City sized safe havens and safe haven networks....

[azazel1024]

No reason you can't try to raise tomboys, or for that matter that they won't be. My wife was a serious tomboy, though she did have a brother, but he is also 4 1/2yrs younger, so she had a lot more effect on him than vice versa. Of course, at least in my opinion, there is only so much nuture you can do to impact a child's personality and preferences. I think the majority is still nature. My oldest started pointing out cars and trucks and grabbing toy cars and planes in stores before he was even 1 year old (before we had really gotten him any toy cars or anything). My youngest son picked the stuff up real early, though I guess you could argue its because all of his older brother's toys are around.

That said both kids LOVE playing with their toy kitchen that I built for them and LOVE pushing around the doll sized stroller my wife got for them (my older son when he was younger was obsessed with a neighborhood girls little pink stroller. So my wife bought him a navy blue one off Amazon and recovered the cloth seat from plain navy blue to a black and red flame stripped fabric with skulls on it. My wife felt like she should have a more masculine stroller).

Both kids also have no issues wearing my wife's heels around the house (to the deteriment of my hardwood floors).

Some of me hopes the next one is a girl (we are planning on just 1 more), but at the same time frankly I'd have a hard time with the princess stuff and talking with the neighbors (one who has 3 older girls and 1 boy slightly younger than my oldest) and friends who have girls or boys and girls...I just don't know. I love little girls, and some of me kind of wants a daddy's girl (I won't lie), but at the same time, teenage girl drama is about 1,000% worse than teenage boy drama and most stuff after about age 7 or 8 seems to be the "end of the world" with most girls. My wife is actually much more concerned about having to deal with this than me (maybe because despite being a tomboy she gave her parents a HUGE raft of that when she was that age). Some of me still thinks that it wouldn't be that bad and would still be nice to have a "change of pace" as it were for kids.

However, I do love my boys.

[Zer0 Kay]

the problem with the M113 is that it's being phased out of the US military. there aren't many left. this makes getting one and keeping it supplied is not easy. and they are notoriously difficult to maintain.
getting a styker or LAV would be somewhat easier. getting humvees and duece and a half's is fairly easy.

There is one issue with the longer vehicles like the Stryker. They can't always make the turns in cities. In Anchorage, AK they tried doing a convoy to the port... they couldn't make the turns in the city even using the four lane roads. They've since fixed the problem, but it wasn't a fix to the vehicle.

[Oberoth]

So anyway....Back to topic.

Speaking of logistics, any city sized haven is going to have the ability to run and organize military hardware along
with a standing army or militia. In the case of Winnipeg, they even have air power/superiority. They can call in "Death from above"
on a herd of zombies or humans alike. That's right, I said HERD. This is a common theme these days in Zombie fiction.
One Zombie hears a noise or something in the distance and starts walking. Along the way it bumps into another Zombie. That Zombie
starts walking in the same direction and makes noise, or bumps into another Zed and so on... Eventually you have thousands of them
shambling across the country side. A migration of sorts. The older a haven gets, the more likely they will be attacked by one of these herds.
This is when they could pull out the big guns. Death from above first to slow them down. Then mortars and tank positions.
.50 cal vs Zombie next to mow them down further. And finally rifle squads with clean up crew.

[Illendaver]

So anyway....Back to topic.

Speaking of logistics, any city sized haven is going to have the ability to run and organize military hardware along
with a standing army or militia. In the case of Winnipeg, they even have air power/superiority. They can call in "Death from above"
on a herd of zombies or humans alike. That's right, I said HERD. This is a common theme these days in Zombie fiction.
One Zombie hears a noise or something in the distance and starts walking. Along the way it bumps into another Zombie. That Zombie
starts walking in the same direction and makes noise, or bumps into another Zed and so on... Eventually you have thousands of them
shambling across the country side. A migration of sorts. The older a haven gets, the more likely they will be attacked by one of these herds.
This is when they could pull out the big guns. Death from above first to slow them down. Then mortars and tank positions.
.50 cal vs Zombie next to mow them down further. And finally rifle squads with clean up crew.

