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erzherzog-von-edelstein · 3 years ago

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what do you think the relationship is like between Austria and prussia is like ? , are they like cousins who can’t stand each other or what ?

On the most general level, I think I take a much more favorable view of their relationship than most people who write about them. Because I see a lot of them hating each other and being unable to stand each other, and that is not how I see it. So, fair warning, long post ahead.

If I can tangent a bit, I think the common image of them comes from the fact that they are the only significant canon German states that we have, so it creates a kind of dichotomy that could be buffered by adding other German states who balance out the dynamic. Because with just the two of them, it becomes more of a “who gets to influence Ludwig” push and pull custody battle. There isn’t really room for them to be on the same side or to work together in the political arena, because having the two set up of such opposing personalities makes it seem like there will inevitably be conflict and there is no one else to balance that out. This is why I have felt the need to introduce other German states in Unification before I wrote more of it and then I got distracted and still haven’t written more.

Also introducing them in canon with possibly one of the worst points in their shared history does not help either. Of course they’re going to look like they hate each other from the perspective of the Seven Years War. Canon does much the same thing by introducing Russia and Prussia’s dynamic through the Battle on the Ice.

So, with all that clarifying out of the way, here’s my take on them:

- First off, I know I have clarified this before, but it is always worth saying. The German states all call each other cousins though they do not know how they are actually related to each other. Cousin is the easiest way to explain it without trying to sort out the specifics. The irony is that Gilbert and Roderich are actually first cousins

- So, to avoid starting at a bad point, let’s discuss the crusades. The Teutonic Knights were founded as a crusading order, so Gil certainly had contact with other orders and with the kingdoms that were involved. And the dukes of Austria were involved in crusading as well as financing the Holy Orders. There is a rather amusing instance of Austria bullying a young Arthur for his lunch money, but I’ll get into that some other time. That would be the point where Roderich and Gilbert met each other. Gil as a young knight and Rod as an ascendant Duchy within the Holy Roman Empire. If I could sum up their relationship at this point, it would be what their position dictated at the time. Gil, the knight, showing proper deference to a lord, no matter how much he disliked bowing to anyone.

- In the years between the crusades and the War of Austrian Succession there is relatively little between them, which makes sense considering their geographical distance between them. There are a few points of interest though:

- First, Austria was generally friendly to Poland, though there was a war when Austria tried to force the election of a Habsburg monarch that was ultimately unsuccessful. I wouldn’t describe Rod as supporting Poland really, he was basically forced out of Polish politics and then decided he had other priorities anyway. This indifference meant that I doubt Gil would really add him to the list of people he hates because they supported Poland, that list is basically just Saxony and Lithuania (though we could absolutely also add Hungary there too)

- Second, it may be a bit of a given, but Austria was part of the massive conflagration in the German states over Martin Luther in the early 17th century. Brandenburg-Prussia was a part of the Protestant side of the Thirty Years War, but in all fairness it was more of a victim as Sweden left a bloody swathe through the German states (the losses in Brandenburg are absolutely staggering.) I hesitate to assign friendships and hatreds based on the Thirty Years War, because the German states basically all ended up bitter at the end.

- Third, and perhaps the best one to lay the groundwork for what comes next, the elevation of the Elector of Brandenburg to King in Prussia was approved and supported by the Holy Roman Emperor, who was a Habsburg at that point. So, Roderich was directly involved in the first step to Gilbert’s rise to prominence. For that period, he was trying to act like a kind of mentor and support to Prussia. Of course, Gilbert viewed this as patronizing, but Roderich was approaching it with some good will.

-The War of Austrian Succession and the Seven Years War are a huge low point for them. It’s when they viewed each other as the greatest adversary. For Gilbert it was toppling a giant to add to his own prestige, and he viewed Rod as an obstacle to overcome. Rod viewed it as a stab in the back and a massive insult after he had supported him before.

- A lot of this feud died with Fritz and Maria Theresa. As much as I would love to imagine Gil playing 4D chess to permanently supplant Roderich as the most powerful German state, that’s not really what happened. In fact, Joseph II admired Fritz and did not carry on his mother’s strongly anti-Prussian campaign.

Look at all the tension in this meeting between Fritz and Joseph II. I mean, there’s a certain kind of tension, but we’ll ignore that.

- Which takes me neatly to the Napoleonic Wars, or nearly. Both of them recognized the threat to stability that was the French Revolution, and combined forces to invade France and restore stability. The French were able to keep them at bay. But, putting this in terms of Rod and Gil’s relationship with each other, they decided they didn’t dislike each other enough to prevent them working together. Rod had a personal reason to intervene on behalf of the queen, but Gil agreed with him because they are actually remarkably politically similar. When it came to liberalism and the threat of Revolution, they were absolutely on the same page.

- The Napoleonic Wars are something of a mess to explain all the alliances, but suffice it to say that Rod and Gil were on the same side for most of it. And when it came to the alliance that actually defeated Napoleon, their ability to work closely with each other was vital. Put bluntly, if they really hated each other they would not have been able to get rid of that little Corsican.

- Aside from a few points of political tension in the Congress of Vienna (Saxony and Poland mostly), they were generally on board with creating a new vision of Europe. If anything, the Napoleonic Wars allowed them to bury the hatchet of their previous conflicts and to move forward together. The German Confederation allowed them a place to take their issues without coming to blows. It was something meant to improve their relationship and prevent war, and for a time it worked.

- I cannot emphasize enough how Prussia was willing to follow Metternich’s general plan for Europe, because it’s the biggest piece of evidence against them being eternal enemies. The Concert of Europe was a group project, and Austria just happened to be leading it.

- Of course, the Revolutions of 1848 kind of blew that up for a time. Granted, though the Frankfurt Parliament weighed them against each other as potential German leaders, I would not say that Rod and Gil saw each other as enemies at this point. They were both staunchly anti-liberal, and neither would have accepted a crown from a revolutionary mob. They saw each others as collaborators in returning the previous status quo.

- One person changed all of this, like the giant of history that he is. Graf Otto von Bismarck. He made a point of strengthening Prussia at Austria’s expense, which ended the political co-existence. But, even then, Bismarck mulled over the necessity of war with Austria, because forcing that kind of direct conflict would ruin the decades of peace between the German states. Fully turning against Austria was a heavy decision. Gilbert mirrored this feeling I think. He didn’t want to hurt Roderich really. Why would he? They had supported each other for half a century, and been relatively consistent allies. But, Roderich was going to be an obstacle to German Unification, and Gilbert couldn’t avoid that fight. Also, I think the English translation of the name of that war makes it was more dialectic than it was. I do prefer the German “German War” or “Brothers War” because that’s ultimately what it was, half of the German states against the other half, not just Prussia and Austria.

- And again, it is clear that Gil didn’t actually want to hurt Roderich with the war, because he elected not to invade Vienna or to make any demands for land. This was an incredibly lenient treaty, especially compared to what Prussia would do to France. The exclusion from the German Confederation, as critical as it was for both of them going forward, was not a particularly spiteful action on Gil’s part. He just needed to make sure he wasn’t competing with someone with a stronger claim to being German emperor (because the Habsburgs had held the title of Emperor of the Germans for a very long time.)

- And in the First World War they were on the same side, and I cannot help but imagine Gilbert immediately going to help his old ally when it was clear that the Habsburgs were floundering. Not that it prevented the collapse of the empire for either of them. Perhaps the greatest irony of it all is that even with all the scheming and plotting, the Habsburgs and the Hohenzollerns fell from power at exactly the same moment anyway.

- After the war Gilbert helped Roderich get back on his feet, since the loss was absolutely debilitating for him. From there they rekindled the rather warm relationship they had in the early 19th century, this time without the political machinations because neither of them were particularly powerful anymore.

And....I was going to use this post to also state my feelings on PruAus as a ship, but since this has gotten absurdly long already I will wait for another ask.

#hws austria #hws prussia #historical hetalia

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samurai-kohaku · 5 years ago

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There are people in this world that naturally would have and should have died and or be somewhere else geographically, and most of them know it, they know they're out of place. Not at all unusually out of place, but actually more normal than the majority since they have reverted to primal instincts. The unusual ones are the masses, the 90% are the freaks of nature, the ones that don't belong, and the ten percent are the ones being smothered to very near death, the ones that rightfully deserve what the shitstains get easily, too easily. We have to fight much much harder for our amenities and necessities, we have to dig through scum too get what's ours.

Government and society have made it so that we live the most unnatural lives possible, forcing us to revert to the animals we were, fighting for bits and pieces we wouldn't normally have to fight for. NORMALLY, things we need come so naturally that it's not a problem, but it is very well a problem now, ripping food from the mouths of starving children on the streets. Through history the poor had to feed from the greedy rich to survive, now the rich are eating the poor. We're feeding the demons by sitting idly by, the masses need to stand up and speak their word, and not just any word, but one they've thought their whole life about, perfected, for the good of the people. We need a cyborg Robin Hood.

