A Rough Proposal for the Functionality of Tank Mines

[JesNC]

But this isn't about nerfing AT mines to keep AMSes alive - it's about tuning them to fit a more defensive role.

Because that's what is lacking atm, an area denial tool versus ground vehicles. There's really no shortage in weapons/explosives that can take out vehicles, but infantry is lacking a way of keeping vehicles from entering an area in the first place (an AMP station courtyard for example).

Originally Posted by Mietz

Not everything needs to outright murder people, sometimes all you need is to do enough damage to be perceived as a threat. Its a tactical tool to deny an area by creating a risk-reward scenario that must be assessed and evaluated.

And that is IMO exactly what flak AA does in PS2 right now - it's dangerous enough to deny pilots from lingering around its position, but a good pilot can work his/her way around it most of the time. If they manage to tune AT mines to that power level I will be more than happy.
But in PS1 a good driver could work his way around minefields all of the time, they really only ever caught those who were not paying attention - thus, I refer to them as toothless.

[Rumblepit]

ahhh there is it folks ...... we dont want mines to be effective ,we want them to be a deterrent.

all im reading is how peopel dont want to defend spawn points/sundys. sure it suucks to be the guy who has to watch the car,but you guys love the xp a primary sundy brings in.right? so if you want that xp to keep coming in you need to defend your spawn points.

i dont think the mines are overpowered, i think people in this thread crying about av mines are incompetent , and refuse to defend and forward spawn point.....

what i suggest is, if you see any sundys that belong to the people in this thread that cry about av mines you need to blow that sundy up ASAP. even if they are apart of your faction blow up their sundy. allow players that know how to defend a sundy to get that primary spawn point.

you guys want to rely on a sundy driver thats goning to deploy and leave the sundy unattended ?

av mines kill me because im incompetent, or i refuse to defend a sundy because im incompetent, i dont have gunners in my sundy to help me defend because im incompetent.

PLEASE NERF MINES BECAUSE IM INCOMPETENT.

BRAVOO........

[JesNC]

Originally Posted by Rumblepit

ahhh there is it folks ...... we dont want mines to be effective ,we want them to be a deterrent.

[mad rant about mines and Sunderers]

I guess you missed the point.

'We' - or at least I - want mines to be effective as an explosive AND as a deterrent.

'We' want AT mines to be useful as a strategic asset and not just as another way to blow up tanks.

If you're looking for a 'NERF MINEZ OP' thread to counter-rant, I'm sure you'll find one over here.

[Epidemic]

I laugh at tank mines, 75% reduction makes them a resource sink for any engineer that thinks they're about to cash in.

edit; The only effective counter to my strategy is to have tank mines set, detonated by C4.. which takes 2 coordinated people to achieve. In which case they deserve the kill.

[BIGGByran]

Originally Posted by JesNC

Using them offensively takes hadly any effort atm. Scout a target, run/hotdrop/jumppad/teleport in (you know they like to put their AMSes right next to those things...), drop mines and gtfo.
And this is actually one of the core problems with AT mines now - the effort required should be at least equal IMO.

2. C4 is unique because you an stick it to vehicles and walls. Aside from that, you can use any explosive to blow up anything in PS2, and IMO C4 feels clunky with its placement/detonate mechanic.
AT mines, on the other hand, only require a vehicle in proximity or a few bullets to set them off - I've killed Liberators, MAXes and swathes of infantry with them. It's cool, sure, but it simply devalues C4 for the Engineer class when you can use the cheaper AT mines as your multipurpose explosive solution.

1) Using them as an offensive weapon hardly takes any effort:
-I would completely agree IF they don't defend their sundy at all AND do not have mine guard. It is their fault for leaving a sundy undefended without mine guard
- I would disagree IF
i) They guard their sundy (even without mine guard)
ii) unguarded sundy but with mine guard (as a mine guarded sundy cannot be blown up with 2 tank mines or even 3 if you have max mine guard)

2) There have been a few times where I wish I had C4 instead of Tank Mines, as I run up behind the target, kissed it in the @ss and whisper "sweet dreams my prince" as I laid down 2 tank mines. He rolls forward. "Sh!t" I said, "Now roll back, come on you can do it." waited there for roughly a minute and got spotted, killed and didn't even get a kill with my tank mines. While C4 on the other hand would have done the job much better.

