Frag Grenade (Fallout 3)

The frag grenade is a weapon in Fallout 3.

Characteristics
The frag grenade is a standard grenade creating an explosive blast and dealing significant damage, with a high chance to cripple limbs. It seems to have the same blast radius as its more powerful energy-based variant, the plasma grenade. They are commonly used by melee equipped raiders and super mutants when they are out of melee range.

Thrown grenades are affected by physics; they may bounce or roll unexpectedly if not thrown carefully. However, in game physics can also be used to your advantage; such as throwing grenades through doorways or bouncing them around corners to attack enemies who cannot see you.

Grenades are an optional target in V.A.T.S., and can even be shot out of the air, causing them to detonate. This can be used to your advantage, as they will deal damage to an enemy if they are holding them or in close proximity when they explode. Grenades can be thrown point-blank in V.A.T.S with less danger due to the fact you only take 10% of the damage in V.A.T.S. you would take when outside V.A.T.S. Additionally, throwing grenades with V.A.T.S and subsequently landing a successful hit will cause the grenade to explode right at the target's feet, making V.A.T.S the most efficient way to use grenades to best effect (unless your throwing it around a corner or through a hole in the floor/celling).

A grenade that has been thrown toward you will show up on your HUD as a red arrow denoting its direction relative to you. Move in the opposite direction as quickly as possible to escape the blast radius and minimize the damage to both your overall health and your limbs.

It is also possible to plant a live grenade on an NPC by passing one from your inventory to the NPC's inventory via reverse-pickpocketing. This will kill the NPC, regardless of how much health he has, making the frag grenade far more deadly. If you get caught putting a grenade in an NPC's inventory, they act as if you were normally stealing something from them, and return the grenade to your inventory though it won't detonate. If you successfully kill a NPC using this technique you will earn the Psychotic Prankster achievement.

Bugs

 * Sometimes when throwing a frag grenade in VATS it will not explode.

Behind the scenes

 * The frag grenade does not appear to expel any fragments; the damage radius also supports this. It seems that the frag grenade works more like a Concussion Grenade.