Hey all.

As the topic title suggests, I was looking for some advice on creating a Grenadier type character. Normally I GM our game, but I have the opportunity to play a short campaign as one of my players is stepping in temporarily. My original character concept was for a sneaky explosives technician type who would use intellect/mechanics to create explosives and a bit of stealth to sneak to plant them places - probably a Demolitionist/Outlaw Tech combo. However, one of the other players is very interested in playing a mechanic & slicer type, so the requirement for the Tech-side is somewhat lessened.

I was looking at having my guy be more of a Demolitionist/Heavy, mixing some explosives planting with carrying a grenade launcher. I went straight to Oggdude's CharGen tool and started looking around. The obvious primary weapon is the Z50 Grenade Launcher, so I grabbed my copy of Dangerous Covenants and took a closer look. The weapon itself is pretty big at Encumbrance 5 / Cumbersome 3, but fair enough, it's a big weapon - a harness or even a couple of ranks in Burly will deal with the latter. The problem I have is with reloads - while I understand the desire for a simplified encumbrance system, mandating all grenades as encumbrance 1 means it's impossible to carry even a single set of six reloads for the launcher, not if you want to add basic armor, a blaster sidearm, or even any gear bigger than a comlink. The Z-50 entry in the book describes launchable grenades as distinct from throwables, so that rules out being able to be flexible between Ranged Light throws and Gunnery to shoot. There's an implication in the fluff text that the grenades are smaller and easier to carry, but from the context I think they mean relative to Missile Tubes rather than throwable grenades.

At first glance, I can see the need to limit the potential destructive power of a Grenadier, but compared to a Heavy build with e.g. a Heavy Blaster Rifle, the grenade launcher loses out in range (Med vs Long), Damage (8 vs 10), and price (1750 vs 1500), and while it has Blast it does not have Autofire, plus the HBR is not limited ammo.

So, my questions - has anyone got a Grenadier build they'd like to share? If you used a launcher, how did you handle ammo - all frags, or a mix? Did you carry/use exotic grenades as launchables or just hand grenades? Did you carry reloads or limit yourself to a max of 6 shots / encounter and assume you'd get more reloads between encounters? Am I overthinking this (yes! :-) ) or am I missing something (possibly)?

You shouldn't as a general rule be totaling up Encumbrance. It's only supposed to be an issue when you're doing that long jungle trek. Your GM should just take a look at what you're proporing to carry and if it looks ok, it is ok.

Quote

In general, players and the Game Master won't need to track a character's encumbrance (how much he's carrying on his person). Occasionally, however, it may play an important part in the story, and a player needs to know if the weight, mass, and collective bulk of the items his hero is wearing inhibits his actions.

AoR p. 165

You could try Mercenary Soldier or Commando to get Strong Arm. Saboteur as well, to up those ranks of Powerful Blast and Selective Detonation.

Maybe check out the projectile launcher from Forged in Battle as an alternative grenade launcher.

Commando with Gunslinger, forget the grenade launcher all together and throw 2 of those things every turn thanks to Improved Quick Draw.

There are lots of Enc increasing items you can throw on - modular backpacks and combat webbing and the like. Also, the pirate is right: if it fits the character and doesn't seem broken, the GM can hand wave it as "ammo", especially since, as you mentioned, you can't throw it.

9 hours ago, Blackbird888 said:

You could try Mercenary Soldier or Commando to get Strong Arm. Saboteur as well, to up those ranks of Powerful Blast and Selective Detonation.

Maybe check out the projectile launcher from Forged in Battle as an alternative grenade launcher.

I played an character who was a demolitionist/mercenary soldier for a good long time. I went a very different direction with the build however and focused on Agl and Int for crafting grenades. Grenades are very cheap and quick to craft and after two triumphs become zero difficulty. This was a good thing because having disposable weaponry gets expensive very quickly. Also, being a crafter meant that my weapons were always very nicely modded. Encumbrance was an issue as the system doesn't handle light things well and likes to say they all weight 1. Still, it was a lot of fun to have a different grenade for any given situation. While not RAW, I also convinced my GM to allow some of my talents to work with my DF-D1 duo-flechette rifle which was great fun. He died when the capital ship he was on blew up which is a bit ironic given that he didn't have anything to do with the explosion.

The grenade you want is shaped thermal... a smaller version of thermal detonators. I would go demolitionist mercenary soldier (you want the strong arm talent and i think mercenary soldier and commando are the only way to get it. Mercenary soldier also has a copy of deadly accuracy and I think 2 copies of true aim. You should have a rifle with a under barrel grenade launcher as your primary weapon and throw grenades to clear obstacles)

On 4/20/2017 at 7:11 PM, NGnear said:

Hey all.

As the topic title suggests, I was looking for some advice on creating a Grenadier type character.

I like Saboteur better than Demo. Best tree in the game for Strain stuff and all the blow people up loving as well.

Hey all,

Thanks for the input. I'm sticking with Demo as the base career/specialization, as the GM has asked us to stick to EotE careers for now. A word with the GM, little bit of reading (and discovering that OggDude's CharGen doesn't seem to handle "Burly" correctly, unless I'm misunderstanding something) and I think I have a way forward - I'll use the CSPL-12 grenade launcher from Forged in Battle as the base loadout and play from there. Definitely intend to mess with crafting (hence the bomb tech background) to create... "novel" explosives and grenades - I'll actually start out with higher Int than Ag and use my first dedication to bring them level.

Overall, though, good point about Encumbrance, 2P51 - it can come into play at specific points, but they really should be story-specific reasons to do so.