Ship to Ship signaling (Duplicate Thread Reject)

[Crosshair]

Ok, i have looked everywhere for another suggestion, but it seems not to be there...

The 19th C Navies used flags to transmit messages, and they were very versatile, for example Nelson, just before Trafalgar signaled to his fleet:
"England Expects that each man shall do his duty under arms" Or words to that effect. Now, if something like that can be signalled, then you could just type in what you want to say, and have a radio like system which does not need frequencies and is a hell of a lot cheaper. It is also more realistic for the age.

Project Manufacturing Signal flags.
Cotton 1kg (there are a lot of flags)
rope
Tools:
Needle
Knife

Project Signaling.
time TBC
"set of hoists and pulleys"
And also, the signal flags would just be like a machine, but need set of hoists to work as well...

[SCUBA]

I like this alot!

[deadboy]

yeah thats a pretty class idea


however i can see people being really stupid with it

Scenario: guy steals a ship, people go to get it back

You see The stolen galleon in the distance
You hoist up on a flag:"You there, we are coming to get back that ship, dont move"
You see the ship that was standing still suddenly zip off way faster than your eyes can follow
You say:"damn it, why do i always shout, it just gives them time to run away...."

[Crosshair]

1444: a man in his sixties says: Now martha if you had wanted to have children i keep telling you, we're too old now..

Watch less simpsons, boy!

Actually, i see very little boat theft, its quite strange really.

The only difference would be that you could actually warn the ship...

I see no trouble in shouting at the theif, because he's gonna run for it anyway... (unless he's a newb in which case he probably won't know how to pilot the boat)

[Chris Johnson]

The idea of signal flags is a good one, but not the proposed communication. The codes used for signalling should really be developed in game, As in RL the codes will have to be designed and distributed.

[Crosshair]

So you mean...

You could name the flags A B C D? man.. that'd be soooo long strung...

Why can't you just have:

You see ship KIN Nayr Signaling: "Captain of the ___ Come aboard at once"

[Chris Johnson]

No what I mean is the other ship sees

"The Black Pig signals a blue flag , red flag, yellow flag. "

If you know that means "Dock as soon as possible" because it says in the code book which has been agreed on then fine . If not then it's just a bunch of flags. The code is really an in-game development - your proposal for clear speech transmission is nothing like real flag signalling, the signal has to be deciphered using agreed standards.

What I'm saying is that the agreed standards are too much a cultural thing and should be developed in game.

The same concept should apply to smoke signals, Signal towers , horns and drums - all proposed before.

Now there is radio and that will eventually be available on ships but that is the transmission of clear speech.

[Crosshair]

Not everyone can afford a radio though...

But if there are agreed codes, you cannot send detailed messages...

There were literally hundreds of flags in Nelsons fleet... That could pretty much say anything... One ship, the Harvester A frigate, sunk a ship of the line and another frigate in one sea skirmish. To the Frigate from its flagship was sent a message "Well done, Harvester, Yours was the good harvest today"

I suppose that flags could be dynamically named... Start off as blue flag, then to people that know the code, they can be renamed the things they mean... get me?

[Chris Johnson]

The Royal Navy of the time had used a system which just had 10 different signal flags. - numbered from 0 to 9 , not 100's

Using a previously agreed and distributed codebook about 300 words were hard coded using combinations of 3 flags . Combinations of 1 or 2 flags could be used to display letters of the alphabet. This was code was supposed to be kept secret - Foreign (oops sorry .. non-British) navys used different methods.

Universal flags signalling systems came much later .

But the key point is that different cultures and societies developed their own methods of signalling . (EDIT: Using similar tools)

[Crosshair]

What about dynamically named flags? only visible as "dock now" to the person who has been told what it is.

[formerly known as hf]

http://www.cantr.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1320

Inter-ship communication is a must. Radios would help, but semaphore would be good too.

As Chris said, the meanings of flags (dynamic naming them sounds good) should be dveloped in-game.

[Crosshair]

I did search for it, with your tips as well... *shrug*

[rklenseth]

Locked: Already suggested in this thread: http://www.cantr.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1320&start=0