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Hand grenades effectiviness


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Sometimes I'm under the impression that hand grenades lack some effectiviness and they have a poor effective radius in CM.Looks like an average hand grenade,like the American MK2 or the British Mills,have a killing radius of 5 metres and a casualty radius of 15m,thought the shrapnel can reach more tan 200m.I have readed as well that German stick grenades were less powerfull.

Anybody have even made a test?

Edited by arpella72
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*If* grenades are nerfed (and I have absolutely no info on that) it might be an abstractionĀ trying to offset the action-square bound team. You can't spread your menĀ out beyond a certain distance so the grenade's effects are (perhaps) dialed down a bit to represent casualty rate IF the men had been more spread out. At least that's how it works with artillery (or howĀ it did many many years ago).

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20 hours ago, arpella72 said:

I have readed as well that German stick grenades were less powerfull.

German stick grenades were offensive grenades, so they werent designed to produce a lot of shrapnel. They killed and disoriented by blastwave. The idea is that you can throw them into a trench and basically jump in right after. American pine apple nades and the mills bomb were defensive grenades. Due to their shrapnel they were dangerous far beyond the range you can conceivably throw them. The idea is to throw them out of your trench at advancing infantry and duck down while the splinters fly (or of course into a room etc).

The Americans and British also had offensive grenades though, like the MKIII grenade. Also, German stick nades could be fitted with a sleeve that was designed to break up into shrapnel if you needed it.

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Are there differences in the effectiveness of various grenades? At least from what I know, all grenades have the same range, ~25 meters.

As for their usefulness, I've never found them to be lacking in killing power. Grenade fights are over very quick and pretty damn conclusive, as they should be.

The only things I'd wish for grenade-wise would be a dedicated grenade/explosive target command and for the TAC-AI to throw grenades more rapidly.Ā 

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In gameĀ hand grenades, to include smoke grenades, can beĀ thrown up to three Action Spots (24 meters).Ā  To toss one into a building the troop must be standing next to the building wall.Ā 

I suspect saying that a real life frag grenade can throw shrapnel up to 200 meters is technically true and probably comes from the Range Safety Officer's shack :P.Ā  So, while true, I don't think you can rely on your grenade's explosion to be effective against OpFor troops 200 meters away.Ā  Having said all that the game probably does have a lower than real lifeĀ effective blast radius for a grenade.Ā  IMO,Ā for a game, it works well enough most of the time.Ā  If Battlefront wanted to increase the effective blast radius of hand grenades at some point down the road that would be cool too.Ā  :)Ā  Ā  Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā 

Grenade duel.Ā Ā 

qKnTvUth.jpg

Ā 

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34 minutes ago, Xorg_Xalargsky said:

Are there differences in the effectiveness of various grenades? At least from what I know, all grenades have the same range, ~25 meters.

One good (gamey?) trick with smoke grenades is that they will act as if there are no buildings or obstructions in the way.Ā  So, in effect one can have a smoke grenade thrown into a building and it will spread out the other side as if the building (or buildings) did not exist.Ā  This is particularly effective if it's vehicleĀ smoke and the wind is in the right direction.

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On 4/9/2020 at 6:22 PM, arpella72 said:

Sometimes I'm under the impression that hand grenades lack some effectiviness and they have a poor effective radius in CM.Looks like an average hand grenade,like the American MK2 or the British Mills,have a killing radius of 5 metres and a casualty radius of 15m,thought the shrapnel can reach more tan 200m.I have readed as well that German stick grenades were less powerfull.

Anybody have even made a test?

