Masking Gas Grenade

The Masking Gas Grenade

The Masking Gas Grenade (simply, the Masking Grenade) is equipment used by classes in World War Z.

The Masking Gas Grenade is used by the Fixer class in Co-op Campaign, and the Shadow class in Multiplayer.

Overview

When thrown, the grenade creates a small blue smoke cloud that causes all allies standing inside of it to become invisible to zekes both normal and special. While masked, zombies will not attack and will stand around confused. Depending on the position of other teammates, they will begin chasing after survivors that are not under the effects of masking gas. However, this won't stop hordes of zekes from moving towards your position during swarm events. Survivors that are pinned by a Lurker or Bull can be freed by throwing a Masking Gas Grenade at them.

When the grenade's gas is applied, the player's screen will have a deep blue hue until the effect wears off.

Design

The Masking Gas Grenade is based on the M18 smoke grenade which is a colored smoke grenade. The grenade's body being a blue color also serves to indicate the color of the smoke. As bluntly detailed on the grenade, its content includes an inert pathogen. Although the masking grenade does spray out concealing colored smoke, the effective area of the smoke cloud produced is fairly small and does not provide any physical coverage for the survivors. Although breathing and being in smoke produced by a smoke grenade is typically harmful, survivors are expected to linger in it to receive the effects, suggesting a less toxic smoke mixture was used.

Trivia

• The main concept behind the Masking Gas Grenade was inspired by the scene in the World War Z film in which the protagonist Gerry Lane purposefully injected himself with a pathogen to become invisible to the zekes. It can be infered that the militaries of the world have learned about this useful trick and began engineering weapons using this newly-discovered information. This weapon would become known as the Masking Gas Grenade, an altered smoke grenade with a pathogen-laced composition to provide temporary cover to everyone who steps into the cloud from the zekes. Interestingly, the grenades have the word "Lane" written on them, possibly as both a reference to Gerry from the movie and as a credit to him for the eventual creation of the tool.