A game-related question opens into a real design counterfactual about the early ironclad era. The panel describes a proposed two-gun-deck version of HMS Warrior as a much more powerful ship than the vessel actually built. Such a ship would make the French Gloire look like an intermediate step and could redirect how other navies evaluated armored warships between roughly 1850 and 1900. The discussion remains counterfactual, but it shows how one increase in gun-deck capacity could reshape international design responses.
Notable Point · 1:31:48-1:34:27
A two-gun-deck HMS Warrior changes the ironclad race
A larger two-deck Warrior is presented as an unrealized ironclad design that could have reset naval expectations after 1860.