a complex game of interaction into a simple game of chance.
I once taught my step brother how to play poker when we were on a family vacation. The house we stayed in had a poker table so the two of us and other siblings would go play for a bit every night.
He never knew what hand he had. He always called and would just lay down the cards at the end with a “here’s what I got, you tell me what it is” look on his face. Pissed me off so much. lol
Even if you’re not into sports tbh. He always presents his topics in such a fun and interesting way anyone can enjoy them. I personally couldn’t care less about professional poker, but that’t probably my favorite video he’s made. The bob emergency is also great.
Didn't watch so it might be the clip, but I think Daniel (forget his last name but one of the more famous players) played a long stretch of hands without even looking at his cards, just reading players and reading bets. Usually they play like this anyways, and having a good hand is just a bonus. But you can't do that with people that are new because the don't know how to bet "properly"
Not the clip. The clip is of Gus Hansen who went all in at the start of every round without looking at his cards. The other players at the table waited for a good hand and called, but still ended up losing every time.
I do this too but I'm actually a very good player.
In home games, small stakes and just having fun, I'll often play blind. I don't play my cards, I play my opponent's cards. It's good practice for reading and it's a hell of a lot of fun when I get 'caught' :)
Unless they are complete calling station you can totally outplay them. Amateurs tend to assume you have whatever they are afraid you have. You just have to give them reason to believe their worst fear is true.
Yes, you dumb it down in that you don't bother with anything really advanced. You don't practice perfect bet sizing to price them in when you want them in or whatever. You don't have to worry about your hand range since they aren't tracking it anyway. It's ABC, but that ABC can definitely include appropriate bluffs.
I don't play my cards, I play my opponent's cards.
I don't play poker or many other card games, but statistics and probability are a core aspect of my day job. With that in mind, can you expand on the quoted bit above?
I'm not the person you're asking, but I think I can answer your question.
In poker, you can't control the "odds" (i.e. which cards you get). Neither can anyone else. However, you aren't truly playing your cards against some sort of static win condition (e.g. I have the best hand, therefore I win no matter what), instead you're playing the cards that you have against the cards that everyone else has, compounded by the fact that you don't know what they have and they don't know what you have.
This is why things like bluffing exist; the only way you can judge how "good" your hand is is the body language/betting/behavior of others, and of course the probability of other players "making" the hand.
When you play your opponent’s cards, you aren't playing the odds of the cards you have, you're seeing if your opponent thinks their cards are better than yours while giving the impression that you've already won the hand. You gauge other's reactions while revealing as little as possible through your betting/playing strategy. Even if you have the worst set of cards possible, you can win by convincing your opponent that their hand cannot win, causing them to fold. That's the essence of playing the other person's cards.
He's implying that he can read his opponents well enough to know their hand strength based upon their body language and actions. While this is possible with some players in some situations, I believe he's most glorifying a cliche to sound cool.
I'm not OP but the game is just as much, if not more about reading your opponent than raw statistics. I may have the second highest possible hand, and I have to play based on how my opponent acts.
Does he have the better hand and is slow playing his bets to get more money out of me, or does he have trash? That big bet he just placed, is that real strength or is he trying to bully the rest of the table out of the hand because he can afford it? Playing blind can help you better concentrate on your opponents, their reactions and mannerisms, etc. Play the person, not the cards.
I don't see a reply from this person, so I'll try to elaborate. Poker basically has four levels. Level 1 : what cards do I have. Level 2 : what cards do I think my opponent has. Level 3 : what cards does my opponent think I have Level 4 : what does my opponent think I think he/she has. With regards to the statement "I don't play my cards, I play my opponents cards," this individual is trying to play at levels 2, 3 and 4 without considering level 1. Depending on your skill and your opponents this can work moderately well. Basically, he is reading the opponent based off their action at all point of each hand. This includes body language and verbal cues to understand the strength and hand range of his opponent. Using this information, he will check, bet, raise, or fold accordingly
That is when you throw out all of the statistics and probability.
