Simple enough: vehicles running through a minefield with a Defuse skill take reduced damage from mines instead of none at all. I'm thinking that the reduction should be around 50% or higher. In addition, the defuse skill should also significantly reduce the explosive force (for those who have ever hit up to 8 mines in a row, you know what I am talking about). My reasoning is thus: Mines should be an obstacle, and to have vehicles able to render them utterly useless by the acquisition of one skill is just lame. As I have presented my idea, while it would allow a vehicle to set off and remove a number of mines, it would still make them a hazard and a potential threat.
My numbers aren't 100%, but it's better than the current system of "roll over no damage yay". Also, if you do not implement my suggestion of "reduce explosive force", there's still the risk of flipping onto something inconvenient.
I've already said it everywhere, but I think that defusal should provide no protection at all from mines while you're in a tank. A "protect me from one specific type of weapon" skill was a bad idea in the first place, and unnecessarily complicates the balance of mines. It also discourages teamwork -- players should be working together to overcome enemy defenses completely, not taking one skill that lets them rush through them.
I believe it should be limited protection: In a lot of cases, it is impossible for Grenadiers to defuse mines directly because the area is too heavily defended. Even if they manage to defuse one, another enemy Grenadier pops up and lays two more. This is especially a problem on Escort.
I would just rather see more powerful mines but less of them(same amount as sticky nades 4 with ammo up) and have them not be able to be driven over, only diffused. This would clear up mine spam on infantry maps but also make each mine need to have thought behind its placement. People would use team work to wall off certain paths and place mines at the only entrances. And be forced to cover people diffusing mines.
It won't resolve mine spam, I'll tell you that much. If you make it so that only Grenadiers can defuse them manually, then you will be going nowhere. In escort, mines are usually placed at strategic chokepoints that are very open to fire. Any Grenadier attempting to defuse will get his ass shot at. Then the only decent option is to send people in to trigger them off, which I personally think is a very stupid option.
this only requires one engineer with revive this is the best solution to deal with minefields at this time
I know, but it is stupid. You intentionally feed the enemy points this way. What is needed is a reasonably safe means to clear a large field of them while still making them a hazard.