House of Commons

12 February 1909

“The Germans!” Spittle flew from the rotund man’s lips as he spat out the words, as if they did him physical harm. His outburst did not go unnoticed. Parliament was more full than it had been in weeks, evidence of the anticipation—and dread—that many of the MPs were feeling as to how Jackie Fisher would extricate himself from this one.

“Order! The Member for Stoke-on-Trent will resume his seat or be removed from the chamber!” The gavel accompanying the Speaker’s words was lost in the cacophony of voices that exploded in contest. The Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central, the Right Honourable Kelvin Harris, MP, waved the newspaper in his hand menacingly at the man seated opposite the chamber before the Speaker grudgingly acknowledged him.

“Will the Sea Lord explain how the vaunted, and oh-so-expensive, flying toys that he has insisted time and again the nation needs to move into this new century—in opposition to his own Chancellor I might add!—managed to be defeated by the Germans, who by his own words are mere novices?” Harris turned to address the rest of the House, relishing his moment to perform for the press gallery. “Mr. Speaker, I would put forward that if the Sea Lord’s grand flyers are incapable of defeating “mere novices,” then perhaps it is time for a new Sea Lord!”

In his seat to the right and slightly behind Fisher, Devon Cavendish grimaced. Harris was meant to erode faith in Fisher, not the capabilities of the leviathans themselves. The low-born prat knew these abuse sessions made good copy, and he was milking it for all it was worth, but of course, he didn’t know the stakes that were being played for.

Devon couldn’t have planned it better—a defeat, against the Germans, of all people! Now to make sure Fisher bore the brunt of the responsibility. The problem with trying to guide things along the path he had chosen was people were not dolls to be jerked about on strings. The men in this room were weak, their convictions eroded years ago by soft lifestyles and comforts not enjoyed by the average Briton. But that did not mean they were as malleable as he’d like. Plenty were, of course, but most you had to push in the right direction. For all their status in society, and self-perceived worth, at the end of the day, they were simple folk—largely here by dint of their birth. What did the Americans call it? Manifest destiny? The thought brought a smile to his face.

But this was also a risky move, giving Harris the ammunition he needed to pin one of Cavendish’s own party. The general election was still a few months out, and whilst the Party had the early lead, the Opposition could still score a few points of their own. And though removing Fisher was the ultimate goal, it would not do for his failures to bring down the Party as a whole. Especially given the alternatives.

So Harris had to be reined in.

Cavendish coughed lightly, making an exaggerated gesture. As if on cue, the Member for Erdington stood up, waiting to be recognized by the Speaker. With a flourish, the wigged figure gestured for the other man to begin. Nodding his thanks, the lean figure of Andrew Ryan, MP, launched into his own tirade, this time directed at the opposition. Cavendish didn’t bother to listen. He’d told the other man what to say. Devon Cavendish, Whip for the Liberal Unionists—not even Chief Whip—and here he was directing proceedings in Parliament for the grandest Empire on the planet.

And the best part? No one realized. Not Harris, who thought Cavendish was a misshapen fop riding his brother’s coat-tails; not Ryan, who thought he was the Party’s hope for the future, and Devon was simply attaching himself to Ryan’s own rising star. Not Fisher, squirming uncomfortably in his seat, a competitor in a race he did not yet know had started. And finally, not dear old Spencer, seated at the right hand of the Prime Minister he was plotting to replace, the ambition he kept so well hidden quietly fermenting away.

But others had noticed. Had noticed much sooner than Devon realized.

To Be Continued…

Obviously if you’ve read the Lieutenant’s Manual you know there are Type 1 (Destroyers) and Type 2 (Light Cruisers) in the game. As future factions are released the names in parenthesis may tweak slightly, (Fast Cruiser), for example, but it’s still a Type 2 ship (i.e. a “flavor” name verses the hard code of the rules).

The Commander’s Manual contains rules for two more Ship Types: Type 3 (Armoured Cruisers) and Type 4 (Battleships). However, there’s only so many miniatures that can be included in the Core Box set. So while the rules for Armoured Cruisers are detailed, the miniatures for that size of ship do not appear in the box set and instead will be in the first supporting products released for the game line after the Core Box publishes.

So how do they differ? Well, one is size. While a Type 3 ships only occupies 3 hexes like the Type 2 ship (i.e. they’re both “cruisers”), the Type 4 ships occupies 4 hexes. Other differences are what you’d expect: in general, Structural Integrity higher, Starting MP lower, Breach Numbers higher, Enter Hexes Before Turn higher and so on.