The logistical problem is what happens between the zombie invasions. Lets say that a herd does show up at Winnipeg and it is handled as described above. Lets even say that by some miracle nobody got hurt at all doing this.
Now there is a good mile or three that is covered in mangled rotting bodies. Not good for farmland, and also a great way to spread plagues. So the right thinking people go out and form squads that probably round up and burn the bodies in giant pyres.
The problem is this is a vicious cycle. The smell of burned meat in the air, the lights in the distance at night, or the plumes of smoke during the day is just going to bring another hoard/herd of Zombies.
Sooner or later, your going to run out of bullets. Or food from not being able to grow crops uninterrupted. Or medical supplies to keep the injured from becoming zed/dying horribly (its called a miracle because it almost never happens).

[glitterboy2098]

you just got to hope you run out of zombies within the area the sound/smoke/light will reach before you run out of bullets. the triggers that attract zombies are fairly short ranged, and since zombie usually go into hibernation rather than wander long distances, the above scheme could serve to thin out the zombie population in a region, allowing you time to get things settled.

[azazel1024]

As Glitterboy mentioned. In addition instead of pyres, you could use some large earth moving equipment to dig some mass graves and just bulldoze the zombie bodies in to them and cover with a small layer of dirt.

[glitterboy2098]

As Glitterboy mentioned. In addition instead of pyres, you could use some large earth moving equipment to dig some mass graves and just bulldoze the zombie bodies in to them and cover with a small layer of dirt.

that wouldn't eliminate the issue of sickness from all the rotting flesh though. in fact, it would probably make it worse, since now groundwater will percolate through them before going to any stream or aquifer..

anytime you have alot of dead bodies, you pretty much have to burn them. anything else means your facing sickness as the result of the rotting flesh.

[Illendaver]

you just got to hope you run out of zombies within the area the sound/smoke/light will reach before you run out of bullets. the triggers that attract zombies are fairly short ranged, and since zombie usually go into hibernation rather than wander long distances, the above scheme could serve to thin out the zombie population in a region, allowing you time to get things settled.

Thats true, but Oberoth was talking about groups of zombies "herding" themselves together to swarm any living beings they found. If that were the case, any community would be in a whole world of trouble due to the fact that there would be more zombies coming at any given town than bullets/bombs in the town to deal with the invaders.

In my campaigns, Death Priests usually do get a hoard of zombies to go find safe havens to besiege, then they grab the survivors who get away from their zombie traps and that is how they set up their Death Cult community.

[Oberoth]

you just got to hope you run out of zombies within the area the sound/smoke/light will reach before you run out of bullets. the triggers that attract zombies are fairly short ranged, and since zombie usually go into hibernation rather than wander long distances, the above scheme could serve to thin out the zombie population in a region, allowing you time to get things settled.

Thats true, but Oberoth was talking about groups of zombies "herding" themselves together to swarm any living beings they found. If that were the case, any community would be in a whole world of trouble due to the fact that there would be more zombies coming at any given town than bullets/bombs in the town to deal with the invaders.

In my campaigns, Death Priests usually do get a hoard of zombies to go find safe havens to besiege, then they grab the survivors who get away from their zombie traps and that is how they set up their Death Cult community.

Sure. But I never said that these herds would be a common occurrence either. Probably the opposite. Also, city sized havens will have a large Safe Zone around them, dozens of miles round. The above scenario would likely happen a good distance away from the larger haven, being spotted early by patrols and watch towers (perhaps by air too!). The thing with havens this big is the amount of people you would have at your disposal. I'm sure they could muster several thousand people with melee weapons as well.

[G]

I think the best way to survive is on an island.

Otherwise the population of zombies is too much for any city to handle. Lets take Winnipeg as an example. You have 50,000 survivors and something like a million zombies. The odds are too far against them. The first convergence may be the worst, as there will be the most Zombies about, which is probably when people will be the least able to defend themselves. Even 10,000 gunners vs. a million zombies coming in from every direction...

...and once a convergence starts, who knows how big it could get. 1 Million might be a low estimate.

[Illendaver]

I think the best way to survive is on an island.

Otherwise the population of zombies is too much for any city to handle. Lets take Winnipeg as an example. You have 50,000 survivors and something like a million zombies. The odds are too far against them. The first convergence may be the worst, as there will be the most Zombies about, which is probably when people will be the least able to defend themselves. Even 10,000 gunners vs. a million zombies coming in from every direction...

...and once a convergence starts, who knows how big it could get. 1 Million might be a low estimate.

