[x] Chirp spread spectrum. A technique lifted directly from a wikipedia article that permits to send very short but powerful radio Pulses over the entirety of the spectrum the transmitter as access to. Chirp spread spectrum - Wikipedia
I may have overestimating the mass of the wire, because this copper wire for ancient field phones? 13 kg/km.
That thing is extremely troop-portable, and field phone wire spool dinergate won't even need upsizing to follow platoon and spool off wire as it goes. With range for secure communications of 2-4 kilometers.
Quick search tells me that fiber optic cable weights about 15-25 kg per kilometer.
Mission description tells us that Intruder was about two kilometers from frontline.
If platoon can't pull 30 kg transmitter and remaining cable and drag it behind them, letting the cable unspool from the spool automatically, because they lack power? Those are kinda shitty murder robots.
Again, spool and all the wire is in missile, there's nothing to drag behind the platoon. Wire stays in place, new wire expands from the bit platoon drags with them.
It's not just the weight that's the issue. Even on open-ish ground, it's gonna get tangled in grass, caught on rocks, caught on roots, etc. This becomes exacerbated if the squads and platoon needs to move in anything other than a straight line. The friction will drag. The wire might get damaged. Just try to imagine dragging hundreds of metres of cable laterally through grass.
Try to pull the same trick in thick forest, hilly terrain, etc? Even more of a problem. We need to account for terrain that is not a frictionless plain.
I may have overestimating the mass of the wire, because this copper wire for ancient field phones? 13 kg/km.
That thing is extremely troop-portable, and field phone wire spool dinergate won't even need upsizing to follow platoon and spool off wire as it goes. With range for secure communications of 2-4 kilometers.
Do we have examples of those being used on the offensive, instead of for static defenses in trenches and such?
EDIT: Okay, apologies, I actually read your post more thoroughly. You're thinking of actually taking the spool and trailing it behind instead of dragging the whole cable. That...might be workable. I've never heard of it done, though. AFAIK the gear you're talking about is for establishing lines of communication in established defenses.
[X] Simplified command set - A simpler signal is easier to discern than a complex one. Sacrifice bandwidth for connectivity. Set up a Brevity Code system so that, when jammed, Intruder can "shout" commands like '2-2-1, 5-3-14, 1-1-7-1-16-5-17-16' (Squad 2, provide covering fire for squad 1. Squad 3(heavies), destroy the enemy's cover. Squad 1, enter the building to the north and destroy the jammer in that building). Maybe even provide a more simple/rugged transmitter (band-gap radio?) optimized specifically for these transmissions. (maybe even just transmit basic text - Agent mentioned receiving "targeting data over the network", so regular comms sound like they include a lot of bonus data)
simple example code setup
1. (squad ___) advance to ___ and ___
2. (squad ___) provide covering/suppressing fire for squad ___
3. (squad ___) take immediate cover
4. (squad ___) expect hostiles from ___
5. (squad ___) destroy ___ in direction ___
6. code believed broken, switch to cipher-set ___
7. north
8. south
9. east
10. west
11. nearest cover
12. squad ___
13. vehicle
14. hostiles
15. cover
16. building
17. device
18. suppressing fire
A small modification to existing antenna-based designs is using directional antennas and beamforming, with units on front line and back line facing each other, using each other's last known location and configuration to focus their signalling.
It would increase the efficiency of our communications, requiring less energy for counter-jamming and be relatively simple to implement.
[] Clearly we should use the Millenium Challenge 2002 solution here and just have motorcycle couriers who can magically travel at lightspeed!
Being more serious for a moment, the low-tech solutions here like the telephone cable do sound like a good idea if things go to shit, tbh the fact that SF hasn't seemed to anticipate jamming until this point is kinda concerning for their overall capabilities and as others in the thread have said, getting some added redundancy is a plus!
[EDIT: Thinking on it, couriers might not be the worst idea here actually, we likely already have ground troops in the area if we need comms to begin with.]
