Does remove fuse suck hard? Or the hulls pwn mines better?

[IlPalazzo]

I think the issue is not whether or not remove fuse is worth it against a miner, it is, but whether or not it's better than a hull. Frankly mines only work when you opponent has no idea what's going on and thinks he is blowing up randomly. Otherwise mines are easy to overcome even with no more hull than I'd buy normally, then intentionally hitting mines before there's too many. Vs. an enemy that only buys a mine pack or two, this is plenty and remove fuse won't do much for you against so few mines. If someone lays a billion mines then, yes, remote fuse is much better than hull, but by then the enemy has double or triple the cost of a defuse pack dedicated to mines... probably all he has. Then you buy a cheaper item that forces him to sell everything he has or just leave the game. Then you can sell the defuse pack (or w/e) for half and you don't lose much. Even if the miner did nothing for a while (which hurts their team) and aha went back to mining, you just buy the defuse pack back for half.

So the real issue is that mines suck hard... except when pwning people who don't know about them. There needs to be some kind of middle ground, like a distinct animation or message letting the new player know that it was a mine that hit him and not some random explosion. Then mines need to be made better, and defusable but somewhat harder to defuse. I mean you can't easily negate an exploder with hull, why can you easily negate a dedicated mine layer with hull? But then again exploder also needs to be made weaker, b/c any idiot can camp factories and other major points and tele w/e tank he sees on the enemy team regardless of its health. Meanwhile dropping tele wards is effective but only barely so and it's a major PITA that no one wants to do... and then you don't even get the kill gold for it. Fighting a miner isn't so much of a struggle.

The thing I don't like about buying a hull to defuse mines is that your allies who don't have a hull run the chance of hitting the mines themselves, giving the miner profit. It also forces you to run back and forth, forcing you to give up valuable time spent on creep time, which becomes an increasing problem as they place them closer and closer to their base.

The thing that makes the Remote Fuse better is that it's unexpected. Once you learn to track the miners movements, you can scan the area (the Fuse pings mines in a 700 radius) to tell where he's placing them. If he places them on a healer, you can blow up tanks that are trying to heal. If he places them by his base, you can hit them as they come out of it. If he places it close to your side of the creeps, you can use it as a way to defend your area or a way to kill your own creeps (denying the other team bounty for killing creeps). Enemy miners don't expect to be killed by their own mines, and their teammates don't expect to be killed by their allied mines. Even if he only lays one or two mines, by the time him and his teammates start dying he'll be pressured into selling them, because at that point there's no question about it - the mines are a disadvantage to their team.

Nonetheless I have to agree, if your team is somewhat decent at Btanks mines are a crappy item to get all around.