Defending using flamethrowers

[Europa]

In a recent PBEM I tried to defend a small town which was built like an open 'court yard' surrounded by large buildings by putting flamethrowers in the far end of each building. The idea was that when enemy infantry would enter they wouldn't notice the flamethrowers until it was too late.

What did I do wrong?

[GJK]

You didn't play against me. I would of fell for it.

By the way, you owe me a turn.

[Europa]

Ah yes Gary I know... Can we hold that one for a month? I have no stable connection at the moment.

[Juju]

Difficult to guess what you did wrong without knowing first what actually went wrong!

But I wouldn't be at all surprised if flamethrowers just don't like torching their own positions.

[Europa]

Enemy walk in through the door, flamethrower fires, enemy scream WTF, gun him down and continues his advance.

[flamingknives]

Too much enemy, not enough fire. Use FTs to back up squad fires.

[AC]

You should try deplaying some regular infantry with your FTs. They are forward and draw the enemy attention before the FT fires.

Solo FTs get gunned down VERY fast as they are the number 1 target for any infantry man...

[Other Means]

well, here's a guess:

the infantry was in cover (buildings). yes it was the same cover as yours but i'm not sure that makes a difference. plus it was a whole platoon. plus the greens went in first followed closely by two squads of vets. plus they were fresh & hadn't been fired upon. all this coupled with their faith in their general made them hard to pin, therefore your FT's broke & ran.

if i was going to use the FT's individually like that, i'd have had them "hide" by the closest wall to the advance, with a 30m cover arc. that way you get enough cover differential to maybe pin all the attackers. at least to get a couple more bursts off. but generally it's a bad idea to use any unit in a position where it can't be supported.

(i can't find the autobahn map BTW)

[CombinedArms]

I would tend to have the FTs at the edge of a heavy building looking out onto an open area. Have them hide. Give them a cover arc out to maximum range. Have other infantry hiding with them, as others have indicated, with the same cover arc range. Enemy tries to cross the open area--it gets hit by the FT as it triggers the cover arc, panics, and then is gunned down by the supporting infantry.

This can be hard to pull off, but it's very sweet when it works. I'm not 100% sure that FTs won't flame their own buildings, but I think its likely. Try to catch the enemy in the open. Heavy buildings are much better cover than light ones, esp. large heavy buildings, so use those if possible.

[Europa]

Originally posted by Other Means:

well, here's a guess:

the infantry was in cover (buildings). yes it was the same cover as yours but i'm not sure that makes a difference. plus it was a whole platoon. plus the greens went in first followed closely by two squads of vets. plus they were fresh & hadn't been fired upon. all this coupled with their faith in their general made them hard to pin, therefore your FT's broke & ran.

if i was going to use the FT's individually like that, i'd have had them "hide" by the closest wall to the advance, with a 30m cover arc. that way you get enough cover differential to maybe pin all the attackers. at least to get a couple more bursts off. but generally it's a bad idea to use any unit in a position where it can't be supported.

(i can't find the autobahn map BTW)

My own comp is in limbo at the moment so I can't get to it either As soon as I get a new place setup I will send it to you so that we can continue our games

Sorry about that.

[Europa]

I now realise that I did everything wrong in that game I had more flamethrower positions at the back of the buildings "in case the first line falls" ROFL

Cheers!

[JasonC]

What you did wrong is you tried to use flamethrowers in CM. Flamethrowers just suck in CM. Use SMGs. They don't suck.

[junk2drive]

i had a platoon toasted crossing a ford by a german flamer hiding in the woods on the bank.

i have had a ft in a building toast a passing tank.

moving them into position is the hard part. they do take out pillboxes.

[securityguard]

Originally posted by JasonC:

What you did wrong is you tried to use flamethrowers in CM. Flamethrowers just suck in CM. Use SMGs. They don't suck.

It totally depends on the situation. They are not only cheap (especially those Italian AC's) but generally they route enemy instantly or flame the tile. In Afrika Korps i've had huge success with FT's especially in QB's but the terrain allowed that sort of abuse (lots of buildings, extremely dry weather in desert)

[JasonC]

"i had a platoon toasted crossing a ford by a german flamer"

In a ford you have 100% exposure. A squad will do it, or an MG. And if you put an entire platoon on one ford at the same time, you deserve whatever you get.

"i have had a ft in a building toast a passing tank."

So will a panzerfaust - let alone a schreck or a bazooka, which will do the same thing to about 4 times the range. For half the cost, in the case of a zook.

"they do take out pillboxes."

So will anything that gets to the rear door besides rifle - demo, zook, etc. So will an AA gun from the front, at 400 yards.

Flamethrowers suck in CM. All the things they were actually important for and good at in the real deal can be done by other weapons. (Stone buildings can be cleared with SMGs. Bunkers can be KOed by 20mm cannons). All the things they still get to do in CM, other items can do too, cheaper and more robustly (SMGs, infantry AT, etc).

Everybody tells their fish story to the contrary, but they are all outliers. An FT is a unit, sure it sometimes does something. Still sucks. Because half the time the conditions can be perfect and they will still fail (shot first, flame the wrong tile, refuse to fire due to friendlies ahead of them, etc). And 4 out of 5 times they just die without getting within range, or only deliver one shot from static ambush, which a minefield can do more reliably.