Also also, I love the idea of mortar launched HARMs, we should do that anyway if we can
Ok, what if we pulled a Megazord and combined my Signal booster, @Mechasaurian Polarised communications equipment and @Starlit Horizon Frequency-hopping spread spectrum into one ''fun-sized'' package ? Like some backpack that Intruder could carry. The synergy of the three electronic systems could allow to limit the overall raw power needed to overcome G&K jamming efforts !
So I'm proposing:
[X] Architect's Most Excellent Electronic Potpourris (or ''A MEEP'')
''So, I've been thinking... What if we give you a directional antenna with some signal boosting electronics... Mmmm, would that be enough ? Oh and what if we add a polarised comm with discriminatory non-encrypted signal filter, to remove white noise and chaff broadcasted by these nasty jammers ? Mmm, could be slowed by high-power signal... But not of we have a frequency-hopping spread spectrum chips to ease re-acquisition of friendly signals ! What ? If you could have all that ? Of course ! All that electronic could fit in a backpack ! ... Ok, a big backpack if we add the batteries but you would just need to turn it on when needed ! And I will add a direct connection cable so you can jack physically to the backpack.''
Well, that's basically my "Architect's Most Excellent Electronic Potpourris (or ''A MEEP'')" plan but only Intruder would need the backpack as it also have a directional antenna to pick up our units signals
Scheduled vote count started by Solark on Jan 20, 2024 at 7:34 PM, finished with 85 posts and 13 votes.
24
[X] "Home-on-Jam" Extended Range Precision Guided Mortar Bomb: If that jammer is broadcasting loud enough to wash out communications like that, it's loud enough to give away it's location. Design a new mortar bomb compatible with existing stocks of the Jaguar mobile mortar system for ease of rapid deployment by Intruder and other ringleaders, rather than having to set up a new production line for the launchers as well. It should be capable of homing in on the radio emissions of the jammer via adjustable fold-out tail and body fins deployed after launch that allow it to perform significant adjustments in trajectory. If you're going through the effort of putting the extra fins into it anyway might as well make them able to provide enough lift to extend the bomb's maximum range too, so Intruder can just keep a few Jaguars back by her side where the jamming is weaker and they won't interfere with her plays, and still have them able to engage even if she is a handful of kilometers away. Include some way for the ringleaders to adjust what frequencies it should or shouldn't be targeting in the field, so that they don't have to come all the way back to you if Griffin alters how the jammers broadcast to try and prevent targeting, or if there's a friendly emission source in the field that they don't want to hit. Fitting the fold-out fins and guidance system into something the size of the Jaguar's mortar bomb is going to reduce the amount of volume left for the warhead, so see if the new stronger high explosive you put together for Destroyer's grenades can be used to offset that.
[X] Laser communication relay system. The signal reciever is gear made to be carried or mounted on Sangvis Dolls that can recieve laser-based data transmission. The signal sender could be ground-bound or airborne (maybe mounted on a UAV). Laser communications require line-of-sight but are unjammable.
[x] UAV-mounted signal boosters. ''So, what about... UAV-mounted signal boosters ? They could be like... talkie-walkie or assistants to help getting your messages... directions to your... stage crew ? Bleh, enough with theater stuff, what I mean is that a small squad of 3 or 4 UAV with signal boosting equipments could help you get your signal through jamming by either moving closer to your troops easier then you or providing different signal vectors to avoid directional jamming signals !
[X] Radio Inferometry - many troops → many radios → distributed radio array → "big" radio telescope → better resolution → easier to "point" at Intruder & hear signal. Reverse polarity to transmit back.
[X] Modulate our own jammers - encrypted data looks like static; as long as we're using our own bigass radios, might as well use them to shout commands too
[X] Laser Semaphore - Heck, laser comms don't even need to be line-of-sight. Point a bright enough laser at a wall, and your troops will be able to get data just from seeing the scattered light. (bright enough, and that light can bounce many times, reaching all sorts of places)
[X] Makeshift ansible - I remember something in the game's lore about weapon-linked dolls always knowing the location of their gun? Keep the gun, and vibrate/move it (shake it baby shake it) to send data.
