T2 arty drops are the only thing that can even contest with tml, but I’d still say a dude intended on cancering with tml will do a lot more pain. TML acu does make it worse, but you tend to see it on water maps where building a tml is unfeasible I’d say.
It isn’t really about forward, exposed mexes. On a 10x10 you can build a tml well in your map control next to a t2 mex of your own and still basically hit anything that isn’t in the core base. It’s totally unrealistic to say just don’t upgrade half your mexes in a teamgame and you know it.