The reduction in size resulted in the ships' seaworthiness being adversely affected,[2] with the 1911 torpedo boats and the similar craft of the 1912 programme acquiring the disparaging nickname "Admiral Lans' cripples".

[1][3] V2, yard number 318, was launched from Vulcan's Stettin, Prussia (now Szczecin in Poland) shipyard on 14 October 1911 and commissioned on 12 January 1912.

[3] 107 tonnes (105 long tons) of coal and 78 tonnes (77 long tons) of oil were carried, giving a range of 1,190 nautical miles (2,200 km; 1,370 mi) at 17 knots (31 km/h; 20 mph) or 490 nautical miles (910 km; 560 mi) at 29 knots (54 km/h; 33 mph).

[9] On 23 January 1915, a German force of Battlecruisers and light cruisers, escorted by torpedo boats, and commanded by Admiral Franz von Hipper, made a sortie to attack British fishing boats on the Dogger Bank.

[12] The British and German Forces met on the morning of 24 January in the Battle of Dogger Bank.

Further searches by minesweepers could not find any hint of the suspected submarine, and in fact, E5 had already left the German Bight by the time V2 carried out her attack.

[18] V2 survived the war, and was one of the twelve destroyers that the Reichsmarine was allowed to retain under the Treaty of Versailles.