The Mathematics of Scratch Seven

Abstract

The well-received 2020 science fiction novel To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini introduced a novel card game, Scratch Seven, said to be played by Spacers in the 23rd century. The game appears to be based on a mathematical object called a Fano plane, which in turn seems to underlie important structural elements of the novel. This paper will only touch on literary criticism, the main foci are theoretic optimal play in Scratch Seven and useful playing advice in practice.

Keywords: Game theory, combinatorics, modular arithmetic, Paolini, Scratch Seven, To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, Science Fiction, Poker, Gambling, Card Games

JEL Classification: C72, A10