The hugly overpowered panzerfaust

[Rrralphster]

Achtung! Feuerstrahl! means "Beware ! Fire Jet !"

 

[Vonreuter]

The illusion that a PzFaust did little damage to a tank comes from reports of knocked out tanks being repaired and brought back to action later on. That is true, PzFausts rarely caused catastrophical damage which couldn't be repaired, but a tank hit by a Faust was knocked out for quite a while, which, in RO terms, would mean a kill. The damage was caused mainly to the fragile bits inside the tank, like the crew members.

Strother, please do your research before you blurt out your truths based on WWII games. PzFausts did have a fire jet, which could inflict serious burns. I'm still waiting for it to be implemented into the game.

 

[Sclass12]

PF used a black powder launching charge. It and the backblast made for a very prominent shot signature, attracted much fire at once. If backblast and the smoke were modeled into the game, it would help relaism a lot. Penetration seems reasonable.

Not sure why, but changing the fire mode (supposed to change range settings on the PF in game) stopped working for me. Wonder why...

Are you pressing the correct key? You have to press the attach bayonet key to adjust the Panzerfaust sights.

 

[jedinstven-o crni Wuk]

your tank has not the be destroyed or unusable, when it gets hit or penetrated. There have been tanks, penetrated from one side to another, and still "working" (dont ask me, how ...). But you would definetly give up the tanks and abadone it, at lesat in most cases, if you got penetrated (both PzFaust and Shell). When it starts to smoke inside, which i guess is a heavy problem with a Faust, the tank may still be functional, but a crew can not realy operate with a tank, when they have nothing to breath, then smoke or can not see anything inside.

 

[fullmj|glattevir]

I don't think there is enough gore for Panzerfaust related infantry killings. I mean an arm or leg will pop off if you hit it, but when you hit them in the chest there should be a huge flame coming out of their back and when they fall down there should be a perfect circle in the chest like you see in cartoons.

I seem to remember them turning into a cloud of blood. Is my memory wrong, or are you useing the no-gore german version?

 

[Vonreuter]

Once I fired a PzFaust at a T-34 when a friendly jumped in the way. I blasted his arm off, but that was it. No gore cloud, no annihilation, but he did lose his left arm.

 

[Golf33]

Plenty of accounts from the Western Front in '44-'45 recount tanks that were hit by PF and penetrated without crew injuries. I seem to recall a couple of such cases in Strike Swiftly (history of US 70th? Tank Bn - don't have the book with me right now).

I also get the impression from various battlefield accounts (Jentz for German ones, various histories including Keegan I think for Western forces) that when a tank was disabled it was very unusual for the whole crew to even be wounded, let alone killed - usually you read of one or two killed/seriously wounded, maybe one or two lightly wounded, but in most cases two or three pretty much OK and often back in a replacment tank within the day.

I suspect the PF currently in game may be a bit too easy to use. Backblast is one obvious issue that has already been mentioned. The firing position is something else again - look at the crude sighting mechanism and the totally unsupported underarm hold! Does anyone really think they'd find it easy to line up the top of the round with the relevant hole, while lining both up with the target tank, not to mention trying to hold a round, end-heavy tube with no handles upright under your arm?

As already noted in this thread, the Germans made an awful lot of these things. This is at least partly because you don't expect many of them to actually hit anything!

If the PF was as effective in real life as it is in RO, the US, UK and USSR would all have run out of tanks before Berlin fell.

 

[Sichartshofen]

look at the crude sighting mechanism and the totally unsupported underarm hold! Does anyone really think they'd find it easy to line up the top of the round with the relevant hole, while lining both up with the target tank, not to mention trying to hold a round, end-heavy tube with no handles upright under your arm?

You can't hold up 10 pounds?

As already noted in this thread, the Germans made an awful lot of these things. This is at least partly because you don't expect many of them to actually hit anything!

Millions were made because they were cheap and simple to make.

If the PF was as effective in real life as it is in RO, the US, UK and USSR would all have run out of tanks before Berlin fell.

The Russians actually lost over a 1000 tanks to Panzerf

 

[Crim]

The only reason the Panzerfaust could be called 'overpowered' in this game is because of the ranges involved. Panzerfausts excel at close range, of course, and guess how close most engagements are in this game?

Prohint: it's usually under 100m.

The reason the Germans weren't able to obliterate every tank they saw was because of one very simple reason.

Tank engagements usually occured at long range.

If the Germans had jetpacks and were able to close the distance in seconds without getting hit, maybe complaining about the panzerfaust would be understandable.

At the moment, travel with infantry.

 

[[5.SS]Strother]

I'm not sure if there would be a "backblast"

Strother, please do your research before you blurt out your truths based on WWII games.

Vonreuter make sure you understand what you have read before you blurt out a flame.

Once I fired a PzFaust at a T-34 when a friendly jumped in the way. I blasted his arm off, but that was it. No gore cloud, no annihilation, but he did lose his left arm.