The most significant differences are two fold, and both apply to the Type 4 (Battleship). First, the Type 4 Ships have 6 Locations on their Ship Cards: Fore-Port, Aft-Port, Fore-Starboard and Aft-Starboard added to the Bow and Stern. Second, due to the increase in size and the two side Locations, the firing arcs for the Type 4 ship are significantly more complex than those shown in the Lieutenant’s Manual, including a broadside firing arc. That’s a lot of firepower into either side…and toss in turrets (say what we have on the British HML Leviathan Type 4 Battleship), where you can turn the brutal double 12 IN Gun Batteries in the Bow to also fire into that broadside…and you better be prepared for a world of hurt if you didn’t manage to out-maneuver the Battleship.

In almost any game of this style I play I love “fast and agile”…it’s one of the reasons the Pontbriand is one of my favorite ships to date…but having torn several un-touched smaller ships in half with a broadside volley…exceedingly satisfying. And of course completely appropriate for the kings of the sky.

See ya next duty shift!

Randall

Port of [redacted by ship’s censors]

23 October 1908

Ma Mère:

I want to you to know that I am well. The events of the last few weeks I am sure have reached you via the newspapers. I hope some of my earlier posts arrived, but if they have not, this letter will attempt to get you up to date. Suffice it to say this is not how I expected to complete my cadet cruise. Do not worry about me. I am well, a little shaken and battered, but doing fine.

The cadet cruise is supposed to be the pinnacle of schooling at the École d’Aviation. We all hope for postings to one of the larger battleships. Cadets with lower grades get assigned to destroyers or even tenders. Those with the highest grades and merit are given duty aboard a battleship. I was assigned to a light cruiser, the Mount Olympus, which gives you an indication of my grades this last year. Once more, advanced mathematics has proven elusive to me.

I was made an officer of the deck on our Atlantic cruise. Justin, my roommate, has been posted to the Mount Olympus as well, as her auxiliary bridge officer. We set off to patrol the warm waters of the southern Atlantic. Many ships have made the passage to South America of late. This is all part of our [redacted by ship’s censors]

On 7 September our meteorologists noticed the barometer dropping sharply and the winds picking up. Wireless traffic with merchant ships at sea told us there was a large tropical storm front extending on our patrol path. We swung northward and cut speed in hopes of eventually shifting west in the wake of the front. The storm picked up the next day to hurricane strength and we struggled to keep our distance. Riding out a storm at sea is one thing, in the air another altogether. I was bruised on my hips and thighs from slamming into the railing while at my post. It was the same for every man on my duty shift. Even going to the facilities was a nightmare. Men were sick constantly. As Justin said, we may be airmen of blue, but we were all green during a hurricane.

As you have no doubt heard, the Mount Olympus picked up a signal from an American Gany, the Richmond. She is one of their newest battle cruisers; she had been caught by the hurricane and was trying to break through toward us in the east. Her course, from what we could tell, was taking her right into the storm. The Richmond was having difficulties just as we were.

Storms play havoc on Ganys. The static discharge of lightning forces the crew to make a number of complicated compensatory efforts to keep us even-keel. The winds also make maneuvering difficult. Our Capitaine, Jean DeGual, maintained contact with the Richmond. Having another ship nearby can sometimes prove useful during such weather conditions, as it was in this case. The Richmond was struck several times by lightning and had been battered badly by the storm. She was having issues with maintaining altitude. On 10 September, on the morning duty shift, we got the word they were issuing a general distress signal.

Our Capitaine was a brave man to respond, the epitome of the Air Service. A lesser man would have left the Amis to their own fate. He did not. He ordered us deeper into the storm front to rendezvous with them before they went down. As deck officer, it was my job to tie us alongside the Richmond once we found her so our engineers could board and assist the Americans.

It took four hours to locate the American vessel. She was badly damaged by the storm. Two of her boilers were out and she was losing altitude slowly but steadily. In the 170 kph winds, it was a deadly maneuver for us to swing in to attempt to assist her, but Capitaine DeGual has ice in his veins. He took us in a low swinging arc, diving us down alongside the ship.

