It's a huge advantage when dealing with anti tank guns as they have a gun shield. Flame nade negates that entirely. A regular grenade is also not a guaranteed kill against green cover short of poor grouping. While that is not ideal it sometimes helps. A flame nade forces you to move regardless.
I didn't say StGs were good at all ranges. I said the unit was good at all ranges. I believe they still have 3 kar 98's, no? Allied weapon upgrades also actually drop making double equipping a risk - especially for tommies.
Why would one ever throw a flame nade (or a normal one) at an AT gun? If you in grenade range and the at gun is unsupported, it's going to die or run away soon enough anyways. Are you actually using such an obscure and rare event as evidence for the flame nades overpowered-ness vs normal nades? Btw if one throws a normal grenade properly, the gun shield does nothing anyways.
Are you trying to say because the unit still has 3 kar98s, the squad is good at all ranges? What definition of good are you using? Kar98s long range dps doesn't have anything on any allied weapon upgrade. You do know that Kar98s don't do that much damage right?
And I think you are seriously overestimating the risk of dropping a weapon vs the reward of having much higher dps. It's like saying shrekblobs were ok since there is the chance for the shrek to drop. WTF?
Also could you explain why you think volks are resilient to damage, I'm still confused about that one.