I don't usually loose more than two or four mines to a single scout, and I usually arrange my homing mines as close as possible to the planet and around my defensive structures, so the scout ususally has to go out of it's way to set them off. But generally mines are only a good investment when you have a shortage of tactical slots, starbase and repair bays are better.

Both Vasari and TEC mines that are near the edge of the grav well can be dealt with by warping in flak frigates and scouts.  The scouts will quickly reveal mines in a large radius, and the flaks will remove them before other defenders can even react.  So really, it's not that much harder to create an opening in Vasari and TEC minefields.

That's kind of the point.  Mines got a considerable cost reduction in the most recent patch, so I'm going to give them another try.

My biggest complaint about mines is that they all say they are cloaked, or out-of-phase. And yet you can still see them, but nothing will attack them until a scout checks them out, specifically with the ability "decloak mines". To me this would mean that you cannot judge their placement or amount until you use said ability. So make them invisible fer crying out loud. If i jump into a planet without good enough recon and the place is filled with mines I cant see and I have made no plans for them, let me get chewed up. because as it stands, i can scout, se that there are a lot of them but they are all on the right side of the GW and I can just jump in from a little to the left of the phase lane. Avoidance should only be part of it.  I realize this makes the game MUCh harder if we don't have minesweepers or a minesweeping ability. Unless we make the mines attackable, we shouldnt be able to see them until a decloak is used on them.

my second biggest complaint about mine is that they deploy too few at a time, with too low a limit. Decrease the dmg done per mine, but increase the number of mines per deployment and maximum number of mines per GW. Then it might be an actual defense instead of a "oh noes! i lost a ship that was already super duper damaged and was turning the wrong way when i wasnt paying attention." presently mines are a lot like trees on the side of the road, the only way they are going to hurt you is if something else has already gone really wrong.

ok, so game mechanics wise, it works.

i tend to get "big-picture" about space warfare. I get wrapped up in things like assault defense and vastness of space.

regardless, i think smaller and more would be ok. out of phase being visible... i guess i could accept that. but really if you did it my way, later in the game having mine busting or sweeping ships would be necessary. personally i would send about 30 scouts in a wide formation to open up a space and then bring in the fleet.

If only mine laying was like in Homeworld2...where you can order your ships to make lines of them, instead of guessing where they are going to land from phase space.

Or better yet, make mines be an upgrade of the planet. Each upgrade adds mine density around the planet. At max level, nearly the entire gravity well is saturated.

I second that motion, that's brilliant.

  I had about 30-35 Mines detonate on my Kol, (lvl 7, i think,) and lost it.