30 Naval Officers

The Captain Bligh

The Captain Bligh, contrary to what many people outside the Navy think, does care for the crew under his command, making sure that their health is good and that everything goes well on ship. He is personally brave, rarely orders floggings, and has several friends amongst the crew. But he likes to swear and shout at them and bully them about the deck. Unknown to him, his actions are close to driving at least a few of his crew to a mutiny, despite the threat of the death penalty if they are caught for such an offense.

The Fletcher Christian

A former close friend of the Captain Bligh, the Fletcher Christian has decided that he can no longer put up with his foul mouthed hectoring bullying captain. Unable to leave the ship as they are out in the open ocean, he even considered committing suicide before one of the young midshipmen suggested to him that the crew would join him in a mutiny. Now he is trying to sound them out and find his true supporters without being betrayed and hanged from the yardarm for spreading sedition on board ship.

The Admiral Tryon

A clever man but an even stricter disciplinarian then the Captain Bligh, the crew of his ship are terrified of him and try their best to stay out of his way. Even his junior officers are worried about saying the wrong thing and getting on his bad side. He has no true friends that he can confide in, and nobody on his ship dares to tell him when he has made a mistake. This is unfortunate as he is on the verge of crashing his ship into another during fleet maneuvers and no one dares to tell him what is wrong.

The Thomas Kydd

The Thomas Kydd is a very unlikely captain, as he was pressed into the navy thirty years ago after dressing up as a sailor for a fancy dress party and falling foul of the press gang. After making a success of naval life he was promoted to petty officer rank and when an officer fell in battle he became a naval officer. Several years later he became a captain, and as he knows how it was to serve before the mast he orders the bare minimum of floggings necessary to preserve discipline.

The Rader

The regime this elderly admiral serves is utterly foul and hell bent on conquest, slavery and genocide.However, he does his best to keep politics and the dictator's political party out of the navy and concentrate on it doing it's job, to battle other navies, take control of islands and keep the sea lanes open to keep his country fed, whilst avoiding committing war crimes if at all possible. As long as he manages to do his job well, the dictator will overlook his private distaste for the regime that he serves.

The Rohestvensky

The Rohestvensky is on a voyage at the head of a fleet to face a foe on the other side of the world. Coaling is a problem, fear of the enemy amongst his sailors is rife, and to make matters much worse, his fleet mistook a fishing fleet belonging to a superpower for the enemy's fleet and opened fire on them just off the superpower's shores. Now his fleet is being followed closely by the superpower's fleet to make sure that it cannot cause any more trouble in the superpower's domains.

The Wanderer

The elderly Emperor of Ka Phum placed the Wanderer in charge of a fast frigate and told him to sail to a certain island where a flower is said to grow that if eaten causes immortality, so he can bring it back to the emperor. Privately the emperor has warned him that he and all his crew will be executed if he comes back without the flower. The Wanderer knows that the flower does not in fact exist, so he has in effect been exiled from his country and can never return.

The Nelson

The Nelson is a truly brave officer who has been in a number of naval battles, some of which he barely escaped with his life. In one a round shot tore away an arm, in another a splinter from a nearby mast smashed by a cannon ball took out an eye, yet he survived and carries on fighting. He once disobeyed signals from his admiral to withdraw by putting his telescope to his blind eye, but won the battle and so was not punished for insubordination. Sooner or later he is likely to die in a naval battle.

The Hadrada

The Hardrada is a firm friend to his crew and a fearsome foe to those he dislikes, and operates as a raider both afloat and ashore. Extremely brave, it is said he is never happier then when fighting for his life, and has killed a score of people with his sword. Hated and feared by the monks who he often robs, he has adventured in many lands and on many seas, and is idolized by his crew. As a king in his own right he does not need to raid but enjoys himself too much to stop doing it.