[x] Medium-sized heavily armored dinergate-based armadillo bot. Rolls forward, ignoring fire. Spools off cable to connect to Invader or paired receiver ardillogate. Emplaces itself and acts as retransmitter. Attacks by rolling into T-Dolls and grinding on them. Has laser comms receivers.
[x]Spreadspectrum chirp transmission. It is entirely possible to have our radio send highly compressed data packets over a wide range of frequency. This hard to counter because the only foolproof countermeasure is that the enemy transmiter is more powerful than yours.
[x] Communication missile. Repurpose some old wire-guided anti-tank missile if you need to. Five kilometers of fiberoptic cable, retransmitter with fifteen minutes of battery power or power wire to go with fiberoptic, cheap enough to spam and not worry if stuff breaks, powerful enough to overwhelm jamming locally. Because, frankly, lasers are useless if G&K start spamming smoke.
[X] But for lasers... You know, first communication satellite was literally reflective balloon? So fill the sky with mirrors! Mylar film, hexamine fuel tablet, completely passive reflective hot air balloons, could be spammed by thousands, communications firmware will need some updates to deal with reflections, but it's a dumber than a brick solution. Frankly, implement anyway and program drones to deploy floating reflectors and direct communication lasers at them in case of jamming. Let hostile T-Dolls deal with, heh, smoke and mirrors, even if actual communication method would be completely different. Weather-dependent, but that's why both Intruder and drones will get some balloon deployment modules.
[X] Human armies deal with such command issues by having autonomous command element at lowest level of combat force. Design either Sergeant-class Doll or Non-Com bolt-on package, that will provide limited command and control response if Ringleader is indisposed. No need to make them very smart, just a bunch of situation-dependent packaged battle plans would do to deal with completely predictable flanking maneuvers and loss of communication.
[X] Turn to the documentation of old Soviet equipment. Everything new is the same old thing, right? Just transfer it all to a new platform and put our sign on and we're done. Isn't that what they called Katyusha artillery? Earth should burn from your missiles!
-[X] Also, you literally just recently provided Destroyer something that might help you with this task. You just need to tweak the idea a bit with a file.
-[X] Install Dinergate tape recorders capable of playing old Soviet songs to further demoralize the enemy. Everyone should know that YOU are the real USSR receiver, not these budget fakes! And it might also allow you to clog up your opponents' airwaves to degrade their communications. Double benefit!
[X] Message runners - the oldest communication tech? It worked for ancient humans. Probably want to use multiple in parallel to provide redundancy against the inevitable suppression fire.
[X] Lead from the front - Intruder likes to sit waaay back to provide cover fire and direction, but what if she didn't do that? Hole up somewhere secure or hidden (but close) and strike via arcing shots. (Plus the Drama! She was here all along!)
[X] The identical hordes - all the decoys. All of them. Every bot gets remodeled/makeover'd to look like Intruder. Even the Dinnergates get cute little dresses
[X] Laser communication relay system. A signal of laser signal senders and relievers.
-[X] Backpack or head mounted relay gear for the Dolls.
-[X] UAV mounted relay gear. Either adapted for use on existing drones, or built into a custom drone.
[X] Signal amplifier.
-[X] A monstrously powerful radio signal emitter built to overpower jammers at close range. Mounted on a wheeled or legged chassis.
-[X] Equipped with anti-drone defenses, either laser based or ballistic
[X] Polarised communications equipment.
-[X] Custom versions of existing comm equipment to introduce radio polarisation, filtering out unwanted radio signals
[X] Subvert G&K dolls - as far as I can tell, most G&K dolls are motivated primarily by ice cream and friendship. We can do those! We're already working on hacking, but let's try some more overt options - throw up some billboards "Join Sangvis Ferri! 32 flavors of ice cream! Extra sprinkles for every friend you refer to our side!". (Watch out for fake defectors, though)
[x] Field telephone. You can't jam field telephone. You can't track field telephone by electromagnetic emissions. You need to lay field telephone on offensive. That's specialized dinergate with a spool of wire. You need to retransmit signal from field telephone to existing command and control channels. That's either second, differently specialized dinergate with a large radio or special addon to existing dolls. Retransmitter is most vulnerable part of whole process, because it radiates loudly, so there need to be spares. Whole solution bolts on to existing drone forces. Of course, it should not radiate or be noticeable before jamming makes current command and control solutions untenable, to prevent early location and destruction.
