Further Discussion on Stun Grenades

[EskrimadorNC]

This recent thread on Flashbangs/Stun Grenades has gotten me thinking about the rules for said devices, specifically this part:

Originally Posted by GURPS - High Tech

A Vision- and Hearing-Based affliction that affects a 10-yard radius. The Protected Hearing and Protected Vision advantages (or equivalent; e.g., hearing protection and dark goggles) each give +5 to the HT roll. Failure to resist means you’re stunned; roll against HT-5 to recover each turn. Also creates smoke in the area of effect.

HT -5 is pretty steep, especially since it's a static roll you have to make every turn (until you succeed).

For a HT10 NPC, that's what...a 5% chance to succeed? In my personal RL experience, normal folks usually recover from the effects of Flashbangs sometime around the 6 second mark, give or take.

When PCs have used them in action games, rarely do the NPCs ever pass the HT -5 roll, and the PCs end up being able to act with impunity for way longer than they should.

Has anyone out there had the same experience? Do any of you GMs have special house rules for stun grenades? Do your players ever even employ them?

[MrFix]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

This recent thread on Flashbangs/Stun Grenades has gotten me thinking about the rules for said devices, specifically this part:



HT -5 is pretty steep, especially since it's a static roll you have to make every turn (until you succeed).

For a HT10 NPC, that's what...a 5% chance to succeed? In my personal RL experience, normal folks usually recover from the effects of Flashbangs sometime around the 6 second mark, give or take.

When PCs have used them in action games, rarely do the NPCs ever pass the HT -5 roll, and the PCs end up being able to act with impunity for way longer than they should.

Has anyone out there had the same experience? Do any of you GMs have special house rules for stun grenades? Do your players ever even employ them?

Can you elaborate on your personal experience? The ones I've had experience with caused a huge blind spot to develop in your vision, and burst both of your eardrums if you were in a room with it and dared to look towards it.

To be honest the only issue with Stun Grenade that I see is that it has zero crushing explosive damage, so it cannot take advantage of High-Tech's optional rules for explosions in interiors. Stingballs are superior in that regard, because they come with effects of flashbang AND release shrapnel AND cause cr ex damage.

[EskrimadorNC]

Originally Posted by MrFix

Can you elaborate on your personal experience? The ones I've had experience with caused a huge blind spot to develop in your vision, and burst both of your eardrums if you were in a room with it and dared to look towards it.

US Army Joint Readiness Training Center, Ft Polk. Both as part of a unit doing MOUT qual, and later as OPFOR stationed there. Never had one dropped in my lap, but I've been in the same room/corridor within 5 meters or so. It's a damned awful experience, but not one that makes you non-functional for dozens of seconds.

FWIW, I wasn't complaining about the mechanical potency, just that it normally will take a $hit-ton of rolls for a HT 10 person to succeed on a HT-5 roll.

For $hits and giggles, I just did some test rolls for 4 HT 10 NPCs.

Here's how many rolls/seconds it took for them to recover from the standard Stun Grenade in High Tech:

1st NPC: 15 rolls/seconds
2nd NPC: 21 rolls/seconds
3rd NPC: 48 rolls/seconds
4th NPC: 07 rolls/seconds

I get that data is anecdotal, but it pretty much mimics the experiences I have had in actual games. NPCs that get flashbanged are DONE unless they have one or more of the following:

• Good quality Eye/Ear protective equipment
• Robust Hearing/Vision Perks
• HPT/Protected Hearing/Vision/other such Advantages
• High HT Attribute (13+)
• Heaps of luck and/or Luck

To be honest the only issue with Stun Grenade that I see is that it has zero crushing explosive damage, so it cannot take advantage of High-Tech's optional rules for explosions in interiors. Stingballs are superior in that regard, because they come with effects of flashbang AND release shrapnel AND cause cr ex damage.

That's fair. Being near one is like someone hitting your chest with a sledge hammer.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

U
FWIW, I wasn't complaining about the mechanical potency, just that it normally will take a $hit-ton of rolls for a HT 10 person to succeed on a HT-5 roll.

r.

Just as technicallity most soldiers will have Fit and the +1 to HT-based rolls in that AD counts for this case.

[MrFix]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

US Army Joint Readiness Training Center, Ft Polk. Both as part of a unit doing MOUT qual, and later as OPFOR stationed there. Never had one dropped in my lap, but I've been in the same room/corridor within 5 meters or so. It's a damned awful experience, but not one that makes you non-functional for dozens of seconds.

FWIW, I wasn't complaining about the mechanical potency, just that it normally will take a $hit-ton of rolls for a HT 10 person to succeed on a HT-5 roll.

For $hits and giggles, I just did some test rolls for 4 HT 10 NPCs.

Here's how many rolls/seconds it took for them to recover from the standard Stun Grenade in High Tech:

1st NPC: 15 rolls/seconds
2nd NPC: 21 rolls/seconds
3rd NPC: 48 rolls/seconds
4th NPC: 07 rolls/seconds

I get that data is anecdotal, but it pretty much mimics the experiences I have had in actual games. NPCs that get flashbanged are DONE unless they have one or more of the following:

• Good quality Eye/Ear protective equipment
• Robust Hearing/Vision Perks
• HPT/Protected Hearing/Vision/other such Advantages
• High HT Attribute (13+)
• Heaps of luck and/or Luck

That's fair. Being near one is like someone hitting your chest with a sledge hammer.