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tinydooms · 3 years ago

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Do Rick, Evie or Jonathan play games with any of the things haunting their English manor? like, does anyone go into the attic every few days to see how the chess pieces on the board have moved, make their play and then leave to come back a few days later to see the counter move?

You know, that's actually a really good question. And the answer is: I'm not sure. I think the supernatural entities in the English house and the house's mortal denizens exist mostly in a comfortable state of ignoring each other, save for occasional offerings to the Little God and sometimes talking aloud to them.

Case in point: one winter the electricity was on the fritz; it just kept crapping out, and Rick, tired and cold and exasperated, stood in the middle of the upstairs corridor and loudly asked that the electricity be allowed to function properly, " because I'm cold and I'm really tired of this, and we have a new baby who I don't want freezing to death, and if you're going to haunt this place, you've got to put up with some modernity for at least the parts of the year when we're here".

The electricity worked perfectly after that.

#asks and answers #prompts #The Mummy

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oldfritz · 4 years ago

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this was surprisingly hard because half of them I wanted to throw in f, but then felt guilty about it so here’s where we are. explanations under the cut to be nice (fair warning: I’m writing this while tipsy so this is a journey)

S-tier

Old Fritz: look me in the eyes. look at me. are you looking? good. where else was I was going to put him? where? in C with the other losers? foolish. I am ruining my life for this man, I’m going to go into debt so I can be moderately qualified to write books on him so Tim Blanning and Christopher Clark don’t boo my off the stage. I sit here sometimes and I’m like ‘y’know, I would start a podcast to talk about his life’ as if I’m some straight white guy who thinks any of you want to listen to me for an hour. he’s a bastard, a smug bastard, and is the epitome of self-destructive tendencies. and, honestly, I wouldn’t mind if he wasn’t so fucking misogynistic all the time. ‘oh women aren’t fit to rule’ shut up Fritz before I time travel to fuck your wife and make her have one night where life feels worthwhile. but he’s funny, I enjoy how he does foreign policy, and he’s unfortunately relatable to me. cheers, Fritz. here’s to never being satisfied from one gay disaster with anger issues to another. may we burn in hell together

A-tier

Friedrich iii: “Suzanne, he was only on the throne for 99 days!! how can he be this high up when some of these bastards refused to die?” I hear you, my friends, and I have answers. I’ll tell you two words you’ll be shocked to hear put together: liberal Hohenzollern. a rare breed, isn’t it? imagine, friends, a world where he got over his throat cancer because he listened to a doctor and we get through the 1910s, 20s, even the 30s without Wilhelm II Electric Boogaloo being in power. Prussia is still on the map, the Anglo-Prussian alliance is strong, and I live in peace. but no. this stupid man had to keep smoking. because he’s selfish and doesn’t care about my needs. you know, he actually loved his wife. rare in this family. loved her and wasn’t abusive. the bar is so low, guys. and his wife is amazing too, Victoria. the world would’ve been in competent hands if they’d been in power longer (and Bismarck would’ve been out of a job still but at least these guys are smart. their son inherited grandma Vicki’s IQ). I would sleep with both of them and would thank them for the honor (when it should always be the other way around, remember that)

B-tier

Friedrich I: if your name is Friedrich and only Friedrich, we’re buds. that’s my rule. I have to give him credit where credit’s due. he was the first. while I agree with Fritz in his proscription that he was ‘small in big ways and big in small ways’ (I may have flipped that around), he wasn’t a bad guy. he just was born into the wrong job for him. I appreciate that he rode on his father’s coattails of proving useful to the Habsburgs and did a little himself to get that sweet, sweet kingship. smart move. I also like that he saw Louis XIV and said to himself “I stan, I kin, on God we’re gonna do that’ and tried. only for have his stupid, ungrateful, unclassy son to do away with that. I, too, am a woman of luxury and self-indulgance and if I had all the riches of Brandenburg and Prussia at the time (not much), I would spend them ridiculously on outfits and music and art. now, what did he do as king? what policy legacy did he leave behind? that’s a good one :)

C-tier

Friedrich Wilhelm III: now as a king he sucks. and I stand by this because, you know, he lost to him *imagine me pretending to be short and saying ‘oui, oui’ in a bad french accent*. and as any proper Englishwoman I can’t support a monarch who goes around losing to the French unless their name is Mary I. but, he’s a pathetic little man. he really is. so indecisive, so unsure of himself. what are you doing little guy? you think because your last name is Hohenzollern, God thinks you’re a good king? well it is like 1805 and, while divine right isn’t really being used as much, it’s as good as any reason on why you’re the chosen one and my family is eating dirt in Sicily and on the Scottish border. he’s really just a dude, nothing extraordinary about him except that his wife was the only one with brains and was the first to establish that (sorry Wilhelm I). he cried when he found out that his children didn’t call him ‘papa’ and went into a deep depressive state when his wife suddenly died. he’s an average man, of average abilities, but of big heart. and the big heart is what bumps him up, for me, from his old place as an F to a C. though, his moralizing is tedious

Friedrich Wilhelm II: this man should have partied with Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. everyone’s got that one ruler whose all about sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll. for the US it’s JFK, for the UK it’s Margaret Thatcher Charles II, France has Louis XIV. Prussia has this guy and we should thank him. so many mistresses, so much sex, so much revelry and debauchery and sin! this guy’s personal life is like a treasure trove of political and sexual intrigue. if you’re into that - as I am as a town gossip - you’ll love him. I am constantly amazed by the fact that some STD didn’t kill him. syphilis, herpes, crabs. something, man, anything. but he didn’t. he’s a shit king though. absolutely horrible. all he did was whine that he didn’t get taught anything by Uncle Fritz and, yes, that’s not good if it’s true (but it’s not completely because the treatises are detailed but I guess he didn’t have time to read) but c’mon. actually apply yourself and learn on the job. I know that would’ve required him to not be balls deep somewhere, but unfortunately he’s not Dorian Gray. there’s work that needed to be done and he didn’t do it. boo!!

D-tier

Wilhelm I: apparently he was a good guy, unlike the other 3 who populate the lowest rungs of Prussian kinghood. so I give him that and I can respect that. but what did he do? what were his own ideas? I thought about putting Bismarck as king instead because, really, he was. Bismarck was a minister who ran around the king’s back to set things up exactly as he liked and it fucking worked because he was the brains. his wife was intelligent too, but theirs wasn’t a wamr and loving marriage. and Bismarck worked to get Wilhelm to distrust her because she was liberal and the fact that Wilhelm would listen to Otto even if it meant allowing himself to be drowned in the Rhine is pathetic. fun party at Versailles though. hope it was worth the war reparations

F-tier (bastard time) I’m going in a different order because I want to go from the ones I hate least to most xoxo

Friedrich Wilhelm IV: “I won’t accept a crown from the gutter” then you won’t accept a crown at all, stupid idiot! god, the smugness. the authoritarian impulses. I know it was the cool thing in 1848 to put down any revolts/protests with as much force as possible, but man, at least the Habsburgs were transparent. homie was like “yeah guys lol I’ll make a constitution and it’ll be epic! you’ll have so many rights! xoxo gossip girl” and then...nope. and AND he wanted the Habsburgs in charge of things too! Mr. ‘I’m Nostalgic For When HRE Was Great And We Blew Austrian Dick!’ grow up man. it’s Prussia time buddy, Austria is beginning to fall apart. don’t look to the past, look to the future, but you didn’t have that vision did you?

Wilhelm II: *banging pots and pans* I blame this man for everything! now, intellectually, does Germany take all the blame for WWI? no, that’s foolish and propaganda of the Allies only. if you’re a European power in 1914, you get to share the blame (ex: why did UK need to make this a naval arms race? Austria should’ve declared war on Serbia sooner if that’s what it wished to do. Russia, please stay out of the Balkans then and forever). but does my irrational hatred of Wilhelm blind me to this truth when I see his stupid face and that ugly fucking mustache that I wish to yank off? my god, yes. I see him and Rule Britannia and The Yanks Are Coming start playing so loud in my head and I’m like ‘yeah, the kaiser’s gonna pay.’ I’m sorry that Bismarck’s ego was bigger than yours but did you have to prove him right by getting incompetent buffoons who were playing checkers when he set the board up for chess to replace him? Did you have to prove Freud right by displacing private problems onto public life with your little tit-for-tat with George IV (VI?) because his mummy loved you more? Why did you need to fuck every naval vessel you saw like an inferior of Peter the Great who believed he was Sir Francis Drake? but that’s just the first war and he lived to see things setting up for the second. wasn’t in convenient for you to be close with the N@zis when you thought they might want a king back on the throne and you could reclaim your little tyrant. like every goddamn Prussian conservative or Junker, you thought you could play the tyrannical cockroach. sure, you figured out earlier that he was no pal, but you still collaborated and you still allowed yourself to get played like the weak man of conscience you are. cheers!