[x] Some Large Loudspeakers. All our dolls come with rather high-resolution microphones, that they often don't know what to do with. And ability to encode digital data in the audio stream is rather old. It's one-way communication, but large speaker system that transmit correctly encoded and signed order packages in modem sounds is better than nothing. Big fold-up panel of ultrasound tweezers to make a steerable beam, amplitude or frequency modulation, and you have your medium-range remote control that G&K won't know what to do with or even know it's happening unless sound beam hits them head on. It needs emitter roughly the size of a panel truck's side, and if you have that, you can cram some other goodies in said panel truck. P.S. What's resonance frequency of a T-Doll? Need to check if this can induce component failure on direct hit.
[X] Frequency-hopping spread spectrum. With cryptographic algorithm to control frequency change it is effectively impossible to predict the next frequency (as long as the key is secure and regularly updated), forcing the enemy to either use wideband jamming, reducing effective jamming power over any specific frequency, or trying to locate each new frequency as it appears, which can be further complicated via shortening the duration spent on every frequency. In cases of heavy jamming, you can make all available units other than the primary transmitter to send garbage on additional frequencies, either forcing the enemy to, again, go for wideband jamming, reduce wattage on each individual band, or even to miss some of them. After all, the enemy is going to have only so many dedicated jammers, presumable less of them than you have radios.
[X] Meta: General Upgrades - Any communication upgrades we devise for Intruder will likely be applicable across all Sangvis Ferri forces. Don't forget to apply them everywhere we can.
[x] Chirp spread spectrum. A technique lifted directly from a wikipedia article that permits to send very short but powerful radio Pulses over the entirety of the spectrum the transmitter as access to.
[X] Simplified command set - A simpler signal is easier to discern than a complex one. Sacrifice bandwidth for connectivity. Set up a Brevity Code system so that, when jammed, Intruder can "shout" commands like '2-2-1, 5-3-14, 1-1-7-1-16-5-17-16' (Squad 2, provide covering fire for squad 1. Squad 3(heavies), destroy the enemy's cover. Squad 1, enter the building to the north and destroy the jammer in that building). Maybe even provide a more simple/rugged transmitter (band-gap radio?) optimized specifically for these transmissions. (maybe even just transmit basic text - Agent mentioned receiving "targeting data over the network", so regular comms sound like they include a lot of bonus data)
[] Decoys - suppressing fire keeping Intruder from reaching her troops? Which Intruder? Costumes are cheap, getting shot less is priceless.
It's going to cost us almost nothing and Intruder is going to like it, I hope Architect at least mention it to her.
If we're going for anti-radiation missiles or mortar shells, I hope Archie integrates the ability to remember the last known target location, if the jamming is deactivated.
Also, could we put those on the UAVs?
It would increase the danger and complexity of jamming them if it drops one of these before turning around to re-establish the connection.
Updating the behaviour of SFs forces incase of jamming sounds like it could be very cheap to do, since it's just a software update.
I'm not sure about the effectiveness of decoys as Intruder like to stay far behind the fight, she would need to keep a "personal guard" of look-alike dolls around herself. And I don't know how close we can grime SF dolls to look like her, maybe it's easy, maybe it's hard *shrug*
If we're going for anti-radiation missiles or mortar shells, I hope Archie integrates the ability to remember the last known target location, if the jamming is deactivated.
Also, could we put those on the UAVs?
It would increase the danger and complexity of jamming them if it drops one of these before turning around to re-establish the connection.
Unfortunately, it seem that SF software is the private domain of Mastermind, we/Architect can't access it. Maybe we could float the suggestion through Agent but that would be the most we could do.
I'm not sure about the effectiveness of decoys as Intruder like to stay far behind the fight, she would need to keep a "personal guard" of look-alike dolls around herself. And I don't know how close we can grime SF dolls to look like her, maybe it's easy, maybe it's hard *shrug*
I was envisioning the shells/missiles more as a "fire and forget" kind of thing.
