The sea battle I lost, because I didn't have a clue what was happening, but sea battles have always confused me, so that's probably my fault. The graphics are nice. The ships are hard to maneuvre, but I guess that is realistic.
Sea battles with wind powered ships have always been messy due to the unpredictable environment. In a 1v1 ship battle, the ship with the wind in her favor can engage and break off faster than the opponent, that is a huge advantage. Disable the enemy's rudder or mast and you can strafe it to pieces from where the broadsides can't hit you.
Lines of battle were the order of the day for the largest warships, basically a gunnery contest to see who could cause the most damage in the shortest amount of time.
Imperial Glory, an otherwise rather buggy dame of the same type handled naval combat excellently up to about 5-6 or more ships total were engaged, then it all became too much up to chance, as you couldn't hope to order them all around at the same time.