I always find it funny how their arm just pops off. One time I snuck up behind a guy and shot him in the back and his arm fell to the ground and his ragdoll made him stand up straight for about 2 seconds and he slowly titled over untill he fell.

 

[Pongo]

They are easy to aim because they are heading for a big target from a very short distance.

The Panzer Faust is probably under powered as most here have said. What it needs is a back blast like many here have said. If fired from inside a building all in side should be suppressed for 30 seconds like the effect of a arty near miss or a grenade near miss.

And having fired an 84mm recoiless rifle many times. They have far GREATER back blast then a rocket.

 

[Harry S. Truman]

If the PF was as effective in real life as it is in RO, the US, UK and USSR would all have run out of tanks before Berlin fell.

Funny you should say this, by 1944 Soviet tank losses became so large when executing armored breakthroughs, mainly due to infantry AT weapons that the Soviet High Command changed their entrie battle doctrine and forbid any unaccompanied armored breakthroughs. This is why it took almost another entire year to get to Berlin from the Polish frontier.

 

[Crim]

Looks like the people who think the panzerfaust is "hugly [sic] overpowered" have been thoroughly educated.

Therefore, I am now going to use this thread for a Panzerfaust Appreciation Post.

Mmm... hand-held-anti-tank-weapon-tastic!

 

[Malfunkt]

This thread is pwned already.

This thread is pwned already.

Nice to see a gaming community that actually does a bit of research.

it would be nice to hear back from the original topic starter in a thread like this. Hopefully they'll think a bit next time before making such sweeping accusation and been proven wrong ("this game is BS... blah blah").

 

[derspiess]

I always find it funny how their arm just pops off. One time I snuck up behind a guy and shot him in the back and his arm fell to the ground and his ragdoll made him stand up straight for about 2 seconds and he slowly titled over untill he fell.

First infantry kill I had with a 'faust blew off the guy's leg at about the knee. Come to think of it, every kill I've had that I can remember had the same effect.

FWIW, it seems like you literally have to hit someone with the round (as if it were a solid bullet) to kill someone-- there doesn't seem to be any sort of blast that harms anyone when the round impacts (I know it would've been a fairly small blast, but IMO it should cause harm if a round lands 1m away from a guy). Anyone notice the same?

 

[=GG= Mr Moe]

Nice to see a gaming community that actually does a bit of research.

it would be nice to hear back from the original topic starter in a thread like this. Hopefully they'll think a bit next time before making such sweeping accusation and been proven wrong ("this game is BS... blah blah").

Oh, man, I was gonna' say that!

 

[Golf33]

You can't hold up 10 pounds?

Cute but not the point I was making. Look at the photo above! That has to be about the most awkward and unstable firing position ever. It's a round tube with the weight towards the top so it's going to be trying to rotate in your hands, hardly conducive to keeping it aligned and on target.

To put it in perspective, compare the PF with a Vietnam-era M72. The M72 is a relatively modern design, lighter than a PF, and is held above the shoulder which makes lining up the sights far easier. It also has an effective range of around 200m, compared to the PF effective range of under 100m. We only had the sub-cal training rounds so I don't know how different the live rounds would be, but given half a dozen shots most people still struggled to hit a target well inside the effective range. I am assuming here but it seems that the pioneering PF would be a good deal worse than that, given all the disadvantages compared to the M72...

Millions were made because they were cheap and simple to make.

Well, that too

The Russians actually lost over a 1000 tanks to Panzerf

 

[melipone]

I'll add one thing though.. they really need to model in the backwash of flame when these things were fired. Then you'd see people taking care when aiming them instead of casually popping off a shot like it's a normal gun. The firejet coming out the back was dangerous to 10m, and lethal to 3m. And not just a danger to friendlies nearby.. if you were to fire it in a confined space or with a wall behind you.. YOU would be at risk from the flame.

I recall the old old version of Infilitration (a mod for unreal/UT1) had this for the RPG, and it really made you think before you fired it. And doesn't America's Army have it also?

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't this happen in the mod version? I remember tking someone by firing a panzerfaust while standing in front of him .

 

[Dax02]

The big problem is that the Panzerfaust is still a little bit underpowered but it's everywhere. There are just to much Panzerfausts.

I'd like to see some german AT-Rifles like the PzB39 or some close quarter tank weapons like satchles that will stick to the target or stay on it.

 

[SiFi]

Cute but not the point I was making. Look at the photo above! That has to be about the most awkward and unstable firing position ever. It's a round tube with the weight towards the top so it's going to be trying to rotate in your hands, hardly conducive to keeping it aligned and on target.

Well, how much would the sights and trigger *really* weigh? Thin sheet metal is not massive. Also, the tube is not a smoothly polished and greased surface, so your hands could get a fair amount of traction on it.

Does anyone have any sources on if there was any training done with the PF, or were they just given out?