Studying these cards will enhance your capacity to compete successfully and not be fooled by strategies rivals play against you. This means you will have a greater capacity to get what you want despite those who would rather see you fail.

You could spend thousands of dollars to attend seminars and courses in order to learn the information presented by the Art of War: Sun Tzu Strategy Card Deck. Or you could enhance your power to succeed right now for a fraction of the cost. The situation is critical. Which card will you play?

The Art of War: Sun Tzu Strategy Card Deck is made from the finest quality casino grade card stock

Representative Content:

Card Ace of Spades

• Title ELIMINATE YOUR ADVERSARY
• Strategy Terminate your adversarys present and future participation in the engagement.
• Basis Eliminating your adversary undermines his capacity to oppose you.

Card Queen of Hearts

• Title CREATE SOMETHING FROM NOTHING
• Strategy Demonstrate your willingness to bluff so your adversary doubts your real actions.
• Basis An adversary that doubts the reality of your actions may leave your initiatives unchallenged.

Card Jack of Clubs

• Title - CHANGE THE SCOPE OF THE ENGAGEMENT
• Strategy Expand or limit the field of action until key measures of advantage fall into your favor.
• Basis Decisive advantages often reside within alternative boundaries.

The cards are divided into four equal parts as follows:

Elimination All spades involve the elimination of something. That something may be an adversary, an option, an objective, time, etc. You make something go away.

Isolation All diamonds involve the isolation of something. This something may be an adversary, an option, an objective, time, etc. You separate something from something else.

Preparation of the Field of Contest All clubs involve shaping the field of contest. You create the conditions, such as confusion on the part of your adversary, that better allow you to accomplish your goal.

Preparation of Self All hearts involve shaping yourself. You set your disposition as best suited to reach your goal and present your adversary with appearances that favorably influence his actions.

Each strategy card provides a memorable title, a definition of the strategy, and a basis from which the strategy works. You reach your goal by enacting one or more strategies together at the same time or in sequence. The strongest combination of strategies tends to have at least one representative member from each card suite.

For conflict strategy, these four elements of preparing the self, preparing the battlefield, isolating and eliminating follow a natural logic. Consider the wolf. The wolf, as an entity, is optimized for the hunt - hearts. It seeks optimal ground for the hunt - clubs. On the hunt, it isolates its intended quarry from the herd - diamonds. Then it goes in for the kill - spades.

Likewise, a professional will prepare himself for a contest - hearts, set the stage for the contest - clubs, isolate key issues from the distractions - diamonds, and then close on the matter at hand - spades.

StratEffects

A game for the world as it is

(This game can be used for training and to solve real world problems.)

1. Select a strategic problem to solve.
2. Describe what the problem is and what the problem means.
3. Build a cause and effects chain forward and backward from the problem. For example, if the problem is I do not have outside support, meaning I will have to proceed on my own, you might go forward with I will have to proceed on my own, meaning I will have to succeed with the resources I have, and then I will have to succeed with the resources I have, meaning I will have only one chance to reach my objective. You might go backward with I have moved beyond the capacity of my support to reach me, meaning I do not have outside support, and before that, my objective is remote, meaning I have to move beyond the capacity of my support to reach me. Go forward and backward at least two steps from the central problem; branches are acceptable. (Within reason, the broader your cause and effects chain or net, the better your potential result.)
4. Deal at least five Strategy cards from the Art of War: Sun Tzu Strategy Card Deck to each player.
5. Allow each player, on successive turns, to apply a Strategy card anywhere along the cause and effects chain to include supporting previously played cards in a way that supports the resolution of the original strategic problem. For the example in #2 above, the card 10 of Diamonds, FEINT IN THE EAST, ACT IN THE WEST, evokes the possibility that you might draw an adversary away from your objective thereby eliminating your need for support at the objective. Queen of Hearts, CREATE SOMETHING FROM NOTHING, evokes the possibility you might cause your adversary to believe you have support even though you do not. You might further develop the Queen of Hearts by playing the 3 of Clubs, SOW A DISCORD, that evokes the possibility you might allow your adversaries to discover secrets that are actually false the secret in this example being that your support has greater reach than it does.
6. Draw cards to replace those used.
7. Play until you have a plan, succeed at a plan, or until cards run out.
8. For real world problems, play is continuous as the situation changes.
9. You win as a team by solving the strategic problem, though a moderator or group consensus can award the designation of winner for training games.

You may also be interested in "Understanding Sun Tsu on the Art of War" by Robert L. Cantrell