De Latte's Orders for Move Six. . .

General de Latte grinned devilishly from across the gaming table as his host and opponent walked slowly back into the study with a distinct list to the left.

"Ah, there you are von Tschatschke! They've finally pried you loose from the gin bottle, I see?"

"I'll shank you not to have fun at my expenshe, old corkscrew!" the older officer thundered, his eyes unfocused as he put a hand to his temple and rubbed gingerly. "Pardon me for my, my ab, absence," slurred von Tschatschke, "I've been. . . shomewhat indisposed, you shee."

"Perfectly well, old dressing gown," de Latte chuckled. "And that's quite an impression of Humphrey Bogart you've got going there. Or is it Sean Connery? Now, what about our orders for Turn Six, eh?"

"Fire away!" exclaimed his host, looking around the study. "Blast! There's never an ice bucket around when you need it!"

"Alright then," began de Latte. "Here are my orders for Move Six. . ."

1) The Ermland Guard shall stand fast and continue firing upon the von Auflauf Infantry. Perhaps they might shuffle a little to their left to make room for one of the artillery batteries? While you are not looking I might nudge that wooded hill over a little to make room.

2) von Flickenhoffers' shall Pivot (making a left wheel) on the von Mittau Volunteers to take your Dragoons in their flank.

3) The redoubtable Mittau Volunteers (who deserve a ribbon on their colours for their performance today) shall move in conformity with von Flickenhoffers' so that all three regiments form as nearly as possible a continuous front.

4) The von Auflauf infantry shall move forward as far as they possibly can to form a continuous front with The Ermland Guard, plugging the gap left by the heroic maneuver of von Flickenhoffer's regiment.

5) O'Malleys Irish Borderers will line the edge of the wood closest to the von Auflauf Regiment.

6) The jolly old Red Battery will cease firing upon the benighted residents of Eispicke and redirect their fire upon your Fourth Dragoons.

7) The remaining Artillery (the laggards) will make for the gap that the Ermland Guard has opened or them in the battle line.

8) The Electoral Pioneer Battalion... Hm, what to do with them. Too many units and too little space - been the story of the game for me. Hm. OK, keep then coming along behind von Auflauf.

9) Have the cavalry form up behind the Mittauers and have the Hussars join them.

"Does that seem clear, then, old twizzle stick?" de Latte inquired.

"As the nose on your face!" roared von Tschatschke, who was sobering up slightly. "My pipe! I can't light my pipe without a match!" He patted his waistcoat pockets absentmindedly. "I say, de Latte? Have you got a light? There's a good chap! Now, let's get to my orders for Move Six, shall we?"

And We're Off!!!

Arrrgh! Gotta go back into camera settings on my iPhone to bring all of the frame into focus. Blast! Painting is underway on the 60 or so Minden Austrians, which are slated to become my version of the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment of AWI renown. More or less indistinguishable from Austrians of the era really, right down to the red facings and turnbacks, but the eventual flags (already in my files) will set them apart. I went ahead and based-coated all of them over a couple of days lthe last week of August, using a mix of light gray and white acrylic gesso, before next applying my usual basic alkyd oil flesh tone to the faces and hands. In a day or two, I'll hit that with Army Painter Flesh Wash to tone things down a bit and bring some definition to the faces and hands. As usual, the plan is to focus on about 20 figures at a time, splitting the regiment roughly into thirds along with the color party and regimental staff. Depending on ...

Sunday Morning Coffee with AI. . .

A rmed with a second cup of fresh, strong coffee, I messed around a bit this morning with artlist.io using its image to image function in an attempt to convert my hand-drawn map from September 2006 to something that more resembles an old map from the mid-18th century. And just like my experiments with Ninja AI in June, the results are mixed. The above map is pretty good, but Artlist keeps fouling up the place names and has trouble putting a faint overlay of hexes across the entire area. Hexes, admittedly, are not likely to be found on any genuine maps from the era in question, but there we are. Frankly, I prefer the appearance of the Ninja map, but there were problems getting it to correct its errors. Grrrr. As is the case with so much having to do with the various AI's out there now, the output generated is a direct result of the prompts entered. For text alone, and when you develop a lengthy, highly detailed prompt, it is...

Continued Regional Map Revisions. . .

F ooled around a bit more with the revised map just before and after dinner this evening, using the Fotor app to reinsert missing text . I also removed a few other things using the 'Magic Eraser' function, which works surprisingly well. Now, we're getting somewhere. I just have to figure out how to ensure that the text is all a uniform font style and maybe figure out a way to add a few bunches of trees to suggest forested areas, Ninja AI is not always entirely cooperative to the tune of "I'm sorry Dave. I can't do that." -- Stokes

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

Search This Blog