Ship review: Emerald class British light cruiser

Hi folks!

I've been working my way up the new British cruiser line these past weeks, so today, we'll take a look at the tier five "Emerald" class light cruiser, and her direct competitor, the German "Königsberg".

First, the Emerald. She's got the same 152mm main guns like her predecessors, and the two triple torpedo launchers on each side. The guns are single-mounted, and she's got seven of them (over the tier four "Danae"'s six guns).

There's a catch, though - the centre turrets can't rotate all the way around, so you can effectively only ever bring six guns to bear at the time.

The biggest advantage the Emerald has is her smoke generator (again a hint that these things really are just oversized destroyers). You can do some fun things with these, like do a straight run at a battleship, launch your first torpedo salvo, kick the engines into reverse, pop smoke, and peacefully turn around to fire the torpedoes from the other side, without being seen.

So, how does she hold up against the tier five German cruiser? In my opinion, not very favourably.

Let's take a look. The Königsberg's guns are vastly superior - for starters, she's got three triple turrets for a total of nine 150mm guns, they do 100 points more of base damage with the AP shells, and they can switch to HE for blistering fire against heavily armoured opponents. The Emerald can only do up to six guns in a broadside, does less damage, and can't fire HE shells.

This means she's struggling against destroyers, because she just doesn't have the damage output to deal with them at range effectively, and her shells mostly bounce off battleships. She doesn't have the manoeuvrability for close-range torpedo duels, and virtually no armour and low health, making destroyer dogfights quite hard. The Königsberg, on the other hand, can do severe damage to destroyers quickly, and with her precision consumable, do so comfortably out of torpedo range.

So, in summary, when playing the Emerald, you have to rely heavily on your torpedoes, concealment and smoke screens. Play her like a US destroyer, not like a cruiser. Personally, I'd still take the Königsberg any day. Things might get more interesting after tier six, when the German cruiser line switches over to fast heavy cruisers, and the British cruisers will have to compete with the Soviet light cruisers in the anti-destroyer role, where their torpedoes are going to be vastly superior.