How minesweeper work

[Baron Munchausen]

Ah...

I see what it's supposed to be now. I've never bothered to use it before. We have misunderstood how the game is designed. That button is for issuing the AI 'move to' order just like the 'remote units deploy' or 'remote unit recover' buttons are for issuing the order that the AI would issue to send a ship to a specific location. So it seems you cannot sweep mines without moving! It sure would be nice to be able to sweep the location where you are currently located without leaving it. I wonder if we could get MM to change that at this late date???

[Cipher7071]

Baron, do you mean it's a button to order a ship to sweep mines at a certain location? Similar to ordering one to lay satellites at a certain location?

[geoschmo]

I thought the reason for the sweep button was basically a manual override for the "Ships should not move into known mine fields" empire option. Normally when you have that checked your ships won't move into a minefield, even if given the "move to order", right? I may have that wrong, that's just alsways been my assumption.

[Cipher7071]

That would make sense, Geo.

[Parasite]

I have had a minesweeper in a hex mined by an ally. When we went to war, I could not sweep the mines in that hex. I believe I didn't even get the button because the ships were fleeted. After removing them from the fleet, I swept mines in the hex to no effect.

The mines did not get removed while I stayed in that hex.

I was unsure of what happened at the time, but it looks like the discussion here explains it.

[Fyron]

That is not a very useful feature then.

[Grandpa Kim]

Geo, you can order ships to move to a known minefield and they will move to it. Trusting little buggers aren't they?

But I agree with Fyron. It looks like the sweep mines button serves no useful purpose. The one thing it can do can also be done with a simple move to order.