The ONLY reason why tank mine are effective is because Engs work their ass off to get to the target (if defended) or took his precises little time picking flowers on the way to the sundy because it was undefended.

C4 is available to ALL Classes (except Infl, i think), while Tank Mines are ONLY for Engineers. And again C4 has more uses than Tank Mines. How about we eliminate C4 from the engineer's class and let them ONLY have tank mines or Inf Mines?

[Satanam]

Originally Posted by BIGGByran

@Satanam
TANK mine aren't better than C4. Tank mine ARE better at killing tanks, because they are Specialized at killing tanks. C4 is the "Jack of All Trades" therefor should not be better than a specialized item.


It is like you want C4 to be the best at everything.

No, I want C4 to be better than tank mines against deployed/stationary vehicles. Tank mines should be, yes, damn powerful and deal more damage than C4 against vehicles moving around, but as a 'tank mine' is supposed to be a trap against vehicles in this situation, they shouldn't be also useful and so powerful against deployed/stationary ones.
Otherwise C4 will be useless. And it's not described as "Jack of All Trades", that's only how you (and other people may) think it is. Anyway, what you said about some changes on tank mines would make C4 more useless against deployed/stationary vehicles, so I don't see why we should be acting like we're not defending the same thing.

[BIGGByran]

Originally Posted by Satanam

Anyway, what you said about some changes on tank mines would make C4 more useless against deployed/stationary vehicles

What did I say?

[Satanam]

Originally Posted by BIGGByran

What did I say?

My bad. It was supposed to be "useful" instead of "useless".

[BIGGByran]

Originally Posted by Satanam

so I don't see why we should be acting like we're not defending the same thing.

Well I am not defending making tank mine a deterrent. I would hate tank mines to be abundantly annoying, but would rather be more of a minimally effective.

[Obstruction]

since this thread is all a bunch of people repeating the same tired things i'll repeat too.

if you don't like people walking up and blowing up your sunderer, stand by it with a shotgun and kill them.

this has been a public service announcement.

[Satanam]

Originally Posted by BIGGByran

Well I am not defending making tank mine a deterrent. I would hate tank mines to be abundantly annoying, but would rather be more of a minimally effective.

Neither do I. I just want it to be less effective than C4 against vehicles at 0 km/h.

[Figment]

Wow Rumblepit and Obstruction, talk about selective reading.

*No word on Sundies specifically as primary reasoning for change by JesNC or anyone else -> cue Rumblepit and Obstruction with rant on how it's all about Sundies*

Sounds like some people are obsessed with using it AGAINST stationary vehicles, particular AMSes. Interestingly, without any critique on the ease of their own playstyle. Hmm. Vested interest bias per chance?



@WarbirdTD: moot point that one should be able to defend from engineers etc, because it isn't a given that you can prevent arrival. You can't see nor control all routes. Sure, you can ward off a lot of attacks, but there are no guarantees you had a chance to see the attack coming. Placing the blame solely on the defending party is highly hypocritical, because you might as well say an attacker that isn't capable of breaching a defense or make use of a number of seconds surprise attack or being able to stay alive long enough for placement of X amount of mines is the one to blame for potential failure.

Nowhere does it say it has to be 2 mines on a stationary AMS and nowhere does it say it has to be 7 on a mine guarded AMS. Both are somewhat extreme and it's rather weird, wouldn't you say, that a mine guard (designed to stop damage from driving over minefields) is more useful on a stationary vehicle than on a troop insertion transport that does NOT have an AMS utility slot? It would make a lot more sense to have AMS and mine guard interchangeable, so you could have a clearly role defined armoured blockade runner troop delivery transport into the heart of an enemy defense, than to have it sit back and having to setup a porcupine defense downwards, instead of to all the threads around it.

Basically, it's a rather ridiculous design situation that doesn't make sense whatsoever. Besides, you're argueing using status quo arguments like current damage, carried numbers of mines and absorption levels against people who have a future vision with clearly differently defined context and tool specifications. Hence the present day stats are only relevant to demonstrate the current situation, but irrelevant in a different future setting as they could be tweaked to anything appropriate to changes to the tool in question.