Off shore oil rigs are pretty good too. They produce their own power, a fuel source for ships (If you set up a crude refinery), and its practically impossible for zed to climb up into one. Clean it out once and stick about 5 people with guns up there and you have a gigantic ocean fortress. Now find a way to feed them... Course, I live in Nebraska, so I am pretty boned anyways

[azazel1024]

As Glitterboy mentioned. In addition instead of pyres, you could use some large earth moving equipment to dig some mass graves and just bulldoze the zombie bodies in to them and cover with a small layer of dirt.

that wouldn't eliminate the issue of sickness from all the rotting flesh though. in fact, it would probably make it worse, since now groundwater will percolate through them before going to any stream or aquifer..

anytime you have alot of dead bodies, you pretty much have to burn them. anything else means your facing sickness as the result of the rotting flesh.

Sorry, been out of town for the last couple of weeks.

It depends on the distance between ground water and burial depth along with distance from "town".

Most/all disease/bacteria is going to be filtered out of any ground water seepage before it gets to the level of an aquafer. If you have shallow depth wells this could however be a problem. However, in most areas of North America well depth is in excess of a couple of hundred feet and at those depths you'd have little penetration of bacteria from decomposition reaching well water.

Shallow wells above ~100-200ft you'd begin to encounter issues. Pretty much anything where you have to dig through rock to hit the well (with the exception of limestone since it is so porous) you won't have bacterial seepage in to drinking water.

Also if it is several miles outside of town you'd have few issues.

[azazel1024]

One other thing to point out is we are working on an assumption of no fortification from what most people seem to be mentioning. Most zombies are pretty dumb, and even with a thinker around a stong chain link fence with barbed wire or razor wire on top would be slow down a large wave or even stop one. Sure they'll ignore getting cut, but it'll still snag them badly slowing them getting over the top. Its not the easiest to climb as a living person, let along a dead, effectively, unthinking person.

Setup some nice barbed wire fences 4-8ft high backed by, say, a 12ft high chain link fence topped with hurricane/concertina wire and a moat filled with water about 8ft deep and 30ft wide with a concrete wall about 7ft high on the otherside of the moat with periodic pill boxes about every 500ft and watch towers about every quarter mile. Have a rail line about 100ft behind the concrete walls/bunkers running the entire circumference with spur lines heading in to the city/town or to whatever military base(s) the defenders use. Then have a cleared zone about a quarter mile deep from the furthest fence. Would it take a long time to setup? Sure, but it would pretty much be impenetrable to any zombie short of having hundreds of thousands of them concentrate on exactly the same point and pile their bodies like ramps to get over. Even then, some flamethrower flamebe and they'll likely burn up before they can clear all the various obstacles.

As for the million zombies for Winnipeg, keep in mind, there wasn't a million instantly. There were tens of thousands "instantly" and the residents reacted quickly. It still killed most of the city, but there weren't 50,000 people poorly armed up against a million. There was nearly a million people up against tens of thousands of zombies at first.

[Oberoth]

Yep. Any safe haven will have these sorts of barriers and road blocks already installed. Especially A large haven like Winnipeg, that has a possible labor force of thousands.

[Zer0 Kay]

So anyway....Back to topic.

Speaking of logistics, any city sized haven is going to have the ability to run and organize military hardware along
with a standing army or militia. In the case of Winnipeg, they even have air power/superiority. They can call in "Death from above"
on a herd of zombies or humans alike. That's right, I said HERD. This is a common theme these days in Zombie fiction.
One Zombie hears a noise or something in the distance and starts walking. Along the way it bumps into another Zombie. That Zombie
starts walking in the same direction and makes noise, or bumps into another Zed and so on... Eventually you have thousands of them
shambling across the country side. A migration of sorts. The older a haven gets, the more likely they will be attacked by one of these herds.
This is when they could pull out the big guns. Death from above first to slow them down. Then mortars and tank positions.
.50 cal vs Zombie next to mow them down further. And finally rifle squads with clean up crew.

So... does winnipeg have JP-8 fuel manufacturing capabilities for that death from above bit? Aircraft are fuel hogs, it would be better to strip the cannons off of the equipment and mount them either as stationary emplacements or on some sort of technical. The best thing to use the JP-8 for is to fuel generators. The best death from above would be to mount those big guns on tall buildings. But the ordinance... unless you have some sort of mount to make it a ground to ground missile... or lob bombs far enough away, you'd better set 'em up as booby traps. Maybe place the explosive materials out as shaped charges so when they blow they send the zombie shrapnel away from the city instead of raining the infected flesh into the city?

