Quick grenade related question.

[bobbys]

I find that grenades are almost useless in certain situations. My soldiers are unable to throw a flashbang as far as a flare and although they should be used to breach sometimes they are not as effective as I would like. Is there any reason for the throwing distance to be so low and can it be improved?

[Gorlom]

Isn't it improved by leveling the soldiers Strenght stat?

[MikeV37]

I don't know how to use flash, and prefer to ignore them, but other grenades are pretty useful. Frags get rid of enemy cover, smoke is essential when breaching anything higher level, and EMP is great against those terminator guys and to capture officers.

And yeah, the distance is determined by the strength stat. Kind of weird that the flares aren't limited to the same. My rationale is that since the soldiers can carry infinite of them, they must be mass-less, and so can be thrown anywhere .

[Ol' Stinky]

Flares can be thrown 5 squares further than a normal grenade, while C4 has a -1 range modifier. They made the change to flares because short range flares made night time missions nightmarish.

Grenades have a range of 2 tiles that's increased by strength. If you don't like this, the easiest way to mod it is to open up config.xml in Xenonauts\assets\ and change

<BaseThrowingRangeLimit>2.0</BaseThrowingRangeLimit>

to a higher value.

Grenades got spanked by the devs because for a while they were better than the guns. After the guns got an accuracy buff, though, I don't think this is still true, especially since frag grenades destroy equipment and explode at the end of the turn now. I think it'd be better if the rookies could throw them ~10 squares instead of the ~8.

Edited September 29, 2013 by Ol' Stinky

[Wraith_Magus]

What's the formula for how strength modifies throwing distance, by the way? 2 + Str/8?

[Ol' Stinky]

What's the formula for how strength modifies throwing distance, by the way? 2 + Str/8?

I'm not sure. I think it's 2 + every 10 STR a soldier has. For example, a 59 STR soldier can throw 7 tiles, a 60 STR soldier can throw 8 tiles. If anyone's done a more thorough look at it though, I'll be happy to be corrected.

[bobbys]

cool. Thanks for the help.

[GlyphGryph]

Flashbangs (and then electroshocks, pretty much an upgrade) are still absolutely amazing, because practically guaranteed suppression (and a decent chance of elimination) is great. A full team firing at an enemy behind heavy cover might not be able to kill it - but a full team each throwing an electroshock grenade is guaranteed to take it out, without damaging or destroying anything. Combined with smoke grenades, it's a brutally effective strategy - I have effectively taken down landing ships without firing a shot, and just filling soldiers with grenades of various types.

The only problem is...

EMP is great against those terminator guys

I'm pretty sure robotic enemies are completely immune to the effects of electroshock grenades. At least they seem to be when I played - 10 stacked electroshocks had no effect, while 3 or 4 is enough to take out pretty much every other enemy in the game.

[Max_Caine]

EMP damage was back in v18, but that seems to have been phased out. EMP damage was specific stun damage to Androns and Drones. Given that Androns won't be stunned, what would you like EMP to do? Extra damage?

[EisenKreutzer]

I find anything other than smoke and possibly flashbangs completely useless with the current range. In the OG you could throw grenades pretty far, and they didn't make guns obsolete.

[Ishantil]

Can something have more than one damage type? If so, they should do both stun and EMP damage. EMP should be harmless to biological units, but should do full damage to synthetic units. Stun damage should only work on biological units, obviously.

Either that, or we should have EMP grenades. Maybe the damage type should be "electrical" instead of EMP.

[Max_Caine]

Ah, see in v18 they could. EMP was an extra damage type separate to stun and normal damage.

[Ishantil]

Why would you take something out that was so awesome? That was perfect. Even if the Electroshock grenades don't do both types, there should be an EMP or electrical damage type.

Better yet, let us mod in our own damage types.

[Elydo]

Having EMP be stun damage to units that can't be stunned (Robotic types specifically, if there are unstunnable biologicals), and so just dealing damage would be fine for me. Though I'd question having electroshock being quite so good at stunning biologicals. I use them exclusively over the actual stun gas grenades.

I'd also like to see an electroshock rocket.

[Max_Caine]

@Ishantil, eh, been there, tried that

[Ishantil]

I should have known, Max.

[Ol' Stinky]

Can something have more than one damage type? If so, they should do both stun and EMP damage. EMP should be harmless to biological units, but should do full damage to synthetic units. Stun damage should only work on biological units, obviously.

Either that, or we should have EMP grenades. Maybe the damage type should be "electrical" instead of EMP.

That's how they're meant to work, but they're bugged. Chris' post about it.

Edited October 3, 2013 by Ol' Stinky

[Anon_Spartan]

How many electrostatic grenades does it take to deal with an upper level Andron? Or are they bugged beyond usefulness? I tossed like four at a red one and it didn't do anything before he cut my guys to ribbons and this was only on normal difficulty. Besides fast tracking to plasma weapons is there a way to deal with Androns?

[Ol' Stinky]

How many electrostatic grenades does it take to deal with an upper level Andron? Or are they bugged beyond usefulness? I tossed like four at a red one and it didn't do anything before he cut my guys to ribbons and this was only on normal difficulty. Besides fast tracking to plasma weapons is there a way to deal with Androns?

They're bugged so that they attempt to deal stun type damage to all targets. They're meant to deal EMP type damage to robotic targets instead, as robots (androns, drones) don't care about stun type damage. It's a bummer.

[Anon_Spartan]

Ah, alright. It's those blasted tin cans that give me so much trouble. It seems like the newest big tactic in Xenonauts is flashbang and breaching...which is ineffective on these guys.

What is a good Andron tactic, especially in ship control rooms? Just smoke the room and blast away and pray they don't walk into you? Or maybe I should just start using explosives since alien gear isnt worth much now.

[StellarRat]

Ah, alright. It's those blasted tin cans that give me so much trouble. It seems like the newest big tactic in Xenonauts is flashbang and breaching...which is ineffective on these guys.

What is a good Andron tactic, especially in ship control rooms? Just smoke the room and blast away and pray they don't walk into you? Or maybe I should just start using explosives since alien gear isnt worth much now.

Until we get functional EMP grenades my advice is to use lots of C4 and rockets and not bother trying to save anything. Edited October 9, 2013 by StellarRat

[Wraith_Magus]

It depends on the concentration of the enemy, but C4 is definitely the way to take out anything you'd have trouble dealing with any other way. If it's low-concentration, I'd try to use either smoke or the exploit/bug about them facing xenonauts that are on the other sides of walls to get a free chance to shove a carbine up their tailpipes. Either way, never fight fair.