Agreed. I had a PBEM where my opponent put an HMG42 team behind a wall. I remembered the trick that you can throw grenades over walls, and I managed to land one right between the legs of one of the enemy troops... but I was very disappointed to see that it went off with no effect :(

Also, the granade effect seems really random - maybe they are just a graphical representation of a hidden dice roll. I've seen prone troops in foxholes get killed by grenades that exploded some distance away, and on the other hand, I've also seen grenades fall directly into foxholes and not harm the soldier inside.Ā 

Edited by Bulletpoint
yes, i know about grenade sumps, duds, etc etc
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Sure everything can be mathematicallyĀ  "averaged" out but for grenades under combat cirumstances there is no real written-in-stone kill/injury-radius as it depends heavily on the circumstances such as terrain, vegetation, enclosementĀ of the detonation area (small room vs open area), personal protection, other objects that could become shrapnel,Ā and very important:Ā position/posture of the receiver. There are accounts where individuals survivedĀ grenade detonations more or less unharmedĀ at close rangeĀ but same is true for vice versa.

The 200m is more a security range especially for grenade ranges and practice but yes for some models it is theoretically possible that ordnance could reach out to you that far and cause more or less significant effect. That is also the reason why explosive ordnance such as artillery sometimes injures far away personell in CM while others nearby are left unharmed. It is a matter of luck or bad luck.

I think CM does a good job in modelling grenades without overestimating their capabilities although I never had grenades dropped close-by me in RL. I also think they can be quiteĀ deadly and grenades at least for me do the job of often neutralizing or at least surpressing the enemy. IĀ“ve noticed differences between the grenade models but all of them managed to get the mission done.

However if a grenade lands right between the legs of an enemy,Ā sure it would be safe to assume that this guy would have a bad time.Ā Most times I witnessed this it ended badlyĀ for the receiver. Also an interesting question would be if terrain ground or vegetation indeed has an impact on the game. At least for the enclosement it is sure to assume that there is no effect modeled as I canĀ“t recall any game/simulation that ever went this far withĀ ballistics.

Edited by Aquila-SmartWargames
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3 hours ago, Erwin said:

One good (gamey?) trick with smoke grenades is that they will act as if there are no buildings or obstructions in the way.Ā  So, in effect one can have a smoke grenade thrown into a building and it will spread out the other side as if the building (or buildings) did not exist.Ā  This is particularly effective if it's vehicleĀ smoke and the wind is in the right direction.

I didn't know that.....Useful tip, cheers!Ā  B)

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10 hours ago, Aquila-SmartWargames said:

Ā personal protection,Ā 

However if a grenade lands right between the legs of an enemy,Ā sure it would be safe to assume that this guy would have a bad time.

I would appear that in this case the "personal protection", came in the form of armoured underpants.

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On 4/10/2020 at 5:09 PM, Xorg_Xalargsky said:

Ā 

The only things I'd wish for grenade-wise would be a dedicated grenade/explosive target command and for the TAC-AI to throw grenades more rapidly.Ā 

I totally agree with this.For instance,I recall listening to a old veteran from the Spanish Civil War(1936-39) saying he didn't do so much shooting but he thrown lots of hand grenades that were used by hundreds.

Ā 

On 4/10/2020 at 5:37 PM, MOS:96B2P said:

In gameĀ hand grenades, to include smoke grenades, can beĀ thrown up to three Action Spots (24 meters).Ā  To toss one into a building the troop must be standing next to the building wall.Ā 

Hand grenades exploding inside buildings or any other confined place have a greater effect.Dunno if that is even modeled in the game

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25 minutes ago, arpella72 said:

Hand grenades exploding inside buildings or any other confined place have a greater effect.Dunno if that is even modeled in the game

I don't know either.Ā  If I had to guess I would say probably not.Ā  However back-blast from hand held AT weapons that are fired inside a building is modeled.Ā  So its possible.Ā  Ā 

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On 4/9/2020 at 12:22 PM, arpella72 said:

Anybody have even made a test?

I haven't made a specific test for grenades, but I have used hundreds while playing various scenarios.

I think what we get with grenades is deliberately toned down from what I've seen in live videos as far as blast effect. Grenades 'pop' more than they 'bang'.