@BIGGByran: Do I feel they don't require any effort at all? Yes and no. Yes in that you have to get within range. No in that this is actually exceptionally easy. It is far too easy to say "you should have been situationally aware" or "you just want to leave the AMS alone" or "someone should have prevented him from getting there in the first place". If "getting there in the first place" is sufficient reason to have something die, then that saddens me greatly. Why shouldn't someone first establish some sort of dominance in an area before they get to determine what blows up or not?

I feel that getting there isn't the sum of actions that should be considered skill. Staying alive while placing them should require effort too and this effort should be key IMO. I believe it should be possible to thwart the engineer WHILE placing the explosives, since often times you cannot become situationally aware until something has already occured.

This is a huge problem in PS2 mind you and is not limited to engineers, but devs thinking in completely rushed gameplay on everything. Everything has super-low TTKs and that's a huge problem IMO. So yes, there should be a chance the engineer would be shot before completing placement after initiating it. It simply should take more time. Mind, I'm of the opinion placement of C4 also takes too little time and provides too little warning and I should know, since I got pretty much all C4 medals.

I prefer a slightly slower gameplay where action can cause a reaction, not just a consequence.

I perceive mines as a form of explosive that one places with care and planning, with low quality but therefore allowing for high quantity, where one expects a threat will occur later (passive future expectation). If it is primarily used as a spontaneous, limited quantity, high quality suicide bomber rush tool on an object that's already there (active, present reactive)...

Then something is horribly wrong because it's the exact opposite.


I can fully understand people like blowing up AMSes, but isn't that exactly why engineers can cert into boomers (C4)? Boomers after all are placed to "rig certain things to explode in a controlled fashion".

As for meaningful variety, I believe tank mines to currently be too poorly designed to be used for anything but suicide rushes and throwing them down from a top cliffs and buildings at vehicles. It currently doesn't have any meaningful variety, because you can do that with C4 as well. Stimulating a passive defensive role and prior placement gives it a far greater variety in usage. You could still try to place them on stationary vehicles, but you might need a few more. And hey, it'd take you a second or three-five more. Big deal, I regularly walk around enemy AMSes for 5-12 seconds with my LA - as soon as you get within the dead angles of the guns, you can use the Sundy as shield against opponents trying to hunt you. In PS1 you'd use your stealth and that AMS as a shield.

But can you say that there's currently any meaningful variety of explosives that enable you to create minefields that control strategic areas like roads, flanks, hills or field approach routes? Meaningful variety doesn't mean being able to do a wide range of the same things, it means you can do more diverse tasks with diverse types of objects.

Is C4 a jack of all trades currently? Yes, it is. But it also requires very specific placement on vehicles (top/rear!) to suffice as an AV weapon and tbh, I'd rather they blow up one at a time (like in PS1, where you could select the explosive to blow) and that you'd have a way to destroy them without setting them off after you killed the wielder. Currently I can destroy anything I placed a C4 on in my next life. In itself, fine, but I'd rather require one to first get back to that C4 to pick up a new detonator or having to set it off with a grenade or other explosive.

See, if I see something is too powerful or used wrong, I'm not going to defend it even if I use it myself extremely effectively. :/

@JesNC: You didn't need enhanced targeting to see them (ET didn't do anything for detecting mines). A bigger problem was that people would disable graphic options (vegetation) so they would not obscure mines.

But why a lot of minefields failed to take out good drivers (which is good btw, it rewards the aware driver), is that a lot of engineers were just crap at placement. Most minefields were placed in square straight line formations instead of diamond formations in a \__/ trap (expecting evasive action) and a lot of people didn't take into account line of sight when placing the mines. Me I always placed mines behind little differences in ground inclines, so the crest of the incline would hide the mines. I also always looked for entry routes into battle of vehicles, because most experienced drivers take the same route out of the battle: they knew there were no mines there, so they will presume it is a safe route to return on. I literally killed hundreds of tanks that way.

