The Razors of House Dolour’s Expeditionary Force

1. Pillage, then burn.
2. Range support covers a multitude of sins.
3. Range support and friendly fire should be easier to tell apart.
4. Never turn your back on an enemy.
5. Once is happenstance. Twice is a coincidence. Three times is a pattern.
6. When in doubt, empty your quiver.
7. Perception is not reality. You may choose to ignore reality but reality is never going to ignore you.
8. Do unto others.
9. People who say the ends justify the means are either unable or unwilling to find better means.
10. Don't break anybody's heart, they have only one. Break their bones, they have 206.
11. Marksmen motto: Only you can prevent friendly fire.
12. Your name is in the mouth of others: be sure it has teeth.
13. The longer everything goes according to plan, the bigger the impending disaster.
14. If your attack is going well, you have walked into an ambush.
15. If you're not willing to attack your own position, you're not willing to win.
16. Don't be afraid to be the first to resort to violence.
17. If violence wasn’t your last resort, you failed to resort to enough of it.
18. If the price of collateral damage is high enough, you might be able to get paid to bring ammunition, magic items, and material components home with you.
19. The enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy, no more, no less.
20. A little trust goes a long way. The less you use, the further you'll go.
21. Never attribute to stupidity that which is adequately explained by malice.
22. If you're leaving tracks, you're being followed.
23. If the enemy is in range, so are you.
24. That which does not kill me has made a tactical error.
25. There is no 'overkill.' There is only ‘shoot’, and 'I need more ammunition.'
26. Not all good news is enemy action.
27. No good deed goes unpunished. No bad deed should go unpunished either.
28. "They'll never expect this" means "I want to try something stupid."
29. If it's stupid and it works, it's still stupid and you're lucky.
30. Always check around doors and corners. Curiosity did not, in fact, kill the cat. Carelessness did.
31. There's a fine line between genius and insanity. Tread carefully.
32. If it will blow a hole in the ground, it will double as an entrenching tool.
33. The size of the combat bonus is inversely proportional to the likelihood of surviving to collect it.
34. Don't try to save money by conserving ammunition.
35. Weapons, poisons, and magic items exist for a singular purpose - to be used.
36. Incoming attacks have the right of way.
37. Be courteous, be professional, and always have a plan to kill everyone or everything you meet.
38. No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.
39. Don't expect the enemy to cooperate in the creation of your dream engagement.
40. Always have a backup plan. It's all fun and games until someone loses it.
41. If you find yourself in a fair fight, you didn’t plan your attack properly.
42. Every client is one missed payment away from becoming a target.
43. Every target is one bribe away from becoming a client.
44. When a client says is ‘Very pleased with your work’, it means ‘Now go hurt some people and break their stuff.’
45. Let them see you sharpen the sword before you fall on it.
46. The army you've got is never the army you want.
47. The intelligence you've got is never the intelligence you want.
48. It's only too many troops if you can't pay them.
49. It's only too many weapons if they're pointing in the wrong direction.
50. The pen is mightiest when it writes orders for swords.
51. Two wrongs is probably not going to be enough.
52. Don't complain about training. The more you sweat in training, the less you'll bleed in battle.
53. The best techniques are passed down by the survivors.
54. Anything worth doing will make a mess.
55. Anything worth fighting for is worth fighting dirty for.
56. Any weapon's rate of fire is inversely proportional to the number of available targets.
57. Don't bring big explosions into small rooms.
58. The nobles know how to do it by knowing who can do it.
59. An ounce of sniper is worth a pound of suppressing fire.
60. Necessity is the mother of deception.
61. If you can't carry money, carry a weapon.
62. Negotiating from a position of strength does not mean you shouldn’t also negotiate from a position near the exits.
63. Sometimes rank is a function of firepower.
64. Failure is not an option. It is mandatory. The option is whether or not to let failure be the last thing you do.

## References

1. The Seventy Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries
2. Binary Soul