When one looks at the Majestic or Canopus class of British pre-dreadnaughts, it's easy to see the growth and progression towards HMS Dreasnaught. And while each of these classes of ships (and the ships themselves) had variations, they were relatively standardized.
Then there's the French with Carnot, Jauréguiberry, Bouvet, Masséna, etc were all substantially different in shape, variations in armaments, etc. I understand politics played a role in (mis?)shaping these ships but was there less centralized oversight than in the UK? Or was France hoping to find some secret advantage with all the variations? Why wouldn't somewhere, somehow, speak up about having to support so many various calibre of weapons?
And the tumblehome with all those portholes and turrets and casemate turrets and towers and various smoke stacks...how could they have fared in high seas during a real shooting engagement? They look like 1 or 2 shots from either broadside could flip them right over.
Edit: now that I think about this, is it a perfect example of waterfall vs agile methodology?
Apologies if this has been asked before...the whole pre-dreadnaught era seems like designers were throwing ideas against the wall to see what sticks. Except the French were just commissioning ships with wild design ideas (and then meddling during the build process) vs building and learning along the way to make incremental improvements.