If those weapons need to be used, there's a good chance comms are already jammed.
Relying on being able to adjust the flight path via datalink seems risky if the weapon can just guide itself to the target.
It also frees up Architect from having micromanage them.
In that case, the ARM mortar shells should probably do the trick.
Even a relatively basic quadcopter can carry mortar shells.
It'll reduce the drones endurance, but that might be worth it if you suspect the enemy has jammers.
Unfortunately, it seem that SF software is the private domain of Mastermind, we/Architect can't access it. Maybe we could float the suggestion through Agent but that would be the most we could do.
I was envisioning the shells/missiles more as a "fire and forget" kind of thing.
If those weapons need to be used, there's a good chance comms are already jammed.
Relying on being able to adjust the flight path via datalink seems risky if the weapon can just guide itself to the target.
It also frees up Architect from having micromanage them.
In that case, the ARM mortar shells should probably do the trick.
Even a relatively basic quadcopter can carry mortar shells.
It'll reduce the drones endurance, but that might be worth it if you suspect the enemy has jammers.
Not sure about that, SF drones seem to be quite useless when jammed and I fear that UAV would be too. A missiles-launcher with a ARM missile would be both more effective and reliable
Not sure about that, SF drones seem to be quite useless when jammed and I fear that UAV would be too. A missiles-launcher with a ARM missile would be both more effective and reliable
I intended the ARM shell on the UAV more as a deterrent.
If G&K wants to jam our UAVs, they'd need be prepared for immediate counter fire.
Besides, the shells would usually be fired from mortars.
That's one of the big advantages of the mortar shells over the missiles.
We just need to produce the new seeker and slap it on the shells.
Cheap, easy to mass produce and the mortar exists already.
A missile would be faster and have a longer range, but I'm pretty sure we'd need to develop one from scratch and set up a production line.
Whatever platform we fire it from would need to be adapted too.
Remember, we are on a time-limit.
I intended the ARM shell on the UAV more as a deterrent.
If G&K wants to jam our UAVs, they'd need be prepared for immediate counter fire.
Besides, the shells would usually be fired from mortars.
That's one of the big advantages of the mortar shells over the missiles.
We just need to produce the new seeker and slap it on the shells.
Cheap, easy to mass produce and the mortar exists already.
A missile would be faster and have a longer range, but I'm pretty sure we'd need to develop one from scratch and set up a production line.
Whatever platform we fire it from would need to be adapted too.
Remember, we are on a time-limit.
You are correct.
However, the Jaguar is already in servce and could accept the shells with no further modifications, except maybe a standing order to fire one or two if it is being jammed.
The issue with the missile is that we will probably have to design it mostly from scratch. Does SF have any existing guided missiles?
If they do, I doubt they are man-portable.
Besides, the largest advantage of a missile would be range and speed, which would not be that good from a man-portable version.
Either way, we'd need to modify some of our units to mount and fire it.
If there's already a suitable missile with an existing launch platform to modify, that would be ideal and in that case, I'd vote for the missile over the mortar.
But we just don't know that and I'm not aware of such a missile in use by SF.
And we are in a timecrunch, so "good enough" will have to do.
You are correct.
However, the Jaguar is already in servce and could accept the shells with no further modifications, except maybe a standing order to fire one or two if it is being jammed.
The issue with the missile is that we will probably have to design it mostly from scratch. Does SF have any existing guided missiles?
If they do, I doubt they are man-portable.
Besides, the largest advantage of a missile would be range and speed, which would not be that good from a man-portable version.
Either way, we'd need to modify some of our units to mount and fire it.
If there's already a suitable missile with an existing launch platform to modify, that would be ideal and in that case, I'd vote for the missile over the mortar.
But we just don't know that and I'm not aware of such a missile in use by SF.
And we are in a timecrunch, so "good enough" will have to do.
Yeah, I don't think it's feasible to design a missile from scratch, especially as Intruder don't have missile weapons herself.
