Hell Let Loose Update 21 explained: Conquest Morale, rifle grenades, and the AT/armor pass

Expression Games and Team17 shipped Hell Let Loose Update 21 live on all platforms — console builds show as 1.060 — with a Confirmed premiere for Softcap’s Hell Let Loose desk. The Steam Live Now post and the matching full changelog (dated 22 September 2026 on the official blog, live rollout reported 23 September) put Conquest, rifle grenades, new weapons and loadouts, fire-mode selectors, and a wide Armor / Anti-Tank balance pass into regular matches after Experimental Branch testing.

Primary sources: Update 21 | Live Now on All Platforms and Update 21 | Full Changelog (Steam News, app 686810), mirrored on hellletloose.com. Softcap does not invent rollout clocks beyond those Confirmed posts.

At a glance

Beat	Published detail
Build	Update 21 (console Ver. 1.060)
Live	All platforms — Steam Live Now + full changelog
Headline mode	Conquest — both sides start at 1,000 Morale
New weapons	Rifle grenade launchers (3), ROKS 2 flamethrower, M1903A3 Springfield (+ M1903A4 sniper model update)
Systems	Weapon fire selectors; Weapon Skins DLC on select bolt-actions
AT guns	Barrel rotate 1°/s → 3°/s; pitch 1°/s → 2°/s; damage retune
Armor	HE radius bumps by weight class; Commander vehicle spawn 5 → 8; salvage Fuel 1.5×–2×
Maps	Fixes across nine maps

Conquest: Morale is the win condition

Conquest is the systems flag of Update 21. Victory is a Morale race, not a single Warfare-style front collapse:

• Both teams start at 1,000 Morale
• First team to 0 loses
• If the timer expires first, the side with higher remaining Morale wins
• Five objectives stay active and can be captured at any time

Published Morale drains:

Pressure	Rule
Player losses	−1 Morale per respawn; revives prevent that loss; 6-second post-spawn grace (death/redeploy in grace = no Morale hit)
Vehicle kills	Transport/Supply/Light vehicles 2; Recon / Half-Tracks 5; Light tanks 7; Medium / SPA 12; Heavy 17 — wrecks inside a friendly HQ do not cost Morale
Objective deficit	−2 / −4 / −6 Morale every 10 seconds for a 1 / 2 / 3 objective disadvantage

Each team starts with three Half-Tracks across HQ spawns; the middle-HQ Half-Track auto-respawns after destruction (same pattern as mid-match Medium Tank spawns). Softcap reprints the published Morale table; Softcap does not invent ranked queue placement or map rotation for Conquest beyond the changelog.

Rifle grenades and the new kit floor

Five new weapon variants land, plus a model update for the US Springfield sniper line:

Addition	Detail
Karabiner 98k / Schiessbecher	Rifle grenade launcher
M1 Garand / M7 Grenade Launcher	Rifle grenade launcher
SMLE No.1 Mk III / No.1 Mk I Cup Discharger	Rifle grenade launcher
ROKS 2	Soviet flamethrower
M1903A3 Springfield	US bolt-action; existing sniper now represented as M1903A4

Rifle grenades double as ordinary infantry rifles and launchers. Published ammo types (counts vary by role/loadout):

• HE — same explosion radius as a regular frag
• Smoke
• AT — Tier-1 structure damage (not Garrisons), light armor penetration; can destroy Recon / Light tanks and damage heavier tracks

Studio framing: a side-grade to hand grenades — longer range, impact detonation, slower reload, worse up-close. All rifle grenades detonate on impact for gameplay (historically some used timed fuses). Update 22 is flagged as the target for planting launchers for indirect fire — Softcap treats that as a forward-looking studio note, not a live feature.

Fire selectors, loadouts, and Weapon Skins

Weapons that now support fire-mode toggles (published list): MG34, FG42, STG 44, M1918A2 BAR (fast/slow auto), M1A1 / M1928A1 Thompson, Bren, Sten MK2 / Canadian MK2 / Mk5, PPSH 41. Audio was adjusted for single-shot where needed.