Friedrich Wilhelm I: ladies and gentleman, the moment you’ve all been waiting for! the biggest bastard straight outta Berlin, FW1! and who doesn’t love an abusive father? who doesn’t love a man, so insecure and pathetic, that he needs to terrorize children to be able to look at himself and have a little pride. I understand that it was because he wanted his kids, specifically Fritz, to be best. but being best and perfect meant being miniature versions of him and aren’t we supposed to want our children to be better than a carbon-copy of a small man? honestly, I could live with the occasional smack for this time period. it’s within the norm and, while horrible, isn’t irreparably damaging. this guy really had to beat the shit out of Fritz and Wilhelmina and I’m sure Augustus and Henry and Amalia and all the others (so many kids) didn’t get spared either because if you hit one, you’ll hit ‘em all. and I judge them for their flaws all the same but, for some of them, it gets hard to. because what fighting chance did they have when their father was telling them how worthless they were and beating them senseless and threatening death and life imprisonment on some? I’m constantly impressed by Henry and Fritz and Wilhelmina for amounting to any semblance of maturity, even though it’s always fleeting, because this man didn’t give them the tools to be functioning adults. but each of them managed to be greater than their father, as did Amalia managing a really cool coup in Sweden. and what did FW1 get? he built up his army, had a tall guy fetish, increased the treasury, and made the cabinet and executive offices more efficient. there used to be this one guy on here that would argue that that was all a good king made and that this lowlife didn’t deserve the contempt he got by some on here (an obvious vague of me) for his behavior as a father. and maybe I’m a crackpot, but I believe the quality of a man outshines all those other achievements and that that’s meaningless to me, in my personal life. and when I get to hell, before I go to any of these other men, I’ll go to him and ask him how hell’s fires feel because, if his God was real, it would never love him. and that’s beautiful

#i just wanted to give you guys the mental image of ol maggie doing lines of coke #i dont like her i just like to give nicknames to all my enemies #makes them uncomfortable #im very tipsy so this is weird #i apologize #but i hope its kinda funny and enjoyable #frederick the great #old fritz #the name frederick officially looks meaningless to me #frederick william i #frederick i #frederick iii #frederick william ii #frederick william iii #frederick william iv #wilhelm i #wilhelm ii #prussian shitposting

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kaschra · 5 years ago

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This is some weird shit. I'll definitely need to re-read the chapter a few times.

Eren not being on board with Zeke's plans and bucket girl being Ymir Fritz were expected, but Zeke actually did play 5D chess after all? And activated the power of the FT himself? I don't like that Zeke just got rid of the first king's will like it was nothing...

Most intriguing part is that Grisha actually seems to see Zeke. I also wonder if Zeke will change his plan now.

The ending was so sudden, I thought the last page was missing. The chapter itself felt very short too.

#snk spoilers #snk 120 #shingeki no kyojin #snk

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ravensroleplays · 5 years ago

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Norman: What are you kids doin’? Jeremy F., trying to color a poster board with Fritz S., Mike S., and Crystal:....we’re trying to make a four player chess board. Norman:.....good luck with that.

Norman, to Fluffy: This should be interestin’...

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energylifetime · 2 years ago

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Online bounce out blitz game

With multiple levels and a quest to reach the highest level and score possible, Bounce Out is the perfect way to start your Saturday morning off right, and you can now play it for free right here on Games. You can win in these surprising rewarding physics games by bouncing. Some games that use bouncing are billiards, basketball, marbles, and just bouncing a ball. But watch out, the puzzle gets crazy as balls bounce every which way. Try the three game modes and use the special balls to clear out some of the bin. This reset doesn't stop you from continuing on where you left off, but the timer won't stop ticking down even if the board resets, so watch out! What's more, you'll need to watch out for black balls that fall randomly into each level, as they can't be moved. Bouncing is a fun game mechanic that often relates to gravity. Jump into the challenge of Bounce Out Blitz Move the bouncy balls around the bin to line up three of the same to remove them. If you do happen to run out of moves, the board resets. This twist on classic match-three play is timed, and you'll only have a certain number of moves to eliminate the required number of balls for that level. Balls must be matched in a straight line vertically or diagonally, but the design of the board itself eliminates the possibility for straight lines horizontally. In the original Bounce game, the player controls a black ball. Use the links or keys (underline letters) to navigate through the screens. Click, Enter or Space will make the ball start moving. Bounce Out from Gamehouse offers level based play that challenges you with lining up three or more like colored balls on a hexagonal grid. Use the mouse or left and right arrows to move the ship. It's been so long that the only deep variations I remember without having to ponder are against the Pirc, the Nadjorf, Caro-Kahn Advance, and the lines of Semi-Slav/Meran.Today's Game of the Day will have you swapping and bouncing balls in a timed race to the finish. Share Free Code GameHouse Bounce Out Blitz Install exe Free Code GameHouse and Download GamesHouse Bounce Out Blitz Install exe, Play a Free GameHouse Daily for your Kids.Find your favorite GameHouse example Game Bounce Out Blitz and Download Games Online Full Version with Free Code. I joined for the tactics training to get my brain back in the right frame of mind. Below is one of my games against the Crafty engine preset at 2400 this month, compare that to the quality of my blitz games and it's night and day. Serial: Its necessary to disconnect from Internet when you register. Knicks takeaways from Friday’s 113-98 win over Bucks, including a 21-point comeback. With three unique challenging game modes theres something for everyone. I just started playing blitz, but I find myself comforable in the same range (again, account is new, not even five game I think, so don't go off of it).ĭeep Fritz 12 says my rating is 2070 this month since coming back to the game (that's standard 90min time controls) right now so my problem seems to be is board vision when playing blitz chess or faster. Its a Blitz Bounce into some frenzied fun with Swapper, kick back and puzzle over Strategy, and for a little twist slip into Slider. My bullet rating is 1579 (based on nearly 2,000 games), it was a 1700ish until this month when I started playing again and it dropped to 1300ish in days, took a few days of playing 3-5 hours a day to bounce back to the 1600 range. In Blitz youll find the perfect mix of adrenaline and benefits, combining online challenges with an excellent brain training tool. I took off from chess for a good 3-4 years and my account is new so results may look backwards. Blitz: Minigames is an online multiplayer game in which you can test your abilities in different minigames, facing off players from all around the world, included your best friends.

#Online bounce out blitz game

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ghostandghouls · 6 years ago

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(2/2) For Clive: How long do they sleep for? Are they a light or heavy sleeper? Does the bedroom have a theme / what is the layout like? Does your Muse play any games (video, card, board, etc)? Has your muse broken any objects in their past?

[Answers for Clive Clawson]1) How Long do they Sleep For?Clive’s average hours of sleep is between 11-15 hours. He is, a very sleepy ghoul and prefers to only be awake in the darkest hours. However he has gotten a bit better at being awake near sunrise, but not much longer after that. 2) Are they a Light or Heavy Sleeper?Heavy. Clive would sleep through a cannonball being fired next to his head. The one thing to wake him up quickly hearing Fritz calling for him. 3) Does the bedroom have a theme/what is the layout like?Don’t tempt me to design a floor plan for the whole Fear Guild House I swear.Clive’s room is strangely small for a ghoul his size, but has tall ceilings. There isn’t a particular theme other than it’s a strange mix between bedroom and artist’s studio. The walls are faded green and covered mostly with drawings done by Fritz. His room is near the back of the house, and he has his bed tucked into a little nook on the far left side. Close to the door entering the room. There’s a bedside table beside it that normally has either a book or knitting needles. Beside that is a narrow bookcase.At the far right side, there is a large desk that has been organized with various crafts. Mainly yarn, thread, wood, and clay. All in separate compartments though whatever Clive was working on last would be sprawled out on the desk. He has one large window looking out to the side of the house near the desk. There is a small closet but he hardly ever uses it. 4) Does your muse play games? (Video, Card, Board etc?)Clive is surprisingly good at card games. His enjoys shuffling cards and the social aspect of it. He doesn’t get competitive and he isn’t a sore loser. But there is no denying the rather delighted grin he gets when he has a good game. He enjoys Solitaire (of course), but also loves playing Eucher with the rest of the Guild, and he got very excited and being introduced (by George) to Uno. Any game involving cards he’d be curious to learn the rules of. He also likes board games like chess and checkers. He finds video games stressful, mostly because his hands and claws are too big to handle the controllers. So he’d rather watch someone else play. 5) Has your muse broken any objects in their past?You mean other than his noggin? Yes unfortunately poor Clive as bumped into things when he isn’t paying attention to where he is going, or where he is dragging his box. Most ‘victims’ tend to be vases, bric-a-brac, or light fixtures. Clive always tries his best to fix whatever he might break, however. He has also become much more careful with his movements so these little incidents do not happen often nowadays.