I took my crew out on the deck to effect our boarding. As you know, we wear safety harnesses on-deck and it was this that saved my life. It took three efforts to successfully fire our grapples across to the Amis’ ship. When we began to tie off, the winds buffeted us. The Richmond bumped us alongside, hard. I went right over the edge, head over heels. I am all right, Mother. I hit hard on the hull between the ships as they drifted apart. My shoulder was thrown out of its socket, which was painful, but not as painful as falling to the waters during the storm!

I hung there between the ships for what seemed like forever as my team pulled me up and worked the cranks on the ropes to pull the ships back together. I feared that the Richmond would once more bump us, as I would have been crushed. Fortunately, my crew got me up before the Richmond nudged us again. They propped me by the rail and I directed them to extend the gangway.

I was carried off to sickbay as our crew boarded the Richmond. As you have no doubt read in the papers, we succeeded in getting their boilers fired up, saving their ship and crew. While I am sore from the events that unfolded, the Capitaine has spoken of my bravery during the boarding action, earning me a citation. Such an honor will no doubt assist me in my first duty assignment.

The doctors say I am healing well, though I itch constantly under the plaster cast. I am sending you a copy of the citation I received in a separate letter. Please keep it for me and show it to Papa and Julianne. I have made our family name a revered one, at least aboard the Olympus. Even the American newspapers have spoken of the bravery and daring of our crew in helping them save their newest ship. I enclose copies of some of the articles about us, just in case you have not heard about the incident.

My love to you all.

Paul Patel

Cadet Sous-Lieutenant de aérien

To Be Continued…

I know we just updated these a few weeks ago, so wanted to let you know the exact corrections this time around and why I felt it worthwhile to update again.

For the Lieutenant’s Manual, somehow the sample Ship Card on page 7 reverted to an older, incorrect version of the file when we generated the update. Neither Matt or I have any idea how it happened…but it’s fixed.

Since we originally published the James’ Fighting Leviathans PDF, as noted in my blog, I’ve fleshed out the various Gun Batteries to a nice, anal-retentive level of spread-sheet awesomeness. In doing so I noted some tweaks that needed to be made to some Gun Batteries…and while we made one of those tweaks in the previous update (namely the change of the Beagle’s Port/Starboard 4 IN Gun Batteries from “6/8 Hex” to “5/10 Hex”, I completely missed that the Beagle mounts two such Gun Batteries in each side Location. Sorry about that…and it’s now fixed.

Thanks to those that caught these little niggles and let us know!

See ya next duty shift!

Randall

HML Philopoemen

12 January 1909

Ratings spoke quietly into the speaking tubes before them as Christian continued giving rapid-fire orders. “Helm, bring us about, make sure those buggers can’t get a good shot at the boats.” Crippen nodded. Admiral Jellicoe’s plan was for the larger leviathans to shield the lighter, more nimble vessels with their bulk, whilst opening up their broadsides at the Germans arrayed against them. The Edward VII-class leviathans were well armoured enough to take whatever the Krauts could throw at them. In this fight, the Germans were simply outclassed. Even with a decade’s worth of neglect, the ocean-going vessels of the Royal Navy were still a match for any navy in the world—whether augmented by Levs or not.

As if to illustrate the point, the Philopoemen heaved under his feet as the designated batteries opened fire. The thundercrack of each gun was largely absorbed by the mass of steel and wood that served as the Philopoemen’s superstructure, and only the wavering of the pegs holding aloft from his map board the wooden blocks that served as representations of the various fleet vessels gave any indication of the Germans’ return fire.

“Rupert, shift fire and hit those surface targets before the Counties go in. And for God’s sake, Rupert, make sure those gunners know what they’re hitting before they fire. Fisher will chew my arse out if any of those bloody floaties takes one from us!”

“Sir! Look at the Suffolk!” Both Crippen and Christian snapped their heads up in unison to look off the port bow at the British County-class light cruiser.

“Bloody fool! He’ll get his arse kicked!” Crippen nodded as he watched the other British vessel engage the German surface targets. Unlike the Philopoemen, which had stayed back and used its superior range to drop fire onto the German surface flotilla whilst continuing to engage the German leviathan fleet, the Suffolk had rushed forward and was now tilting at an angle of twenty-five degrees off the vertical, allowing its gunners a much clearer shot at the German boats, but exposing the softer superstructure to the German leviathan counter-fire.

Sensing the opening, two of the German vessels shifted fire away from the naval cruisers they were intent on engaging, and towards the Suffolk. A low-caliber cannonade peppered the deck of the British Lev, but there was no real damage as the British vessel raked the German flotilla with a full broadside. Black smoke exploded as the German vessels attempted to shroud their position from above, but it was too late, with several of the Suffolk’s shots hitting a target.