Maybe mixing a Harpy UAV with a Goliath suicide drone ? Basically a suicide flying drone that can be programmed to target jamming signal. Something cheap and "self-contained" that Ringleaders can bring a few of and deploy when encountering jammers without needing to lugg a secondary weapon system around ?
Maybe mixing a Harpy UAV with a Goliath suicide drone ? Basically a suicide flying drone that can be programmed to target jamming signal. Something cheap and "self-contained" that Ringleaders can bring a few of and deploy when encountering jammers without needing to lugg a secondary weapon system around ?
Of course it's not! In fact, you have so many ideas popping up in your head that you're overwhelmed for a moment. Are you getting better at this? Getting used to it? No matter, you have a problem to solve!
You grab a marker and dash to a whiteboard to draw three columns, put "jammer" in the first one, "signal" in the second and "we" at the last. That's it! The problem is not a monolith, it's a system that can be solved in a number of ways at different levels, independently or in combination. Solve the "jammer" part to instantly uproot the problem, or solve the "signal", and the jammer becomes useless. Or solve SF troops dependency on remote commands, and the former two become irrelevant. You're going to have so much fun with this!
You start with the jammer part. Now, how would a talented engineer solve a fragile, expensive and bulky piece of equipment? Naturally, by blowing it up! You put down a sweeping "BOOM" and grin in satisfaction. Next, delivery and targeting. You quickly single out Sangvis Ferri Jaguar as the platform of choice, its powerful shells more than a match for flimsy transmitters. Add a radiation-seeking guidance module, fold-out control surfaces for steering, or even something bigger for extra lift and range... yes, that's something you can try. You write it down on the whiteboard, think for a moment and add "missile" for a second delivery option— it'd be a more complex solution, but might not require Jaguars to be launched from. Oh, and what about flying drones for a third?
Ideas pool check (loitering munition): False.
Nah, those might manage to drop unguided explosives, but that's not what you're looking for here. They've got nothing on the first two, are expensive to produce, susceptible to jamming, and have their virtual hands full with recon and surveillance tasks.
You move on to the second column. Most of your ideas are about solving the signal part, and you're pretty sure you have more than enough. So, they're using a more powerful transmitter to win the shouting match? Then what if you simply accept the challenge and roll out a "no ducks given" ridiculously powerful radio in turn? You're pretty sure you'd win this brute-force competition, as you have schematics for the functioning jammers that Intruder is so fond of. Those are essentially powerful transmitters, and though some hardware components would need to be replaced, antennas recalculated and resized, that's very little effort compared to producing one from scratch.
Then you remember the inverse-square law, and do a quick math. Aw, shucks, to have the desired levels of signal 2 kilometers away, electromagnetic field strength near the transmitter would put Intruder in coma...
Ideas pool check (directional transmission): True.
Unless you switch from omni-directional to something more focused. You re-run the math for parabolic mirror profile and this time get what you want. Even better, there's no need to have a huge and power-hungry transmitter. The more focused the beam, the less energy the system would require. Tightly focused "pencil" beam is virtually unjammable, but needs to be pointed directly at receiver. Usually tracking would present a challenge on its own...
Breakthrough points requirement (1): True
But suddenly you have a vision of two fluffy cat ears-shaped parabolic antennas on top of Intruder's head, twitching, rotating and refocusing to independently track two groups of her advancing troops with narrow communication beams... That... that'd be the most unconventional cutting-edge tracking design on this side of the Milky Way! You quickly write down "power + beamforming + tracking (cat ears)" and switch to the next idea before your giggles have a chance to suffocate you.
What else can you do with RF signal to avoid jamming? Spread spectrum? Nice workaround for narrow-band jamming, but are you sure that's what G&K is fielding? What can you do about wide-band jamming then? Maybe you could devise some kind of multicarrier receiver with orthogonal frequency division multiplexing, make it sample the signal spectrum based on a bank of discrete-frequency matched filters, then directly apply either frequency bin excision or a minimum mean-square solution with the data samples provided by the frequency domain...
Ideas pool check (software-defined radio): False.
