M7 Priests need Divine Guidance

[Panzer Man]

Is there any good way to use these things..I cannot get them to fire indirect and every time they move in the open they get brewed up by AT or Tank fire..They seem useless if they cannot use indirect fire,they should come with a roving spotter..lol...

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"If Patton were alive today,he'd play Combat Mission."

[Guest Scott Clinton]

The M7 in the game is direct fire only. If you want 105s for indirect fire you have to purchase a spotter (just pretend he is calling your M7s ).

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Please note: The above is solely the opinion of 'The Grumbling Grognard' and reflects no one else's views but his own.

[Panzer Man]

Yeah I know,,but they look cool They just are kind of out of their element in this

game.I never checked their price vs.105 spotter,have to see about that.I bet they cost more..Expensive junk.

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"If Patton were alive today,he'd play Combat Mission."

[Popper]

I've generally found that the best way to use lightly armored assault guns like Wespes and Priests has been to provide onboard artillery support for your firebase. You have to be carefull how you do it, but when used, it can be pretty demoralizing to an enemy faced with 105mm blast with direct fire accuracy.

Keep them out of LOS of anything with an antivehicular capacity and concentrate on soft targets like infantry. They, btw, do a REAL serious number on buildings.

Use buildings, trees, and defalaide to narrow your cone. On defense, this is best done by anticipating the enemy's path of advance with infantry. Ideally, you can get a clear LOS to buildings the enemy will use as waypoints for advance. Pin them down with small arms fire and pulverize them with HE.

On offense, this takes a bit more creativity. Use scout vehicles or infantry to feel out the enemy's AT assets. Avoid these STUDIOUSLY with your SP's. If you want to be clever. See if you can maneuver to a spot where you can hit areas close to set artillery pieces but still stay out of LOS. The 105 has a giHUGic blast radius and makes bratwurst out of Pak 75's when set to area fire nearby. Remember, area fire is your friend.

Resist intensely the desire to use them like tanks. They look and feel like true AFV's, but should not be employed as such. Flank with fast movers like your Stuarts and/or M4's. SP's are to be used to anchor your center.

Hope this helps.

[Panzer Man]

Thanks Popper, I guess with a little patience and skill they still can be used effectively.

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"If Patton were alive today,he'd play Combat Mission."

[Spacewrangler]

These guns are very very effective at LONG range. You can fire all the way across the board (assuming you can spot the enemy that far) and do crazy damage on infantry units.

You see a spot of trees that might have an ambush? Give it two or three rounds, it the blast alone will send men running.

I love these guns, they are not junk at all, very effective, you just got to keep them all the way at the back of your side (and keep them moving around for God's sake once they're spotted you best believe the krauts are going to move tanks in to engage ASAP) and use them to suppress spotted enemies and fire into buildings, trees, anything where you suspect the enemy. You got plenty of ammo, go ahead and use it early.

Scare those krauts silly!

[gibsonm]

Panzer Man,

These vehicles (Priest, Sexton, Wespe, Hummel, etc) are open topped SPA with light armour to protect against small arms and shrapnel, they are NOT assault guns like the ISU 152!

These shouldn't be near the front line (unless they have to - due to an en penetration). I presume they are included to replicate such a penetration into a rear area.

If your opponent is inf heavy then if you stay out of range of the p'fausts and 'schecks you should be OK. If the en has any armour start hiding (they do have a couple of HEAT rounds but its unlikely you'll hit anything before you burn).

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Regards,

Mark:-{)

Anxiously awaiting the G4 PowerBook

[Popper]

No prob. Another tip on moving your sp's. Get really good at "rocking". Basically, by alternating "hunt" and "reverse" orders in a zigzag, you can move laterally without having to worry about changing facing. This is especially useful when you have a predator out there. This works particularly well with a combination of defalaide and vertical cover (trees or buildings).

The best policy is still to keep them out of sight until your own AT assets can deal with predators like Stugs or Panzers.

[Olle Petersson]

Check out this older thread! http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/Forum1/HTML/010208.html

I love the M7, it's a very good tank destroyer...

Cheers

Olle

[Popper]

I'd have to disagree with the efficacy of Priests as tank destroyers. The accuracy of the 105 isn't good enough to hit vehicles consistantly (or as consistantly as AT guns) and even moderately armoured vehicles can usually shrug off HE rounds.

They put a real hurt on open top vehicles, but risking mano-a-mano with a Hetzer or Stug (let alone a Pz4 or bigger) is usually a great way of losing a very valuable onboard artillery asset.

I'd recommend using them primarily against soft, area, and fixed targets.

[Panzer Man]

I think he was joking..LOL..A tank destroyer it surely is not..

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"If Patton were alive today,he'd play Combat Mission."

[CrapGame]

He might not be - I've had a Hummel make short work of two jumbo Shermans in one game. Those shape charges can be deadly (if you can get them to hit).

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CrapGame

[Popper]

Oops. I guess I didn't see the winky face. Even still, it is pretty shi'ite advice to suggest using an SPA as a TD. Like I said, it's a great way to lose a very valuable asset.

[Popper]

A particular favorite soft target I have for my SPA's is the flanking machinegunner.

Most defenders will attempt to anchor the flank of a firebase with one or more machinegunners. This gives them a great overlapping field of fire and prevents the attacker from easily flanking a defended position. It is usually pretty costly to assault these positions dead on. The better solution is to neutralize it with one or two turns of area fire pounding. A solid 40 seconds of 105 usually sends an MG42 crew screaming for Muter.

This leaves your own assaulting troops an unmolested path to your enemy's flank.

All you have to do is expose the MG's with a scout car or probing infantry, follow the tracers back to the likely source, and pulverize the area with half a minute of HE.

[CrapGame]

Popper -

You're absolutely right. I didn't hunt for those jumbos, they stumbled through some heavy smoke right into the path of my Hummel. Watching the super-slow reloading time of a Hummel race against the fast turret of a Sherman caused me to curse loudly and often at the crew of that thing, that's for sure. Thank god the 2 jumbos didn't appear at the same time, or old Mr. Hummel would have had a really bad day...

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CrapGame

[Olle Petersson]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Panzer Man:

I think he was joking..LOL..A tank destroyer it surely is not..

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If you read my posting in that other thread you'll notice that in one game I played it (or rather "the two of them") most definately were.

They took out IIRC two Crack Hetzers (frontal) and one Crack King Tiger (flank).

All were within 200m and i think first-shot-kills.

... so I wasn't joking a lot, although I never pick M7s with the purpose of anti-tank use. (In that other game I had a few Jumbo,s, Hellcats, a Pershing and so on, but they never got to shoot at the enemy armour.

One Jumbo was homing in on the KT, but didn't turn the turret fast enough (the KT was at 10 o'clock) to aim before my M7, in whose LOF the KT showed up, got a shot off.)

Cheers

Olle