How I would do mines:

I would make mines a large entity, a mine field that is built or deployed at a slower rate than individual mines now.  Once deployed they aren't visible to ships until they are close range and only targetable by scouts like now.  Ships take large damage going through the field in chunks but this reduces the health of the field (unrepairable, well maybe by the ships that deploy the mines).  Scouts can attack the field but cannot be harmed by the field.  I would perhaps scale the damage and health loss of the mine field based on the size/class of ship passing through.  Limit the fields per Grav well to something like 8?

I would certainly make it so frigates or Cruisers would die passing through one side to the other but a cap would take something like 33%-50% of it's hp doing so.

Represent the mine field graphically by lots of little mines that reduce as the field's health reduces (fade out?).  Explosions occur at the ships passing through but individual mines don't need to be shown as which one detonated.

One reason I would do them this way is that by making them individual mines you are further highlighting that we are playing on a 2D plane and reducing our ability to believe what is going on in the game.  It really is silly we have to go around these mines when going above or under would be way more effective.

Please offer replay to as how you came across this.  Its hard for me to believe 1 is harder to then the other.

Mines in history have been used offensively in real life.  Its been rare but has been done.  Mines in sose have been mostly used for defense and rarely offensively

Could you give an example of when mines have been used offensively in combat?  A ship carrying mines would customarily dump them before entering combat, basically because you wouldn't want to carry large amounts of high explosives around on deck.  I doubt this can be considered combat use?  There have been no 'mine throwers' either, unless you count depth charges, which have no permanent presence.  Often the 'offensive' use of mines would involve dropping mines off harbours, which would be similar to dropping them in an enemy gravwell, but not similar to dropping them in the middle of a battle!

It might be useful to consider that the mines used so far in live warfare have not had the ability to recognise their own ships, which would tend to restrict their role in fleet combat.

Another aspect of naval mines is that they were not only often deadly, but a crippled ship would be out of a war for a long time.  However, we have a game where repair is easy, so that mines that are set successfully cannot be counted a success unless the target is destroyed.  If the target is easily repaired the exploded mines are just a cost.  A good reason why Sins mines should be more deadly than they were in history..

The effect of banning their combat use might seem to favour Advent, as the synergy with Repulse would still exist.  When I considered this I came back to the realisation of how little the capital ship abilities were integrated into the expansions.  As the mines are supposed to exist in phase space, where Vasari are masters, it wouldn't take much imagination to replace the Subverter synergy with another one?  Perhaps ships stunned by Subverters could attract mines over greater distances, effectively turning pre-laid Vasari mines into homing mines?  The same could be true of (for example) the Marauder's ability to phase out enemy ships, the ships could then attract mines from far further away?  That would retain the need to lure the enemy into the vicinity of your mines, instead of having ships bombed by mines directly in combat, which seems wrong? 

You dont need to attract mines for vas lol.Its easy.Sub disable -lay mines-disable 2-3x more boom.Easy as pie.This patch makes this glaring for vas.Fleets mostly made of lrf and flak.See a fleet of 100 frigs heading your way?Get 15 ships and wipe them out in 30-40 sec.

I don't see the confusion but let me dumb it down for you.  Subverters disable everything within a certain radius.  The affected ships can't move, shoot or do anything.  This enables the mine layers to lay their mines without them being destroyed.  The only things that can destroy them is cap, SB or strike craft when this happens(something that is not disabled by the subverter).  This makes it less likely that the mines will be destroyed by what you are trying to use it on.  Assuming you have strike craft to do so, you can still destroy the mines but at a lot less risk seeing as how most firepower will be locked up with the subverter.

Now with advent, mines are strike craft so they are vulnerable even before built if left undocked.  To do as you say with advent homing mines, one has to lay mines and afterwards repulse the enemy into them.  The frigates and strike craft etc are still active and able to fire.  Now this does not matter as much assailants and other forward shooting ships unless you give them enough time to turn and shoot or some are not facing the same directions.  With flak this does not matter however because of the 360 degree firing arc and the fact that the flak can shoot them down as they are flying over to be laid.  The strike craft can still kill after they are laid but they have the benefit of being able to do it before its done as well.  This leaves a wider opportunity and more possible combatants to shoot down the mines rendering your strategy useless and less the money you spent on them.  Did I explain it well enough for you?

