sentences:  Thereafter they were reduced to reserve status beginning in 1908, since more powerful dreadnought battleships had begun to be commissioned; the rest of their peacetime careers consisted of periodic reactivations to participate in annual fleet training maneuvers.At the start of World War I in July 1914, the ships were recommissioned and assigned to V Squadron; they were tasked with coastal defense in the North Sea but were quickly transferred to the Baltic to support German operations against the Russian Empire.They saw limited activity during this period, and they returned to the North Sea for guard duties in early 1915.