After 100 hours in ARC Raiders, it's time to do something about grenades

After 100 hours Ark RaidersI can confidently say that I am a fan. There is a certain kind of tension that keeps players like me coming back to the game. It's not just the adrenaline of a clean sweep or the thrill of attacking another team; It's a way of feeling uncertain every moment. That tension is undeniable, and it's the reason ARC Raiders The rising withdrawal stands out among the shooter genre. However, something in its combat loop that has become more prevalent and unstable: the prominence of grenades.

ARC Raiders Released on October 30th, and in the months since launch, players have seen a steady stream of patches, fixes, and balance adjustments across 11 updates. Embark Studios has repeatedly shown its willingness to adapt the game in response to community feedback — take after the recent map event frequency increase. ARC Raiders Player Response – But despite these efforts, the way grenades define combat remains a sore point. And it dives into the fundamental design rather than just rebalancing the numbers.

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Embark nerfed Trigger 'Neds in January

At accessible community locations ARC Raiders Update 1.11.0, grenades weren't just a nuisance – they were a defining feature of the meta. Steam community threads and subreddit discussions were rife with complaints about how trigger 'nids could turn any choke point into a death zone, or how their use at extraction points could distort encounter outcomes. The January 13th update openly acknowledged the disproportionate impact of grenades in the meta, stating that Trigger 'Nade currently dominates PvP encounters and is being selected more often than any other throwable option.

In response, the developers made specific changes to the trigger's mechanics to curb its effectiveness.

The detonation delay between the weapon and the explosion was doubled from 0.7 seconds to 1.5 seconds, giving opposing players more time to react.
Along with this, damage falloff was reworked so that explosions focused their effects closer to the center, dealing less damage to the outer edges of the blast zones.
These adjustments were intended to make the air-trigger mechanism less reliable while preserving the overall utility of the grenades.

This patch represents clear evidence that this is not just a perception problem. Embark admits that players love Trigger 'Neds because the tool can solve every problem a raider can face. Grenades obviously offer controlled, direct firepower, but with a little tweaking, they can also: knock players out of cover, trap players while hidden, scout with no reaction, and quickly reset most engagements. They are great against players and they can do it all against ARC as well. Sure, this is true for trigger 'Neds and remote detonation opens up some unique tactics, but it applies to all the best grenades. ARC Raiders.

The issue is bigger than the trigger 'Nades

The problems arising from this dominance are systemic. Grenades are beginning to overwrite the original dynamics ARC Raiders' PvP combat encourages otherwise. Combat is believed to be driven by positioning, careful attention to sound cues, and incremental (sometimes gut) decision making. Excellence with firearms requires target discipline, ammo awareness, and a basic understanding of how to behave when that weapon is fired, all at risk. The same cannot be said for grenades.

The unintended consequence is a blast-first, ask-questions-later rhythm that eats away at the strategic core. ARC Raiders. Instead of clever flanks, silent infiltrations, or improvised deception, the tension often boils down to finding a player and layering explosives. That's a much less dynamic gameplay loop, and it doesn't align with the heart-racing action that initially drew me in.

The shift made in update 1.11.0 was necessary, but it did not fully address the root of the problem. Increasing fuse time and focusing damage only softens the worst abuse of Trigger 'Neds. It doesn't address grenades in a way that generally supports the game's objective flow. Objects still perform multiple functions at once. They have become a source of lethal damage, positional pressure, and free information. The problem is not just that the grenades are strong; It is that they are very universally effective for very little investment.

ARC Raiders When adversaries are forced into asymmetric encounters, when engagements depend on intuition and environmental reading, or on brokering deals rather than anticipation of coming explosions and repeated exploits. ARC Raiders Duplicate meta object. In games built around fast, close quarter chaos, eg Call of Duty or battlefieldThere is an established reference to grenade-like power. They are just one of many reliably powerful tools at their disposal, along with weapons, potential vehicles, melee weapons, or other support items. ARC Raiders Advertises something different. It promises strategic withdrawal, emergent conflict, and meaningful trade-offs between aggression and caution. When one commodity type begins to short-circuit those trade-offs, it undermines the broader system.

How grenades can evolve with ARC Raiders

Since update 1.11.0, some shifts have been noticed. Attackers may not be hoarding trigger 'neds like they once did, but that didn't do much to discourage players from using grenades more than their guns. Even in recent days ARC RaidersIn the new Bird City event, explosives remain a catch-all solution, partly because the sandbox has little to offer compared to the rest. Options such as mines and support items such as barricades and zip lines exist, but they will do little to stop an attacker with a backpack full of light impact or blaze grenades.

Grenades should have a more defined hazard, which nicely offsets their higher efficiency. This could include limiting the number of grenades a player can load, increasing the resources needed to craft them, or potentially being more strict with skill tree specialization. While some ARC Raiders The players don't want to marathon-esque limitations, I fear that grenades will undermine the game's own strategic architecture if they are not addressed.

The real resolution won't come from slight detonation delays or isolated fall-off adjustments, but from changes in how the explosives fit into the world. Until then, every encounter will carry a constant reminder that some of the game's tools don't dominate because they're well-designed, but ignore the many dynamics they create. ARC Raiders worth playing I'm hopeful that as the game evolves, Embark Studios reevaluates and rebalances the throwable items. If not for me, then for every rider who has been oblivious to opening some filing cabinets.