#asks #ask meme #Clive Clawson #[ Im so happy you asked questions for Clive aaaaa this was fun ]#long post

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themepluginpro · 4 years ago

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Fritz 17 Chess Playing Software PLUS Chess Success II Training Software Game Program

Description Fritz 17 Chess Playing Software PLUS Chess Success II Training Software Game Program :

Price: (as of - Details)

Product Description

Fritz 17 Chess Playing and Training Software Program

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*Fat Fritz is based on LCZero. LCZero is an open source project licensed through the GPL v3 with all due rights. Source code of LCZero and the modifications for Fat Fritz can be found at Github.

** Requires a powerful graphics card with NVIDIA chip

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: Minimum (not optimized for Raytracing and FatFritz): Dual Core, 2 GB RAM, Windows 7 or 8.1, DirectX11, graphics card with 256 MB RAM, DVD-ROM-drive, Windows Media Player 9 and Internet access.

Recommended: PC Intel i5 or AMD Ryzen 3 (Quadcore), 8 GB RAM, Windows 10 with 64-Bit (current version), NVIDIA RTX graphic card with 6 GB RAM and current driver (FatFritz on older NVIDIA cards or older graphic cards: drastic loss of performance, and runs on CPU only for demonstration purposes) , Windows Media Player 11, (DVD-ROM drive) and Internet access.

System requirements for ChessBase Account: Internet access and up-to-date browser, e.g. Chrome, Firefox, Safari. Runs on Windows, OS X, iOS, Android and Linux.

TIP: When installing Fritz 17 make sure you update the program immediately to avoid potential problems .

Fritz 17 and Fat Fritz

What is Fat Fritz?

The pièce de résistance in Fritz 17 for many people will be the inclusion of Fat Fritz. Based on the AI technology by DeepMind that created AlphaZero, Fat Fritz is a new set of custom made neural network weights that work in the open-source project Leela Chess Zero. The Leela Chess Zero project is based on the Go program Leela Zero and was designed to reproduce AlphaZero on the PC. One of the key tenets is that it follows the "zero" philosophy, which means it uses nothing except what it learns of its own accord. The philosophy behind Fat Fritz has been to make it the strongest and most versatile neural network by including material from all sources with no such "zero" restrictions, such as millions of the best games in history played by humans, games by the best engines including Stockfish, Rybka, Houdini, and more, endgame tablebases, openings, and so on. If it was deemed a possible source of improvement, "zero" or not, it was used. Even millions of exclusive self-play games were created, but tweaked to create content that was more aggressive and speculative to learn from and mold its style. The only material that was not used to train Fat Fritz, out of principle, was content from the Leela project itself, as this was developed by their community for their neural networks. After over a year of development, thousands of hours of computer time and human effort, we feel this will enrich analysts and players with creative and unique moves, all of the highest quality, to explore openings and the middlegame. While there is no question that making sure the engine can bring the highest standard is vital, and worry not it is there, it would be quite uninteresting to present an analyst that was essentially exactly the same as Engine X, except 20 Elo better. Instead, a contrasting point of view, no less strong, is far more interesting, and of far greater use.e challenge that presents. Fritz 17 brings an assortment of tools to help you and make that process as painless as possible.

Fritz 17 : Learn Your Openings!

The new opening repertoire in Fritz 17 is called "My Moves." It is separate for White and Black. You add variations to your repertoire by clicking on a move anywhere in the program and marking it as "My Move." This will include the whole variation up to this move into your repertoire. Marking moves is the only way to store variations, but this also saves a lot of time from entering moves one by one, copying from a source.

Manage and drill your opening repertoire

Your "My Moves" repertoire is stored online. You can access it from any machine, and also from a web browser. But the goodies don't stop there. Imagine you are watching a live game in Playchess, whether a casual blitz, or a broadcast from a top GM tournament. You can instantly check to see if a game played is following an opening from your repertoire.

Fritz 17- Standard Repertoires

Fritz 17 provides access to standard opening repertoires for nearly every prominent line in chess. Those repertoires are regularly updated to current theory and recent games on our server. You can either drill them with "Free Drill" or upload them to "My Moves." Or you pick single lines by marking moves. Of course you may simply store them in your traditional databases. Open a list by calling "Openings → Standard Repertoires." Click on any entry and it will automatically load.

Standard Repertoires are available in four levels: Easy – Club – Tournament and Professional. This saves work: As a normal club player you don’t have to extract the best moves from a deeply nested professional repertoire suitable only for master level players.

Fritz 17 - 3D Boards with Ray Tracing

With the arrival of the newest generation of video cards from Nvidia, Ray Tracing has now become a reality in real time. In a nutshell the idea is that it is able to calculate and show light reflections from surface to surface in all of the incredibly complex relationships such as sunlight bouncing off a wall, which gives a lighter light, filtered through humid air, and so on. ChessBase has now introduced this added layer of realism to its 3D boards, with full control over every aspect if such is your desire.

Chess Success II Training Software included with Fritz 17

Chess Success II Training Software by ChessCentral

Here you'll find something for every chess player, whether just learning the moves or a highly rated tournament competitor. ChessCentral has gathered everything needed to get you started in the world of chess - take a look:

Chess for Absolute Beginners ChessCentral presents our 14 part series of beginner chess videos on how to play chess. Narrated by noted columnist Steve Lopez, these videos will teach you how to set up the chess board and move the pieces - and much more.

Play Chess - Have Fun! Are you ready to begin a lifetime of adventure in chess? Here is your chance to quickly learn the movements of each chess piece, along with the complete rules of our royal game. But that's only the beginning! Next you'll want to conquer that first opponent, and Play Chess - Have Fun! will show you how.

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Common Sense in Chess This e-book records a series of lectures given by Emanuel Lasker, the 2nd World Chess Champion, before an audience of London players in early 1895. Lasker's clear presentation has created a classic and timeless guidebook which has benefited generations of chess players. Anyone who has learned the rules of chess will be amply repaid for his study of Lasker's Common Sense in Chess.

Instructive Positions from Master Chess Imagine an experienced Grandmaster showing example after example of crushing finishes and narrow escapes, all explained with notes directly on point and delivered in a friendly and engaging style. That's what you get with Instructive Positions from Master Chess.

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For Windows PCs Now with "Fat Fritz," an extremely strong neural net engine inspired by Alpha Zero, which produces human-like strategic analyses.** Improved Fritz 17 engine with traditional search and evaluations technology Chess Success II Training: Here you'll find something for every chess player, whether just learning the moves or a highly rated tournament player. ChessCentral has produced everything needed to get you started and trained in the world of chess More Details #Fritz #Chess #Playing #Software #Chess #Success #Training #Software #Game #Program

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techcrunchappcom · 4 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/queens-achievement-world-news-group/

Queen’s achievement | WORLD News Group

Irina Krush, the only American female to achieve the title of chess grandmaster, lives an unassuming life for someone who has won the U.S. women’s championship eight times.

Krush, 36, lives in a modest apartment in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, the neighborhood she grew up in after her Jewish parents immigrated from the Soviet Union when she was a child. As she did her daily walk in November around the bay where swans patrol the waters, she ran into her landlady, who was also her high-school French teacher.

When Krush was playing the U.S. championship at home last month, her landlady tried to keep the internet working, Krush explained with a laugh. In the penultimate championship game, her connection fritzed, and she had to disconnect and reconnect. “If I had only five seconds left, I would have lost,” she said. (In online chess tournaments the clock keeps running even if a player loses her internet connection.)

Krush won the championship. Her landlady bought her flowers.

Netflix’s popular show, The Queen’s Gambit, follows a fictitious American women’s chess champion. But Krush is the real thing: As a little girl she used to beat grown men in chess in New York City parks.

Krush played the championship, which kicked off online in October, from her small Brooklyn apartment that consists of a kitchen, a bedroom, bathroom, and an alcove where her computer and chess board sit (her “workspace,” she says). She sees her tiny apartment as an advantage for bathroom breaks in games: “Five seconds and I’m back! Everything is very nearby.”

Krush describes herself as a “Christian Jew,” having converted to Christianity in 2011. She and Alex Lenderman, another grandmaster in Brooklyn, attend the same Russian Orthodox church. She and Alex also went to the same public high school in Brooklyn, Edward R. Murrow High School, famous for its chess teams. Elite chess teams don’t typically come from public schools.

She had never been interested in Christianity, but after a year of reading spiritual books, she decided she wanted to see what a church service was like. At her first service, she says, “it was immediate: There was no more thinking or choosing. … I felt like, ‘Oh yes, this is where the truth is.’”

