Grenades & Flamethrowers

The new Caesar Miniatures US Army WWII set 1 in soft plastic 1/72nd scale contains two very common weapons, frequently seen in the hands of miniature soldiers. The flamethrower and the hand grenade.

In my wargaming rules I give each of these weapons a range of 50 meters, that's five inches in real world scale. Since infantry can run ten inches, that is a pretty short distance. One of the main advantages of these weapons is the ability to attack a bunker. Get the figure right up next to the firing aperture; easier said than done. Then roll a 1 on a D6 for the hit location. If you score a hit, the bunker is burned out or has a grenade explode inside it.

The trick is to get close to the bunker without getting killed. One way is to throw smoke grenades at the bunker. That prevents the soldiers inside from seeing outside and delivering accurate fire on the attacker. The way around this for the defenders is to have landmines, barbed wire and interlocking fire from other bunkers to keep the attackers away.