Grenades

[Vostijabor]

Hello folks, 

How do you handle grenades in Mythras? I can’t find any rules on this in the Core rules or Arkwright or Vampire Wars. 

I’m currently favouring an Athletics Roll to throw the grenade up to STR in metres, or a Hard Athletics Roll to throw it up to double STR in metres. A failed roll sees the grenade go off target 1d6 metres in a random direction, a fumble sees it land 1d6 metres from the thrower in a random direction - a perfect chance to dust off your d12... 

On the damage I’m also a bit unclear, as Vampire Wars has fragmentation damage at half damage to 1d3-1 locations to all within its burst radius. Does this mean the main target take full damage? 

Thanks in advance.

[Bilharzia]

Mythic Constantinople has full rules for grenades (Grenados), gunpowder, early firearms, artillery and Greek Fire, a lot of burning and exploding malarkey to be had there. I think what you've figured out for yourself isn't a million miles of the rules but MC includes some interesting details you might not have considered.

[Vostijabor]

I think one of my RPG group has that, I’ll take a look. It was more for modern style grenades, but I’m sure their will be some useful stuff there and Greek Fire gives me an idea for my current campaign. 

Cheers. 

[Opiyel]

I'm running a near-future M-Space campaign and I sat down and did up grenades on my own for my players. I researched things like radii and used the RQ6 firearms rules as well as other d100 games (River of Heaven) to come up with something in-between realistic and gameable. Tell me what you think.

 

Grenades & Explosives

The first radius is the Kill Radius and does the full dice of damage. The second radius is the Injury Radius and drops one of the dice. Injury Radius is measured from where the Kill Radius ends.

 

Concussion: 3d8 - Tiny - Thrown - SIZ 1 - Radius 2m/5m - Ablating

A grenade that strikes with a concussive blast. Very effective at taking down cover and structures.

 

Fragmentation: 3d6 - Tiny  - Thrown - SIZ 1 - Radius 5m/10m - Fragmentation

An anti-personnel grenade that releases synthetic steel shards to maim and kill people in the radius.

 

Smoke: 1d3* - Tiny - Thrown - SIZ 1 - Radius 4m - Choking, Unarmored

A grenade used for screening allies behind a cloud of smoke or signaling help with colored phosphorous. Can only burn targets that are unarmored. Anyone caught inside of the cloud without a rebreather or mask makes an Endurance check to prevent coughing uncontrollably and doing nothing.

 

RPG-11 Launcher (Anti-Personnel): 6d6+6 - 500 m - Radius 10m/20m - Fragmentation - Ammo 1 - Reload 3

 

RPG-11 Launcher (Anti-Armor): 6d6+6 - 500m - Radius 5m - Ablating - Ammo 1 - Reload 3

The RPG-11 is the evolution in portable explosive weaponry. The anti-personnel ammo is perfect for taking down a group of infantry, while the anti-armor’s focused blast is great at taking down armored vehicles. When holstered, the RPG is disassembled into two parts that take a Turn to remove and a second Turn to reassemble. The user must spend a Turn bracing themselves or else they run the risk of firing it in a random direction.

 

[Vostijabor]

I like the ideas here, I’ve been thinking of similar adjustments for blast radius as well, with half damage to the outer one. I’ve also looked at the Call of Cthulhu firearms supplements and they suggest a maximum range of STR x3 - I think I’ll adopt this as a third range modifier, at Formidable. The change of special effect for different grenade types is a great idea, if I remember rightly Vampire Wars has some similar options. 

Your RPG-11 is pretty powerful, but then it is futuristic and clearly a large weapon if it’s in two parts, almost approching a rocket launcher perhaps. The weapons I’m mainly trying to create are for a Steampunk world, so are a bit cranky and unreliable. 

[Raleel]

I might suggest your smoke grenade not prevent all actions, but impose serious penalties on rolls. I think that moving out should still be an option there. 

[g33k]

13 hours ago, Raleel said:

I might suggest your smoke grenade not prevent all actions, but impose serious penalties on rolls. I think that moving out should still be an option there. 

I would differentiate between "smoke" grenades and "gas" grenades.  I don't believe most "smoke" grenades are terribly disabling... sometimes, troops are expected to advance/charge THROUGH the cover of that smoke, and may not have rebreather gear.

I would only penalize aiming rolls -- hard to hit what you can't see! -- and maybe navigation (e.g. you're running toward a gate in a wall, then a smoke grenades go off... maybe you end up reaching the wall NOT at the gate, off by 1dN meters, where N is roughly 1/10 of the distance you advanced (ran through smoke for 50 meters?  you end up 1d5 meters from the gate (and if the smoke is dense enough, 3+ meters from the gate MAY be far enough that you cannot tell which way to go along the wall...) ) .

[Vostijabor]

Smoke can also effect lasers. Maybe impose Herculean, Formidable then Hard to hit rolls with lasers as the smoke clears each round. 

[g33k]

37 minutes ago, Vostijabor said:

Smoke can also effect lasers. Maybe impose Herculean, Formidable then Hard to hit rolls with lasers as the smoke clears each round. 

I'd apply normal ranged-weapon sighting penalties, same as any other gun.

What I'd penalize for lasers is the damage -- the laser spends most of its energy on the smoke.

edit:  how about just treating being in a smoke-grenade zone as being equivalent to laser-specific armor.  For any given visual penalty, set a level of "optical armor" for all shots fired into or out of the smoke...

Edited March 20, 2018 by g33k
optical armor

[Vostijabor]

Now that is a good idea. 

[...]

On ‎3‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 12:02 PM, g33k said:

I don't believe most "smoke" grenades are terribly disabling...

Many countries use or have used White Phosphorus as a smoke producing agent. It is very toxic, and incendiary.

[Raleel]

I would treat the area as cover. It doesn’t actually have to block any damage, just make it hard to choose location. Cover the whole person and they are firing blind at whatever penalty that is. 

[Opiyel]

When I was doing the smoke grenade, I was using the coughing fits rules in the basic Mythras as a guide. I could see making it a harder skill to pass, but less punishing though. The smoke grenades here were admittedly inspired by the ones used in Rainbow Six Siege by the operative Smoke. As for the RPG launcher, that one I got from River of Heaven and tweaked it compared to the listed stats of the Tank in M-Space as well as some real world stats for range. It's definitely a nasty weapon used in dire circumstances.