So one day there’s psycho engineer sitting in his cubicle, hard at work in the lab thinking it will never end and the boss’s office is ten metres away. He couldn’t be buggered walking over there to set the boss on fire. He has a can of petrol, a bottle of gas and some tubing, voila, squirting huge sheets of burning petrol all over the inside of the bosses office and he doesn't even have to walk over there.

I’m pretty sure there’s probably a base-caveman instinct in a lot of people that has this urge to set things on fire, because fire makes it good; better if it’s not on you, either.

Flamethrowers are terror weapons, pure and simple, bullets tend to kill people a lot more effectively, quicker and at longer range. A flamethrower often means getting into a relatively point-blank range, spewing highly flammable substances over someone or something in an essentially chaotic situation. Not to mention, you're carrying or wearing a very flammable substance in what could always be a thicker bottle, that’s under pressure and a very distinct risk of immolating yourself if something went wrong and that’s a really ugly way to die.

So not only do you have to be brave to actually carry the damn thing in the first place, but you have to be to some degree, ‘fucked in the head’ to want to make people die in this way too. Psycho’s love these things, of course, not everyone who owns a flamethrower is a psycho, but chances are, they’re probably ‘not quite right’ in the head.

If flamethrowers do have a place in warfare it’s to fill confined spaces with burning stuff that you can't hose down directly with a machinegun. Rooms, buildings, cars, bunkers, armoured vehicles and corridors are all places where you really don’t want to be in the same area as someone with a flamethrower.

Due to popular request, SLA still manufactures vehicles with firing ports and slide down windows in the side of them so that the proles, grunts and SHIVERs can poke their guns out of on the way to Sunday school, work, wars and riots. Sticking a flamethrower in one of these is a good way to make you a popular kid in class the next day for giggles alone.

Flamethrowers do not accept weapon accessories like:

• Laser painters (as if a big sheet of roaring fire is that hard to hit with)
• Silencers (because someone will try)
• Flash suppression (… I mean, really dude?)
• Or any kind of recoil baffling (because they don’t need it)

Important

Skill to fire is 'Autosupport' with a +3 bonus to hit. Scores above 20+ indicate more than one body area or person is covered with burning fuel, up to 6 locations per person
DAM per phase for 3 phases to the first thing they hit, additional applications increase burn duration for 3 phases. One wound per area covered that causes damage but it does not cause bleeding.

It also sets on fire: ammunition, explosives and surrounding areas at the GM's discretion.

Flamethrowers do not have PEN; they just burn shit real good.

Flamethrowers do not have range; the fire only goes as far as it says.

Combat drugs are not effective against being roasted alive.

Being targeted is a Fear roll of 8, being hit is a Fear roll of 13.

Damage is not modified for 20+

They make dark areas really bright.
Jumping in water will help.
You have the IR/Thermo signature of a bonfire.

TT-FFF2 ‘Cindy’

ROF – 1
Magazine- 5 shots worth of fuel
Weight- 2.5kg (loaded) Range- 3 metres
Cost- 3000u
DAM: 5

Kind of like a bad joke, this pistol sized weapon is up there with filling a squirt-flower full of pee and covering people in something they really wish you hadn’t. It also quite nicely fits inside a VITO, Scarab, handbag or overcoat pocket that would be SMG sized.

It also quite annoyingly blows up occasionally, covering the user in burning petrochemicals (Natural Double 1 on the dice)
Made completely of ceramic with an electrical ignition, it is beginning to make life distinctively uncomfortable for SLA Industries as a way of starting fires, both on its buildings and people.

Reload cylinders cost 50u, reloading them yourself costs 5u, and a failed Weapon Maintenance roll means your bedroom is on fire.

DN 90-Z ‘The Zee’

ROF – 1/5
Magazine- 45 shots worth of fuel
Weight- 25kg (loaded) Range- 20 metres
Cost- 19,000u
DAM: 8

Designed either for protracted burning of SLA property or to increase the physical fitness of anyone that has to lug one of these things around for awhile. While it is bulky, heavy and makes the owner a nice big fat target for enemy snipers or anyone else that doesn't like being burned alive, the 90-Z is quite a good flamethrower. (If there is such a thing.) Good range, ample supply of gelled petrochemicals and gas, all fitting into two big cylinders on the users back making the nozzle easy to point and hose.

Those cylinders have PV 10 ID 15 for purposes of it being targeted and they weigh 10kg each when filled.
Full ones cost 300u or 30u if you want to risk a failed Weapon Maintenance roll and set your house and probably the neighbours on fire.

CREA-3 0018/F1 Incinerator ‘Stinky’

ROF – 1/3
Magazine- 35 shots worth of fuel
Weight- 12.5kg (loaded) Range- 15 metres
Cost- 15,000u
DAM: 7

This weapon is always an unpopular detail for Thresher troops, not because of reliability or danger of explosion, but simply because of the inordinate amount of enemy fire the soldier attracts when they are spotted. In fact the weapon is possibly one of the most simple, rugged and reliable weapons in the Thresher arsenal, capable of firing under the most adverse conditions with an electronic ignition system and liquid methane/Naphtha gel propellant fuel mix. It resembles a very ‘bulky’ shotgun.

Fuel canister: 300u (PV 15 ID 15 for purposes of it being targeted, weigh 4kg each full) Refills cost 40u per canister.
Feel free to blow your house up with a failed Weapon Maintenance roll.

CREA 0001/BB2 Incinerator ‘BBQ’

ROF – 1/5/10 Magazine- 50 shots worth of fuel
Weight- 48kg (loaded) Range- 30 metres
Cost- 90,000u
DAM: 10

Mostly seen fitted into V-Vorth IFV’s where it can be used to dissuade SLA militia at close range from being acquainted with the vehicle intimately. Once in awhile it will also be lugged into a bunker complex by particularly big suits of armour to encourage the same SLA militia to go somewhere else for awhile. If you're really lucky, maybe you’ll even see it re-fitted onto the left arm of a Sarge powersuit once in awhile too.

But mostly, you’ll sadly probably never see one in your neighbourhood as Thresher tends to like keeping their toys to themselves.

This twin barrelled holocaust comes with a massive supply of Naphtha gel injected at 480kPa into two electrical induction turbines and blasted out at over 400km/h. Capable of deep frying a Blocker clad militia or SHIVER in under a second, someone in heavier armour tends to run around a little longer before being reduced to a crisp.

There’s probably easier ways of burning down a suburb, but probably not nearly as much fun.

Fuel canister: 6000u
(PV 18 ID 35 for purposes of it being targeted, weigh 30kg each full)
Refills cost 800u per canister.
Blow your suburb up with a failed Weapon Maintenance roll. Priceless.

DN J5-Z ‘Poppa’

ROF – 1
Magazine- 1
Weight- 1kg
Range- 4 metres
Cost- 900u
DAM: 10

This gruesome little party trick consists of a steel can a plastic handle attached to its base with a ring-pull trigger on the bottom. Inside is a small amount of gunpowder which propels a sticky charge of white phosphorus mixed in with a hefty amount of powdered magnesium that burns ferociously on whatever it hits. About the size of a can of beer or foodstuff and can be easily carried in a pocket, bag or somewhere else for disguise. There is also a small set of induction pads where the device can be set off remotely by connecting a circuit through its detonator. They are not refillable.
There are a number of uses for it in the field.
A rail can be bought to under barrel mount Poppa’s under a SMG or Rifle.
They can be held in the hand and pointed at someone.
Poppa’s also make a good booby-trap, either by having a cut-wire or electrical connection passed through its detonator.
Set up in areas for remote detonation to start fires.