That could work, but you have no idea how to give it the required flexibility with the hardware element base at your possession. A pity. And, given frequency hopping is already a part of the current protocol, and taking into account the risk of signal fratricide, you're not sure playing with the spectrum is going to do you any good.
Once again you consider inverse-square law of electromagnetic propagation. Intruder's forces were jammed because they were closer to the enemy's jammer than to her. Distance has this unfair advantage over transmission power, and you could utilize that by equipping the troops with signal repeaters-amplifiers. Say, backpack-sized solution, one or two per platoon, letting mesh networking do the rest. Or do you need a bigger self-propelling version? And maybe not just ground troops, but UAVs as well. Under normal circumstances multipath propagation is a pain to deal with, but under heavy jamming it could turn into a blessing, and you may even position and synchronize the UAVs in a way to combine their signal power. You write down "signal amplifiers (ground- / air based, portable / self-propelled)"— all of these ideas look sensible to you.
You search your mind for more RF-bound ideas and find none. But no one said the solution must be within radio frequencies exclusively. Asymmetric measures are your favorite, it's where you can cut loose with your craziest designs!
You immediately put down "laser comms", then subdivide it to "free space" and "fiber-optic". High throughput, unjammable, with clearly defined limitations... you can't go wrong with this one. Just by adding it as a fail-over channel to the varied types of the RF boosters you thought of earlier, you'd drastically improve resilience and availability of the comms. UAVs would solve most of the line-of-sight issues, and really you could target any object in the vicinity and take advantage of diffuse reflections. The best part is you wouldn't need any special receivers for this, as SF T-Dolls have eyes that are capable of perceiving such reflections, albeit at lower data rates. You'd need to update the troops firmware though.
Speaking of which, you can get around any data rate limitation by introducing a brevity code system. Divide operational area by sectors, assign numbers to squads and basic combat maneuvers... with this, one byte of data could contain more useful commands than a megabyte without. It's so efficient that Intruder could use signal flags to transmit it! And you don't have to invent anything here— it's a free bonus, the system can be taught to SF T-Dolls without the need of additional programming. "Brevity codes", here you go.
Now, about the fiber-optics part. You have a cable type that's thin, extremely lightweight— about 1,5kg/km, and very tolerant to bending. The downside is that it's unarmored and not designed for outdoors use, though you're sure it's about long-term endurance. You could easily have some T-Dolls unspool it from their... ah... no, why would you suddenly think of spiders? Well, fiber core does look like spider silk... but of course you mean from their MOLLE, or whatever piece of equipment a spool can be fastened onto. Or you could modify something of SF make into a dedicated cable layer unit. Dinergates maybe? Heck, even a missile with a spool could do the trick, quickly delivering the business end to where it's needed. "Cable layers", put down.
Do you think good old electric signal cable can beat fiber-optic for your purpose? Hmm, it's heavier and somewhat thicker. The only upside you can think of is that it can be field-repaired if damaged. Field telephones have been used for ages and nothing can jam them, but they can't transmit digital signals at any meaningful data rates. Still, there's something about those devices that triggers your classics appreciation instincts, and maybe Intruder would take to shouting orders into a handset? There's only one way to find out. "Field telephone".
What else... message runners? Hardly. Intruder is playing a real-time strategy here, not a game of chess. Those are too slow to control dynamic engagement.
Signal polarization? That could reduce jamming efficiency if the jammer doesn't have dual-stack antennas, but you'd be shooting yourself in the foot with the groundwave vs skywave propagation tradeoff.
Reflective balloons for the lasers? They'd make a beautiful sight, but are too finicky about weather and won't maintain position or altitude. Maybe you'd give them a try if you didn't have UAVs.
You let your imagination run wild, moving to even more extreme and experimental ideas. What about seismic hammers, earth-pounders of massive scale that'd make the ground quiver like a herd of sprinting elephants? You remember using seismic sensors in some border areas of the SF territory, and sigh in disappointment: they're only good enough to tell when heavy equipment is moving nearby, but are not very portable and lack resolution for anything beyond that. Even if you manage to assemble a contraption to transmit encoded messages by pounding the ground, your troops wouldn't be able to receive it due to the sensors limitations and secondary vibrations.
