Infantry Anti-tank Weapons – Revising Crossfire Anti-tank Rules 6

While I mull over the feedback I got about my previous post to revise Crossfire’s tank rules (Anti-tank Rating – Revising Crossfire Anti-tank Rules 5), I thought I’d share my thinking on infantry anti-tank weapons. Bazookas, Panzerfausts, Panzerschrecks, PIATs, and their poor relation, the anti-tank rifle.


Infantry stands

The direct fire ratings for infantry stands depend on the weapons available to the stand. Infantry stands are shot at with the anti-personnel ratings. The anti-personnel ratings for infantry stands are just the normal shooting dice. For example, a Rifle Squad is 3d6, a HMG 4d6, and a SMG Squad is 2d6 (4d6 at point blank range).

The infantry anti-tank weapons of the infantry stands define the anti-tank ratings. An anti-tank rifle is 3d6. A piat, bazooka, panzerfaust or panzerschreck is 7d6 / 2d6 i.e. 7d6 when shooting within a base width and 2d6 beyond. And that requires a bit of explanation.

Fallschirmjaeger 6359 3rd Company 1st Platoon F-3-1 squad
Fallschirmjaeger 6359 3rd Company 1st Platoon F-3-1 squad – guy in the foreground has a panzerfaust

Bazookas, Piats, Panzerfausts, and Panzerschreck

I’ll start with the exciting weapons: Bazookas, PIATs, Panzerfausts, and Panzerschrecks. One of the common complaints I hear during Crossfire games is that infantry anti-tank weapons (IAW) can shoot across the table. Our Dung Farm game had an example of this. A long range Scottish PIAT sniper got my StuG! Given my ideas about ground scale in Crossfire I don’t think this long distance sniping by IAW should be possible.

DungFarm-1877 Long range shot by Scottish PIAT
DungFarm-1877 Long range shot by Scottish PIAT

The accounts I’ve read have men armed with PIATs and such like skulking about, trying to get close to their target. So I think range is more important for infantry anti-tank weapons. In the standard Crossfire rules, SMG squads are the only type of stand that have a point blank range. SMG squads are rated 4d6 anti-personnel at point blank range, otherwise 2d6. I think this existing SMG mechanism can work for infantry anti-tank weapons. That would give bazookas, piats, panzerfausts, and Panzerschrecks two anti-tank ratings. One for point blank range and one for longer range. At point blank range (within stand width) a bazooka etc shoots at 7d6 (modified by armour). But at longer ranges they only shoot at 2d6 and ignore all modifiers.

Point blank range is a stand width, but given Crossfire lacks an official ground scale it is hard to say how far that is. I’ve written up my thoughts on Ground Scale in Crossfire and a stand width can be anything from 11m to 53m, although I assume 30m. 30m seems about right for close range infantry anti-tank fire.

italy-137 Kiwis fight back
italy-137 Kiwis fight back
italy-146 StuG hunting with a PIAT
italy-146 StuG hunting with a PIAT

Anti-tank rifles

I’m going the complete opposite direction for anti-tank rifles. Where Bazookas and such like require sneaking about to get a good close range shot, anti-tank rifles are about quantity.

In my revised rules anti-tank rifles shoot like an ultra-light gun. 3d6 against light armour and going down from there. They do get to group fire, and that is where numbers will count. A single squad shooting with an anti-tank rifle won’t do much. But if the entire platoon has them, then they can do something useful.


Update Gun versus Armour Matrix

For comparison purposes I’ve added infantry anti-tank weapons to my 2022 Gun vs Arm matrix from Anti-tank Rating – Revising Crossfire Anti-tank Rules 5.

Gun versus Armour Matrix (Jul 2022)
Gun Calibre Band Calibre Light Armour (0d6) Medium Armour (1d6) Heavy Armour (2d6) Ultra Heavy Armour (3d6)
Bazooka, Piat, Panzerfaust, Panzershrek 7d6/2d6 6d6/2d6 5d6/2d6 4d6/2d6
Anti-tank Rifle 3d6 2d6 1d6 0d6
Super Light Gun (“Door Knocker”) Up to 44mm 3d6 2d6 1d6 0d6
Ultra Light Gun 45-64mm 4d6 3d6 2d6 1d6
Light Gun 65-84mm 5d6 4d6 3d6 2d6
Medium Gun 85-104mm 6d6 5d6 4d6 3d6
Heavy Gun 105-124mm 7d6 6d6 5d6 4d6
Ultra Heavy Gun 125+mm 8d6 7d6 6d6 5d6

5 thoughts on “Infantry Anti-tank Weapons – Revising Crossfire Anti-tank Rules 6”

  1. PIATs were used to attack buildings at much longer ranges, but that is probably an edge case you can safely ignore. The principle of a 1BW range works well.

    The only question I’d have is whether these numbers are still too good. A single ATR is nothing like as effective as a 2pdr AT gun at any range at all. A bazooka has a 60mm warhead, so even at point-blank range it seems a bit hard to see it compared to a 105mm gun.

    Reply
    • The 7d6 is based on the +3 PEN for a Later Panzerfaust or Panzershreck. Admittedly a Piat and Bazooka only get +1 PEN, so might warrant a downgrade.

      I’m happy to take suggestions.

      Reply
  2. Hi Steven, to make up for my recent rather meandering and, on reflection, fairly pointless comment on your post of 5 November, let me instead try to be helpful and point out two minor errors in this week’s otherwise excellent post.

    1. This link in the first paragraph is not working, https://balagan.info/anti-tank-revising-crossfire-anti-tank-rules-5 .

    2. At the end of the first paragraph, “the” is superfluous in “and the their poor relation”. That’s pretty trivial, I know, and I wouldn’t have bothered pointing it out if I hadn’t noticed 1.

    Regards, Chris

    Reply
  3. Sigh, I forgot to mention this one, further down the post, where a probable link seems to come up as an href code.

    See “Update Gun versus Armour Matrix”.

    “For comparison purposes I’ve added infantry anti-tank weapons to my 2022 Gun vs Arm matrix from a href=”anti-tank-revising-crossfire-anti-tank-rules-5″>Anti-tank Rating – Revising Crossfire Anti-tank Rules 5.”

    Reply

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