[azazel1024]

It should be well within the capabilities of a city that sized to manufacturer WWII level prop planes, and those could, if designed right, just be feed alcohol for their engines. A few P-51 type planes with some .30 cal and .50 cal machine guns and a few 250lbs bombs under the wings is plenty of death from above.

[Zer0 Kay]

It should be well within the capabilities of a city that sized to manufacturer WWII level prop planes, and those could, if designed right, just be feed alcohol for their engines. A few P-51 type planes with some .30 cal and .50 cal machine guns and a few 250lbs bombs under the wings is plenty of death from above.

yeah and New York which is much larger should be able to produce a space shuttle... but they can't. Does Winnipeg have the production capabilities? Why are you trying ot get crap into the air anyway when they can do what they need from the ground, more safely? Just need one thinker and one of the big guys to start throwing mindless little zeeks at the planes. The better use for the aircraft is transport and cargo.

[azazel1024]

I could build a plane using any decently stocked fabrication/metal working shop and a working engine or three.

And I doubt New York City has the resources to build the space shuttle. Probably no natural resources for some of the more important alloys and metals you'd need to withstand reentry.

Planes would be most important as observers/spotters.

As for throwing things at the planes...unless you planned on straffing runs at 50ft, I think you are pretty safe.

Aerial power allows you to spot large groups of zombies from a long distance and engage them far from the city. Alternately you can route fire teams to smaller concentrations that don't warrant an attack from the air.

For transport and cargo, where are you transporting to/from? If most/all the rest of the world has been consumed by the zombies, its not like you are running stuff between Winnie and Toronto. You might have some good use out of VTOL craft or helicopters for salvage runs (quick in and outs), but those would be very difficult to build compared to fixed wing aircraft.

[Oberoth]

I could build a plane using any decently stocked fabrication/metal working shop and a working engine or three.

And I doubt New York City has the resources to build the space shuttle. Probably no natural resources for some of the more important alloys and metals you'd need to withstand reentry.

Planes would be most important as observers/spotters.

As for throwing things at the planes...unless you planned on straffing runs at 50ft, I think you are pretty safe.

Aerial power allows you to spot large groups of zombies from a long distance and engage them far from the city. Alternately you can route fire teams to smaller concentrations that don't warrant an attack from the air.

For transport and cargo, where are you transporting to/from? If most/all the rest of the world has been consumed by the zombies, its not like you are running stuff between Winnie and Toronto. You might have some good use out of VTOL craft or helicopters for salvage runs (quick in and outs), but those would be very difficult to build compared to fixed wing aircraft.

I agree. Except Winnipeg although capable of manufacturing aircraft probably wouldn't need to for some time. Considering the military base (NORAD) is located at the airport plus they would have a fleet of civilian aircraft at their disposal. Really all they would need was a small plane or ultralight for scouting, but it would be handy to have a squadron of F-18's on standby when needed.

The fuel problem...

Well eventually you would run out right? No. The military would be all over the ammo/fuel problem from day one IMO. J-P8 is a distillate of petroleum and is Kerosene based. Really all you need are a few petroleum engineers with an escort to reclaim a refinery or used oil recycling facility(Making a new haven in the city's network). They could theoretically build smaller refineries closer to the city too! Like this. http://www.new-ag.info/en/focus/focusItem.php?a=1067

If you need some more explanation on how simple a refinery is look here. http://science.howstuffworks.com/enviro ... ining2.htm

The same thing goes for ammo production. We are talking a population of 50,000+ people. When the new economy is based on Food, ammo and fuel, people will find a way to locate these resources and manufacture these things.

Not to mention the military/government will still have radio AND television broadcasting ability with much of the centralized haven having power (Electricity was covered earlier). They can call for volunteers far and wide to help with the recycling/manufacturing effort.

[azazel1024]

Sure, "instant" military power. However, because of the fuel situation, and ammo, I'd think they would want to "tool down" a bit on what air power they are using. Not that they wouldn't use what they have, but against "human" ground threats, an F-18 with a single 20mm cannon and some bombs under wing isn't necessarily more deadly against a zombie swarm than an A-1 skyraider, or P-51 with several .30 and .50 caliber machine guns and some under wing bombs and napalm. Easier maintenance (likely), easier to learn how to fly, shorter run ways and can operate off unimproved runways, uses less fuel, etc.