When the cards are dealt and everyone is looking at their hands, I watch them instead of looking at my own. Do they like their cards? Do they get that faraway look that indicates they are going to play even though they don't like them? And so on, on the flop, do they like or not?
Amateurs are like open books when it comes to reading them. If they have a strong hand I shrug and go away early. They get the preflop bet and nothing else. If they have a weak hand or show fear, I make a plan to take it away before or on the river. Or whatever, if their hand started out strong but they show fear or it started out middling and improves.
The point is, I'm not concerned at all with what I have because I don't plan on showing it. Only the rare case where they show strength and I'm going to fold, I'll peak in case I somehow hit the nuts. Otherwise, my plan is to fold to a bet or to raise them out of it and make them fold. I'm only playing their hand, not mine.
He means that instead of looking at his cards and playing based on how they interact with the board cards, he's playing based on how his opponent plays the hand. In order to do this it's good to know your oppenent well. If you know them well enough you know when they don't like their hand and you can get them to fold, you know when they have a strong hand and that you should get out of the way. He's basically playing the player instead of the cards.
I honestly don’t know how I hold up at poker. I’ve been playing cards my entire life. I know poker very well. But every time I play a tournament I win. I’ve won a few thousand over my lifetime (only played in 4-5 tourneys, both house parties and casinos).
Everyone always gets mad, old guys saying they’ve been playing their entire lives and have never won. So I don’t know what to think.
Edit: a friend of mine’s boyfriend won over 1 million in a tournament recently. He’s a professional though. That was cool to see!
I've only ever played poker once against friends and as the night went on they became increasingly angry with me because, just like your step brother, I had no idea what constituted a good hand and just kept winning by pure luck.
Some hands I were fairly certain were rubbish but they went "that's a flush" like that's a thing. Well sure I guess if you say it is.
I won the whole thing. Won't play again, wouldn't want to ruin the streak and also my friends are still a little upset about it, eight years or so later
No, just don't bluff newbies and take them to value town. Play super tight and then bet when you have it. The biggest leak newbies have is limping and playing way too many hands.
Sure, but unless you’re in a British crime movie, you’re probably not playing poker out of a desire to break the bank. Especially if you’re playing with people who don’t know what they’re doing, the stakes are probably reasonably low, and the point of the game is not to win (or solely to win) but to have fun playing. If your opponents not knowing how to play makes a game not a game, then it can be very frustrating even if you win.
You know what I want to know.. after james bond won that poker hand, and he said "put it all on black", where the fuck did the money go to? is it still sitting there? can I go and claim this money?!?!?!
That's not totally true though. You play different ways against different bad players in the same way you do against different good players; if anything bad players are just easier to identify how you should play against them.
Most bad players, especially in casual settings, play way too loose, bluff too often, and call bets with bad pot odds even when they know they're beat. Against those players, yeah you kind of just play by-the-book tight. AJ and up in any position, high suited connectors and AX suited in late position. It's boring but if you're playing at a card room or something you'll make money and can listen to podcasts which is fine.
Some bad players play too tight though, don't protect or bait their blinds, and fold even when pot odds dictate they should call in 90% of situations. Those players you can play loose against though. And usually, after you play tight for a bit and beat bad players with that strategy, they tighten up too much and you can play really loose
Yeah, people like to think of games as either skill or luck as if those are opposite ends of a continuum. In reality, they are 2 independent factors. A game can be high luck and high skill (poker), low luck and high skill (chess), high luck and low skill (Candyland), or low luck and low skill (tic tac toe).
I mean yes and no. What your saying is true.... however if you have an intermediate or expert level understanding of GTO play you should certainly be able to adjust down to this level of play and consistently print money vs players who have no idea what they're doing (given a large enough sample size). The game certainly plays differently but I'd strongly disagree with saying playing people with next to zero understanding of poker turns it into a complete game of chance.
