Ask HN: Your favorite IP-law war story?

Care to contribute a "war story" -- carefully anonymized -- of some trade secret or patent business, that worked out especially well or badly?

Here's one of my own. While working for a small, underfunded startup, I built some novel code. Another employee managed most of our dealings with the patent attorney. His summary of their talks: "X doesn't understand. I mean he really doesn't understand." Moral of the story: Expect to pay well for the time of any competent patent attorney.

Selfish motive for the post: I expect to be seeking advice soon from an attorney skilled in patent research, trade secret protection, and IP monetization strategy in general.