In mid-1912, due to the Agadir Crisis, the summer cruise only went into the Baltic to avoid exposing the fleet during the period of heightened tension with Britain and France. During this period, "Fregattenkapitän" Heinrich Retzmann served as the ship's commander from October 1912 to January 1913. Retzmann left "Mainz" when she went into drydock for an extensive overhaul that lasted until mid-June. She thereafter returned to II Scouting Group. The High Seas Fleet again hosted a British squadron in June 1914, days before the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. On 5 July, Kaiser Wilhelm II arrived in Kiel to join the fleet for the annual summer cruise to Norway, where the fleet conducted training exercises as Europe drifted to war. By 29 July, days before the outbreak of World War I, the fleet was back in Germany.