The present methods and apparatus relate to wireless communications at either a user equipment (UE) or a network entity in a new radio communication system. The described aspects include receiving, via a communication channel, a scheduling grant from a transmitting wireless device, the scheduling grant including a Resource Indication Value (RIV) corresponding to an allocation of resource blocks (RBs) for communicating on the communication channel. The described aspects further include mapping the RIV to a constrained set of one or more RBs to identify allocated RBs, the constrained set of one or more RBs including a fewer number of RBs than a number of available RBs in a slot or transmission duration. The described aspects further include communicating, with the transmitting wireless device via the communication channel, using the allocated RBs from the constrained set of one or more RBs as signaled by the RIV.