The Scharnhorst class would have been a much stronger design with fifteen-inch guns. That potential contrasts with later German projects that became rushed and overly complicated. The historical eleven-inch battery left Scharnhorst under-gunned for a battleship, but that weakness does not reclassify the ships as battlecruisers. Weapon scale affects combat value without by itself determining a capital ship's category.
Notable Point · 2:45:38-2:46:01
Small guns did not make Scharnhorst a battlecruiser
A fifteen-inch battery would have made the Scharnhorst class more formidable, but its historical eleven-inch guns did not convert a battleship design into a battlecruiser.