She remembered the sermon: “‘Faith is a gift from God’… those words went into my heart.” Three months later she was baptized, and she has now joined the choir even though she describes herself as “the least talented person you can imagine … but I’m learning to sing.”

“This is one of the unexpected moments of my life,” she said.

Another unexpected moment: In early March Krush contracted COVID-19. At the time, doctors knew little about the symptoms of the disease or how to treat it. Krush recalled suddenly struggling to breathe and feeling like a truck had run over her chest. At first, she didn’t even think about the coronavirus—she just thought she might be dying.

She went to a hospital in Brooklyn, tested positive for COVID-19, and was admitted for several days by herself. She would go to sleep with Psalm 90 playing on her phone: “Lord, you have been our dwelling place, for all generations.”

That early in the outbreak, medical workers didn’t know how to treat the virus, and after a few days the hospital discharged her as it grew overwhelmed with patients who needed to go on ventilators.

She got a pulse oximeter for herself, and doctors told her to go to the emergency room if she found she couldn’t breathe again. She did go to the ER several more times and was in a lot of pain, but her blood oxygen remained high enough that she didn’t have to be readmitted.

She’s now a COVID-19 “long hauler,” and her inflamed lungs are taking months to heal. Given her cerebral profession, she was thankful to have been spared the neurological damage that often comes with some cases.

“Brain fog or loss of memory or concentration would be very impactful on what I do, but I think that’s bypassed me,” she said.

Krush resents the idea of being a strong enough “fighter” to beat the disease. But she does think chess helped her face COVID-19.

“Chess is a character shaper,” she said. “Chess players know the experience of being in bad positions, right? It’s not pleasant, and you’ve got to defend them. … You don’t know how long it’s going to take, and you don’t know what the result is going to be. You don’t know if … after playing for six hours, you’re going to lose.”

Krush wrote health updates on Facebook to the chess community, and encouragement poured in from other top chess players: “Krush it!” one said. Through her recovery she played and coached chess. She had to call off one lesson after 15 minutes because she suddenly felt like she couldn’t breathe again. She realized that talking inflamed her lungs.

In recent years she had focused more on teaching than competing. The pandemic gave her a break from her normally frenetic commutes and travel schedule. Now she takes walks by the bay, which she previously never had time for. And she plays chess.

She thinks the healthier pace helped her during this year’s championship. During the tournament, she would play a game, walk out to her backyard and have a moment of sunshine, then go back and play more chess. Playing chess at this level is physically draining, studies have shown: The world champion in 2004 lost 17 pounds during the championship match.

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#achievement #queen #World

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autodidact-adventures · 7 years ago

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World War I (Part 61): Passchendaele

Many were doubtful about Haig's planned offensive in Flanders – for good reason. But, like Nivelle, Haig wouldn't listen to sense.

The infantry & tanks were to drive back the Germans at least 4.8km on the first day, and 24km overall within fifteen days. Once they'd captured that railway junction at Roulers, a specially-trained division would be landed behind the German lines, on the coast.

The Fourth British Army was positioned where the River Yser meets the sea (at Nieuwpoort). After the division was landed behind German lines, they would move eastward (under the protection of the Royal Navy's shipboard guns), and link up with it. The Germans, Haig declared, would be at the end of their strength, and after the Entente had forced them to withdraw from the coast, they wouldn't have enough troops to form a new defensive line.

Roselare = Roulers.

But the Germans knew what was coming, for starters. Haig knew it would be impossible to conceal anything except the amphibious landing – security was so strict that those training for it on the Thames Estuary (on the northern side of the Channel) weren't even allowed to write home.

The Germans had observation points on the low ridges circling Ypres, and from these (and aerial reconnaissance) they could see the biggest concentration of soldiers & weapons that the British army had ever put together.

So 14 German divisions were sent to Ypres (four from the Eastern Front) while the British were getting ready. A week after the explosion at Messines Ridge (probably June 14th), Ludendorff sent Fritz von Lossberg to Ypres. He had originated the new defensive system in depth, and he would be Chief of Staff of the German Fourth Army.

Lossberg had 50 days to prepare, and the German commanders became increasingly confident. The Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria was head of the army group in Flanders, and he wrote in his diary, “My mind is quite at rest about this attack, as we have never possessed such strong reserves, so well-trained for their part, as on [this] front.”

On July 10th, the Germans carried out a pre-emptive raid on the Yser bridgehead, which was where the British Fourth Army was supposed to move eastward from. The Germans drove them back to the other side of the river. They also found a tunnel that the British had been planning to use for blowing up important German positions at the start of their advance. So now the Germans knew that something big was being planned for the coast; and they had captured the (relatively) high ground just east of the Yser. The British were now in a more difficult position than they'd planned.

The preparations on both sides were huge. A seemingly-endless supply of gravel was being purchased in the Netherlands, and sent to Belgium by train, for the construction of the Germans' concrete pillboxes (the first line of defence) and underground bunkers (behind the lines, to shelter the counterattack troops).

Haig's plan was the same old thing that had been happening since after the Battle of the Marne. This was Lloyd George's opinion, and also Churchill's (the Conservatives had insisted that he wasn't to join any of the government's important war committees, but he was still very opinionated). Pétain and Foch thought the same (Foch called the plan “futile, fantastic and dangerous”). But Haig believed the sheer scale of it would make him succeed; also that the French were useless and that was why Nivelle had failed.

The weather was still unusually dry, but it wasn't likely to stay that way, and Haig didn't want to waste time in beginning the offensive. But there were hold-ups, and pieces of the plan weren't falling into place, and one non-rainy day after the other was wasted. Haig had given responsibility for the main part of the offensive to his youngest army commander, 47-year-old Hubert Gough. Gough was bold and eager for action, and was also originally a cavalryman – things that would have made Haig like him. But he wasn't good at organizing, and the staff he'd created was more arrogant than capable. Here at Ypres, the ability to organize huge numbers of men and quantities of equipment was extremely important.

On July 7th, Gough reported that his preparations weren't up to schedule, and that he was worried about the readiness of the French troops on his left – he needed more time. Haig said no. On the 13th, Gough asked again for more time (specifically, for five days). Haig agreed to postpone the offensive three days – from July 25th to 28th.

On July 15th or 16th, the British bombardment began – the most massive of the war so far, even greater than the Somme. The front was 24km long, and there were over 3,000 guns for it (over double the concentration at the Somme). The bombardment continued day and night for a fortnight (finishing on the 31st), with high explosives, shrapnel and gas being used. Preparations for the Somme had used only a million rounds; here it was four million rounds (100,000 of them gas). 65,000 tonnes of shells were used, killing 30,000 Germans before the offensive even began.

The landscape was already wrecked; now it was even worse. Before the war, the region had had a complicated drainage system because the terrain was so wet; now what was left of it was destroyed. When the rain came, there would be no place for the water to go.

On July 17th, with the bombardment having just begun, it was clear that another postponement of three days was necessary.

Lloyd George and his War Policy Committee were in a difficult situation – the offensive was a bad idea, but forbidding it could cause major political trouble. On July 20th, they finally informed Haig that he could proceed (they really had no choice, as they'd left it so long). The told him that if his attack wasn't quickly successful, he would have to stop, and asked him to specify his objectives. Haig told them he was offended, and they quickly sent another message assuring him that he had the committee's “wholehearted supported”.

On July 22nd, the barrage intensified. On the 26th, 700 British & French planes took off and cleared the air of German aircraft.

The final stage of the bombardment was on July 28th – a counterbattery barrage to deal with German artillery, which had been causing major damage to British positions. But this final stage had to be cut short because the fog came back, wrecking visibility for both sides. However, the weather continued to hold – there had been intermittent showers over the last fortnight, but nothing too bad. The artillery had turned the terrain into a mess of shell-holes, but it was still dry.

Third Battle of Ypres

The offensive began on July 31st, at 3:50am. 17 Entente divisions advanced, and another 17 were waiting in the rear.

At the northern end of the Entente line were two French divisions – they were to protect Gough's flank (on his left). Five divisions of Herbert Plumer's Second Army were at the southern end – they were to capture a few strongpoints, but mostly their orders were to hold the Messines Ridge as a pivot point for Gough's advance.

The main attacking force was 10 divisions of Gough's Fifth Army – they were to force the Germans back, and then the reserves would come forward. Gough had nearly 2,300 guns on about 11km of front (about 1 per 6m). The Entente had nearly 500,000 men in total.

Opposite them were the German machine-gun nests, arranged in a sort of chess-board pattern. Behind them, the German Fourth Army had 20 divisions arranged in four groups – 9 closest to the front, 6 behind them, 2 further back, and 3 even further back. German reserves were in place to move forward & fill in almost any hole the Entente made.

