The tides of progress were an elusive thing, after all. As simple as it might have seemed to a man looking at it for the first time, when they saw how Oliver extended his advantage, with feint after feint, growing his lead all the way to two steps, that was a mistaken interpretation.
It was as simple as the idea that work would lead to progress. There was a correlation, but they were not one and the same. On a strategy board, reckless advancing would leave troops overextended and vulnerable to extreme tactics. The same was true of the gaining of initiative in one one-on-one combat – take too much of it, too quickly, with not enough sense for the game, and you would be playing with fire. Rather than making your position stronger, you would be revealing weaknesses for the enemy to exploit.
