Radio towers and underwater telegraph lines

[Desertfox]

Should we have some sort of rule to deal with both? I was thinking:

Radio towers - The first (or second?) IC built in a province with a port symbol includes a radio station.

Underwater lines - Players must build line laying ships (under mercantile rules) ships can lay X amount of lines per half based on misc weight dedicated to laying lines.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cable_layer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable

[Kaiser Kirk]

We had rules for such things in the past.
Part of the "Snip-o-vision"(tm) was to simplify things.
Keep the rules to those which mattered more.

So in that spirit, going with the idea of linking presumed presence to IC
makes more sense than requiring budgeting and then mapping, and having record keeping.

Since we're doing IC regionally..kinda... It's probably better to pick a level where the colony is important enough they would bother to build communications for it.
A) Really Big radios  first, we can pick a range limit. I kinda like 2100nm as I think I read that in the entire Wiki thing.  Could have been longer. How far is Newfoundland to the UK?
B) then slower but more secure underwater cables.

I'd be inclined to set it at 3 IC / Colonial Region = Radio Towers, 5 IC = Underwater cables.
Since a province holds 2 IC, that means you've built up at least 1 and started another.

But it's certainly worth chatting about.
Opinions all?

[maddox]

KISS.

Hardened  military communicatie setup cost resources, and thats reflected in the  research and military spending.
Diplomatic, trade and  news communications are  story generators.

[Desertfox]

Since we are primarily about building ships and underwater lines do require specialized ships, I do think it would be nice to require said ships to be built before gaining that ability. Maybe something simple as for every cable laying ship you have you can connect the homeland to one colony (with at least 5 IC?) per half.

[snip]

I do not feel there is a need to track this, beyond binding it to levels of IC.

[maddox]

Since we are primarily about building ships and underwater lines do require specialized ships.
Specialised ships, like dredgers? Crane ships, special cargo vessels, large -non auxilary cruiser-liners ?
That's all part of the IC of a country. Do you wish to keep track of every small ship/repairyard? I don't even want to keep track of the bookkeeping that floats the Nverse.

I do think it would be nice to require said ships to be built before gaining that ability. Maybe something simple as for every cable laying ship you have you can connect the homeland to one colony (with at least 5 IC?) per half.

I would say, if your cablelayers and such are also auxilary cruisers, or in other ways combat capable, please write about them, and that's it. You now have spend a bit of your resources to, maybe, give you a leg up in war.

But I'm just a storyteller. Nothing more, nothing less.

[The Rock Doctor]

I do not feel there is a need to track this, beyond binding it to levels of IC.

Agreed.

[Jefgte]

I don't think it is necessary to assign ICs or develop special technos.
In a few years, radio waves will cover the earth.
Eventualy, simply complete the rules

"
Signals/Intelligence:
Baseline: Wax seals, primitive codes.
1895:  Ability to create simple codes.
1900:  Ability to use and break simple codes, bored crews at wireless stations listening to radio traffic
1905:  Basic encoding protocols, dedicated radio and telegraph line listening stations
1912:  Centralized cryptographic institutions, enforced radio discipline, Room 40
1920:  Primitive mechanical encoding/decoding machines etc.
"

[Desertfox]

Eh, I just thought ya'll might be interested in trying out new interesting ships. I'm good with a straight up tying to IC approach. But I'll still be building dedicated ships, they can be quite handy at not just laying down, but also cutting lines...

Do want to propose one small addition to the ship guidelines:

Miscellaneous Weights:

Wireless:  10 t for a short-range (100 mile) set, 25 t for a long range (250+ miles) set, 150 t for very long range (land based equivalent, 2,100+ miles) set.  Redundant installations are allowed.  New construction laid down 1/1/10 or later does not require weight to be set aside for one (1) short-ranged set.

[maddox]

Cutting undersea telegraph lines don't take a lot.  Position and a well dragged anchor will do the trick.   
And jamming spark gap radio's is even more simple. Just use more powerfull spark gap transmitters.

As I wrote, building dedicated ships is perfectly possible under the auxilary rules. No need for more complications.

I just see it as opportunities to write more stories.  And it's up to the moderator that such interactions yield any results, positive or negative.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Long Range Radio
I think this is an aspect where the desire to create a long range radio would come naturally once the region became of economic value.
Tying it to the region's development makes sense.
3 IC means at the port and then some of the hinterlands are developed.
So that's where I'm inclined to put it.

