Help with M7 Priests

[frode]

It's my understanding these are great assets...yet mine have never been able to inflict any damage before getting nonchalantly destroyed by tanks or AT guns.

Can anyone shed some light on proper use of these units? It's driving me nuts.

[offtaskagain]

Leave them back for a while. They obivously aren't assault guns, so wait for your infantry and main armor to locate the defensies, then once they are suppressed, roll up the priest to beat em to the dirt. The closest the Americans have to an assault guns is the Sherman(105). It costs 44 points more though. It's a better choice if you have the points to play with and a close range map.

[Mr. Hankey]

Priest's are very useful for infantry support and will run like frightened school girls at the sight of anything vagely resembling a tank.

Don't use a Priest to go hunting tanks. Leave them back till you have a located some entrenched infantry guys, move into position and then let have it. Watch them fly! Make that high HE load and blast rating work for you.

As far as tanks go, there are a few simple rules:

1) Never move your tanks out too soon

2) If you think it's time to move your tanks out, it's too soon.

3) When in doubt, refer to rule one.

[Mr. Hankey]

Well, Panzerwerfer beat me to it, but yeah, what he/we said .

I may be wrong, but I (currently) think the blast rating for a Priest is 77, but the blast rating for a 105 is about 34, or something (somefink?) Plus the He load for a Priest is about 80 - 90 rounds. So for assault, I feel the Priest is better all around.

[ 07-16-2001: Message edited by: Mr. Hankey ]

[offtaskagain]

Actually both carry the exact same gun. Both have 77 blast and fairly similar ammo loads.

[MikeyD]

My Priests have come in handy in built-up areas. They're great for knocking down houses and it's nice having a .50 cal mg so mobile. And they're really no more sucidal to use than a Sherman if a Tiger's got them in their sights. They'll stand up to a mg42 but German light armor can't cope with their .50 Browning.

[Mr. Hankey]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by MikeyD:

And they're really no more sucidal to use than a Sherman if a Tiger's got them in their sights.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well, this rather illustrates the point of my post. If you have Shermans/Priests and a Tiger has you in his sights, it really doesn't matter if you have 30mm of armor or 130mm. Close the curtain on that tragic little scene...

While you sometimes have to take your chances to kill German armor, if a Priest spots a Tiger, 90% of the time the Tac AI wil reverse you outta there so fast, it'll make your head spin. Even if he has a shaped charge, more than likely, he won't take the shot.

All I'm saying is it's better to use Priests from a spot where he's not as likely to get ambushed by armor.

[Pvt. Ryan]

You can keep the Priests back (and Shermans for that matter) so that they have limited LOS to the tops of tall buildings. You can flatten the tall buildings which might contain sharpshooters, FOs, or HQs spotting for mortars. Take down those big buildings from a safe distance and your job will be easier.

[Pak40]

As many before me have stated, the key to the Priest is to use it in an anti-infantry role. And the key to successfully using it as anti-infantry is to find that one little nook or cranny where your Priest has a LOS to an infantry target but is out of LOS of all your enemy's anti-armor units, using trees, buildings, and earth to do this. Always keep your Priest close to a quick escape route, for instance, backing him up 10 feet will put him completly behind a building or hill.

Your opponent will obviously relocate his tanks to try and snipe your Priest but you must be one step ahead of your opponent and anticipate this move. Don't try and duke it out with your Priest, he has a slow rate of fire and bad accuracy.

City busting is it's strongest role.

[Redmow]

If you are playing against a live opponent, what I tend to do is keep it hidden thru most of the game....till that mad dash for victory flags comes around. Then you should know of the enemy's tank strength or gun strength and their location. I play Germans all the time and usually have a Wespe hidden like that until the last couple of turns. By then, I tend to have eliminated most if not all of the enemy's heavy weapons and my platoons are still at a considerable strength, though my enemy thinks he dealt me a heavy blow with his arty...but how I do that is my secret...have the enemy pound you where you want him to pound you. Fidgety players will fall for it every time. Heheh. But thats my secret. But anyway....I hold out my Wespe until the endgame. Later.

[PiggDogg]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>As far as tanks go, there are a few simple rules: 1) Never move your tanks out too soon 2) If you think it's time to move your tanks out, it's too soon. 3) When in doubt, refer to rule one.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>, Mr. Hankey.

Hankey, great tank rules with a sense of humor. I have used the essence of these rules, but had never formulated them into prose. Well done. Thanks for the rules and the chuckle.

Richard Cuccia