That being said, there are instances of single grenades inflicting many casualties I could count on more than one hand. It really seems to matter what type of terrain you are throwing into, what model of grenade, and how many are thrown. Throw grenades onto a paved surface and men will fall like bowling pins. Throw them into thick woods terrain and you'll likely not even cause a severe casualty. Positioning also matters a great deal, being in defilade from a bursting grenade (even the smallest amount of slope or obstruction) seems to offer great protection.

The experience level of your troops also seems to have a determining factor on how accurate a throw is. I've seen Crack troops throw grenades and bullseye individual foxholes or men, and I've seen Regulars scatter them all over the landscape like drunken lawn darts to little effect.

Ā 

On 4/9/2020 at 7:47 PM, JoMc67 said:

Whatever the actual effectiveness for Grenades, I just wish the amount of Grenades thrownĀ per FireTeam/SquadĀ (per Turn) would be a little less.

This.

It would be nice to have a 'Target Grenade' order, but we all want commands we likely won't see. At least I'd like to see less than 100% of a Team throwing grenades all at once.

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10 hours ago, General Jack Ripper said:

Throw grenades onto a paved surface and men will fall like bowling pins. Throw them into thick woods terrain and you'll likely not even cause a severe casualty

This sounds like the game gives grenades a relatively high hit rate but a correspondingly high save rate. IIRC the throwing save for paved surfaces is almost nil.

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2 hours ago, com-intern said:
12 hours ago, General Jack Ripper said:

Throw grenades onto a paved surface and men will fall like bowling pins. Throw them into thick woods terrain and you'll likely not even cause a severe casualty

This sounds like the game gives grenades a relatively high hit rate but a correspondingly high save rate. IIRC the throwing save for paved surfaces is almost nil.

I haven't noticed any difference in lethality between paved surface and forest etc. Actually the example I mentioned with the grenade that went off between the feet of a standing soldier happened on paved ground.

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On 4/12/2020 at 5:35 AM, Bulletpoint said:

I haven't noticed any difference in lethality between paved surface and forest etc. Actually the example I mentioned with the grenade that went off between the feet of a standing soldier happened on paved ground.

With any explosive in the game there is a degree of randomness.

Steve explained it once as a [paraphrased] 'Chance to Hit' divided by 'Distance' divided by 'Terrain'. So it's still a dice roll, but if the grenade goes off at your feet, you've got maybe a less than .01% chance.

I think what you ought to do is go shake that pixeltruppen's hand and congratulate him for being the single luckiest SOB in all of Combat Mission history.

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Quote

....but if the grenade goes off at your feet, you've got maybe a less than .01% chance.

I recall an anecdote from the 'Blackhawk down' incident in Somalia. Several members of a squad were huddled together behind a wall when to their horror a grenade sailed over the wall and landed right at their feet. It exploded but to their amazement not a single man got scratched from it. They couldn't believe their luck, frantically checked for wounds to convince themselves they has survived.

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On 4/12/2020 at 7:28 PM, com-intern said:

Hmm that is interesting. I've never done tests but played hundreds of hours and have noticed that a single shot will often kill or wound on metalled roads while in other terrain they can often take no damage from an intersecting shot.

That's because you are talking about shots now. I was talking about grenades going off.

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Don't trust me on this but I have a vague recollection that shell bursts, at least, are affected by soil conditions. soft ground on a damp day will absorb much of the force of the explosion. Hard rocky ground won't - No (presumed) penetration of the soil so the blast is practically an air burst (Its been ages and ages since there was a conversation about this). Different 'explosive devices' do have different characteristics in the game. Nebelwerfer is pretty much all HE whileĀ 122mm field artillery has a big frag effect.

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An item remaining on the "wish list" for me would be a special grenade assault target line or perhaps issuing an "assault" order within about 50m of the squad makes them lead with a grenade assault. It's rather discouraging to see such timidity from infantry when theyve got grenades and dont use em much.Ā 

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