SPIN DETONATED

Forgotten Ruin War Journal

One of the iconic weapons from “back in the day,” was the simplified, man-portable grenade launchers that made their debut during the Vietnam war. Firing the forty millimeter grenade, these single shot, shoulder fired launchers lent a degree of lethality uncommon seen in the average infantry squad before. 

Innovations quickly followed, where the hooligans that created the XM style rifles (short AR-16s, also called the CAR-15) developed short, single shot, reloadable launchers that fit to the underside of the rifle with the removal of the bottom handguard. 

Not to be outdone, the manufacturers at Springfield Armory told the army they could fit the M-79 (which was more user friendly) to the soldier’s carbines AND their M-16 rifles. Thus, the star of TV and movies galore, the M-203 was born.

Capable of firing a multitude of different grenade types, the military employed this weapon system for decades as the premier launcher for infantry units. For special operators who liked to keep their weapon packages smaller, they often just ran with the old school hand held M-79 to lob grenades out to 300+ meters.

Grenade types included High Explosive (HE), High Explosive Dual Purpose (HEDP), Illumination Rounds (Parachute flares), and even specialty munitions. The special types were innovations that came in fighting in urbanized areas, such as the Air Burst (for enemies behind deep cover) and Thermobaric (when you absolutely have to cook everyone). 

In Underspire, we see the successor to the M203, the M320 come into play at several points during the story. While fighting a giant golem and their lizard-men handlers, the side loading, tech heavy launcher was used to great effect to punish the enemy and back them away so Big Lou’s fire team and the Dwarven Sappers could get a better bite on the target. 

Later in the story, dwarven ingenuity plus some forethought on the part of the Rangers let us see the difference between the low-velocity launchers carried by the team, and high-velocity forty mike mike grenades used to great effect.

Want more grenade lobbing Dwarves in action? Check out Forgotten Ruin War Journal: Underspire!