I used to make the same mistake of keeping a grenade at hand, though I only primed them when sending rookies into ufos :)
It was the unofficial strategy guide that taught me of the lower accuracy. PrejudiceSucks is right, the penalty is 20%.

A nice tactic I remembered with all the talk about blaster launchers, at least when you don't need to capture any live aliens: blow a hole into the third floor of large ufos, at the "north-east" corner. This will usually (or even always) destroy the walls of the command room. Then send another blaster bomb inside, let it explode in the command room. Fireworks guaranteed. Though quite a few alien leaders have a tendency to be outside the room at that time and survive anyway.

A note I've just come across: even shooting down terror ships above the sea will gain you a net 500 points.

I used to play the game without giving my troopers anything better than the weapons you start out with. It actually turned out okay, because I had trained them so well, the only thing is that firefights were excruciatingly long.

The 20% accuracy only apply on two handed weapons. Pistols are not affected by this.

Hmm I see... long firefights, eh?

Oh here's a nice trick I learned - if you want your rookies to shoot way better, save all of the time and just arm them with grenades. If they blow 2 aliens up at once then they get 200% of the shooting accuracy % bonus. Woot or some other such announcement of victory.

And I know that my German is not that great. I are English and all of that. Guv'nor.

Oh, by the way, have any of you guys tried my unique and javelinesque style of ammo feeding? For weapons such as Rocket Launchers carrying around that many rockets is a complete pain in the arse!

Here's my method in some easy steps (at least two) :

Give rookie (or lowest available soldier) a whole backpack + one hand full of rockets of your preferred type. Also give him a Stun Rod.

When your better soldier fires off a rocket (he should carry two in his backpack + stun rod) he reloads.

Alien advances towards him. Good soldier thinks 'Oh bloody crap there's an alien coming!'. Said rookie lobs him a rocket! 'Cheers mate' he says as he blows up said alien. If he misses, the rookie merely chucks him another.

Possible happening 2 - Etherials/Good sectoids decide to MC either soldier.

If rookie is possessed by evil spirits (and/or mind controlled by an alien) - Rocket soldier can just rely on his own ammunition and if worst comes to worst, a 'commissar' (I take one, shoots the fleeing and/or MCed and not recovering) can blow the crap out of the Rookie (Commissar is armed with the only Heavy Plasma in the squad and only 1 clip. Also takes a laser pistol).

If Rocket Soldier is possessed by evil spirits (and/or MCed by an alien) -
The rookie simply walks up to him and stuns him. End of story. If the Rocket Soldier fires off a rocket then he will run out of ammo very quickly.

Oh and my research shows that you can improve the shooting skills of your soldiers on your 'friends' in the landing craft! Yes, that is correct! Merely take along a medic or two (each carries 3 med-kits) and shoot someone with a crappy starter pistol. Then knock them out with a stun rod and revive and heal them, whilst netting some valuable shooting XP and I believe strength. Woohoo.

X-Com Tip for the day: Luck and High Explosives will always prevail over skill and Blaster Launchers.

LOL LOL LOL
But it is true..... :sneaky:

Hehey yeah, especially in Terror sites.

But there's something that's just so cool when you finish a mission without ever having moved a step or even moved your head... blaster launcher in one hand, tons of blaster bombs at your feet, and a psi-amp to get some passing aliens to scout out targets for you before you thank them with a blaster bomb to the back. Shooting around corners, tearing apart UFOs, ah, the possibilities are endless with blaster bombs. Until you run out of ammo. ;)

Store nades on the shoulder slots. Only takes 3 TUs to get them in hand. And only prime proxies; they don't have a timer. ;)

Another nade tactic is relaying them to the front. Prime the nade and throw to the advance scout. He uses 25% + the TUs to pick it up. Much better than 75%+ TUs gone for your front line guys.

Large rocket = poor man's blaster bomb. Bring at least 8. :Titan:

The end off all things

Well, it's funny when one doesn't want to reveal any spoilers from a game that came out in 1993... BUT what you gonna do? So I stuffed all the boring stuff I was gonna write and will just let you know that I finished the game. The Cidonia mission was pretty intense in the surface, but once we went into the base proper it was too easy. Only one soldier explored the base, the others kept MControlling all and any oposition. Then I met the big bad guy and just "blasted" him to hell, heh

Heh

Great game. One of the few I feel like playing again INMEDIATLY after I finish it.