Thoughts
There’s an exchange in a book where two characters are sparing with wooden swords. One guy slips past the other man’s guard and is about to
hit him when the other man brings his left hand up and catches the sword with his palm. The first man kind of hurrumphs and says ‘where I’m from, we teach people to always treat practice swords as real swords.’ And the man who caught the swords says, ‘where I’m from, we teach people to tell the difference between a practice sword and a real sword.’
Okay so 10/10 quip, but I think there’s a useful distinction being made here. “Always follow best practices” sounds good, but it should never come at the cost of understanding why the practice exists or when it is *actually* needed.
Of course the real punchline in the book is when the second guy says ‘I can do it with real swords too’ and shows a scar down the middle of the palm of his left hand.
I don’t remember the book. It might have been the Queen’s Thief series or that other one that always confuse it with (false prince or something).
Edit :18: I think the book is The Runaway King, the sequel to The False Prince. It can’t be The Queen’s Thief because the guy gets his hand cut off in like book 1.