No problem! There's a lot of card effects so it can be hard to keep track of, or even categorize sometimes. Don't worry about memorizing cards if it gets in the way of having fun - if playing physical paper MTG, most people are reasonable enough to explain what their cards do if you ask!
The best way learn things is to build the deck you want and have fun playing with other people, and to see cool stuff people are doing.
Of course Ukraine wanted Russia to leave Ukranian territory? That's like saying Taiwan wants Taiwanese territory even though China has been complaining on the world stage for 50+ years. Borders have always tragically been enforced through the use of force.
And I don't think the seperatists were as organized as people think - because almost immediately after the first cease fire, a group of seperatists attacked an airport here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_Donetsk_Airport
I'm wondering if instead if maliciousness among all the seperatists, it was disorganization. Even if someone was acting as commander, it only works if someone recognizes that person's command.
I'm not sure there's any blameless parties here other than the civilians. Russia used scummy US-esque actions - funding seperatists in a country that isn't theirs and now doing their own forever war trying to play "global cop"; the seperatists who attacked the airport didn't honor the original agreement pissing off Ukraine; and Ukraine pulled an Isreal and escalated things way too far in retaliation.
Probably the card design categories as well, since if you know a lot of the categories you know what strategies to expect, or even build.
Things like
Removal - spells and abilities that get rid of permanents you don't like
Board wipes - cards that clear the board of all creatures (including your own), and sometimes other permanents too.
Ramp - cards that get your more mana than you're usually "supposed" to have at a stage in the game.
Card Draw - spells or abilities with the magic words "draw a card", or something similar
Looting - spells and abilities that discard a number of cards and draw a number of cards.
Wheels - spells that discard your entire hand and draw a number of number of cards.
Cantrips - a minor effect with the words "draw a card" tacked onto it.
Xerox spells - 1-2 mana Cantrips with the only effect being some library manipulation + "draw a card". Usually blue.
Counters - spells and abilities with the magic words "counter target spell", sometimes with a condition for the counter. Usually blue.
Beaters - big creatures
Mill cards - cards that put the top card(s) of someone's libraries into your graveyard.
Reanimators - cards that drag a creature from a graveyard to the battlefield
Clones - cards that enter as a copy of something
Tribal - cards that care about creature types, like goblins, angels, etc.
Burn - spells and abilities that directly damage your opponents. Usually red.
Stax - cards that interfere with the normal plans of both you and each of your opponents, hopefully your opponents a lot more
Tutors - spells and abilities that search for a specific card in your library
Fog effects - spells and abilities that prevent all damage for a turn, usually from creatures.
Any I'm missing?
Yeah, the US defense department is salviating at sending supplies to Ukraine and funding an extremely cheap proxy war with Russia.
I agree with you that Ukraine isn't "a perfect country of sunflowers" like a lot of news orgs seemingly claim. The Donbass border situation is a massive shitshow of corruption and incompetence. I don't like my taxes going towards sketchy corrupt regimes either.
Russia isn't blameless either. They still performed their own proxy war with Ukraine by funding seperatist rebels in donbass, and they still invaded a sovereign nation US "global cop" style. I'd be a hypocrite if I didn't critisize Russia for the same type of behavior the US did in Afganistan and Iraq.
The article is garbage, becuase it assumes NATO acts as a cohesive unit beyond being a defensive alliance with a required (and barely enforced) 2% GDP expenditure. NATO as a whole will never send troops to Ukraine - the US and some of its allies MIGHT send aid beyond sending military supplies, but member states are never required to send aid outside of article 5 invasion triggers. Members are never kicked out or penalized in the alliance if they choose to not participate in the US's forever wars.
NATO did nothing in Donbass. It was Ukraine and a Russia backed seperatist movement making a series of cease fires, both sides ignoring them over and over, and way too many lives tragically lost. Donbass is not Russian or NATO territory.
Yes there was an very harsh coup. Yes the following election was controversial. But the brutal world is Russia had zero reason to care outside of either US style "global cop" warmongering, or extreme paranoia with Ukraine maybe someday joining a defensive alliance. Ukraine is a sovereign nation, and their shitshow should have been their own.
If Russia truely cared about the Crimean people, instead of annexing them for empire building, they'd have opened their borders to Ukrainian migrants and refugees. They chose to invade.
This isn't a war between "NATO and Russia", this is a war between Ukraine and a Russia that is either Warmongering in a sovereign nation to empire build, or a Russia that is Isreal levels of paranoid.
I read the report, and it only says instances where ceasefire were violated.
So I looked up why there was border shelling in the donbas region, and found a French article here. Its a bit goofy in trying to make France look good in the situation, but it is a French source, and importantly, it's neutral towards both parties.
And a source from All Jezeera for context in 2020: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/7/29/ukraine-ceasefire-violated-more-than-100-times-within-days-osce
The timeline for the ceasefire violations seem to look like:
In 2020, Donbass has had an over 20 ceasefire agreements broken. Ukraine and Russian backed rebel groups blame eachother, and its hard to determine who is the overall aggressor.
Ceasefire aggreements between Ukraine and Rebels in the region aren't worth the toilet paper they are written on since they keep firing at each other and breaking them in 2022.
US says Russia likely to invade due to troop movements near border. Russia denies. Ukraine doesn't trust Russia after the Crimean annexation.
There is shelling near the border and Ukraine is mad. Russian backed seperatists in the eastern region seem to be to blame for escalation?
Ukraine fires back accross border ("north 122 shells" from the OSCE report in the Donbass region). The TASS article claims this is the starting point of aggression.
The 2000+ ceasefire violation shitshow occurs from both sides in the Donbass region. US continues to think Russia will invade Ukraine.
Russia invades Ukraine. NATO starts sending weapons to Ukraine after a while, etc.
So at second and third glances, it looks like the situation is a lot more "he said she said" than straight up "Ukraine performed a bunch of ceasefire violations Donbass." and TASS wasn't exactly representing the full situation. You can't trust direct Russian or Ukrainian sources because they are at war, and will be extremely biased in favor of their country's politics.
More recent news of a Wagner official admitting to founding a troll farm - Not to say the article is incorrect at hillary being an unliked candidate in 2016.
Tass is russian controlled state media, and it's not wise to trust direct Ukrainian Government or Russian Government sources during wartime.
Is there a clear source on the ceasefire violations? Like is the OSCC report reliable? Most news spurces seem to be a bunch of "Russia did it first / Ukraine did it first" accusations like the one here:
Ukraine was practicing to blow up the dam and even hit a valve before.
Do you have any neutral sources on this like telegram sources? The only sources I can find are far right RT spam.
Ukraine used water as a weapon with Crimea and blew up the Kerch bridge which justified Russia’s attacks on civilian infrastructure.
I'm not surprised that Ukraine blew up bridges, since blowing up bridges is very much in line with NATO-esque doctrine. It makes sense they'd do that after their military "decommunization" training with foreign militaries.
On situations like Japan, there seems to be a trend of income and purchasing power with having children. If people want children, but can't afford them... They won't have them.
You can see a higher percentage of wealthy people having children vs a lower percentage of working poor people having children everywhere. The only way to increase childbirths naturally is to make working affordable to support them.
It makes sense for allied countries to have bases in eachother's countries - the US is famous for this. Especially near a country China keeps declaring is the worst thing ever in their propoganda.
Interesting how it wasn't a public base though.
It does cool things, but it's definitely a "Mark Rosewater designs a perpetual card that stays on the side" design. Like dungeons, attractions, day/night, etc.