Impotent flamethrowers?

[Verdun1916]

Hi guys!

Was just playing the German campaign SB First World War, namely the 1916: Fire and Thunder scenario set in Flandres.

I had broken into the Canadian trenches and fired on an already demoralized canadian infantry section (with only two soldiers left in it) using two flamethrower teams. One flamethrower team fired from the hex just in front of the trench hex with the enemy unit, and the other flamethrower team from the adjacent trench hex I had captured in the previous turn. I fired three salvos with each flamethrower team at the demorolized enemy yet non had any effect at all! It was like the flamethrowers were completely impotent.

I expected the flamethrower attacks to have atleast some effect, even though the flamethrower team firing from no-mans-land was disrupted while the other team in the trench hex was perfectly fine. But the effect were nill!

After all flamethrowers historically speaking was extremely effective in trench warfare, since they either burned the enemy to a crisp or the mere threat of getting attacked by one was enough to cause the defender to throw away their weapons and surrender or flee in panic.
I've noticed in other scenarios aswell that the flamethrowers doesn't seem to have the same effectiveness as one would expect compared to what the historical sources describe. However I've never seen them so impotent as on this occation.

Has anyone else noticed this in SBFWW or any other SB-game titles containing flamethrower? Is this caused by a bug or is this an effect of how the game works?

[wololoh]

Hi,

This has to do with how flamethrowers are modelled in SB:FWW: they are meant to demoralize enemies before assaulting, but not that useful against enemies which are already demoralized. See this excerpt from page 29 of the Designer's notes:

In SB:FWW, the flamethrower has the
demoralizing flag. When used on the enemy, it will demoralize them, making them easier to
push back in an assault, and preventing them from moving forward without being rallied.
To be successful with the flamethrower in the trenches, use flamethrowers to
demoralize the defenders in a trench hex, then save additional shots of the flamethrower for
other hexes (do not continue to fire the flamethrower on the same hex). Assault the
demoralized enemy units with other infantry and bring the flamethrower up to repeat the
process. Needless to say, the defender should make the flamethrower a priority target.

[Verdun1916]

Thank you for the response! I looked in the game manual but found nothing on it. So it was in the designers notes which I did not look in properly!

Thanks! That explaines part off it!

Cheers!

[Carlos]

Note that while they are tagged as Demoralizing weapons, flamethrowers still pack a solid punch. They have a Lethality of 300 (which gets doubled since their range is 1) and a high penetration value.

If you're not seeing casualties, it may be due to a number of reasons (FOW, your units/weapon status, etc), but generally flamethrowers can and will inflict damage on top of demoralizing the enemy (in FWW).

Edit: On re-reading your original post, I noticed this:
"I had broken into the Canadian trenches and fired on an already demoralized canadian infantry section (with only two soldiers left in it)"

There's your answer - the target unit only has two soldiers. The density effect is applying a large malus to your fire values.

[Verdun1916]

Yes, that much I get. And that was why I thought it so wierd that my flamethrower attacks did not cause a single casualty. Considering the enemy unit was already demoralized atleast the firing by the team in the captured part of the trench next to the target hex should, atleast on paper, have caused some casualties as that flamethrower team was in good order, neither disrupted, pinned nor demoralized. Atleast that was what I thought.

Edit: density effect: ah then I get it!
Thanks! I had totally missed that.

[Carlos]

Edit: density effect: ah then I get it!
Thanks! I had totally missed that.

Sure! Interestingly, in FWW the Alternate Fire Density rule is permanently disabled. I don't think any other of the SqB games does that.

On the flip side, given the larger squad size in FWW, a well placed flamethrower attack on a full strength unit can wreak a lot of havoc.

[Verdun1916]

Edit: density effect: ah then I get it!
Thanks! I had totally missed that.

Sure! Interestingly, in FWW the Alternate Fire Density rule is permanently disabled. I don't think any other of the SqB games does that.

On the flip side, given the larger squad size in FWW, a well placed flamethrower attack on a full strength unit can wreak a lot of havoc.

Yes, I saw that after responding to you when I took a closer look at the designer notes.
I wonder what the ingame effects of a flamethrower attack against an enemy tank would be. I just red in Albrecht Rothacher's "Die Feldgrauen - Leben, Kämpfen und Sterben an der Westfront 1914 - 1918 that flamethrowers were deployed when possible against Entente tanks by the Germans. It reminded me that I have read this in other sources aswell. Historically this would usually spell a horrible demise for both the tank and the crew within considering the many openings and direct vision ports present in the tanks of the day. The flaming liquid would easily find a way inside igniting the gasfumes, fuel cans (spare feul cans were often carried inside the British Mark tanks for example) and ammunition aswell as setting individual crew members on fire.
I will have to see if there is any scenario which has both tanks and flamethrowers on opposing sides to try this out.

[Carlos]

There doesn't seem to be any scenario in the stock game that pits flamethrowers against tanks, going by the stats alone I imagine the result should be close to what you describe.

There's always the scenario editor... I need to read the whole designer's notes, but I did take a look at the conclusion and saw the list of maps that are unused and provided for eventual expansion... interesting.

[Verdun1916]

I have to read up on how to make scenarios and try my hand at it. I've been thinking about scenario building for FWW for a while since I've missed certain battles represented in the stock game. And this certainly rendered some ideas for scenario building.

[Stejones82]

In AOTR, one of the early stock scenarios pits a flamethrowing tank, as well as infantry flamethrowers (if you can get close enough) against Soviet KV-1s (if memory serves). the FTs are quite effective against the tanks. Unfortunately, the Flammenpanzer rarely survives the return fire from the victim's mate!

ALso, I would be up to a FWW PBEM game if you are interested. I have not played much on FWW, but am pretty experienced in SqB in general.