“Blast!” Christian shouted. “What the hell is that?! Bloody Admiralty told us all their Levs were accounted for!”

Crippen grabbed the field glasses off the plotting table and stepped outside the flying bridge, making sure to secure his guide strap’s dog clip to the recess provided for the purpose. Sure enough, emerging from the haze at the rear of the German leviathan formation was a massive vessel, bigger than even the Philopoemen and its brethren. Crippen could hear Christian, still roaring: “Rupert! Get on the horn and let Jellicoe know, now!”

Crippen was more concerned about the crew of the Suffolk. Their captain’s bravado in disregarding the threat of the German leviathans now saw them exposed to the murderous fire that only a Battleship could deliver. The new German arrival’s capabilities were unknown, but Crippen could count as many, if not more gun batteries as on the Philopoemen. As if reading his thoughts, the other British vessel slowly rolled on its axis, trying to present its armoured underbellly to the marauding German behemoth bearing down on it. The naval vessels it was ostensibly escorting were forgotten.

“Captain Christian! Admiral Jellicoe has given the withdraw order!”

“What?! God help me, boy, if you’ve messed up, I’ll God Walk you until you’re dead!”

“No, sir! Order has been confirmed, the surface vessels are taking too much damage.”

“Bullshit! Those bloody Krauts aren’t even getting a hit in!”

“Surface flotilla reports heavy fire, and—”

Crippen winced as a stream of invective flowed from his superior’s lips. “That’s why we’re using fecking Levs! What the feck did they think was going to happen?! Of course they’ll take heavy fire. Useless fecking bastards! Rupert! You tell Jellicoe to push those fecking floaties and we’ll make sure the Germans stay hit!” His frustration given voice, Christian walked outside the bridge to share a private word with Crippen. “Withdraw, Alun—withdraw! Fecking useless bastards. I—”

The captain’s next words were swallowed by an almighty explosion that rent the air. Wheeling quickly around to face the Suffolk, Crippen felt his mouth dry as little fires danced across a full third of the British vessel that was falling in a stream of fiery detritus across the wake of the German surface fleet. The Suffolk had managed to present its best face to the German battleship bearing down on it, and had still fallen. Like a pack of wolves, the remaining German cruisers fell into a formation with the larger vessel, seemingly sensing the British fleet’s moment of hesitation.

Crippen knew Christian was the most outspoken of the leviathan captains, but that didn’t mean he was the only one. The Sky Fleet had been formed from those officers and men that the Royal Navy considered expendable, and discipline was one of the main reasons. So he had no doubt the same conversation he’d just overheard between the contrite XO and the brusque captain was being replayed throughout the fleet. The Germans had seized that moment to show more cohesion than they had exhibited before, and the Suffolk and its crew were now paying the price. The British fleet was stronger and larger than its German counterpart, but the Germans weren’t hampered by the lack of communication and even respect that plagued the two separate halves of the British armada. Crippen hoped the fool at Whitehall was keelhauled, or more appropriately, God-walked for this debacle.

“Rupert! Get those guns on that bastard now! I want it out of my sky!”

“Admiral Jellicoe is ordering us to withdraw, Captain.”

“Rupert, fire the God-damned guns or I’ll kick you off the deck myself!”

“Cap’n Christian sir, look at the fleet!”

Despite Crippen’s earlier thought regarding the discipline of the Sky Fleet, when it came down to it, Admiral Jellicoe commanded a large amount of respect, and the repeated orders were slowly being obeyed. The Suffolk was struggling to set down in good shape, but thus far the Germans had refrained from further attacks. Only the Philopoemen remained at combat range, and the Germans fired sporadically, trying more to entice the Edward VII-class leviathan closer than to effectively damage it.

The Sky Fleet had lost here today, despite the decrepit forms of several Kormorant-class leviathans limping gingerly towards the rear of the German lines. They had failed, and with that, the image of invincibility the Sky Fleet had crafted was rendered impotent. Crippen looked towards his captain, the unspoken question asked by his arched eyebrows. Slamming a fist into the plotting table, Captain Christian nodded.

“Aye, Alun—rejoin the Fleet. The Germans have won this day.”

