[jimbob]

yes, essentially you are suggesting that mines should have a half life... just like radioactive decay. If the half life is 10 years, then it will take 100 turns for half the mines to go "non-operational". But becuase it is a log function, at the 20 year mark you would have 25% of the mines still present, then at 30 years you'd still have 12.5%.

So your larger minefields won't go away for a very long time, just become weaker and weaker over time.

I end with another plug for satelites! Please, can we have formations for them? You could put them in high orbit, medium, or low orbit; one bunch, several bunches; location of the satelite packs (ie 2 bunches, one on North side, one on south side) etc.