This is directed mainly at @GiledPallaeon , but I put it as an 'open letter' here because I know others will enjoy this.

Your help with my dual MC80 list before our Region tourney gave me a weather eye on your posts. The Liberty (I'm told by my local Armada friend) is my natural 'best-fit' ship for my style and gets used often regardless of my preference to 'try all the things' in Armada.

Your use of Repulse and Renown keep making me think of a series (currently available free on youtube) that is worth watching. It is based on books by C.S. Forester. They built a full size sailing ship for the series and both the effects and plot are incredible IMHO. It is similar to Master and Commander (with Russel Crowe).

Horatio Hornblower Episode 1 The first episodes are very tense and extra gritty, but the naval action intensifies in later episodes.

Let me know what your opinion was if you've heard of this series or watched it on this recommendation. It makes me want to play Armada.

I watched them on TV years ago and enjoyed the series. They were made around the same time as Sharpe and are better with more realistic plots, less bodice ripping and non of those daft Aztecs. You still rarely see anyone reload a flintlock but get a good view of naval life. It has some classic lines too....

"Madam be careful your dress is slipping, and so is your accent"

oh yes and Nicole from the Renaut Clio adverts turns up.

Thing is that the books for the 'Master and Commander' series (more specifically, the Aubrey/Maturin series) are just so much more interesting than the Hornblower novels . Sadly, only the one movie got made that is more-or-less an adaptation of half a dozen of the books, but...

Yeah, anyway, if you can dig up the audio books for that series as read by Simon Vance (the other readers are inferior, IMHO)...**** fine stuff, there.

I agree with @xanderf - O'Brian's novels are much much better than Forester's.

However, the Hornblower series are a much much better introduction to the age of sail, and I heartily recommend reading them first. Once you've absorbed them, you'll be primed to really enjoy the Aubrey/Maturin series.

And I do love the Hornblower movies - Ioan Gruffud plays a delightful Hornblower, and Robert Lindsay as Sir Edward Pellew is fantastic.

"Hornblower!"

I enjoy the Honor Harrington series for getting me in the Armada mood, it is essentially Hornblower in spaaaace. I think the first book, On Basilisk Station, is free electronically.

4 hours ago, Wired4War said:

I enjoy the Honor Harrington series for getting me in the Armada mood, it is essentially Hornblower in spaaaace. I think the first book, On Basilisk Station, is free electronically.

Indeed it is...as well as the second. Search the Baen Free Libeary for David Weber novels...

http://www.baen.com/catalog/category/view/s/free-library/id/2012/?author=1952&category=0&dir=asc&limit=24&order=name&publisher=0

How about the Alexander Kent (aka Douglas Reeman) “Richard Bolitho” series. Read them when I was younger and enjoyed them. There’s definitely plenty to get through!

All good recommendations. Loved the Hornblower series, available on YT. I've read pretty much everything from Honorverse. Space dildos for the win.

Also enjoyed the "master and commander" movie. Did not read the books though.

On 1/8/2018 at 3:16 PM, Wired4War said:

I enjoy the Honor Harrington series for getting me in the Armada mood, it is essentially Hornblower in spaaaace. I think the first book, On Basilisk Station, is free electronically.

Pity they became so turgid. Weber telling us the same thing about a character a dozen times in a book, instead of showing, becomes unbearable. There are worse things about them than the desperate need for an editor to cut the word count by 40%.

@elbmc1969 sadly so true, if DW had had a good editor I might still be buying his stuff. The number of times somebody spent half a chapter explaining their suspicions and then went "but on the other hand" and then doubled the exposition made me cry.