The French troops on Gough's left flank got to their objectives with relatively little difficulty. In the centre, Gough's forward units fought their way through the German first zone (which was the Germans' intention) and into the second zone. They advanced nearly 3.2km at some places, but only 800m in others. Within a few hours, 6,000 Germans were taken POW.

But things changed in the early afternoon. By now, a light rain was falling, and the leading British units had lost contact with their artillery. The Germans had field guns on higher points north & south of the British salient, and they opened fire. (If the fog hadn't cut the British opening bombardment short, these guns might have been destroyed.) The British, taking great losses, were forced back.

Gough had started with 52 tanks, but 22 had broken down; another 19 were put out of action by the German guns. By late afternoon, the offensive had slowed to a standstill, and it was raining hard. Haig reported to London that it had been “highly satisfactory and the losses light for so great a battle”. Actually, 23,000 had been killed or wounded, but he didn't realize this.

Also on July 31st, Pope Benedict XV sent a letter to the Entente & Central Powers governments, in which he offered to mediate a peace without territorial conquests. But Germany still would not settle the Belgium question. The new Foreign Minister Richard von Kühlman ignored the letter and decided to approach London directly, hoping to separate Britain from its allies by offering a private promise to withdraw from Belgium in exchange for a stop to the fighting.

But the new Chancellor Georg Michaelis destroyed the possibility of this idea succeeding. Ludendorff insisted that Germany had to keep effective control of most of Belgium, and also of the coal & iron mines of France's Longwy-Briey district. He also wanted large parts of East Africa.

There were various other attempts at arranging talks around this time (Austria & France were involved at some points) but nothing came of them. Both sides were determined that they were the ones to dictate the final settlement, with no compromise. Michaelis was completely useless in all of this, and the Reichstag came to hate him like they had Bethmann Hollweg. He had to resign after only three months in the job.

The Entente resumed the offensive on August 2nd, with torrential rain falling. The place was flooded – every shell-hole was filled with water, and the ground was so boggy that it was too deep to find a solid footing. The tanks couldn't move, and the planes couldn't fly. Haig still kept going.

But after two days, it was obvious that it wasn't possible. It was still raining, and the Entente casualties were up to 68,000. He ordered a halt until the ground dried out.

This wasn't until August 10th. A new attack was intended to drive away or capture the German artillery. They succeeded, but at high cost. As soon as they'd finished, Haig began planning for a resumption on the 14th.

But this wasn't possible either, causing two postponements of 24hrs. When they finally carried out the attack, it was (again) costly and achieved little. Haig should have stopped (according to the promises he'd made to London), but instead he decided to try something new.

This was the end of the first part of the Third Battle of Ypres. It had taken 3.5 weeks to cover about 4km – just over ½ of the first day's objective. Roulers hadn't been captured, and as it became clear that that wasn't going to happen, the amphibious force would be quietly disbanded. The British had 14 divisions that were too badly battered to continue and had to be replaced; the Germans had 23. Back in London, Lloyd George was complaining again.

The focus shifted from Gough to Herbert Plumer's Second Army. Plumer had been at Ypres for the past 2yrs, and like Pétain, he cared about them and was unwilling to waste their lives. His soldiers were loyal to him; their morale was high and they were eager for action.

Unlike Haig and Gough, Plumer had actually paid attention to and considered the new German defensive system. With this knowledge in mind, he worked out a counterattack, possibly inspired by his experience at Messines Ridge. Haig approved it and gave him 3wks to get ready.

Meanwhile, Lloyd George summoned Haig back to London for another meeting with him War Policy Committee. As usual, Haig argued that it was necessary to keep attacking Germans until they broke, which he was sure they were about to do; and as usual, Robertson supported him. He returned to France having won that round, and with Lloyd George still unhappy.

Plumer had figured out how to take advantage of the new defensive system. He realized that small territorial gains (about 1.6km or less) were easy because the Germans' forward positions were elastic & spread so thinly. But much larger territorial gains were definitely not possible, because the Germans were now much more able to counterattack in force. So they should capture only the easy ground, and not go far enough to set off a German counterattack – the exact opposite of what the Germans were luring them in to do. If they could carry out a series of such attacks, then they could drive the Germans out of their defensive infrastructure, and into a war of manouevre that they didn't have enough troops for.

During the first 3wks of September it didn't rain, and Plumer organized a huge mass of artillery (bigger even than the one of the initial bombardment). He ended up with one artillery piece for ever 5m of front. The bombardment would consist of five waves of fire, with each covering a destruction zone 200m deep – 1) shrapnel, 2) high explosives, 3) indirect machine-gun fire (aimed into the air because the gunners couldn't see their targets, and the bullets would arc down onto the defenders from above), 4) high explosives, and 5) high explosives again. The entire thing was about 800m deep, and the pattern would sweep over the Germans, so that each position would find itself in a new zone every few minutes. In the first day of this attack, the artillery would fire 3.5 million rounds of ammunition.

Plumer's troops had possession of slightly elevated ground that they'd first captured at Messines Ridge, and then later got more of by moving forward on Gough's flank. Because of this, they were able to conceal their preparations from the Germans.

Battle of the Menin Road Ridge

They attacked on September 20th, with the a creeping barrage in front of the advancing troops. The Germans who hadn't been killed by the initial bombardment were dealt with almost easily. When the troops had reached their objectives, they stopped and began to quickly construct defences. The main German troops were waiting in the rear until the British advanced towards them. By the time they realized it wasn't happening, it was too late to mount an efficient counterattack.

The operation had been quick and successful. There were 20,000 British casualties in total, but most of them were from German artillery fire after the advance. Both sides realized that things had changed. The Germans were worried, and the British were delighted.

Not only had they captured new ground, but the now had possession of some of the infrastructure of the Hindenburg Line – pillboxes and underground bunkers that the Germans needed for their defensive system, and they were now more vulnerable to attack. Plumer knew this, and hurried his artillery forward.

Battle of Polygon Wood

The Battle of Polygon Wood began on September 26th. The weather was clear, allowing Entente planes to fly low over the German defences, strafing and bombing them. After the initial bombardment, the troops advanced the assigned 800m on a 6.5km-wide front, and then dug in again, with the main German force looking on helplessly. They'd lost yet another set of strongpoints, and if things kept going as they were, they could end up losing all their infrastructure.

So they gave up on the new defensive system, and went back to the old way of doing things – deploying large numbers of troops in a strong forward line to fight off the attackers right from the start, and stop them from making easy gains. Plumer was moving his artillery forward again, preparing for another attack.

Battle of Brookseinde

This month was extremely dry – the dryest September on record at that time. But it wasn't to last. On October 3rd, the first day of the Battle of Brookseinde, a light drizzle began to fall.

The Germans had had only a few days to prepare their new forward line, and the bombardment slaughtered them. The German generals had been too eager, and placed the reserves too far forward, so they were blasted as well. The British advanced 700m and then stopped. They had suffered 25,000 casualties, while killing/wounding 30,000 Germans. Even though the casualty levels were about the same, this was unsustainable for the Germans. The old tactics weren't going to work for them. Something had to be done.

Ludendorff was receiving dispatches from Flanders, and was alarmed. He tried to think up a new offensive that could draw Entente troops away from Ypres, but it wasn't possible as they didn't have enough troops themselves. Pétain was launching attacks at Verdun & elsewhere, using French divisions that had recovered enough to be able to fight again. Ludendorff ordered the Sixth Army to use the new defensive system again, which at least would keep most of the troops out of reach of enemy artillery. But there really wasn't anything they could do.

The weather was what saved them. The drizzle turned into a steady rain, and a few days later a downpour. Flanders was turning into a huge shallow lake, with every piece of low ground filled to the brim. When the British commanders met on October 7th, Plumer and Gough said that they should stop fighting, but Haig refused.

Plumer's troops were along a line that would be extremely difficult to hold during the coming winter. They should have pulled back to some slightly higher ground, but Haig definitely didn't want to do that. He insisted on keeping going to capture Passchendaele Ridge. This was the northern extension of the high ground that Messines Ridge was a part of. The main force in this offensive was to be made up of Commonwealth divisions (NZ, Australia and Canada), as nearly every British division in the region was in a terrible state.

Passchendaele

“Passchendaele” means “Valley of the Passion”. The first attack in the valley was the Battle of Poelcappelle, and it began on October 9th. It was raining, and the conditions were absymal. Nearly everything was covered in water, and everything else was covered in deep mud. It was impossible to move the artillery or set it firmly in place where it already was. It was nearly impossible for the infantry to move, as the mud prevented them from finding footholds. Big guns sank into the mud out of sight, and so did an entire light railway. The only way they could bring the shells forward was to use pack mules – but many of the mules sank and drowned.

