The Dwarf Ironclads are the pride of Barak Varr, the great sea-hold of the Dwarfs of the Mountain Holds, and the only true navy the dour mountain-folk have ever built. Squat, iron-hulled, and driven by roaring steam-engines rather than sail or oar, they are as ugly and unyielding as the folk who forge them, riveted vessels that ride low and heavy in the water and care nothing for the grace of elven ships or the speed of men's.
What they lack in beauty they repay in sheer stubborn strength. Their armoured hulls shrug off cannon-fire and ramming alike, and their decks bristle with the finest artillery in the world, cannon and organ-guns and bolt throwers wrought by engineers whose craft is measured in centuries. When an Ironclad opens fire, the sea itself seems to flinch, and few enemy vessels can weather more than a handful of thunderous broadsides.
From Barak Varr the Ironclads range out to guard the dwarf trade-routes, to hunt the greenskin raiders and dark elf corsairs who prey upon honest cargo, and to answer any insult written against the Great Book of Grudges. Slow they may be, but they are near impossible to sink, and a dwarf captain will pursue a debt across every sea in the world sooner than let a grudge go unpaid. The Dwarf Ironclads are grudge-keeping given hull and steam.
The fleet continues