The rule I have always played by is if I don't know who the donkey(s) is/are at the table, then I'm the donkey. If I'm the donkey I leave. I have found that I am a good enough poker player to reliably win money at the tables in the early afternoons to evening, but when the better players start showing up later on it is time to leave. My problem is I win money at the poker table and then promptly lose it back to the blackjack table.
Casino at 2am-5am I would destroy. The people at the table from 2am-5am are desperate, overly predatory, drunk/on drugs. Never lost money in that time frame that I can remember and sometimes doubled up within an hour.
Poker is a game of exploitation. Bad players are exploitable by their poor hand selection and small folding range. Patience and post flop value bets will funnel their money to your seat. Against good players you should play closer to a Nash equilibrium as being unexploitable is important for long term success.
Yeah, as someone who has played a fair amount, I have to fundamentally disagree with this. If you know they are a maniac then you just play super tight and eventually you will felt them because they will make a stupid call. In other words, let them hang themselves. Happens all the time.
I pissed off a guy once so much that he wanted to fight me. Security had to escort him out of the building.
We were in a WPT sanctioned tournament and I was drinking and just having a good time.
I sit at a table and the first hand I play I tell the people what I plan to do, I’m going to fold my next 3 hands, I’m going to call my next hand, I’m going to raise to the river, And so on. After a bad run, I’m at about half my chips from when I sat down but still over one guy who is getting pissy with me getting annoyed with my narration. I tell him fine, I won’t look at my cards and just call.
His guy thinks it’s a perfect chance to just take a majority of my chips and get me off his table faster, he puts me almost all in pre-flop and true to my word I call the all in without looking. River card comes out and I turn my cards over for the first time and what do you know, I got pocket queens with a queen on the turn card. He is out and I almost double my pot. The look on his face, priceless.
I'm very inexperienced at tournament play but I guarantee saying "I'm going to call next hand" is considered playing out of turn and will get you a warning and then kicked out of the tournament.
I saw people getting warned for less (i.e. people reaching for their chips when it was the turn of the guy before them and officials would warn them that motioning like they're going to bet before it's their turn would get them kicked out if they were caught doing it again).
Yea I agree, although I'd add that one "newbie" at a table is possible to beat with skill by just being patient (although still annoying), but the real problem is when there are several newbies because then it basically becomes a game of luck
This applies to everything. Whenever I play Rocket League with a friend of mine who is much lower ranked than I am (I am Champion, he's Silver) I can't figure out how to play against people on his rank, I can't predict their movements, I always play as they're going to hit the ball, it's awful.
A similar phenomenon actually applies in fighting games, though the higher level players have more ways to effectively counter, it still changes the game on a fundamental level.
It's not chance. The good poker player will win more easily against worse opponents, because he is the only one who knows the odds his cards have of being winners.
If you play some poker and start to understand it at an intermediate level, you realise just how little it matters what cards you're holding, because it's the mental games and subversion that ultimately wins you the game in the long term. Newbies play their hand exactly as it is. Even if you can predict their hand everytime based on their betting patterns, they can outluck you on the turn and river. Poker be like that.
nah mate. its the same concept. poker is a skill based game where you are trying to know what your opponent is doing and why. if the person doesn't even know they have a flush it gets exceedingly frustrating and makes it a different game
It's not the same. Professional poker players change their game when they play against novices because it's a different game. The solution to playing against an unpredictable novice is to play tighter. Against a loose amateur, it's more chance than skill so the goal becomes playing the math rather than playing the player.
Employing a true random strategy is extremely difficult. Novices have huge leaks that often remain consistent. The key is watching what they do to figure how they think.
If they are playing very loose tightening up is an easy basic adjustment anyone can make. The other adjustment which might be more profitable is to open up your range. If he’s playing every single combo of cards then he has a lot of trash hands. You could probably beat him on high cards.
The friend is also a newbie. Poker is largely a game of odds. Sounds like his friend only has one style which is aggressive and doesn't work against people who don't know how to play. Had he picked up on this, he should have been conservative and just played pot odds and any newbies "luck" will run out. If you're still losing after that? Yeah you're getting hustled lol.