This is not real life and comparing real life to a game gets you nowhere.  If you use mines offensively, they are called bombs.  Mines by nature are passive and only triggered by encroachment of presumeably the enemy but pretty much anyone that comes close enough to trigger it.

If this is an attempt to bust my balls about your "strongest lrf" thread, then try again.  I am not the one that started a thread about a test and not show a replay to back yourself up and demonstrate methodology of your test.

[_]-Greyfox

I know how mines work and how Subverters work currently.  The thread is about suggestions for change. 

JJ argued that banning the combat use of mines would affect Vasari unfairly.  Perhaps I should explain what banning their combat use means, for the stupid.  It means not firing them at ships.  Clear?  Mines either could not be deployed if a ship was deemed in combat, or not be deployed too near an enemy ship.  Simple enough?

So, if they could no longer be fired at ships in combat, to retain the synergy with Subverters I suggested that disabled ships could attract prelaid mines from a distance.  As if whatever disabled them also attracted the mines.  As it would be impossible to have disabled ships set off mines otherwise, because unless you have godly powers like Advent, ships you have disabled do not move around like dandelion seeds in springtime, setting off mines.

Then Vasari would have to try to lure ships into mines, or near to mines, rather than firing them straight into disabled ships during a battle.  The use of the synergy would require similar skill.

Is that easier to understand?  It's not rocket science?

What does any of this have to do with memory optimization. 

Priority one of this thread is to reduce the memory causing lag. If there was a reduction in mind then discuss balance or any other optimization that might change balance then discuss balance.

Please Read The OP

EXAMPLE: If there is a 50% reduction in mines at a grav well and the damage was doubled, would that cause a balance issue?

My comments were not aimed at you, desconnor, but at JJ.  He was being a smartass about showing a replay and feigning ignorance to forward his agenda so I figured I would be a smartass as well.  The problem with your suggestion is that it makes subverters even more powerful than they are already.  Is it not enough already that they render a wide area of ships completely defenseless and unable to retreat?  You would rather they attract already laid mines while they are at it to make them even more of a game winner?  Basically all a vasari player would ahve to do is throw mines around willy-nilly and then subvert once or twice to attract swarms of mines.  It would be the same thing as before except the mines spread out a bit before blowing with minelayer doing it instead of having them come to 1 or 2 spots with your subverter suggestion.  Potayto....potahhto.  I would still call that offensive use of mines rather than defensive.

[_]-Greyfox

MINES are a type of BOMBS.  I dont argue to make all mines move and seek to destroy fleets

Lets see if I can dumb advent mine laying for you.

Guardians repulse entire fleet preventing them from attacking and cripples movement

Advent undocks mines and lays them behind fleet (dont be  dumb and fly to enemy flak or sc when deploying)

Fleet cant turn around fast enough to kill mines before the become cloaked and active

2nd Guardian repulse fleet to mines

Hey look repulse affects Capital ships too

Plus you dont have to use mines with repulse. Just lay them in front of you and hide in them. Mines can be effective against spammers early in the game

Again advent mines move as fast as SC and are the least prioritized target

Grey you dont use mines in combat. Why bother offering suggestions on fixes or modification.  I try to balance the game as a whole unlike you,who lobby for the sole race that you only play or remove any aspects of game play you dont use.

The OP was also about tweaks to game play and not just memory optimization.