That isn't to say they'd push what they had in to the nearest landfill, just that I think at some point, they'd want to gear down what they were using to prop planes (spookies are going to get some heavy use!).

[Zer0 Kay]

I could build a plane using any decently stocked fabrication/metal working shop and a working engine or three.

And I doubt New York City has the resources to build the space shuttle. Probably no natural resources for some of the more important alloys and metals you'd need to withstand reentry.

Planes would be most important as observers/spotters.

As for throwing things at the planes...unless you planned on straffing runs at 50ft, I think you are pretty safe.

Aerial power allows you to spot large groups of zombies from a long distance and engage them far from the city. Alternately you can route fire teams to smaller concentrations that don't warrant an attack from the air.

For transport and cargo, where are you transporting to/from? If most/all the rest of the world has been consumed by the zombies, its not like you are running stuff between Winnie and Toronto. You might have some good use out of VTOL craft or helicopters for salvage runs (quick in and outs), but those would be very difficult to build compared to fixed wing aircraft.

Could have sworn at the start of this there was discussion of a network of these cities, must have been another topic. VTOL are insane fuel hogs even Helocopters consume less and the freaking Osprey are accidents waiting to happen. At Altus AFB they bolstered our SAR training because we were going to get a Crash Hawk... have to make sure we're proficient at finding all the body parts, it made it even more gross that the local Bar-S plant donated left over parts.

So the giant zombies can only toss a smaller zombie up to 50 feet away? Well dang that makes them pointless. I think that is wrong, may want to recalculate that.

[Zer0 Kay]

I could build a plane using any decently stocked fabrication/metal working shop and a working engine or three.

And I doubt New York City has the resources to build the space shuttle. Probably no natural resources for some of the more important alloys and metals you'd need to withstand reentry.

Planes would be most important as observers/spotters.

As for throwing things at the planes...unless you planned on straffing runs at 50ft, I think you are pretty safe.

Aerial power allows you to spot large groups of zombies from a long distance and engage them far from the city. Alternately you can route fire teams to smaller concentrations that don't warrant an attack from the air.

For transport and cargo, where are you transporting to/from? If most/all the rest of the world has been consumed by the zombies, its not like you are running stuff between Winnie and Toronto. You might have some good use out of VTOL craft or helicopters for salvage runs (quick in and outs), but those would be very difficult to build compared to fixed wing aircraft.

I agree. Except Winnipeg although capable of manufacturing aircraft probably wouldn't need to for some time. Considering the military base (NORAD) is located at the airport plus they would have a fleet of civilian aircraft at their disposal. Really all they would need was a small plane or ultralight for scouting, but it would be handy to have a squadron of F-18's on standby when needed.

The fuel problem...

Well eventually you would run out right? No. The military would be all over the ammo/fuel problem from day one IMO. J-P8 is a distillate of petroleum and is Kerosene based. Really all you need are a few petroleum engineers with an escort to reclaim a refinery or used oil recycling facility(Making a new haven in the city's network). They could theoretically build smaller refineries closer to the city too! Like this. http://www.new-ag.info/en/focus/focusItem.php?a=1067

If you need some more explanation on how simple a refinery is look here. http://science.howstuffworks.com/enviro ... ining2.htm

The same thing goes for ammo production. We are talking a population of 50,000+ people. When the new economy is based on Food, ammo and fuel, people will find a way to locate these resources and manufacture these things.

Not to mention the military/government will still have radio AND television broadcasting ability with much of the centralized haven having power (Electricity was covered earlier). They can call for volunteers far and wide to help with the recycling/manufacturing effort.

You do know it is JP-8 right (assuming that is a typo) and that the base there is A NORAD base not THE NORAD base? There is no ONE NORAD base, it is a command with many bases and tennant units.

[Zer0 Kay]

Sure, "instant" military power. However, because of the fuel situation, and ammo, I'd think they would want to "tool down" a bit on what air power they are using. Not that they wouldn't use what they have, but against "human" ground threats, an F-18 with a single 20mm cannon and some bombs under wing isn't necessarily more deadly against a zombie swarm than an A-1 skyraider, or P-51 with several .30 and .50 caliber machine guns and some under wing bombs and napalm. Easier maintenance (likely), easier to learn how to fly, shorter run ways and can operate off unimproved runways, uses less fuel, etc.

