What do you use Squash Mines for?

[Danya Turrel]

In another thread they are being used to get rid of troublesome (supposed to be) friendly lasertowers.

I thought maybe you could mine gates, but that would hit a lot of friendly traffic.

What can they be used for?

[Gazz]

Regular SQUASH mines?
They are good for... turning random races hostile one by one.

If that is fine with you they can serve as an extremely cost and maintainance intensive way of blocking traffic.
This is because of their 1.5 km blast radius. That always blows up the whole minefield at once so you will be replacing it nonstop.

Actually, there is a combat use.

Fly into a Khaak cluster and drop 1 mine.
Say good bye to cluster.
Detonate.

It would be wise to have 3+ full 25 MJ shields for that. Accidents happen yaknow?

[Asmayus]

Pirates sometimes carry and drop them while your on their tail. Or so I've heard.

You could do the same in say, a xenon sector. Don't know how efficient it'd be though.
Squash mines as offensive weaponry.

Only marginally less effictive than
Lasertowers as offensive Weaponry*

You know that dolphin SF you have? "har har me hearties, come and get some!"

*Ah, not tested

[karl_1_marx]

Only use I'd be able to think of, where they actually do something good for you is to place them around your satellites. This way BOTH attacking fighter, the satellite and as a free add-on all the mines around that sat will die....

Otherwise, Mine factories are heard to be as profitable as the Booze/Weed ones.


And to Asymayus: Have you ever even TRIED lasertowers?



Cheers

KarMa

[Kor'ah]

A single SQUASH mine will instantly kill nearly all scouts in a split Kha'ak cluster.

[Gazz]

And to Asymayus: Have you ever even TRIED lasertowers?

Have you? =P

Cost of 1 TS + 80 LT: maybe 13 MCr.

Cost of fully decked out Teladi M2: well over 100 MCr.
(chose that one because it's the heaviest shielded M2 - others die faster)

In 160 seconds 80 LT annihilate the M2, losing 6 or 7 LT.

And if you argue that it was an easy and slow moving target... against small ships a decent number of LT works much like a gimongous industrial strength bug zapper.

Qualifies for offensive weapon in my book. =)

[BrigandPhantos]

Just a thought, but you could probably line squash mines around pirate bases and their Lasertowers as a means to blow it up, along with the Lasertowers in the process. The blast damage is cumulative right?

[Alec_trev]

can you use like the explorer software from bonus pack, to lay a minefield or LT screen instead or is it just nav sats?

[karl_1_marx]

can you use like the explorer software from bonus pack, to lay a minefield or LT screen instead or is it just nav sats?

Either this or - as I seem to remember - Fleet Support Soft. Always have both on my ships, so I'm not absolutely certain which. But what I do remember with certainty is that that soft automatically drops a 2km cube if enough mines are on board.


Cheers

KarMa

[Carlo the Curious]

Dropping Squash Mines
If you select a Squash Mine to be dropped, the commands will enter Create Minefield mode. In this mode the ship will place 8 Squash mines within 2km² of the target position. If the ship doesn't have enough Squash Mines it will attempt to purchase them first.

Once the Squash Mines have been placed the ship will contact you and ask you to activate the mine field. At this point you can run the command again until you have mined the desired area, or you can activate the mine field by comm'ing one of the mines and selecting "activate all mines".

EDIT: The chances of anything actually getting in range unless you lay them across a gate is pretty minimal though, in my experience. I was going to write a mine-laying script at one point to make bigger minefields, but I decided using trcker mines was easier .

[Danya Turrel]

Pirates sometimes carry and drop them while your on their tail. Or so I've heard.

You know, I hadn't tought of that. But that would explain a couple of completely unexpected dog-fight deaths I've experienced in this game. I had always thought it was a rear turret, another pirate I hadn't seen, or a rock or something. But if they can drop mines, THAT IS SO COOL! Pirates aren't as dumb as I thought.

[Carlo the Curious]

That might have been just a loose Hammerhead being shot down.

I've not seen a pirate patrol drop (or even carry) mines, although that's not to say they don't .

[karl_1_marx]

Pirates sometimes carry and drop them while your on their tail. Or so I've heard.

You know, I hadn't tought of that. But that would explain a couple of completely unexpected dog-fight deaths I've experienced in this game. I had always thought it was a rear turret, another pirate I hadn't seen, or a rock or something. But if they can drop mines, THAT IS SO COOL! Pirates aren't as dumb as I thought.

Unlikey. With an M3 you should normally survive the blast. Hammerhead's the more likely culprit there....


Edit: (Grghng, too slow.)

Cheers

KarMa

[Nanook]

That might have been just a loose Hammerhead being shot down.

I've not seen a pirate patrol drop (or even carry) mines, although that's not to say they don't .

Me neither. I've killed and/or captured literally tens of thousands of pirate ships, and have never seen one carrying a SQUASH mine in its hold, let alone drop one. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen a normal pirate carrying any kind of deployable wares (mines, drones, satellites, LT's). I've only seen these things in smuggler ships, normally TS's. So SQUASH mine dropping sounds like one of those X3 myths.

[BrigandPhantos]

That might have been just a loose Hammerhead being shot down.

I've not seen a pirate patrol drop (or even carry) mines, although that's not to say they don't .

Me neither. I've killed and/or captured literally tens of thousands of pirate ships, and have never seen one carrying a SQUASH mine in its hold, let alone drop one. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen a normal pirate carrying any kind of deployable wares (mines, drones, satellites, LT's). I've only seen these things in smuggler ships, normally TS's. So SQUASH mine dropping sounds like one of those X3 myths.

Just a thought, but a Hurricane Missile does similar to a squash mine with it's blast radius. Useful for taking on multiple targets with a single missile. If one hit something near the player, it does similar damage to a squash mine.

[em3e3]

Since no one else has suggested this: How about making a profit? Producing them and selling them to the NPC traders? Just a thought, you know, may not work. Other than that, I've never used one for anything else!

[Gazz]

Just a thought, but a Hurricane Missile does similar to a squash mine with it's blast radius. Useful for taking on multiple targets with a single missile. If one hit something near the player, it does similar damage to a squash mine.

Aye but in this case similiar means 1/5 the damage and 1/8 the blast radius.

[Nanook]

Since no one else has suggested this: How about making a profit? Producing them and selling them to the NPC traders? Just a thought, you know, may not work. Other than that, I've never used one for anything else!

This is exactly what I did with that 'free' ore mine from the plot. I added two SQUASH mine factories and a Soyery L for a mini complex. Bought the soja beans and energy locally. Made a nice profit once it got going. Could never keep more than a few in stock.

[XanII]

For some strange reason i still have 0 squash mine factories, though they should sell just as good as space weed or booze. Dont know why, theese littel buggers are always overlooked.

[Auseryan]

Once i was killing a load of xenon, i think in The Wall or something. Then 2 M3 class ships came at me and i thought "right, I'm out of here!" but they were about to catch me so i droped 3 clusters of SQUASH mines, killed te smaller ones and damged the bigger ones and then i went through a jumpgate to Argon Prime