I did offer trying to balance out the mines by making the tec mines be invisible due their inability to lay in foreign planets.  Grey just likes to nerf everything he doesnt use or dumb things down

It would seem to me that you are lobbying for vasari, JJ.  Flaks as I mentioned can shoot all the way around and can kill them placed behind, side, or wherever.  Fleet doesn't need to turn around with flak and flak aren't necessarily facing all the same direction anyways.  Far be it for someone to micro their fighters to shoot down the mine squads especially if the enemy have shown a propensity to have and use them.  You don't argue to make all mines move and destroy fleets.  Vasari is already able to lay them in the middle of the enemy without any movement or retaliation due to subversion.  Mines by definition are passive.  You lay them where your enemy would go or want to go and the enemy passes over it because they don't know exactly where it is or have to move too fast to look for them.  If you are launching them at something, they are no longer mines.  They are missles or bombs.  Semantics to be sure but there is a difference.  The thing is you cannot hide them.  You can see them quite clearly when you are present in the well regardless of if there are scouts or not.  The invisible thing is not a bad idea but one would have to have them not used offensively with subversion or the like.  I am trying to avoid making a bad thing worse.  Subs and mines are already a cheap tactic.  Would you have them made worse because you prefer vasari having another tool in their overly large toolbelt?

[_]-Greyfox

How is the Vasari player supposed to set a trap in an opponents grav well using the attract method though...?  Whereas as it is currently the Vasari can jump into a gravwell, disable then fire mines off?  I'd hardly call that an insignificant change?  Especially as the mines put down beforehand are subject to the same sort of interception that you pointed out Advent mines could suffer from?

JJ claiming that mines are a type of bomb brings up another issue, mines, at least naval mines, do not have splash radius.  I doubt that there has been a single mine that has damaged two ships at the same time, or a bomb directed against ships for that matter.  Ships just do not operate close enough together.  Even if you consider tanks, more than one tanks would not be damaged by a mine and it was notoriously hard to damage even one tank with a bomb.  Would removing splash radius help?  Is it possible to make the mines objects-attracted-by-ships rather than objects-that-seek-ships, would that help?

I wish people would read the thread instead of making pointlessly negative comments.  The issue players have with memory optimisation is that we simply do not need so many mines in the game.  There are almost never used, the AI spends too much on them, they are not very effective when used as mines.  Why make technical changes when we can, far more simply, both severely limit the number of mines used and at the same time make them more useful in their limited numbers?  That leads on to the observation that making them more powerful as mines will affect the way they are used at the moment, as a direct combat ability.

Priority one is to make mines useful in the game.  If they are not useful, then why allocate them any memory at all?   

"One area of concern is the memory and CPU eaten up by Space Mines. I'd like to hear some suggestions on how we can keep mines in the game without consuming so many resources"

It is just my opinion they should not be an offensive weapon.  I stated that whatever change is made that it not exacerbate a problem already existing(mines with subverters).  I am perfectly fine with them being defensive(forcing a certain route through a well or by subterfuge of them not knowing where the mines are without uncovering with scouts).  If you are stupid enough to blunder through a minefield blindly then you deserve the damage.  I just disagree that they should be thrown at the enemy who can do nothing but sit there while in the middle of a firefight.  Subverters are bad enough that you don't need to throw salt in the wound with mines.  Making mines invisible but removing any offensive uses would seem to me beneficial to memory optimization.  There must be some way of doing it without benefitting one race more than others.

[_]-Greyfox

 Good points Greyfox. I like the idea of invisible mines but how would we balance?

Some good ideas.... 

Optimization of the mine model has been done, so you could use that.  You could also lessen the amount of mines and up the hp and damage done.

For balance, I never understood why the mines didn't do friendly fire.  I think that would solve all the problems with them.  You create a choke point, fine.  you can even lay them in neutral territory.  BUT, you will loose all your subverters and possibly more of your fleet if you drop a minefield in the thick of battle.  Vas have enough weapons in their arsenal, they don't need mines and sub combo.

First off I believe if we go the invisible route TEC would have the best advantage but would also be the most balanced. They are big, time consuming to build and would likely have the largest explosive radius. Being invisible would actually be a huge benefit and would in and of itself help level the playing field.

Advent homing mines I believe could also have the invisibility but only if they are not moving. The moment they start to move they would lose their invisibility (this invisibility would likely be a research upgrade as could be a speed boost).

Vasari mines I think might be absolutely fine the way they are lain etc and likely might be the weakest of all the mines with a longer recycle on the ability. 