The Anson

The Anson is an elderly admiral who has not taken part in a sea battle for over a decade and in fact rarely nowdays goes to sea at all. This however does not make him useless to the Navy and the country that he serves, because he is in command of supply. It is up to him to make sure that every warship has enough cannon balls, gunpowder barrels, muskets and cutlasses for combat, enough food, water and rum, and enough fresh fruit to prevent scurvy on long voyages, and he does this well.

The Willy D Porter

Recently nothing has gone right for the captain of this destroyer. As part of a top-secret wartime convoy escorting his country's President, his helmsman scraped his anchor against a nearby ship on the way out of port. Much worse was to come. After nearly blowing the ship up with an accidentally dropped live discharge, his bungling crew accidentally fired a live torpedo at the President's battleship and nearly hit it, and he was dismissed from the convoy in utter disgrace, his fast-tracked career side-tracked.

The Togo

After a country closed off from the outside world for centuries was forcibly opened up to trade by the threat of naval gunfire, it rapidly modernized and made a large navy of it's own, and the Togo was appointed to command it. His government has gradually got ever more xenophobic, and has decided to use it's armed forces to take and hold a large empire of it's own, starting with a surprise attack on it's foe's main naval base.

The Orlov

The Orlov is the secret boyfriend of the Queen of a great Empire, and has gained his naval rank as a vice-admiral merely for this reason. Recently he has been sent abroad to kidnap someone who is claiming falsely to be the Queen's in reality deceased daughter. Unlike Queen Yocasta who would be delighted with such a situation, the Queen is anything but amused and sees the fake daughter as a threat to her rule. A cold dark cockroach-infested cell in an unpleasant prison awaits the pretender.

The Gromov

Once the grand fleet that the Gromov was the admiral in charge of was the envy of the world, it's sailors and officers well trained and disciplined, it's ships and guns and submarines first rate. But then after a failed coup his country's economy collapsed, and now most of the fleet lies rusting at anchor, it's crews facing bullying, very little pay, and bad conditions to the point that desertion is alarmingly common and many crew members are often drunk.

The Thermosticles

The Thermosticles is facing an opposing fleet that is many times the size of his own, and on paper his chances of success are not great. However, he has a plan to lure this great armada into a narrow bay where the sheer numbers will destroy it's ability to move around without crashing into itself, where his shallow-bottomed smaller ships can have the advantage, darting in and out and doing as much damage as possible. He hates the foe as it burned his country's capital down.

The Matushenko

Until recently the Matushenko was a mere quartermaster, without a chance of getting promoted much higher. But now he is on the verge of leading a mutiny on the most powerful ship in his country's fleet, and he hopes to use it to shell a city and start a bloodthirsty revolution. He hates the ruler of his country and the ruler's underlings as with some justification, he sees them as corrupt, unpleasant and very greedy.

The Smirnov

The Smirnov was a mere junior lieutenant three years before, yet now he is an admiral. His country is ruled by a paranoid dictator who has launched wide scale purges of his armed forces. By just keeping his head down and saying nothing remotely political even in private he has avoided being purged and steadily rose in rank as if he was in a particularly bloodthirsty war, as the officers above him are jailed or shot. He fears that sooner or later the same fate will happen to him.

The Kimmel

The Kimmel is the commander of one of his country's most important naval bases, but unknown to him he is about to get a very nasty shock indeed, for the navy of another country is about to make a surprise attack on his fleet and most likely destroy quite a lot of it before he can fight back, and he'll get the blame and an unceremonious demotion from his high rank. Most likely, he'll end up commanding a desk far from the sea.

The Luna

The Luna is an admiral who prefers that his naval battles be carried out at night wherever possible. He blacks out the fleet on the day of a battle with only one small light burning at the back of his ship, sails in close to the foe and then attacks by the light of his ship's cannons, ramming, racking the opposing fleet's masts and rigging with cannon fire and then sending his mean to board and try and take the rival ships, often with great success.

The Moby

After a huge white whale has started destroying small boats and even small ships, the Navy sent the Moby in a fast moving destroyer fitted out with explosive harpoon guns to find and kill the whale and put an end to it's watery rampage. The Moby himself was once nearly killed by the whale when fishing at sea in a small boat, and is obsessed with revenge on what he sees as a mad beast. In fact, the whale is trying to avenge the loss of it's mate, who was slain by whalers several weeks ago.

