Top 7 Tips For Using Airsoft Grenades

Airsoft grenades are a brilliant tool that can really immerse you in the action, get you out of a sticky situation and turn the tide of an intense skirmish.

But what are some tactics to using them effectively? How can you use each grenade type effectively in order to become the best on the battlefield?

1.Have it Handy

Top tip number 1 – have  it handy. This doesn’t mean in your rucksack or a pouch that you need a comrade to open for you, it means somewhere that you can grab with one hand (preferable your non-trigger hand) and throw towards the enemy without a second thought.

There’s not many situations on the battlefield that are worse than realising you need a grenade – now – and it’s 5 minutes deep in a pouch on your back.

Keep a grenade or two in a pouch on your chest, where you can grab it and throw it in a moment’s notice, without thinking twice about it.

2.Have it ready

This goes hand in hand with tip 1 – Have the grenade ready. This is particularly the case with grenades that aren’t pyro based, grenades like BFGs and Gas Grenades, for instance.

If you’re about to be overwhelmed, you don’t want to be fiddling with a spoon, primer and pin or worse a gas bottle and a speed loader.

Prepare your grenades (if safe to do so) before the battle begins, so that you have everything prepared for when the optimal moment comes.

3.Forget about the perfect moment

This is particularly true for pyro grenades (as we tend to buy them in small quantities, with a cost associated to each grenade), forget about the perfect moment.

With grenades, there’s always a temptation to save it until there’s the perfect moment or when you absolutely have no other choice – the time when there’s 5 enemies behind a door or in a bunker, the time where you can create an epic story. Unfortunately, that time rarely comes and 2 things end up happening – you end up being shot earlier than you should and you end up with a grenade left in your pocket (or a variation of that).

So use your grenades when you can and the time is right, they’re amazing fun and a great tool to use in battle, regardless of the scenario.

4.Carry more than one

Off the back of ‘waiting for the perfect moment’, a cause of this is only carrying 1 grenade. Get yourself a couple of grenades and throw them whenever an opportunity arises.  This is not as necessary when you’re playing with BGFs or gas grenades – their rechargeability means you’re not as afraid to throw them.

With Pyro, carry a few so that you’re never caught out. They’re light enough and small enough so that a few can fit into a single magazine pouch.

5.Don’t choke.

It’s a sight I’ve seen on the field far too often. There’s one grenade left (see above) and you need to get it to land in a bunker, trench or building. Someone is elected to throw the grenade and with the entire team watching, waiting to follow it in, you do the worst possible throw of your lifetime. It lands 30m short, 45 meters to the east of the target and you’ve forgotten to light the fuse.

There’s no easy or simply trick to stop you from choking on that important throw. You very simply, just need to throw it. Forget about the throw’s importance or the amount of people watching you, just get it done.

Alternatively, give it to a team mate. It’s much easier.

6.Consider your surroundings

In very similar situations to tip 5, there’s one way that we’ve all seen grenades go wrong. We’ve all seen them bounce off trees and land back in the trench that it was thrown from.

Before you throw the grenade, take a moment to plan its trajectory, an escape route in case it goes wrong and let others know what’s happening. It’s also a very good idea to consider yourself when you throw the grenade, do you have cover from the blast of the grenade?

It’s a relatively safe rule to play by that if you’re not sure you can throw the grenade to where you want it to go, don’t throw it.

7.Be aware of your team mates

Finally, be aware of where your teammates are on the field and what they’re doing. It’s very easy to “team-kill” your whole team with a single grenade, smoke them out or accidentally double up with grenade throws.

Before you throw the grenade, ensure that where you’re throwing it is occupied by only enemy forces, if you’re not sure who the grenade will land on, don’t throw it!

Double check that the team knows you’re about to throw a grenade, this ensures that two people don’t throw grenades at the same time and that no one enters the blast radius.