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light cruiser, above. Then the Sharnhorst/Gnesenau class were heavier than that
In pre-Dreadaught warfare, there are four types of crusiers:
Cruisers, Protected cruisers, Light cruisers, and Armoured cruisers.
Cruisers are essentially fast scouting vessels often converted from merhcnat ships, and are very sparesly armed. Protected cruisers are slightly heavier, featuring larger calibre guns. Light cruisers eventually replace protected and unproteced cruisers after the emmergence of the
Dreadnaught.They combine speed with armerent, but are still very lightly armed. Armoured crusiers, as the name implies, are heavily armoured cruisers, featuring medium to heavy calibre weaponery. However, they are not true battlecruisers as they lack the "all big gun" ship armerment which is featured on the battlecruiser.
You could describe them as "proto-battlecruisers" but this would be an anacharism as the role of the armoured cruiser was slightly different from that of the battlecruiser, though, as the Dreadnaught era approached, they were sometimes fielded in that role. For example, the IJN used its armoued cruisers to fill spots in their battleship line which had been vacated by the loss of two of their 6 battleships to mines.
Posted: Thu 07 Dec 2006, 08:34