The Captain Cook

The Captain Cook recently visited some very normally very warlike islands, but by chance he visited them in the Makaheete, the harvesting season, where all wars stop so that the crops can be harvested and distributed so nobody starves. As a result, he thinks that the islanders are peaceful and nonthreatening when in fact they are anything but. Now that the Makaheete is over, his is likely to get a nasty and possibly fatal reception if he turns up there again.

The Drake

The Drake is hated as a pirate by some nations because of the many daring robberies and raids he has carried out on their treasure fleets, but his bravery and the money he brings in is loved by both the ruler of his country and the general public of his country alike. There is no way that they would ever agree to extradite him. Should war break out, the Drake will be put in charge of his country's navy to keep the foe at bay on the high seas and fend off invasion.

The Darwin

The Darwin is very interested in nature, and has unofficially brought a whole menagerie of live animals and birds and eggs on board ship from the many islands that he has visited. Some of the animals are a bit unhappy, but so far none of them are in danger of death. Privately some of his crew think that he treats the animals a lot better then he treats them, but there is no danger of a mutiny. What he is doing will make lots of zoos and museums a lot richer.

The Company Captain

He commands a seven masted vessel of the DeMadden Company, specially made to withstand the worst storms that the world of Acqua has to offer. His job is to seek out and buy-or in certain cases to take by force, those amethyst deposits that he and his men find. On his world, amethyst is vital for magic. He generally may only take amethyst by force from countries and islands deemed * primitive* or that the Company is at war with, and has a distrust of the fleets belonging to the Kraken States.

The Kraken States Captain

A human like all his crew, he commands a large ship belonging to Big Red. The giant Kraken and several smaller Krakens have formed the Kraken States, and like the Company, they seek the important amethyst vital for magic on their world. Unlike the Company, they are banned from taking amethyst by force except from countries and islands that they are at war with or that are outright hostile as Big Red wants allies. The Kraken States and the DeMadden Company have icy diplomatic relations.

The Peary

The Peary is on a mission in the northern polar wastes to be the first human to reach the planet's North Pole and gain the fame and the money from celebrity endorsements that such a thing would bring, not to mention pride for his country which is why his government sent him there. His young son gave him a letter to give to St Olaf (the planet's version of Santa Claus) who is said to live at the North Pole and deliver presents all around the world in one night using the [Sleigh of the Storm}.

The Zeng He

The Zeng He is on a mission of exploration mostly for the sake of it, although those who sail out after him,and the Emperor of Ka Phum who paid for his expedition, will have far more mercenary motives. As such he has made a reasonably accurate map of everywhere he goes. He also treats those he meets nicely, even if they only have primitive technology, trades fairly and takes no slaves. Those who he meets will often wish he had never done so when others from his country arrive on their shores.

The Columbus

The Columbus is on a voyage of western exploration, and if he is successful he plans to come back at the head of a mighty battle fleet, to seize the lands and anything of value on them, and enslave or kill their inhabitants. No-one from his country has ever sailed as far west as he, and his crew are a little worried about what might be out there, although they all know their world is round and none fear falling off a waterfall at the edge of the world.

The Vanderdecken

Whilst most officers and men at sea are at least slightly superstitious, the Vanderdecken openly ridicules both superstition and the gods and goddesses in general and is notoriously foul mouthed even for a man of the sea. Privately, several of his crew are worried that their ship is cursed and one day they and their ship and captain will all come to a bad end. However, his crew have enough sense not to openly say this to his face.

The Golikov

The Golikov has no idea that his second in command is being needlessly brutal and demanding to his crew. Nor is he aware of the secret mutinous elements within the crew who are just waiting for something to act as a spark to set their mutiny alight. Although few of the crew hate him personally, his life is still likely to be forfeit if he does not either restrain his second in command before it's too late or find out about the planned mutiny.