I spent quite a long time yesterday... well, an hour at least, on the Dev App testing the capabilities of the Phobos Light Mine Launcher. And what I found was very quite somewhat interesting.
General facts
As anyone can safely assume the Mine launcher launches mines.
These mines fly through the air with a very large arc and activate three seconds after shooting, where they deploy a balloon and float in the air until detonated.
Each Mine launcher can shoot a maximum of five mines at a time. If a sixth one is fired, the first one originally fired detonates.
Mines will detonate when a ship gets close to it and will cause friendly fire.
Mines have a very large radius and therefore can actually set off other mines in the vicinity.
Mines can in fact be either made to explode by shooting the body of it or made to drop by shooting the balloon.
Has a single shot per clip but has a fairly quick reload time of only a few seconds.
Damage
Note: For the duration of the test I was using the new Mobula ship (aka. Manta Ray), which has only a teeny bit more health and armour than the Spire, which it's closest to in those respects.
I decided to test the damaging capabilities of the mines by flying into them at full speed. When testing the effect of multiple mines, I grouped the mines close together. While no one in an actual game scenario would act quite as stupid as to fly directly into them at full speed, the facts of the test still stand.
One mine:
Minimal damage across all systems plus a few fires.
Two mines:
Armour is destroyed but no damage to permahull.
Everything damaged plus fires.
A few things destroyed.
Three mines:
Extremely heavy damage to all systems.
Permahull down to roughly two thirds.
Four mines:
Holy crap! Everything is gone!
Permahull down to a quarter.
Five mines:
Instant death.
Ammo effect on Mine Launcher
I only tested ammos that I thought would actually have a noticeable effect on the gun. Things that increase clip capacity don't work on it.
Lesmok:
As expected, Flight arc is reduced, speed increased. But no difference to arming time so when shot at same angle, it will go further but still activate at same level.
Charged:
Increased damage. Takes four shots for instant death.
Lochnager:
Arming time drastically reduced so it activates almost immediately after being fired, so do not shoot this thing in front of your ship. Damage super duper increased so it takes three to kill.
Maybe other ammos have very special effects on the gun but I only tested these ones.
Disabling the Mines
While it is technically possible to shoot the balloon to make the mines drop, I've found that the hit-box is either glitched or just so small it's impossible to hit. So I only tested how much it takes to destroy the mines. For the purpose of the test I shot the mines at close range just to make life easier.
Mercury:
Two regular shots. One charged.
Gatling:
Takes a few seconds of fire but with the update you have to be a fucking sniper to hit the small target consistently even with heavy clip.
Flak:
Two shots.
Carronade:
Like fifteen regular due to wide spread. But with heavy clip it takes two.
Flamethrower:
For some reason it just would not work. I was hitting it occasionally but it was just glitched out or something. Even then I imagine it would take a while.
Harpoon:
two shots.
Artemis:
Two shots.
Banshee:
Five regular. Four charged.
Scylla:
Two shots.
My Opinion (for what it matters, which is probably not much)
The Phobos Mine Launcher is an extremely powerful weapon damage wise, being able to instakill a Mobula with enough mines. However it is also very situational and would be difficult to find consistent use for. It would be best used as the rear slot on a squid on galleon as an excellent pursuer deterrent and I can only imagine the joy from a squid pilot as he uses tar and shoots a Loch mine right behind him, imagining the cries of "Fucking shit there's a mine in the w-*dead*".
Overall, very good, if a bit situational.
But what does my opinion matter, for I can only imagine the glorious possibilities of what a pro pilot could put it to use for.
