Airburst currently sucks and no one uses it. There’s two types of airburst grenades worth talking about, that being the HE and the Incendiary versions.
HE has no utility other than doing some damage to the target. There’s a couple problems to it however. The nade has no stun for starters, which is pretty much the only reason for using an explosive grenade variant. It only does flat damage in a cone which is also a problem since most of the time the target is moving and your grenades very limited. You are better off shooting at the xeno with your M41A rather than even considering loading the nade in your U7.
The Incendiary version is somewhat better than the HE one. Same function except that upon exploding it can set enemies (and friendlies) on fire with shrapnel which is more utility than simply exploding. There isn’t much else to it besides high likelihood of setting friendlies on fire if you are not careful.
So yes, damage is pretty negligible unless maybe you fire it at a t1 but most of the time it will suck. You have limited supply and it’s hard to actually hit your target, funnily enough hitting your target easier being the whole point of airburst. So what can be done about airburst as it is to not be broken and to not be useless. I have a suggestion or two:
Increase the angle of the cone to 180 degrees rather than 60. It’s supposed to rain shrapnel around it. That’s what airburst is.
Increase the amount of shrapnel of both to accommodate the new spread area sufficiently.
Increase the damage to HE variant shrapnel. Not too much but more so that using it at the right time can make a difference.
Now you have airburst grenades that do what they were meant to do. HE harms enemies in cover and Incendiary sets them on fire from cover. A tool worth using in hell chokes or enemy fortifications. Idk about actual numbers of damage for HE but they seemed not great paired with the shrapnel spread last I used em.
OR just increase the number and ability to carry a better number of them. They are just plainly bad like you said but what makes them truly a pain is that they are in fact LESS Numerous then plain old HEDP. The only reason i can ever get good number of them is the fact that AIrburst is so bad no one every wants to take them…
My experience with airbust is that it’s really hard to land, but it hits like a truck when it does.
I was playing lurker once and I ate an entire airburst, went from full health to almost crit, don’t remember if I survived or not but it was wild.
but was the during the time sharp got a buff?.. as basely anything with shards were a death trap then. Still if not i think its likely a case of RNG on the shards all landing.
I’ve found the incendiary airburst is really useful for IO - when a lurker/runner tries to disengage you hit them with the the incendiary airburst. You’re being chased and trying to get away - incendiary into a doorway or hallway to cover your retreat. Don’t want to fight the lurker/runner, incendiary airburst to start with and they’ll run off to pat themselves out instead of attacking you. It almost never kills anything directly, but it’s great for giving you breathing room.
It’s particularly useful for IO because you usually want to use a Mk1 for ammo economy, but it can’t fit an underbarrel flamer for this sort of backline skirmisher utility, so this is your best second choice.
But unfortunately, as it’s already been said, there are simply too few grenades to actually be that useful. I think ~7 or 8 available per round unless req buys more (they wont and dont) and you’re only going to be carrying 5 (in the gun) because you just don’t have room in your pack or elsewhere as IO.
The entire supply of AGM-I grenades on the almayer is enough for 1 marine to have 2-3 skirmishes and that’s it. Limited is a bit of an understatement; sadar gets more rockets than the entire ship has incendiary airburst grenades.
However, last I tried, you need to manipulate the explosive by firing at the tile immediately in front of your intended target in order for the explosive force to properly hit the target. If you could do this, you would deal an immense amount of damage. But if you hit the tile under the target or behind it, you would deal next to zero damage. Also, I believe if the target is lying down you also miss everything.
Good damage, but extremely unreliable to use. Trying to do this on a moving target feels impractical.
Yeah hornets can still be as stupidly dangerous as they were pre-nerf, but since its so riduculously hard to aim them, they end up being trash. Its unfortunate that almost every grenade is either meh or a waste of space. The only genuinely good grenades are high explosives.
Airbursts are really only worth while in hellchokes with the M79 since you can fire over people and they always shoot shrapnel or fire in front of where they land. Thats how I always use them and since no one bothers taking them I can usually get all of them if REQ decides to be nice that day. I don’t think they need a buff so much as just being able to pack more would be nice or some new variants.