When they fired the shells, they sank into the mud without exploding – the surface was too soft to activate their fuses, as was the mud beneath the water. The Australians & NZers at the centre managed to fight their way forward, but they were then exposed to machine-gun fire from three sides instead of one. Eventually, they realized it was futile, and struggled back to where they'd started from. The wounded sank into the mud, as they couldn't make it back.

The Canadians were chosen to lead the next assault. They were commanded by Sir Arthur Currie, and he wasn't happy about it, predicting that it would cost him 16,000 men, but he didn't refuse. The Second Battle of Passchendaele began on October 26th. They took heavy casualties, and the Germans about the same. But they didn't make it even close to Passchendaele Ridge and what had once been the village of Passchendaele.

Four days later they tried again, with the same results. There was also a shortage of drinking water, because bringing water in was also extremely difficult, and the swamp around them had been poisoned by human waste and dead bodies.

Twelfth Battle of the Isonzo

The Italian Commander-in-Chief Luigi Cadorna had ordered two more Battles of the Isonzo back in May and August, and the Italians had suffered over 280,000 casualties. The Austrians opposite them had taken terrible levels of casualties as well, and when the battles were over, both sides begged their stronger allies for help.

Cadorna was a monstrous commander, suggesting seriously in units that didn't do well enough by his standards, 1/10 of the men should be shot. He worried that Russia's collapse would mean that Austria-Hungary would be able to send all its armies against Italy. But when he asked Britain & France for reinforcements, they would do no more than continue to send artillery.

The new Austrian Emperor Karl was warned by his general staff that the Austrians weren't likely to survive another Italian assault. (Franz Conrad had been demoted and was no longer Chief of the General Staff). The Emperor asked Ludendorff for help, but was rebuffed. So he contacted the Kaiser directly, who intervened.

A German general was sent to the Italian front and reported back that the Austrians were at the end of their strength. Reluctantly, Ludendorff created a new German Fourteenth Army, using infantry, artillery & planes taken from the Baltic, Romania, and Alsace-Lorraine. Otto von Below was to command it, and he was ordered to stabilized the Italian front with the shortest, most limited campaign possible.

The Battle of Caporetto (also known as the Twelfth Battle of the Isonzo) began on October 24th. The Germans & Austrians attacked together, and were incredibly successful. They had only 33 divisions facing 41 Italian divisions, but over 16km on the first day. Cadorna tried to organize a retreat, but it turned into flight, and 100,000's of Italian troops surrendered.

Below ordered his troops to stop at the River Tagliamento, but they reached that so quickly that they kept on going. The Italian government fell and Cadorna was fired. The Italians stopped at the banks of the River Piave (about 32km beyond the River Tagliamento) and made a stand.

The had advanced about 129km in 70 days, shortening the southern front by 320km. The Italians had suffered 320,000 casualties, including 265,000 taken POW. Their stand on the River Piave claimed another 140,000 men. However, they were helped by the Germans' exhaustion and the onset of the winter rains.

This had been one of the war's most successful campaigns, and it seemed as if the war on the southern front would be ended. But the upheavals it caused led to the government & army under better leadership. Previously, the Italian troops had been terribly mistreated, and now this ended, leading to a boost in morale that would be to the detriment of the Central Powers.

Back at Passchendaele

On November 6th, under still horrendous conditions, fresh Canadian troops finally drove the Germans off enough of the Passchendaele Ridge for Haig to claim victory. Nearly 16,000 men had been lost, as Currie had predicted.

On the 10th, the Canadians attacked again, consolidating their new positions, and bringing the Third Battle of Ypres to an end. They'd taken three months and a week to gain 7.25 km – Haig declared it was an excellent starting point for the fighting in 1918, but other generals believed it was worthless.

The British, French, Anzacs and Canadians had taken 250,000 casualties, and the Germans nearly as many. The Germans had used 118 divisions, and many of them were used up. The British had larger divisions than the Germans at this point, and they'd used 43 and the French 6. Both sides were exhausted. The British army was nearly as broken as the French army had been after the Chemin des Dames.

Battle of Cambrai

This was the first time a military offensive used tanks on a large scale. On November 20th, Haig sent 19 British divisions (led by General Julian Byng) and the largest group of tanks yet assembled to attack the Germans. It was near Cambrai, east of the old Arras battlefield, and they attacked a thinly-defended section of the Hindenburg Line.

It was a great success to start with, but didn't last long. 216 new Mark IV tanks were used in the initial assault, but 71 broke down mechanically; 65 were destroyed by enemy fire; and 43 got bogged down. Some of them managed to break through the forward defences, terrifying the Germans and forcing them to flee.

This wasn't actually meant to be a battle of any significance. Haig intended it to be a demonstration to boost morale at the end of the year. There was no follow-through planned or attempted. The British had succeeded only on a narrow front, ending up with the enemy on three sides. On November 30th, 20 German divisions counterattacked and forced them back nearly to where they'd started from.

The Germans learned at Cambrai how to deal with the tanks. A lieutenant wrote about it, saying that “When the first tanks passed the first line, we thought we would be compelled to retreat towards Berlin.” But they figured out that they could stop them by throwing a hand grenade through the manhole on the top. This was a blind spot for the tank's machine-guns – they couldn't reach every point around the tank.

Once a German got on top of the tank, those inside were doomed – the British couldn't escape. The fuel began to burn, and within a couple of hours the Germans saw only burning tanks before & behind them. “Then the approaching troops behind the tanks still had to overcome the machine-guns of our infantry. These were still effective because the British artillery had to stop shooting as the tanks were advancing, and naturally some of our machine-gun nests were still in full action.”

The British attack came to a standstill, and they waited for the cavalry to sweep us and “drive us towards Berlin,” but it didn't happen. They pulled new troops together near the British breakthrough, the situation settled down, and they could see clearly where the tanks haad driven into their lines. After a few days they launched a counterattack, and on the third day they were successful.

The offensive had (as usual) been pointless, but not for knowledge – both sides' generals saw that the new tanks could have produced very different results, if they'd been used properly.

1917 was over. On the Western Front, 226,000 British had been killed; 136,000 French; and 121,000 Germans. The French were unable to mount a major offensive at the end of the coming winter (i.e. in early 1918) because of all the fighting. But the Germans had lost confidence in their new defensive system. These last two facts would shape the year ahead, and finally begin the end of the war.

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prokopetz · 7 years ago

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Hey, what are some of your favorite tabletop RPGs?

Hoo, boy - that’s a tough one!

Well, first off, I’m not too much of a gaming hipster to put Dungeons & Dragons on my list. I wouldn’t pick out any one edition as a clear favourite; I appreciate both OD&D and 4th Edition for the focus and rigour of their mechanical design, for all that they’re aiming at very different design goals, 2nd Edition is my favourite for setting fluff and general high weirdness, and I admire 3rd Edition’s purity of purpose, if not always its actual execution. I imagine I’ll even come around on 5th Edition, once it finally decides what sort of game it’s trying to be.

Beyond D&D, I’m not much of a fan of many big-name titles - I never said I wasn’t a gaming hipster at all! - so it’s mostly high-concept indie stuff from here on out. This shouldn’t be taken as any sort of top ten; they’re merely the first ten that sprang readily to mind. Here we go:

Among the Beautiful Creatures (direct PDF link) - A playtest draft of an unreleased game about a world that’s perpetually ending, populated entirely by shapeshifting monsters who resemble nothing so much as Muppets. Picture Jim Henson does Fritz Leiber and you’ll be in the right ballpark. (Content warning for graphic descriptions of child abuse, including in the introductory fiction.)

Chuubo’s Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine - A game about young gods growing up in a pastoral small town. The core system is a downright fascinating piece of game design, basically taking the idea of XP rewards for roleplaying and driving it to its logical-yet-absurd conclusion: quests take the form of specific character development arcs, which you advance by invoking appropriate tropes and story beats. Conflict resolution uses a combination of blind bidding and semantic arguments (yes, really!).

The Dance and the Dawn - A narrative game for 3-5 players who take on the roles of the Ladies of Ash, come to the crumbling palace of the Ice Queen to court the enigmatic Lords of Ice. (Or ladies, if you prefer; the default setup is admittedly a bit heteronormative, but there’s nothing that actually demands the Lords of Ice be men.) The game is diceless, with resolution employing pieces on a chess board.

Fate Accelerated Edition - Unless you’re totally new to the tabletop roleplaying hobby and/or you’ve been living under a rock for the past 20 years, you’ve probably heard of FATE. FAE is a super-lightweight version of the game, perfect for casual or pick-up-and-play games. By default, it’s focused on YA fantasy adventures, though there are expansion packs available that adapt it for everything from giant robots to competitive cooking to a tabletop adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre’s No Exit - and no, I’m not making that last one up.

Lady Blackbird - A fantasy space opera game that’s a true masterclass in minimalist design. The entirety of the basic core rules fit on your character sheet, so everything you might need to reference as a player is right there. The book is a game and adventure in one, with the default scenario revolving around helping the eponymous Lady Blackbird (who can be a player character, if you want) escape from an arranged marriage and meet up with a notorious pirate lord.

