How to get long distance HPG Pule like signals without help of Comstar.

[hive_angel]

Do IS states have some owned HPG stations or the equivalent? Especially periphery nations? I am trying to find ways to get long distance signals without Comstar interviening or knowing about what is going on in my ATOW campaign.

Also are HPG stations on every planet for general usage?

Or does Comstar simply not give a darn about the periphery outside the Is borders and only send messages.

[worktroll]

What period are you talking about?

In most cases, periphery states won't have HPGs - maybe one at the capital or other significant industrialised world. The rest have to cope with pony express - messages carried by JumpShip.

The ComStar handbook goes into more detail, IIRC - Inner Sphere worlds have class A, B and C facilities. Class C bundles messages together and sends once a week, B class more frequently, A more frequently again.

And, for most of the time from 3rd SW to Clan Invasion, that's how it was. At the time of the 4th War, the FedSuns & Lyrans had their "black boxes" (see also the Warrior Trilogy novels) in limited use. They had low bandwidth, slow speed, but - as you're looking for - evaded ComStar scrutiny. By the time of the Clan Invasion the DCMS had their own, but these remained very black, top secret things.

The secularisation of ComStar led to easier access to HPG technology, and - albeit not necessarily satisfying to most of us - the use of Black Boxes faded into the background. By the time of the Dark Age and Black Tuesday (correct day?), they seem to have been forgotten.

So periphery worlds - pony express is your best bet.

My two M-bills,

W.

[hive_angel]

Yes this would be about 302-3030 timeframe.  communication from slightly beyond FWL periphery border to inside the FWL just near the periphery border. Coded military communications of course.

[worktroll]

Piggybacking on a commercial tramp JumpShip - or what appears to be a commercial tramp jumpship ;) - is probably your only realistic option.

You can cut down on transmission time - start within 2 jumps where you want the message going, JumpShip A starts at the Periphery world, B halfway to the destination. A gets the intel, jumps to B, and transmits the data - no need to rendevous. B then jumps to target, and beams the data down. Safely anonymous - C*, or other intel agencies may figure something interesting is going on, but not have direct access to the message.

[CrazyGrasshopper]

How about using coded messages masked to look like benign communications, different spam mail, for example. Wouldn't this be more effective?

[ANS Kamas P81]

How about using coded messages masked to look like benign communications, different spam mail, for example. Wouldn't this be more effective?

23 Secrets to a Bigger BattleMech in 7 days!  Ask me how!

[monbvol]

Entirely possible to hide coded messages in otherwise innocent looking traffic.  There are many historical examples, even where the people who the message was supposed to be hidden from didn't catch on until it was too late.

Difficult to say how likely Comstar would be to catch on since ROM is supposed to be one of the best intelligence units of any political entity.

[snewsom2997]

Entirely possible to hide coded messages in otherwise innocent looking traffic.  There are many historical examples, even where the people who the message was supposed to be hidden from didn't catch on until it was too late.

Difficult to say how likely Comstar would be to catch on since ROM is supposed to be one of the best intelligence units of any political entity.

Since we have similar software in the 21st century to detect hidden code within a messages and application, I'd assume that would be old hat sort of stuff. There would be a bit stream at some point, and messages could be found in that bit stream, if you looked. However someone if they were looking would notice a lot more data moving through the pipe, if it had a hidden payload. For instance burying a hidden message or application in a video video, would show up as more bits than it ought to be for the resolution.

[monbvol]

That depends on the encryption method.

As stated I would expect actually trying to hide extra data would be pretty old hat and easily detectable.

So something more mundane like pulling every fifth word out, I imagine a more realistic execution of this method would be a bit more complicated, of a by all available evidence completely mundane travel writer's HPG message to his editor could actually be the report of the 1st Sword of Light's current movement orders.

Data is hidden in plain sight and without the cypher to know which words to pick up on it'd be difficult even for a computer to actually figure out.

[CrazyGrasshopper]

23 Secrets to a Bigger BattleMech in 7 days!  Ask me how!

23rd Division redeploys in 7 days, their next destination unknown?  ;)

This can be a bit too straightforward way of reading. Numbers could be converted to different numbers or even words.

[Archangel]

Yes this would be about 302-3030 timeframe.  communication from slightly beyond FWL periphery border to inside the FWL just near the periphery border. Coded military communications of course.

Given the time period the only powers other than ComStar that had the technology required were the Lyran (via Black Box technology recovered by Katrina), the FedSuns (via their alliance with the Lyrans) and the Hidden Worlds.

As a result the only real options available to your unit would be to send a message either via JumpShip courier or secretly via ComStar.  Perhaps in addition to encrypting the message splitting it up and sending in separate packets to relay stations that forward it on to other relay stations before they eventually forward it to the end destination.  Even if ROM identifies one packet, they would need all the packets to successfully make any sense of the message.

[Arkansas Warrior]

What period are you talking about?

In most cases, periphery states won't have HPGs - maybe one at the capital or other significant industrialised world. The rest have to cope with pony express - messages carried by JumpShip.

The ComStar handbook goes into more detail, IIRC - Inner Sphere worlds have class A, B and C facilities. Class C bundles messages together and sends once a week, B class more frequently, A more frequently again.

And, for most of the time from 3rd SW to Clan Invasion, that's how it was. At the time of the 4th War, the FedSuns & Lyrans had their "black boxes" (see also the Warrior Trilogy novels) in limited use. They had low bandwidth, slow speed, but - as you're looking for - evaded ComStar scrutiny. By the time of the Clan Invasion the DCMS had their own, but these remained very black, top secret things.

The secularisation of ComStar led to easier access to HPG technology, and - albeit not necessarily satisfying to most of us - the use of Black Boxes faded into the background. By the time of the Dark Age and Black Tuesday (correct day?), they seem to have been forgotten.

So periphery worlds - pony express is your best bet.

My two M-bills,

W.

Gray Monday.  Black Tuesday was when the stockmarket crashed in '29.  You're probably remembering it from reading it in the papers at the time. ;) At any rate, Black Boxes are still around and in use, it's just that you can only send so much so fast, and it has to be encrypted because anyone else with a black box (most everyone nowadays) can pick up your transmission.