Another thing is to mine there where they don't expect it, for instance, I'd set up a CE field with Spitfire Turrets, which leads players to go AROUND that area, expecting more CE (including mines) in the turreted area. I'd leave a clear, deliberate, but not too obvious trap (less Spitted area) as an opening and mine that, or mine the area just out of the detection reach of the line of Spitfires.

Basically, you must plan your field by knowing how players can or would react to interacting with your field. And since you know the direction they come from (otherwise you wouldn't place your field in a particular way), you can set up shop ahead of your minefield, thus behind them, to finish them off in case they do stop and try to turn back or repair. For instance with a Fury, AMS/HA, etc.

Another thing you'll recall we often did was setup a minefield as a checkpoint to retreat across, in hopes of luring enemy units over them. Killed tons of tanks that way as well by having them be preoccupied with a pursuit. And must say a lot of Skyguards got my Fury ATV that way as well.

[Rumblepit]

Originally Posted by Figment

Wow Rumblepit and Obstruction, talk about selective reading.

*No word on Sundies specifically as primary reasoning for change by JesNC or anyone else -> cue Rumblepit and Obstruction with rant on how it's all about Sundies*

Sounds like some people are obsessed with using it AGAINST stationary vehicles, particular AMSes. Interestingly, without any critique on the ease of their own playstyle. Hmm. Vested interest bias per chance?



@WarbirdTD: moot point that one should be able to defend from engineers etc, because it isn't a given that you can prevent arrival. You can't see nor control all routes. Sure, you can ward off a lot of attacks, but there are no guarantees you had a chance to see the attack coming. Placing the blame solely on the defending party is highly hypocritical, because you might as well say an attacker that isn't capable of breaching a defense or make use of a number of seconds surprise attack or being able to stay alive long enough for placement of X amount of mines is the one to blame for potential failure.

Nowhere does it say it has to be 2 mines on a stationary AMS and nowhere does it say it has to be 7 on a mine guarded AMS. Both are somewhat extreme and it's rather weird, wouldn't you say, that a mine guard (designed to stop damage from driving over minefields) is more useful on a stationary vehicle than on a troop insertion transport that does NOT have an AMS utility slot? It would make a lot more sense to have AMS and mine guard interchangeable, so you could have a clearly role defined armoured blockade runner troop delivery transport into the heart of an enemy defense, than to have it sit back and having to setup a porcupine defense downwards, instead of to all the threads around it.

Basically, it's a rather ridiculous design situation that doesn't make sense whatsoever. Besides, you're argueing using status quo arguments like current damage, carried numbers of mines and absorption levels against people who have a future vision with clearly differently defined context and tool specifications. Hence the present day stats are only relevant to demonstrate the current situation, but irrelevant in a different future setting as they could be tweaked to anything appropriate to changes to the tool in question.


@BIGGByran: Do I feel they don't require any effort at all? Yes and no. Yes in that you have to get within range. No in that this is actually exceptionally easy. It is far too easy to say "you should have been situationally aware" or "you just want to leave the AMS alone" or "someone should have prevented him from getting there in the first place". If "getting there in the first place" is sufficient reason to have something die, then that saddens me greatly. Why shouldn't someone first establish some sort of dominance in an area before they get to determine what blows up or not?

I feel that getting there isn't the sum of actions that should be considered skill. Staying alive while placing them should require effort too and this effort should be key IMO. I believe it should be possible to thwart the engineer WHILE placing the explosives, since often times you cannot become situationally aware until something has already occured.

This is a huge problem in PS2 mind you and is not limited to engineers, but devs thinking in completely rushed gameplay on everything. Everything has super-low TTKs and that's a huge problem IMO. So yes, there should be a chance the engineer would be shot before completing placement after initiating it. It simply should take more time. Mind, I'm of the opinion placement of C4 also takes too little time and provides too little warning and I should know, since I got pretty much all C4 medals.

I prefer a slightly slower gameplay where action can cause a reaction, not just a consequence.

I perceive mines as a form of explosive that one places with care and planning, with low quality but therefore allowing for high quantity, where one expects a threat will occur later (passive future expectation). If it is primarily used as a spontaneous, limited quantity, high quality suicide bomber rush tool on an object that's already there (active, present reactive)...