Shipborne Radio
The little piece on Wiki indicated these transoceanic radios were VLF with very very large antennae arrays. The modern Harold E. Holt station in Wiki has multiple towers up to 378m high.
The Jim Creek, est 1953, has 12x 200ft (66m) towers, with cables 1.7km-2.6km in length strung between. Presumably older ones were smaller, but still very large.

I don't see how anything remotely like that would fit on ships.
Further, I'm not aware of navies producing such communications auxiliaries- up until WW2, when the pacific forces started fielding some dedicated command ships with lots of extra radios. However that was for commanding an amphibious force and that's 30 years off.

Communications is valuable, but in the WWI period, I'm not aware of such auxiliaries.  So I'm guessing there is a functional reason, such as the giant antennas or something else that we're not aware of, why they were not constructed.


Range
There's only a little on Wiki, I don't want to spend time researching turn of the century radio technology.
So. Transoceanic.. presume 200nm per year after 1900.  1910=2500nm.


Auxiliaries
Part of the concept we were using during pregame set up is to reduce and simplify.
The fact is different players have different desires for specifying details.   There are many that don't want to track the number of harbor nettenders they have.
I wanted to detail army unit using KWold's system.... but we're not doing that.
KISS is the mantra for N7.

So, outside "Fleet supply" and the amorphous "Deployment points", you do not have to worry about having the "right" auxiliaries. It's a little like Wesworld- they are assumed to exist in sufficient number.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Reading the Embarassing Embassies thread I realized that under this interpretation, Hawaii could never have a continental Radio, as it's capped at 2 IC.
Places like the Azores, the Canaries, and other provinces which are logically 1 province colonial regions...all are unable to have 3 IC.

So...transcontinental radio..2 IC in 1 colonial region.

[Desertfox]

Shipborne Radio
The little piece on Wiki indicated these transoceanic radios were VLF with very very large antennae arrays. The modern Harold E. Holt station in Wiki has multiple towers up to 378m high.
The Jim Creek, est 1953, has 12x 200ft (66m) towers, with cables 1.7km-2.6km in length strung between. Presumably older ones were smaller, but still very large.

I don't see how anything remotely like that would fit on ships.
Further, I'm not aware of navies producing such communications auxiliaries- up until WW2, when the pacific forces started fielding some dedicated command ships with lots of extra radios. However that was for commanding an amphibious force and that's 30 years off.

Communications is valuable, but in the WWI period, I'm not aware of such auxiliaries.  So I'm guessing there is a functional reason, such as the giant antennas or something else that we're not aware of, why they were not constructed.

I think it had more to do with most combat was in the North Sea and Mediterranean, well in range of land-based radio stations and the British Empire (and everyone for that matter) had an extensive network of well established colonies by that time with radio stations. We are in a much different world where those things don't exist as such and especially in the Pacific, distances can put you far away from land stations. Maybe no one else has a need for such a ship, but I can certainly use one.

[Kaiser Kirk]

The preliminary research on the VLF facilities shows antennae that don't appear to fit ships.

Unless you find a VLF, period -appropriate, example of a naval communications vessel.... 
then I'm inclined to stay with no.

[maddox]

Some historical references.

Battleships had masts and intricate cabling in between them.
Even the smaller ones, like the España class mini dreadnought reached 40m masthight.

There isn't kilometers of cabling in between them.

Further reading gave me the impression that protected cruisers , especialy the German ones, had a fairly long radio range, surpassing 1000nm in good circumstances.

Ballons as a means to erect radio antenna. I have found references to experiments as early as 1897 by Marconi. In WWI it was even common by the German army to use balloons as antenna carriers at the local HQ's. This had several reasons, but the limited supplies of copper was one of them.



But in short. This whole thing was started by the idea that if the inca wanted communications with the world in a fast way, a spark gap radio station in Manaus would connect to the already existing  telegraph network. To get such an installation to Manaus, a barge would be handy. Building an antenna large enough would take time, so a balloon antenna is the start of the larger setup.
Nothing that ws outside the reach of 1912 technology. But wasn't done that way because the world worked in a different way.

Nothing more than a story, and to explain how the Inca from recluse, can go to internationaly connected in a year time.