Nobilis - A companion game to Chuubo’s (see above), this is a much higher-powered iteration of the same basic idea, focusing less on heartwarming small town life and more on punching the Sun. It’s in the running for the RPG with the most descriptively high-powered player characters; a correctly built starting PC is capable of performing miracles that affect the entire observable universe, and matters only escalate from there.

Ryuutama: Natural Fantasy Roleplay - A localised Japanese game about people going on overland journeys; think Oregon Trail by way of Hayao Miyazaki. Fairly old-school in its design sensibilities; if you’re a D&D fan, you’ll find a lot that’s familiar here, along with a lot that’s not. The GM is an actual character within the game, taking the form of an invisible dragon who watches over and guides the party’s travels.

The Shab-al-Hiri Roach - A competitive, GMless game of campus politics in a small New England university town. The twist is that any given character may or may not be possessed by an evil brain-sucking cockroach from the dawn of time; if you’ve got the roach, you’ll occasionally be subject to irresistible telepathic commands, represented by randomly drawn cards written in ancient Sumerian (with English subtitles, of course).

Valley of Eternity - A game in the classic swords and sorcery mould, focusing on gritty adventure in an unforgiving wilderness. Players take on the roles of outcast warrior-philosophers, sworn to defend the very communities that shun them, both through strength of arms and with the aid of esoteric mental disciplines that allow them to craft cunning illusions, manipulate objects from afar, or even imprison enemies within their own minds. Also, all playable characters are penguins.

Wisher, Theurgist, Fatalist (direct PDF link) - When folks talk about tabletop RPGs that are so high concept they’re barely playable, this is what they mean. Player characters inhabit a world that does not, properly speaking, exist, and it’s their responsibility to bring it into being. Includes rules for players declaring setting details, inventing new game mechanics on the spot, and even deposing the GM and taking her place!

Other favourites that didn’t get full descriptions only on account of I didn’t think of them first include Blades in the Dark, Blue Rose, Danger Patrol, Die For You, Dogs in the Vineyard, The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Feng Shui, Golden Sky Stories, Hero Kids, Itras By, Lords of Gossamer and Shadow, Paranoia, Perfect (Unrevised), Pokéthulhu, Risus, Sufficiently Advanced, Tenra Bansho Zero, Traveller, and Unknown Armies; I’ve included links to previous recommendation posts where the game in question is discussed, if available.

#gaming #tabletop roleplaying #tabletop rpgs #tabletop rpg recommendations #saltsower

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macgurn-blog · 7 years ago

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Is AlphaZero a cheater?

[Update:] February 2019, Stockfish beat AlphaZero on equal footing as predicted. In order for A0 to qualify for the TCEC competition, Google's Deep Mind team had to make a version of A0 that could operate under competition rules, thus Leela Chess Zero was created. Finally, we have a way to compare A0 to the rest of the competition, and unsurprisingly it failed to measure up. Stockfish 190203 defeated LCZero v20.2-32930 by a score of 50.5-49.5 in the TCEC Season 14 Superfinal 100-game match held in February 2019.

12/7/2017

Yesterday my nerd oriented news feed was flooded with reports of Google's AlphaZero / Deep Mind AI program slaughtering the reigning world champion chess engine Stockfish with 28 decisive games and no losses after only 4 hours of self training. This news warmed my heart, as I have lost countless thousands of training games to Stockfish, Houdini, Fritz, & Komodo over the years, with only a few dozen cherished hard fought wins & draws under my belt. In one game AlphaZero (A0) sacrificed 3 pawns for a positional advantage, and then spent another 60 moves to force a resignation by Stockfish, the kind of masterful gambit you rarely see!

Unfortunately, although the 28 wins displayed a level of play we rarely see, what none of the reports mention is that A0 actually cheated! Here are 5 reasons the contest was not legitimate:

#1 The only way to accurately assess the true strength of a chess engine is to abide by the TCEC rules which stipulate that during a match, both engines must have equal computation time & power regardless of time controls. A0 used that 4 hour "training period" to construct a relational database the size of a football field (sextillion evaluated board positions), using hundreds of 2nd generation 11.5 petaflop TPU modules to do so. During the match vs Stockfish, A0 only needed one module to access and navigate between branches in its newly constructed database. This vs Stockfish operating with a much smaller database explains 28 wins with no losses! In games like chess that can be calculated with brute force, the bigger database always wins. The monster database A0 had at its disposal constitutes an unfair computational advantage.

#2 Stockfish & his rivals Houdini & Komodo each perform differently under different time controls. For the A0 match they conveniently chose a 1 minute per move time control, which is not any kind of typical setting, and not one that Stockfish performs optimally at. 1 minute turns out to be just enough time for A0 to navigate between branches in its massive relational database, giving it an unfair computational advantage!

#3 Stockfish is not actually the reigning champion. It was defeated already in the TCEC Season 10 by Houdini & Komodo. Houdini is en route to becoming the new champion in a few days. They claim they beat the champ, but in reality, they beat an old version of a former champ, a fact that they must have known when they inaccurately announced their crushing victory.

#4 Google's team avoided appointing an independent arbiter for the match and never offered any form of verification that their claims were true. Did it really only "self learn" for 4 hours? How big was its database of move positions (estimated sextillions)? Did it merely use brute force or did it actually teach itself deep chess theory the likes of which have never been seen? None of their claims are remotely verifiable. When Stockfish did become champion late in 2016 it was subjected to strict rules and supervision to ensure that no cheating took place in TCEC Season 9. In this match, A0 was not restricted in any verifiable way!

#5 If Deep Mind truly did "self learn" itself to be the penultimate GM, and on equal footing in terms of computational hardware as they claim, then it must have developed some very deep chess theory, the likes of which have never been seen before. In that case, the total resources needed to beat it's first known competitor must be comparable to the total sum of the Stockfish program, which means that it could be easily packaged and exported as a stand alone product alongside the current bonafide leading engine Houdini-6.03. A0 would not only become the #1 selling engine on the market, it would also gain the notoriety that entails. But this will not happen, not because they're too modest to take their fair market share of the chess engine business, and not because there would be any risk to their highly proprietary intellectual property, but because they did not do what they claimed to have done. They used Deep Mind's superior processing capability to look deeper in to the tree of possible future positions than Stockfish possibly could. That alone explains the flawless performance, without the need for developing deep chess theory. This wasn't some genius noob beating a genius expert, this was a noob remotely launching a nuclear weapon vs a genius armed with only a shotgun. The noob didn't need to be smarter to win, he only needed a far superior weapon! Sooner or later, they will either be exposed for being a fraud, or they'll have to show some tangible results.

Now before anyone tries to claim that there's no way to package A0 as a stand alone product, superior in every way to all competitors old and new, you should know that this isn't a controversial concept. Software companies with far fewer employees write and package much more sophisticated software every day to be able to run on all kinds of different platforms. The Deep Mind algorithms that supposedly developed A0 into what they claim it is would not need to be included in the package. Whatever complexity allegedly lies inside the heart of A0, it would be no more difficult to convert to any standard encrypted compiled object oriented software program than the likes of Microsoft Excel or QuickBooks. Some people have stated that since A0 uses TPUs instead of CPUs, it is exempt from the TCEC rules of engagement. This is nonsense. The A0 algorithm can be modified to run on any type of hardware.

I'm surprised I haven't heard any blowback yet from their obvious deceit. I would think the Stockfish team would be humiliated except for the fact that they already lost their title weeks ago in TCEC Season 10. I'd like to see A0 go up against the new champion Houdini on equal footing. My money would be on Houdini!

This incident reveals the flawed character of the Deep Mind team leader(s). They're using a bait and switch maneuver to mask their lack of real achievements in AI! On their website, they brag about having 350 people dedicated to their AI facility for several years now. They've spent tens of millions of investor dollars and have nothing to show for it except a few highly orchestrated publicity stunts.

I strongly suspect their team is under fire from the board of directors for not having produced any tangible evidence of any progress, and shareholders want to know if it's worth continuing to pay 350 people to work nebulously on a mission that is almost certainly guaranteed to fail. Therefore, they diverted some of their efforts to concoct a scheme to attempt to demonstrate some form of plausible success. A scheme which so far has failed to demonstrate any legitimate achievements.

Mark my words, they will never reveal their supposedly hard found extreme knowledge of chess theory, and they will also never attempt to package and sell it. They will make every excuse as to why they can't share the deep insites that A0 supposedly formulated to prune that tree of positions down so deftly.

As much as I would love for A0 to not be a sham of a hoax of a charlatan, it clearly is! Shame on Google for having wasted everyone's time masquerading as the Gods of AI code!

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