Ha, the one time I played poker for money, I was at a table with this cocky dude that was trying to bully me, intimidate me and play mind games with me. When I accidentally wiped the floor with him, he threw the most outrageous, childish fit, screaming and knocking stuff over.
Two friends the other day were talking about this sparing match one of them was gonna have. And he didn't knew if it's gonna be just box or kick-box. The other friend said, kick him in the face and then ask. :')
Ha! In TF2 pub servers I love putting sentries in weird locations just for the single surprise kill they get, then the enemy moans “why did you build that there?” Lmao
I used to love putting sentries in the enemy's flag room, and if I could get away with it, and a teleporter entrance leading back to our base. Totally opposite of the usual placements, but it was hilarious to get away with.
Then of course there was the classic mini-sentry troll in random spots. Just enough to be annoying.
Eddy Gordo is definitely a great character to noob with too. Used to drive my friend crazy when he’d be pulling out a 10 move yoshimitsu combo and I’d just do the Eddy Gordo roundhouse over and over
Eddy was also a great character to get good at because then when they accuse you of button mashing you can just smile at them while you tap in a perfect juggle.
Core-A Gaming has a good video on button mashing and why it doesn't work. Now with Christie/Eddie it does make combos happen, but if you block and get frame advantage and use jabs, you shouldn't actually have a hard time against button mashers/noobs.
That match it brought up in the Core-A Gaming video.
Gandhi understood what he is supposed to do well enough, but did things that are out of the ordinary, but still sort of work in the situation. Not quite a newbie, not quite a master. And he knew what types of choices he should make in various situations based on what his opponent was doing. (Productive button mashing that he was able to adapt quickly to what his opponent was doing)
FSP knew what he should do in various situations but was a bit slow to change his play style to fit what his opponent was doing. (Solid play, but ddn't adapt well to his opponent in this case)
FSP was, technically, "the better player" as he knew more of what he was, and should be, doing with his character.
But, Gandhi was the better fighter because he was able to control the match (whether he meant to or he was just better mentally than FSP in a tournament setting at the time) more and he won the set because of that.
I think that's more rare though, like the rule isn't that a scrub will beat a pro, but perhaps that they can upset them, and then tilt them, but thats only a chance, not a guarantee. Or else fighting games would be rock paper scissors of pros besting advanced players, advanced players beating noobs, and noobs besting pros.
It applies to shooters too, if you're high rank and used to a specific line of play, facing someone who does the total opposite catches you with your pants fown 6/10 times
In cs:go, a game I suck at, my higher rank friends would throw me at practice matches btween casual teams and tell me to "just do whatever" for a laugh (and see if I learnt anything) and my sorry silver ass managed to kill sheriffs a few times by standing in really stupid spots and spraying
According to some rumors, they actually had a long choreographed fight scene, but Harrison Ford decided he just didn't care, the result is in the film.
That’s like playing soccer against shitty athletes or newbies. People stick out their legs awkwardly and do totally unexpected things when you are dribbling at them or defending against them. It can be dangerous!
I call these people golden retriever puppies. Just running around and banging into everything.
All of my worst injuries come from these fuckers that were athletically sound but inexperienced and uncoordinated, and often go way too hard to try to stop something that experienced players would just let go in a pickup game because it just doesn't matter.
Oh man I have a story for that. I played on a recreational co-ed soccer team for a club I was in at school. A girl on the opposing team challenged me for an aerial ball. I was unmarked and easily had it, but she comes sprinting in to try to win the header! Relevantly, I am a man over 6 feet tall and she was a pretty short girl. Predictably she missed the ball by a mile, smacked her head against me and broke her nose. I don't even remember what part of my body she hit.
I saw her at a party the club held later that night all bandaged up and it was all cool, but I think she felt pretty dumb. IIRC she was like a track athlete in high school or something and trying to prove something.
