uhhh the usf mortar ht is actually kinda strong since it has white phos. that ability is actually op as hell. the autobarrage is pretty lackluster but i would still get it purely for the white phos.
also the panzerwerfer is pretty decent too, you just have to drive in closer to the target to get an extremely tight barrage AoE. use line of sight blockers etc.
I disaggree on both first if i am not mistaken white phoshorus is a vet 1 ability which means you have to9 get there first and you already admitted that the barrage is lackluster ,not to say anything about its normal attack which is abyssmal , on top of that it costs a whooping 40 fuel , in a faction where you need to get to the major tier as soon as possible and the efficiency and timing of the m20 utility can decide whole games . You see then that from a strategy standpoint the mortar ht is a mistake no matter the circumstances.
On the pwerfer first of all you fail to see the bigger picture , namely that it doesnt pack enough punch to equalise the effect of a kv8 , if you go t4 you usually want to get a panther very soon for obvious reasons , second if you drive the werfer that close to enemy lines you risk it being killed by an atg you didnt know was there or a mine or some other random event which is precisely what you want to avoid with the pwerfer , otherwise you could have used the much cheaper and by that time possibly vetted axis mortar ht tah actually performs reliably