The only use of them in CM that gives a real capability other units don't have is gamey misuse of them to make walls 'o fire. Which in the real world you can do with a zippo, without a can of gas on your back. But kinda burns the guy who does it out of house and home, works only once, and the enemy just waits an hour and hits you afterward. Time is not scarce in the real deal, not CM clock time scarce. Nor is firemaking ability. Making this use gamey to the point of being a cheat.

FTs just suck in CM. A hundred gamers all telling their fish stories won't change the fact. Everybody has had their FT fiascos too, they just prefer not to talk about them for some reason.

[Falcon988]

I disagree. I'm in the process of playing a scenario PBEM where I'm using my flamethrower teams to torch dug in German infantry in the woods. Ordinarily I agree with you Jason, but in this situation my flamethrowers are doing what would cost me probably dozens of casualties to do with my own infantry. So I think it just depends on how you use them, like any other weapon in the game.

Though I would rather have a Soviet SMG squad.

[flamingknives]

Vehicle mounted FTs are pretty funky for clearing cover of stubborn resistance.

[Sergei]

Flamethrowers are good when attacking in a forest. Have them interspersed with the infantry, and when you meet resistance, the enemy will be busy fighting your infantry while your flamethrowers follow from behind and rout the enemy quickly. This really saves lives. Then you just follow the already-routed enemy and finish him off.

[Bartokomus]

gotta agree with Sergei; whilst they are a bit of a gamble by themselves, embedded with more hardy lads they are devastating. i usually form a small group around the CO of the Company, along with a high quality squad and some lmg's. it can be quite a capable reaction force...

[walpurgis nacht]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Everybody tells their fish story to the contrary, but they are all outliers. An FT is a unit, sure it sometimes does something. Still sucks. Because half the time the conditions can be perfect and they will still fail (shot first, flame the wrong tile, refuse to fire due to friendlies ahead of them, etc). And 4 out of 5 times they just die without getting within range, or only deliver one shot from static ambush, which a minefield can do more reliably.

FTs just suck in CM. A hundred gamers all telling their fish stories won't change the fact. Everybody has had their FT fiascos too, they just prefer not to talk about them for some reason.

If you don't know how to use them well, and from your points you obviously don't, then it must not be possible right?

2 points:

-FTs will break any squad . . . even the elites, and quickly, like NOTHING else in CM can do save an accurate shell from massive arty.

-you should never be in a position where your FTs have direct LOS to any enemy under any circumstances. The proper use is to find a keyhole and area target.

[Other Means]

they're valuable when playing as the British whose lack of short range firepower is a handicap in close terrain. but FT's following behind provide the instant hit that ensures fire superiority. the 2" mortars help as well of course.

[xerxes]

"find a keyhole and area target" ... and use sneak/move with a delay to avoid burning through your entire fuel supply in a minute.

And gee, sometimes (in AK a lot of times) you can't buy SMG squads.

[Sergei]

Btw. in the games there's different kinds of flamethrowers on offer. Here's a list of them all:

Unit nat. - range - ammo - (speed if other than slow)

German 32m, 9 (medium)

Finnish 23m, 13

Romanian and Italian, ibid

Finnish '44 18m, 3 (fast)

Hungarian 30m, 8

Soviet 45m, 4

US 45m, 6

British 36m, 6

Allied minors, ibid

[FM Paul Heinrik]

Originally posted by Sergei:

Flamethrowers are good when attacking in a forest. Have them interspersed with the infantry, and when you meet resistance, the enemy will be busy fighting your infantry while your flamethrowers follow from behind and rout the enemy quickly. This really saves lives. Then you just follow the already-routed enemy and finish him off.

Oh yes, flamethrowers along side an inf. platoon is awesome in wooded areas. Platoon assults short 10-15 m at a time FT walks follow up. Always use cover arcs and you will rout your opposition quickly. Even better than reg. inf. is pioneers using demos, maybe smg squad is better.

There ain't nothing better than mopping up enemy inf. using a flame tank/half-track. That flame always shoots out further than the other guy thinks it will. I think it's quite demoralizing to the other player as well as the tac-AI.

I've seen an AI FT guy hiding in a 2nd story building trying to ambush my assaulting inf. platoon only to miss time his shot and ended up toasting the house. The FT guy didn't hit my inf. but they immediately layed down right in the open expecting the next few sec. to be their last, only to see the FT guy come running out the front door of the buring house. Then my inf. filled the FT guy full of lead. It was one of the funniest sights I've witnessed in CM.

[FM Paul Heinrik]

Originally posted by Sergei:

Btw. in the games there's different kinds of flamethrowers on offer. Here's a list of them all:

Unit nat. - range - ammo - (speed if other than slow)

German 32m, 9 (medium)

Finnish 23m, 13

Romanian and Italian, ibid

Finnish '44 18m, 3 (fast)

Hungarian 30m, 8

Soviet 45m, 4

US 45m, 6

British 36m, 6

Allied minors, ibid

Good info. Never paid much attention to the different FT types. WOW! Check out those Soviets. That's outside granate range and their fast. I need to play Russians more.