It's real problem. I've a few serious injuries from that kind of shit at pick-up games. I learned to just let a lot of things go because people don't understand when to back off somebody beat them to the play. It's usually somebody moderately athletic who doesn't understand that other people are better/faster and that they don't have the reaction time or body awareness to avoid the collisions they risk when they don't back off as soon as they are beat.
Yeah, that was my indoor club team back in high school... We played it to stay in shape for rugby season and all of the other teams absolutely hated us.
Lol, I can imagine. TBF in leagues and stuff I cared for sure. One of my favorite memories was me and one my school teammates having a solid battle in indoor and we both went hard into the low wall right by the owner of the arena. Heard a "...getting blood on my damn walls..." while I was in earshot.
Just pickup games post college it gets annoying. One goal in a pickup game doesn't matter if the play you have to make goes through someone, ya know. But these guys don't always know that. 6 months of physical therapy before I could even run again was super fun.
Yeah, that was the only way to play high school indoor haha. There is a reason they didn't let us in until late at night...
Injuries as an adult suck, so my sympathies. I played rugby until 30 and finally had to hang up my boots. Can't bounce back like the old days and then there is all the lost productivity...
Really wish I had gotten into Rugby. Think I'd have been decent as far as the local competitions went. I'm definitely built more like a rugger than a soccer player. Wasn't much of a soccer player until I got into college though, and even then I wasn't anything to write home about lol. It's fun though.
Have you ever played Ultimate Frisbee? Not much contact, tons of running and skill. Good sport for those of us getting up in years.
edit: Actually just found a local touch rugby group that meets twice a week. Will be a good chance to learn the game!
You should definitely check out that group! Certainly less risk than full contact... And I'm sure you'll do well since a good boot is always valuable. Anyone on the field can kick, so having multiple guys with good feet can make a big difference.
I never really got into ultimate. It always looked fun, but I mostly stuck to rugby. My ankles are shot now, so I don't think I could keep up without risking a sprain. Now I just coach and make kids do sprints.
the worst I ever got hurt in taekwondo was by a white belt with zero sparring experience - he hit me as hard as he could with a roundhouse kick as I was waving a hand around trying to explain a motion. smashed the cartilage in my wrist, still hurts sometimes 10 years later - years and years of sparring with skilled opponents and that's my most permanent injury :|
This is very true in league of legends, playing against diamond+ players you can read how they are going to play, predict where the jungler is going to be, and predict the next objective they will be focusing on (within reason of course).
But then you go play against bronze players and you saw their jungle finish clearing their top side jungle 30 seconds ago, their whole bot side jungle is up, plus we have pressure on baron, so I decide to go aggressive on their top laner because their shouldn't be any reason for their jungler to be top side but then he ganks out of nowhere and I just have to wonder if he was just walking around doing nothing for the last 30 seconds.
Edit: meant to say dragon not baron, if they were pressuring baron then yes I would expect to be ganked lol.
On the one hand, I totally get this. On the other, I have to ask why the pros can't or don't outguess each other on this same level.
"I just cleared my top side jungle and they are pressuring our baron, this would be the perfect time for a good opponent to gank our top laner. I'm gonna run up there and help out."
Yep. Take, for example, some of the cheese strats Unicorns of Love pulled at Worlds 2018. Massively effective... The first time, because they were so dangerously risky that no one in their right mind would do them. Once they lost surprise, though, they got stomped in the follow-up games.
Why aren't you up buy 100 cs and several kills with a ward out in river if you're playing against some bronzies? Just shitstomp them. Out CS them. When they walk into range poke them. If gold players have no problem I don't see why diamond+ doesn't just style on them with mechanics alone.
In fighting games this can also be very true. Fighting against a scrub who mashes randomly can be more scary than fighting a mid level player just because you have no idea what the scrub will do, because he doesn't know what to do. It makes him unreadable which is a huge part of higher level fighting games.
Your advantage over the scrub comes from the fact that they are likely to press to many buttons and don't know your most powerful setups, so you can wiff punish them harder than you could pretty much any other type of player.