New loadouts tied to the kit:

Level / role	Kit
L6 US Rifleman	M1903A3 + Explosive Ammo Box
L8 Soviet Support	ROKS 2
L8 Rifleman (appropriate factions)	Rifle grenade — 3 HE + 1 Smoke
L6 Medic (appropriate factions)	Rifle grenade — 5 Smoke
L8 Engineer (appropriate factions)	Rifle grenade — 2 AT + 2 HE + 1 Smoke

Also published: British L1 Engineers move to Rifle No.4 Mk I; standard US Anti-Tank primary → M1 Carbine; US Tank Commander → M3 Grease Gun; all default Crewman loadouts get a Blowtorch; German DAK M43 → M24 grenades for historical accuracy.

Weapon Skins apply cosmetic finishes on listed bolt-actions (Kar98k lines, Springfields, No.4 Mk I lines, Mosin lines) via Barracks Loadout & Appearance. Rifle grenade launcher variants cannot take skins yet.

Anti-Tank guns: traverse finally moves

Studio problem statement: buildable AT guns saw relatively little use. Published handling buffs:

Stat	Was	Now
Barrel rotation	1°/s	3°/s
Pitch speed	1°/s	2°/s
Weapon turn rate	1°/s	10°/s

Pitch limits: QF 6-Pounder / PAK 40 −5…15°; ZiS-2 −5…25°; M1 57mm −5…20°. Horizontal traverse: QF ±40°, PAK ±32.5°, ZiS-2 ±28°, M1 57mm ±24°. Damage retune: M1 57mm 460, QF 470, ZiS-2 475, PAK 40 485. Softcap does not invent pen tables beyond those numbers.

Armor pass: HE, ammo roles, Commander spawn ceiling

HE radius after Experimental Branch feedback (blanket tank survivability buffs did not ship; individual resistance values remain under exploration):

Class / vehicle	HE radius
Light tanks	12 → 13 m
Medium tanks	15 → 16 m
Heavy tanks	15 → 18 m
IS-1 / Tiger	15 → 19 m
Sherman Jumbo 75mm	21 → 24 m
Luchs	10 → 11 m (plus rear Light kills, Recon damage anywhere, engine damage on all tanks)

Smoke launchers (from Update 20) get larger and longer screens. SPA gunners gain one extra zoom level (still one below regular Armor). Salvage returns 1.5×–2× Fuel, now with XP (enemy wrecks pay more XP than friendly). Commander max vehicle spawns: 5 → 8.

Ammo and fuel role differentiation (Heavy = more AP / anti-armor; Medium = more HE / infantry) is published tank-by-tank in the changelog — Softcap’s desk reprints the headline role split and the spawn-ceiling change rather than every AP/HE cell in the lede. Published samples include Firefly damage 920 → 960, Tiger / Panther / Firefly / Panzer IV turret speed +2°/s, and medium HE stacks rising on Sherman M4A3, T-34, Panzer IV, Cromwell, and Crusader.

Fixes floor

Beyond the feature sheet, Update 21 lists gameplay, vehicle, UI, tutorial, localization, server-admin, and nine-map environment fixes — including Artillery Resupply cooldown on rebuild, Artillery Operator blueprint dismantle, winter US Medium turn-speed parity, gunner-sight shell direction, and vehicle Morale / HQ spawn map issues. Softcap does not invent a full map-by-map bug index beyond the published categories.

What the studio did not publish

The Update 21 primaries do not ship ranked MMR charts, a full Conquest map rotation table, or the Experimental Branch blanket tank-resistance percentages as live values. Softcap does not invent those. Softcap also keeps Hell Let Loose: Vietnam Update 1.5 / Hotfix 1.5.1 on a separate Confirmed primary — this ship is base-game Update 21 only.

Who this hits

Squad leads and Commanders get Conquest’s Morale economy and an 8-vehicle spawn ceiling. Medics matter harder when each respawn costs Morale. Anti-Tank players get traverse that can actually track. Armor crews take HE radius and ammo-role retunes plus bigger smoke. Infantry unlock rifle grenades, fire selectors, Springfield / ROKS kits, and optional bolt-action skins.

Why it matters

Update 21 is Softcap’s first Hell Let Loose ship: a Confirmed all-platform drop with a new win-condition mode, a new grenade class, and a published AT/armor numbers sheet. The playable flag is Conquest’s 1,000 Morale loop; the systems flag is rifle grenades plus the AT traverse buff. Softcap reprints those Confirmed lines and leaves Experimental Branch what-ifs and Vietnam live-ops for their own primaries.