As part of a mod, I am currently working on finding a way to make mines...better...

Here is a list of the following changes I have made:

• TEC mines are farther apart (almost doubled placement radius, now at 1000m)
• Vasari mines are farther apart (increase impulse of Ruiner's abilities from 560,000 to 750,000)
• Vasari mines now spread out in all directions (instead of front 180 degrees)
• Range of TEC/Vasari mines' detonate ability increased to 2000 m
• Range of TEC/Vasari mines' detonate buff increased to 3000 m
• Damage of TEC/Vasari mines increased from 750 to 1000
• Range of Advent mine's detonate ability increased from 100m to 300m (note that tracking range is around 4500m, and this is what determines when the homing mine starts going for its target; increase to 300m helps prevent mines from flying past their intended target)
• Range of Advent mine's detonate buff increased to 2000m
• Damage of Advent mine increased to 2000 (applies only to target)
• Damage of Advent mine's AoE increased to 500
• Ruiner now deploys 15 mines
• TEC now builds proximity mines in increments of 15
• Advent homing mine squadron now deploys 10 mines
• Vasari Gravity mines in general more powerful; decrease speed/increase phase jump charge up time by 100%; duration increased from 45s to 120s
• Mine limit for ALL planets reduced from 150 to 60

In addition, I have changed how scouts detect mines...as of v1.2, the reveal/sense/decloak mines abilities were an AoE that revealed all mines (by taking them out of phase space)...this allowed any ship to target a mine, including SC and non-scout ships...though it was somewhat bugged (as range of buff was smaller than range of ability and range of weapons), when properly used it allowed minefields to be cleared really easily...a problem if the max number of mines is reduced from 150 to 60 and you are also trying to make them more useful...

What I have done instead is made the ability a targeted ability (range still 6000m) that instantly disables the mine's abilities and causes it to self-destruct in 10s (uses "MakeDead" instant action)...cooldown of scouts' ability is now 10s and it requires the scout to face its target...

It may seem somewhat counterproductive to make mines more useful by allowing less per gravity well, but the goal is to make mines more valuable without making them too powerful...placing 30 mines early/mid game should yield results or be a huge deterrent...

I'd appreciate anyones opinion/feedback on these changes as I'm trying to make mines as viable as possible given the current engine...even better, if anyone is willing to test these numbers or has tested previous numbers they think work better, please share!