fog of war

there are things i know and things i don't. i move my units of troops across the game map, and the lights reveal everything that can be seen and known. these units of mine are crack troops. they do not fire upon anyone who is a friendly, stumbling out from cover unexpectedly. their guns never jam. i can sit down with a spreadsheet and measure exactly how many will die in an encounter with different numbers of my enemies. i know exactly how much they will eat, and how much they will hurt across the map if i push them too hard.

there's a fog of war across the map. i do not know what my enemy knows. i do not know what i do not know.

when i am not driving them forward they must be cleaning their guns. they must never talk to each other because they know that in the next assault the numbers of things will mean that some of them will die.

they move in silence, like ants.

i haven't played starcraft 2, yet. i think maybe i'm thinking too hard about the story of things, in the fog between what would be real and where the pleasure is supposed to be found.