Tip 27 - Using grenades

Aren't grenades a fun subject? Too much use of them, and the game grinds to a halt, and the winner is randomly determined by who manages to get out of the explosions. Too little, and a skilled enemy will wipe the floor with you.

Here then, are a few ways to use greandes.

First of all, timing.
Grenade timing is, according to Yahn, NOT lag compensated. In real terms, this means that grenades explode pretty randomly.

Now, much as I hate to argue with the celestial wisdom of yahn - clearly SOME kind of compensation is happening, because if everything worke dthe way it used to, grenades would only explode later than expected - never earlier.

So first hing to do, is stabilise your ping. Get it *steady*. High is ok, just so long as it never jumps about. Tweak your rate to ensure packetloss and choke never happen to you.

Right, now - on to the actual timing.

Assuming that you always have a stable ping, then the grenade will go off a certain time after you press the prime key.
This time will be in the region of 3 seconds - but can be anything from 2 to 5.

Ok - the absolute BEST way to time grenades is to be TFpsychic. Lets assume that you're reading this guide for something other than a good laugh and actually want help though.

First of all, practice practice practice. Count along in your head (or out loud if there's no one in the room who'll think you weird for it)

Next up - the default 'official' grentimer. It's just saved as 'timer.wav' in \tfc\weapons.
You can replace that wav file with anything you like (a slightly shorter version is good) to make it louder or softer.

If you delete it, the server will simply resend it to you next time you join a game.

If you want to get rid of this timer (and you will if you want to use any other type of timer) then record a short bit of silence, and replace it with that.

Ok, the next form of timer - ax1.wav (/tfc/weapons/ax1.wav)
This is the 'click' you hear whn you (or anyone else) primes a grenade. Replacing it with a grentimer can work lovely - but is a borderline cheat due to how well it allows you to time enemy grenades.

The third form is just an arbitary wav file.
Replace your 'prime grenade' bind with
"+gren1; play [whatever.wav]"

This starts the grenade timer IMMEDITATELY you press the button, rather than waiting for server confirmation that the grenade is actually primed.
This has advantages (timing more accurate if the prime signal gets delayed) and some disadvantages (plays even if you have no grens, fades away with distance from prime point, goes wonky if the grenade explode packet gets delayed)

And the final form, little used now, is the vox. Get the announcer voice to do a countdown (or up) when you hit the grenade prime key:
"+gren1; speak one, two, three, four, fire"

The advantage of this last one is that it doens't fade with distance - but it quite often cuts out on its own (too many sound effects, or another vox going off) The disadvantages are the same as a wav timer.

Q. Right - so, why do I need to know when the greandes are going to go off?

Well, I'll try and avoid saying 'well DUH' to that one.
There are two big uses for this.

First of all, if the grenade lands at its target with some time left on it, then the target has a chance to get away and minimise the damage taken. If you throw it soon enough - then they can often avoid it completely.

If, instead, you wait until the last possble second, and THEN throw it - it will explode immediately it lands (or even in mid air) and the target has no chance to dodge.

Secondly - if you can time your opponents grenades, then you know how long a grenade they threw to the floor has left on it, and can choose whether to avoid it, or run over it before it can go off.

Thirdly, you can lay traps - if you know a grenade has a second left on it, then you know that that area will have no one alive in it in one seconds time, and can do something else for that second (take a shot in another direction)

This is especially handy when on defence, and having to cope with multiple simultaneous attackers.

Fourthly, without an EXTREMELY accurate sense of when the grenade is going to go off, you will be unable to concjump.


Next section. Types of grenades.

Don't skip this section just yet, this isn't just a boring list of every grenade in the game.
Nope, it's types of USE of grenades. Some grenades are more fit for some tasks than others.

Type 1. Deathmatch grenades.
This type of grenades kills stuff. Moving stuff, usually an enemy :)
Demomens blue and yellow pipes are absolutely the tops for this - controlled detonation, enhanced airspeed, detonate on contact... and don't forget the huge damage.
Beyond that, standard gren1's are incredible, and an airburst mirv had the stopping power of a well aimed car.

Concs are also increibly useful as a deathmatching tool - sends the enemy away (controllable, if you can aim real good) and makes their next shot miss. Can do even worse things to them if you're fighting suspended over lava or something :)

EMP does a large amount of damage, but less push than any other type of grenade. It is best used against groups of enemies, or those enemies lumbered with a lot of explosive ammo. Beware medics and soldiers who threw their ammo, against those gren1 is better.