Then something is horribly wrong because it's the exact opposite.


I can fully understand people like blowing up AMSes, but isn't that exactly why engineers can cert into boomers (C4)? Boomers after all are placed to "rig certain things to explode in a controlled fashion".

As for meaningful variety, I believe tank mines to currently be too poorly designed to be used for anything but suicide rushes and throwing them down from a top cliffs and buildings at vehicles. It currently doesn't have any meaningful variety, because you can do that with C4 as well. Stimulating a passive defensive role and prior placement gives it a far greater variety in usage. You could still try to place them on stationary vehicles, but you might need a few more. And hey, it'd take you a second or three-five more. Big deal, I regularly walk around enemy AMSes for 5-12 seconds with my LA - as soon as you get within the dead angles of the guns, you can use the Sundy as shield against opponents trying to hunt you. In PS1 you'd use your stealth and that AMS as a shield.

But can you say that there's currently any meaningful variety of explosives that enable you to create minefields that control strategic areas like roads, flanks, hills or field approach routes? Meaningful variety doesn't mean being able to do a wide range of the same things, it means you can do more diverse tasks with diverse types of objects.

Is C4 a jack of all trades currently? Yes, it is. But it also requires very specific placement on vehicles (top/rear!) to suffice as an AV weapon and tbh, I'd rather they blow up one at a time (like in PS1, where you could select the explosive to blow) and that you'd have a way to destroy them without setting them off after you killed the wielder. Currently I can destroy anything I placed a C4 on in my next life. In itself, fine, but I'd rather require one to first get back to that C4 to pick up a new detonator or having to set it off with a grenade or other explosive.

See, if I see something is too powerful or used wrong, I'm not going to defend it even if I use it myself extremely effectively. :/

@JesNC: You didn't need enhanced targeting to see them (ET didn't do anything for detecting mines). A bigger problem was that people would disable graphic options (vegetation) so they would not obscure mines.

But why a lot of minefields failed to take out good drivers (which is good btw, it rewards the aware driver), is that a lot of engineers were just crap at placement. Most minefields were placed in square straight line formations instead of diamond formations in a \__/ trap (expecting evasive action) and a lot of people didn't take into account line of sight when placing the mines. Me I always placed mines behind little differences in ground inclines, so the crest of the incline would hide the mines. I also always looked for entry routes into battle of vehicles, because most experienced drivers take the same route out of the battle: they knew there were no mines there, so they will presume it is a safe route to return on. I literally killed hundreds of tanks that way.

Another thing is to mine there where they don't expect it, for instance, I'd set up a CE field with Spitfire Turrets, which leads players to go AROUND that area, expecting more CE (including mines) in the turreted area. I'd leave a clear, deliberate, but not too obvious trap (less Spitted area) as an opening and mine that, or mine the area just out of the detection reach of the line of Spitfires.

Basically, you must plan your field by knowing how players can or would react to interacting with your field. And since you know the direction they come from (otherwise you wouldn't place your field in a particular way), you can set up shop ahead of your minefield, thus behind them, to finish them off in case they do stop and try to turn back or repair. For instance with a Fury, AMS/HA, etc.

Another thing you'll recall we often did was setup a minefield as a checkpoint to retreat across, in hopes of luring enemy units over them. Killed tons of tanks that way as well by having them be preoccupied with a pursuit. And must say a lot of Skyguards got my Fury ATV that way as well.

solve all your problems with this.


http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/i...powered.95734/

[Babyfark McGeez]

When you are running around as a max and a bunny hopping engineer is tossing mines at you like candy on st. patricks day you know something is not right here.

...or was that a cheat?

[Kerrec]

Originally Posted by Figment

I perceive mines as a form of explosive that one places with care and planning, with low quality but therefore allowing for high quantity, where one expects a threat will occur later (passive future expectation). If it is primarily used as a spontaneous, limited quantity, high quality suicide bomber rush tool on an object that's already there (active, present reactive)...

Then something is horribly wrong because it's the exact opposite.

There's nothing "horribly wrong". You have a vision of how mines must be used, and the game plays out in a different way. Other people accept the way AV mines are now, and if the gameplay was switched to your way, they would think something is "horribly wrong".