Thoughts and discussion on this balancing technique? I would really like to see this kind of differentiation as well as model improvement on mines.

Currently mines are rarely used other then by the AI. Are they going to be modified to the point no human player uses them?

As I stated from my original responds. Make the mines deployment and AOE wider. Cost is fine. A tec upgrade to the mines being invisible and allow constructors deploy an area vs 1 at a time.   Would even go as far as suggesting allowing tec starbase deploy mine via upgrade, granted final protocol does a nice job of killing fleets as is.

As for flak shooting mines behind them, as I stated if you deploy behind and out of range of flak and other ships, they can activate before a ship can turn to kill the mines. 

Would making the mines invisible so that nothing is drawn by the opposing enemies screen help with memory or will it use up the same due to the game engine having requiring to keep track of those mines?

Desconneor Naval mines yes, Ground mines no.  There even nastier antipersonal mines that kill entire platoons when triggered

"Would making the mines invisible so that nothing is drawn by the opposing enemies screen help with memory or will it use up the same due to the game engine having requiring to keep track of those mines?"

Yes, somewhat. Not to sure on the games engine but a few posts back made a point of each mine constantly having to calculate if an object comes close. Thats the biggest issue I would think but reducing the poly count of the model helps and if the model is not shown would help more. Again I would have to see how the game engine uses the mines.

I like boshimi's points  , TEC is a little lacking and Vasari are already good.

Is the issue with the mines once revealed, or with the mines acting as mini-ships in tems of AI?  If its AI making mines invisible won't make any difference?  I just wonder whther the close-up poly model matters much unless someone happens to examine it dduring a game?

JJ, an anti-personnel mine isn't the same as an anti-vehicle mine, and starships are armoured vehicles.  It is difficult to damage a vehicle with blast because the blast wave tends to move around a vehicle, and of course the vehicle is armoured against shrapnel.  Blast damage from an explosion would not be possible in space because there is no medium to propagate a concussive wave.  Whatever splash damage is supposed to represent, it has to be something peculiar.  Are strikecraft affected by splash?

I'm not sure that unscoutable mines is the way to go in terms of gameplay.  As long as the more difficult to deploy mines are made destructive enough, that would be sufficient.  I don't believe that splash damage is that useful anyway, what usually happens is that as soon as the lead ships hit mines the fleet stops.  It is not normally possible to 'catch' a fleet in a minefield as they are, more damage to ships that are struck by mines, with a far wider spread, would be more effective.

Rather than making mines unscoutable, I would introduce a simple rule that whoever has most scouts in a gravwell reveals mines.  Otherwise you risk making mines too effective, if they explode for enough damage.

Maybe I'm getting confused here but weren't mines invisible in the Entrenchment beta? I remember mines causing quite some problems then.

they were never invisible.  They were free to deploy in beta.

DesConnor. Its a game. Mines can be whatever devs decide.  Final Protocol doesnt kill SC either nor are they targeted by a starbase.  Mines in space could packed with little phase missile that are violently ejected everywhere when an enemy ship gets near by.  Whatever the mechanics its how it is in the game.

@DesConnor: Once a model is spawned in-game it uses full resources weather it is zoomed in on or not. Thats why it hurts the 2 gig limit so much, all assets are loaded. Strike craft are also bad due to each poly on the model having to be recalculated for movement and the speed of the movement also comes into play. Stagnant models are not as bad like mines but like I said I think the mines are constantly calculating if an object is close enough so its acting like a memory leak which can be worse then a model thats constantly moving and every poly is being recalculated in space.

OMG!  JJ is still around!  I thought he had forgotten all about Sins and moved on to Starcraft II.  I guess this means that we'll all have to be on the look out for JJ smurfs now.

To reiterate, I do not believe invisible mines would be good for the game.  This represents a gambit, not a strategy, in that you're hoping the enemy doesn't reveal in the right place at the right time.  This would punish carelessness rather than poor strategy or tactics.  I quite like that Sins has a relatively low propensity for "blindsides", and feel this is the wrong direction to go.