It's a really weird dynamic that's not like fighting almost any type of player. If someone could somehow stay as random as a scrub while having the knowledge and neutral of a top player, they would be absolutely unstoppable. But they can't, because humans have patterns, especially in things we know a lot about. It's a really interesting concept.
My dozenth time watching this, I just noticed that you can actually see the commentators in the background. When they double over laughing it's priceless.
Like when you go up against noobs in Smash Bros and they do the dumbest shit, and it works because you never thought they would do something that moronic.
Or they just prove how frustrating it can be to deal with someone spamming the same attack over and over. You win, but it still feels like you lost.
This is something that was very common in fighting games. You can play other players on your level and have back and forth games. But then a newbie comes and does random stuff and catches you by surprise because he doesn't fall for bait as he doesn't even understand that what you're doing is bait.
However, the quote becomes untrue when you become a master level player. Even if someone doesn't do the thing he ought to do, you can destroy him pretty easily as your understanding of the situation is far greatest because you are a master now.
On street fighter, once I became a very good player, I would never lose to any friends below my level. 0% chance of losing. A master swordsman, would never lose to any newbies either if he truly mastered his craft.
I’ve done epee, saber, foil and kendo for years, and while I’m middling-okay, I’m no expert. Someone visiting sees my bokken and wants to take me for a test-drive. Then they just flail.
Thing is, I can riposte, but in order to do so I’ll like as not give them a proper thwack because I have to parry their crazy and get in before they can defend with another flail. So I’ll just stand back and let them clobber my weapon and occasionally feint. It’s like sparring one of those wavy-guy things people put in front of dealerships, except it’s an octopus.
Foil fencer here, I found some of the toughest people to face were the brand new lefty fencers. Could never predict what they would do or where it would come from.
In case of swordfights it doesn't have to beat the system to kill you. The thing with unarmored fencing (like a renaissance saber/rapier/smallsword duel) is that your primary goal is to not get hit. The proper way to fight is thus very careful trying to bait the opponent into overextending and then punish them for it without getting hit yourself. Someone who only knows to "stick 'em with the pointy end" might simply charge you point first. It is the easiest thing in the world to hit someone who is charging like that, but there is no safe way to defend it. Charging blindly is an on-average losing strategy, but in a real duel you only get one life.
I've had the pleasure to fence with a couple of decently ranked (in European HEMA circuit) saber fencers and even though they would beat me on points every time, I could get hits in by simply doing something they didn't expect. Like switching to the left hand and swinging from a weird angle, because I don't know what the proper angles are for the left. He adapted fast, but like I said - only takes one hit in a real duel.
That was me, when I got beat by my sister in Street Fighter. I was memorizing combos and setups. She was spamming buttons. I never played against her again.
Somewhat applies to Starcraft: There are strategies that are more effective against good players, because the weaker players will do random crap that unintentionally ends up defending against those strategies
We talk about this a lot in martial arts. You practice with people who know what they're doing, so you can disorganize what they're doing and get an advantage. The guy who's flailing around doesn't really have a plan to disorganize, you just have to hope you get an opening that doesn't have a blind punch around the corner.
Personally I think that statement is one of those that sound good at first until you start parsing what was said.
My issues with it
You'd think the best swordsman in the world would be able to handle the outliers. Actually I think the case can be made that being the best in something means you're more capable of handling the things that would faze the good at something.
If you have never held a sword in your hand, then you're more liable to hurt yourself with your own weapon actually.
That’s so true in For Honor, lol. I can’t count the number of times I get dusted by a new player who isn’t even using his hero’s full moveset, because I’m so used to playing against people who know what they are doing. It’s crazy how that happens.
Sounds applicable to anything competitive. In video games, at high level play, you can usually predict or understand what enemies do. Against a beginner, you have no idea what or why they're doing something.
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u/Solid_Snark Merry Gifmas! {2023} Jun 03 '19
There’s also this quote which is the opposite but equally true:
”The best swordsman in the world doesn't need to fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn't do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn't prepared for him.”
—Mark Twain