Type 2. Antistatic grenades.

You've just got to blow away a sentry gun. Grenades are best for this because you can bounce them around corners.
Gren1's are good, but usually don't do enough damage. EMP is VERY good, because it goes through walls.
Mirv is expceptional, though makes it a bit hard to get through where the defence was for a while - and it takes two napalm to take down a sentry gun, but the engineer will be decideldly depressed when he sees the field of fire stopping him repairing.

Type 3. Area denial grenades.

In order of best area coverage: Nail gren, napalm, mirv, spyspam, caltrop.
In order of longest living: caltrop, napalm, nailgren, spyspam, mirv
In order of most dangerous: Mirv, nailgren, spyspam, napalm, caltrop

Use of these grenades is tactical. They generally (except mirv) only deny an area from wounded people - and the generally don't cover a very large area.
Also, they don't last long - but long enough for you to deal with some other problem.

Caltrops are special, in that they hurt heavy classes hardly at all, but give fast or medium pursuit real problems.

Type 4. Special effects.

Concs and EMP go through walls. Concs make the affected person miss their next shot, but against good opposition, little more. Advantage of throwing them through walls or ceilings is that the defence has less warning of it coming, and thus cannot avoid it. This lets you use it to push thm away.

EMP's through walls can make them reconsider life :)

Spyspam has a very limited effect on defenders, except in vast quantities - it will mean that they won't stand exactly there, since it DOES do damage. But the halluc effect is of minimal use.

Being caltropped is like a legshot - slows them down, but doesn't stop them firing. Also is best used in a small area, otherwise it spreads out too much and is avoidable.

Napalm sets people on fire. Unless they have turned off partial transparency in sprites, this is next to useless, but you get it for free.


Ok. The last big thing about grenades.
Jumping.

Grenades generate a push away from the point of explosion.

The way they do this breaks all known laws of physics.
There is a double push. The first is in the direction that the object being pushed is crrently moving, and is larger the closer ot the centre of the explosion you currently are.

The second is directly away from the centre of the explosion - and is *larger* the further away you are (up to the radius limit, after that you recieve no push at all)

Two final notes. All calculations are from the CENTRE of the explosion to the CENTRE of the model being pushed. In the case of a player, this is BELOW the viewpoint. It's in a different place again for a crouched player.
And a moving player is NOT in the place he may seem to be - it's the sevrers knowledge of the world that is important. This means that a players holding a grenade is effectively 1/10 of a second ahead of the grenade.


Ok, now. Everyone talks about concjumps, but they are not the only type of jumps.
Pretty much any grenade type can be used to jump with - and the principles are mostly the same.
The exception is gren1 jumping - which, when you aren't moving, will provide a push directly upward - higher than a rocketjump.
This means you need do far less to gren1 jump straight up. If you want to do other jumps, it's the same as anything else.

First of all - HHCJ (hand held concjump)

Prime the grenade. Just as it's about to go off, make sure you're moving in the direction you want to go, and jump.
The faster you are going in the direction you want to go, the flatter your jump. If you're not moving at all, you'll go straight up.

don't release the grenade.

If your timing is even slightly off, then you will go almost nowhere.
If your timing is perfect, you can fly all the way across the level, leap tall buildings in a single bound etc etc.

Second. Drop concing.

Throw the grenade to the ground, and when it's timed to go off, be inside the radius of explosion, with it opposite the direction in which you want to go.

With practice using differnet directions of initial movement and placement of the conc, you'll find that you have a lot of control, and can curve round corners.

This jump is especially useful for rapid direction changes, and getting multiple people jumped at once.
It's disadvantage is that it gives away your intentions in advance.

It works especially well in the water, since the grenade floats slowly down.


Final note. Jumping on enemy grenades.

Do it. Do it LOTS.

The push and damage is the same as your own drop-gren-jump, but it costs you no ammo.

also, enemies will often use grenades and other explosives to push you aside and make you eaiser to kill - if you learn to use this against them and get an added push in the direction YOU want to go, then they will have much more trouble with you.

Oh, and mirv jumping is possible, but silly. Use the initial explosion to jump, and clear the explosion caused by the bomblets. This leaves you out of the area, and an area denial mirv secondary explosion where you used to be.

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