Cognitive Scaffold

Preparing your thinking workspace

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MENTAL MODEL · M7016

Thirty-Six Stratagems

Thirty-Six Stratagems
DecideHigh supportGame Theory
Included
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Version 1.0.0 · Updated 2026-07-30

CORE DEFINITION

A collection of 36 strategic stratagems from ancient Chinese military science, divided into six sets: - Winning Stratagems, Enemy Dealing Stratagems, Attacking Stratagems, Chaos Stratagems, Combined Stratagems, and Defeat Stratagems. Examples include: Crossing the Sea by Deceiving the Sky, Besiege Wei to Rescue Zhao, Kill with a Borrowed Knife, Wait at Ease for the Exhausted Enemy, Make a Feint to the East while Attacking in the West, and Retreat is the Best Option.

SCAFFOLDING EFFECT

psychology

Reduce cognitive load

A library of strategic thinking patterns. Each stratagem is an abstraction of a strategy pattern for a specific situation. When facing a game situation, one can retrieve and match the appropriate strategy pattern rather than thinking from scratch.

anchor

Anchor fast decisions

Summarizes military strategies into thirty-six categories (six sets: Winning, Enemy Dealing, Attacking, Chaos, Combined, and Defeat), providing a situational strategy menu.

MINIMUM ACTION

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Source support: Explicit

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    en.wikipedia.orghttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty-Six_StratagemsZH · Explicit
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