What about quantum entanglement? Oh, that'd be instant communication over any distance, something that's called "ansible" you believe...
Breakthrough points requirement (10): False
But you're pretty sure FTL quantum communication is impossible as every attempt to measure the state of one of the entangled particles inevitably ruins the whole system, making it Schrödinger's cat of sorts: it's only working when you're not watching. Of course, T-Dolls being ansible-level aware of their weapons is just one of the many fairy tales infantry grunts come up with to romanticize their job.
Maybe sounds? You imagine Intruder with a megaphone... nope, something bigger. That... could work better that seismic comms in terms of resolution, but no matter how you look at it, 2 klicks distance at typical firefight noise levels at the receiver is simply unachievable. Well, maybe a bullhorn could be useful for coaxing enemy T-Dolls to your side? Right...
Seems like that's it for the signal part. Now, the last column: what can you do about SF troops to counter jamming? Well, first and foremost, why did Intruder's troop turned into a helpless crowd as soon as the comms went down? You're sure that isn't how mil-spec T-Dolls are expected to perform. There's a huge gap here, and it'll only get worse as this shortcoming becomes more apparent and well-known. So, "Better autonomous behavior patterns", put down. You might need some help with this one...
And why did the connection break up immediately and completely? Are military communication protocols supposed to be this flimsy?
Ideas pool check (data rate / Shannon's limit): True.
You know the theory, and you're sure you could trade bandwidth for connectivity. Yes, you'd have to update the protocol, but after that the connection would be slowing down instead of breaking up completely. "Fault-tolerant protocol" written down, and you'll probably need help with this too, which might be a good thing...
You're doing pretty good solving Ringleader to troops part of the problem, but what about inter T-Dolls connectivity? Say, when your dedicated booster-carrying unit needs to relay the orders to her squad several meters around her under heavy jamming? Yep, as simple as it gets: they're going to speak! You discarded the sound option for long range, yet here it seems perfectly suited. Then maybe you can even spice things up a notch? Make the troops hiss and screech like ancient modems, transmitting digital data over audible sound waves? Or even make it ultrasonic? Interesting! "Oral comms", hehe!
Also, why was Intruder 2 klicks away in the first place? That's way too far for a Ringleader of any type, no wonder the signal was jammed. You're not sure how Intruder would react if you start teaching her how to fight, but hey, you have something that she'd definitely like! "Costumes and decoys", here.
You look the whiteboard over. Wow, that's a very... healthy amount of ideas! There's only one thing left to do before continuing to the next phase. You reach out into the network, and after a couple of seconds...
"Scarecrow here."
"Hi-hi, I have a favor to ask!"
You interlocutor looks a bit puzzled.
"Isn't it supposed to be the other way around? I thought it's about my request."
"Yours will be the next one, I promise! Just... this is important, and I'm not sure I can do it without you."
"Important? I'm listening."
And you tell her everything. About the request from Intruder, the jammer incident, and how you think SF troops and the communication protocol could be improved. The moment you attempt to transition from your ideas to convincing her to help you, she holds up her hand.
"Say no more, I'm in." Just like that. Serious, competent, collected. Sometimes you wonder if she'd do better job than Agent leading the war effort. Scarecrow's estimate is 2 day for the protocol and 1 day for troops behavior, which means it's 0 extra days for you as long as your own part takes 3 or more days. Though if you're to trust her with a part of your work, you'll have to take the blame should she screw up. Will you risk it? Meanwhile you put down your own estimates for each idea. That's it, now the final part: combine what you think is necessary to make an ideal solution considering the time limit.
Omg, this is the biggest update size so far!
For making me read a ton of whitepapers and scientific articles, I'm in turn making you deal with this huge number of possible combinations, mwahaha!
Seriously though, for your outstanding ideas I'm giving you a number of 0-days cost options.
Beware, not everything listed would work without a hitch, depending on what you decide to go with there might be secondary challenges. You can still screw up.
] Clearly we should use the Millenium Challenge 2002 solution here and just have motorcycle couriers who can magically travel at lightspeed!