To Be Continued…

So, moving on to the meat of this blog. Originally, like so many other games along similar lines, there was no making repairs on the fly in this game. Thinking back on it I’m not sure why I went this route, though it likely was a case of always striving to strip the game down, helping with ease of learning and play. Ultimately, several things came together to change my mind.

First, after I moved Crews to their own Slots and gave them Crew Dice, I began to realize they needed to have a little more value in game play. While Crew Slots are very effective when wedded to Gun Batteries, I didn’t like the concept that the Gun Battery’s destruction meant the Crew Slot was instantly worthless for the rest of that game. Additionally, I began to realize I wanted the flexibility of giving a ship a unique feel such as having Crew Slots in a Location with no Gun Batteries.

Second was an aesthetic discovery. Unlike so many other games I’ve dealt with in the past where there is a very small number of individuals crewing a playing unit, leviathans are crewed by dozens and dozens of individuals…so having ‘crewmen to spare’ to make repairs seemed logical. Not to mention the feel of a few desperate crewman using ingenuity, desperation and a healthy dose of luck to plug a leak, fix a broken engine part or make a destroyed gun work again…that fit perfectly with the grim and dirty, yet heroic world of Leviathans.

Finally, once I’d put the repair rules into place and gave them a whirl a few times I realized I’d put another “That Was Totally Wicked!” moment into the game, as one side desperately attempts to fix a destroyed Slot, while the other side cheers for a bad dice roll leaving the Location he just pummeled in a bad state.

All of those items combined into a great aspect of the game. Basically at the end of the turn, after all other actions have been resolved in a turn, a player can choose to try and fix any Slots destroyed in a previous turn in a Location that has an un-destroyed Crew Slot (the exceptions are Armor and Crew Slots, which cannot be fixed in this fashion). Any number of such ‘fixes’ can be attempted in a turn, but only one such attempt can be made per Crew Slot (meaning if the ship has multiple Crew Slots, multiple attempts can be made). The player then makes a dice roll to see if he succeeds or not. If he fails, the Slot remains destroyed…if he succeeds, the Slot is fixed and can be used on the following turn.

This helps to explain, as some players have noted, those ships that have Crew Slots in a Location without a Gun Battery. Since you don’t want a game to extend under the Lieutenant’s Manual, which is all about providing a quick and fast taste of game play before moving on to the Commander’s Manual, repair is not found in those introductory rules.

See ya next duty shift!

Randall

As with every aspect of this project, I’ve grand plans for what I’d like to see with these forums. Unfortunately, it simply was proving too much to tackle at this time. And the community that has been following my blogs and the progress of Leviathans for long months has been asking for forums….a lot of asking (which is a great thing).

So we’ve scaled back for an initial launch; at this point I feel forums are more important than that grand vision. As usual, however, we’ll be working in the background on a 2.0 keel overhaul for down the line. To help with that upgrade, I’ve created a dedicated thread in the General Discussion section, where anyone can post their ideas for ways to improve the forum.

At the current time there are no hard and fast rules about what is and what is not appropriate on the forum. However, these forums are moderated by our Sky Captains (sorry…but I’ve seen far too many un-moderated forums descend into anarchy that drives even the most ardent fans away). As such, please use common sense and be courteous. If we must institute some specific rules due to forum member complaints, then we’ll move in that direction.

But for now…please, come, type, discuss…and enjoy. Thanks for your patience on this!

See ya next duty shift!

Randall

Leviathans’ Primer for New Airmen Excerpt offers up a sneak peak of 21 of the 96 pages that will be in the full Primer — just one of the pieces that will be inside the Leviathans Core Box Set: Buy from Catalyst’s BattleShop • Buy from DriveThruRPG

Two previous Leviathans‘ PDF releases have also been updated — if you’ve already bought them, the updates are free, and if not, now is a fine time to take a first look at the Leviathan’s Lieutenants Manual, the 32-page Quick-Start Rules for Leviathans (Buy from Catalyst’s BattleShop • Buy from DriveThruRPG) and James’ Fighting Leviathans: Excerpt From 1910 — 4 additional ships for use with those introductory rules (Buy from Catalyst’s BattleShop • Buy from DriveThruRPG)

HML Philopoemen

12 January 1909

“This is a fool’s errand, lad. Mark my words. Bloody Admiralty thinks the Krauts will back down after this little display.”

As always, Petty Officer Alun Crippen struggled to understand exactly what his captain was saying. He knew his own Welsh accent was hard for some of the lads to decipher at times, but Captain Christian’s thick New Zealand brogue was nigh impenetrable. Especially when he was irritated, as he was now. But one didn’t have to be a linguist to understand the snort of derision that followed the words.