I worked with Zarya-1s, and it took at least 30 seconds for the vision to clear sufficiently, and the ringing and deafness could remain for hours. The 'stun' caused by the explosion/inner ear effects also took a minute to shake off.

Taking NPCs more than 10 seconds to un-stun is the intended behavior. It's a device meant for that. Considering it takes a long time to bring the grenade into play, and then capitalize on it's effects, it's more than fair from game perspective.

[EskrimadorNC]

Originally Posted by MrFix

I worked with Zarya-1s, and it took at least 30 seconds for the vision to clear sufficiently, and the ringing and deafness could remain for hours. The 'stun' caused by the explosion/inner ear effects also took a minute to shake off.

I don't recall the specific type of banger we trained with, but it was back in the early to mid 90s if that helps any.

If your experience is more recent, that could explain the difference in potency.

BTW, your blog is high-speed. Keep it up.

Taking NPCs more than 10 seconds to un-stun is the intended behavior. It's a device meant for that. Considering it takes a long time to bring the grenade into play, and then capitalize on it's effects, it's more than fair from game perspective.

I get it. Maybe it's just my disconnect from RL experience. GURPS lets you do a lot in a 1 second turn, and I have always felt that my Players doing room clearing had time to spare when banging a room of badguys, even after pushing in, taking an AIM maneuver, and putting controlled pairs into vitals. IRL that crap takes time (unless you are CAG/ACE), and I never felt like there was enough time to dilly-dally when room clearing.

Also, in the games I've run, my PCs only really deployed bangers when they had time, and never really while under fire or out in the open. Giving the badguys 3 - 4 seconds of dumping fire on you while you prep a banger never seemed to be a smart play, so they didn't do it.

[MrFix]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

I don't recall the specific type of banger we trained with, but it was back in the early to mid 90s if that helps any.

If your experience is more recent, that could explain the difference in potency.

BTW, your blog is high-speed. Keep it up.



I get it. Maybe it's just my disconnect from RL experience. GURPS lets you do a lot in a 1 second turn, and I have always felt that my Players doing room clearing had time to spare when banging a room of badguys, even after pushing in, taking an AIM maneuver, and putting controlled pairs into vitals. IRL that crap takes time (unless you are CAG/ACE), and I never felt like there was enough time to dilly-dally when room clearing.

Also, in the games I've run, my PCs only really deployed bangers when they had time, and never really while under fire or out in the open. Giving the badguys 3 - 4 seconds of dumping fire on you while you prep a banger never seemed to be a smart play, so they didn't do it.

Thank you.

It's a quirk of GURPS, players are able to make decisions outside of time, and when actions do unfold, they really feel more like slow motion. Even with your IRL experience of 6 seconds, they can enter (1), aim (2), controlled vitals pair (3), drop gun on sling (free), Draw cigarette (4), Draw Lighter (5), Flick lighter open as a free action and light the cigarette up (6). Mission accomplished before the baddies were even half-way to sane.

Best way to combat that is to use counter-assault tactics, rather than rely on beefiness of your bad guys. Bottom line, bad guys value their eyes and thus wear ballistic sunglasses (+5 to resist) and value their ears and thus wear Tactical Headsets (+5 to resist). Or they start listening in for the stack approaching and force them to roll stealth if they don't want to be counter-assaulted. Then it stops being a routine of stack, toss, shoot unmoving lads, a quick way for things to go boring.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

Also, in the games I've run, my PCs only really deployed bangers when they had time, and never really while under fire or out in the open. Giving the badguys 3 - 4 seconds of dumping fire on you while you prep a banger never seemed to be a smart play, so they didn't do it.

I have no real-world experience, but in one campaign where we used them a fair bit, they were generally used to initiate combat when the opponents weren't aware of us, or not fully so. Under those circumstances, they give a huge advantage, as they should.

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by EskrimadorNC

I don't recall the specific type of banger we trained with, but it was back in the early to mid 90s if that helps any.

If your experience is more recent, that could explain the difference in potency.

BTW, your blog is high-speed. Keep it up.

If you trained with them, that would likely explain the shorter recovery time.

A flashbang have 3 effect :

• Vision trouble, which dissipate in a shorter time than the other effects, and much faster if you averted your eyes - which you would with training.
  
• Hearing trouble, which can last minutes to hours, but impair action less.
  And if you trained with flashbang, you likely have permanent ear damage/ hearing loss, which further mitigate the effect.
  
• Dizziness, which is the primary "stunning" factor, and also have a wide range of recovery time, but which can be (partially at least) overcome with training.

Location would also count a lot, I think.
There should be a huge difference between a flashbang detonating a few meter above a crowd in the outside, or a more powerful one point blank inside a room.

[Varyon]

With effective HT 5, the chance to recover within 6 seconds is around 25%. This jumps to 44% for HT 6, 65% for HT 7, 83% for HT 8, 94% for HT 9, and 98% for HT 10.

An active-duty soldier is likely to have effective HT 11 or 12 prior to the penalty (as noted, the bonus from Fit applies). So, leaving things as-is (HT-5 to recover), that means around a 50% chance to recover within 6 seconds. Change the penalty to recover to -4, that jumps to somewhere around 70%.

An alternative would be a +1 to recover per previous attempt (which I believe recovering from surprise uses). So if it's HT-5 to recover the first second, then HT-4, then HT-3, etc, then an HT 10 character is looking at around an 83% chance to recover within 6 seconds, an HT 11 one is looking at around 93%, and an HT 12 one is looking at around 98%.