In any case, the captain was right. The Philopoemen was classified as a Battleship, a behemoth of the air; battle-hardened in the skies of the Dutch East Indies. And the Edward VII-class leviathan was not alone in the low clouds. Crippen knew there were another twelve of the Sky Fleet’s workhorses in the sky with them. But it was the rest of the vessels accompanying them that caused a looked of disgust to settle over the captain’s craggy features.

“Bloody Fisher wants to expand his own little empire. Bastard isn’t happy having the levs under his control, wants bloody toy boats to go with them. Bloody King will agree, too, the dumb bastard.” Crippen managed to keep the wince off his face. Captain John “Black Jack” Christian was well known for saying what was on his mind, the very trait that had nearly seen him keelhauled in the Navy, and the reason he’d been put forward for the leviathans program. Still, calling the King a bastard would not endear the man to the crew. Their last stopover at Whale Island had seen a changing of the guard, with most of the crew hanging up their guide straps. Only Crippen and Dusty, the chief engineer, remained of the Philopoemen’s original crew. The young lads that had heard the stories, all full of bravado, had quickly learnt what it meant to serve under Black Jack.

“Captain, you should not speak about the King that way. I—”

“Shut your mouth, Rupert, before I shut it for ya.” Crippen tried not to smile. Despite the fact the executive officer’s name was Lieutenant Thomas Pritchard (the Third), Christian had called him Rupert from the day the toffee-nosed public schoolboy stepped on the deck of the Philopoemen. Pritchard was one of the new breed, those officers that had grown up with the stories of Tsushima, of South Africa, and all the other victories for which the press praised the leviathans. The lad should have gone to Oxford or Cambridge, not signed up to fly amongst the Devil’s Breath. His delicate features were ill suited to the heavy goggles and scarves that every flyer was forced to wear—except maybe the French. Crippen had heard stories about how the French flyers were cleaner, and had fully serviced kitchens onboard, not the slop galley the Philopoemen’s crew hesitated to visit at times.

“Yessir.” A suitably chastened Pritchard was visibly sulking at the rebuke, but at least Christian had avoided raising the God Walk for once. Crippen knew Sky Lord Scott had ordered Christian to ban the practice, especially on officers, but that was like waving a red flag to a bull. The only way to counter Christian’s desire to punish his crew for their perceived failings, and usually their lack of religious fervor, was to point him at the enemy. Hence their current mission to demonstrate to the Germans that the Baltic was just as much the domain of the Royal Navy as it was of the Kaiserliche Marine.

A naval convoy was being assembled at Portsmouth with troops and a sizable Royal Navy escort—just in case—but as was becoming more common, the Sky Fleet was called forth first to put the German upstarts in their place. Hence the arrival of the flotilla under Rear Admiral Jellicoe. The Germans had their own leviathans, but they were nothing compared to their British counterparts. Christian, during his one and only strategy meeting with Admiral Jellicoe had advocated forcibly blockading the Skaggerak and simply sinking any German-flagged vessel until the Germans repealed their so-called Kiel Proclamation. Jellicoe had been less than impressed.

The Admiralty, ever mindful of the growing irrelevance of the seagoing Navy, had fought hard for a joint component for the exercise, and a small flotilla of British sea vessels steamed through the waters below Crippen and the Philopoemen. The fact that the French were gaining the upper hand in the sky race due to their hidden elefacturies in Africa was irrelevant. Britannia ruled the waves. The sky was an afterthought

In the ideal world, the Philopoemen and her sisters of the Sky Fleet would engage the gaggle of Kormorant-class leviathans floating idly above the German naval forces in a duel for supremacy; a duel where the victor would graciously allow the vanquished to leave the field of battle, and the vanquished would withdraw peaceably, conceding the dominance of their opponents without need for recompense.

But it was not an ideal world.

“Sir, Belligerent signals commence firing.” Crippen stiffened as the young rating passed the message on. This was it. Yet again they were in combat. And this time for no other reason than to experiment with some fool in Whitehall’s idea of diplomacy. The Germans had run up the war ensign, and not backed down as expected. His musings were lost as the booming voice of his commander echoed across the flying bridge.

“Gunnery stations one through four, engage that bastard—and it’s the God Walk for anyone who misses!”

To Be Continued…