That isn't to say they'd push what they had in to the nearest landfill, just that I think at some point, they'd want to gear down what they were using to prop planes (spookies are going to get some heavy use!).

I can kinda see where you guys are going, but... but all of those are less lethal to a zombie mob than a few attack choppers Apaches and Cobras even modifying a Chinook into a gunship would be more devistating than an airplane. More time on target and more precision weapons. I'd still use all the big guns from fighters for fixed installations far better use than inaccurate straffing. So if ya gotta use planes use them for spotters and transports. Remove any mounted guns and use them on installations. You want zombie crowd control use helos with rocket pods and liberal use of their chainguns. Of course it would be intertaining to replace the rocket pods with machinegun pods.

[Oberoth]

You do know it is JP-8 right (assuming that is a typo) and that the base there is A NORAD base not THE NORAD base? There is no ONE NORAD base, it is a command with many bases and tennant units.

Yes. That was a typo, and There are certainly more bases that compose Canada's NORAD contribution to the organization, but the base located at the airport in Winnipeg is the HQ for NORAD in CANADA. Not sure about the HQ in the US, but I assume it is Cheyenne Mountain. I could be wrong but I don't want to Google that right now.

That alone makes that base special. They are likely going to have some stockpiles of fuel and ammo. That should get them through the first few months after The Wave with perhaps enough for a last ditch attack on whatever may be threatening them at the moment. Early on, after the world has gone silent they would probably send out some scout aircraft (And ground troops) to the closest populated areas to see what's happening there.

[Oberoth]

Could have sworn at the start of this there was discussion of a network of these cities, must have been another topic.

Yes. This was touched on but there are no canon details outside of a blurb of Winnipeg and Halifax (Rifter), Denver and Chicago. The Winnipeg Haven would certainly have been in contact with any other haven within it's NORAD network and any within short wave communication.

[Zer0 Kay]

You do know it is JP-8 right (assuming that is a typo) and that the base there is A NORAD base not THE NORAD base? There is no ONE NORAD base, it is a command with many bases and tennant units.

Yes. That was a typo, and There are certainly more bases that compose Canada's NORAD contribution to the organization, but the base located at the airport in Winnipeg is the HQ for NORAD in CANADA. Not sure about the HQ in the US, but I assume it is Cheyenne Mountain. I could be wrong but I don't want to Google that right now.

That alone makes that base special. They are likely going to have some stockpiles of fuel and ammo. That should get them through the first few months after The Wave with perhaps enough for a last ditch attack on whatever may be threatening them at the moment. Early on, after the world has gone silent they would probably send out some scout aircraft (And ground troops) to the closest populated areas to see what's happening there.

Why would NORAD make a base special. You do know what NORAD's job is don't you? It is intelligence gathering not combat so just because NORAD is on a base means nothing except that base has something special for gathering and/or distributing intel. Elmendorf AFB AK is a "NORAD" base but the NORAD unit is only an AWACS and supporting units no combat aircraft. The bases combat aircraft all belong to the 3rd Wing. Cheyenne Mountain... combat... yeah sure. If you want stockpiles of military gear you pick training bases (e.g. Lackland, Coronado, Ft. Brag, etc...) the issue is that many times the stockpile is based on what they're training for (i.e. Fort Lawton would have a bunch of tank and self propelled gun parts and ammunition, while Lackland would have a lot of small arms and ammunition). Elmendorf had regular shipments of JP-8 and not a single drop came from an Alaskan refinery.

But you know what it is your game, just don't (I'm not saying you have) go pretending that the stuff is there in real life.

BTW those big guns off the aircraft would do better on the ground than from the air or even from a tall building because the spray of bullets would be able to go through a lot of zombies. A strafe is more of a downward angle with a single bullet maybe taking out a couple zeeks and then there is the issue of strafes only making a line through the herd per pass. Large ordinance also poses a risk of lobbing some active zeek parts beyond your barricades if they make it that close or simply leaving parts of zeeks that will get others when they go out to inspect.

[Zer0 Kay]

Could have sworn at the start of this there was discussion of a network of these cities, must have been another topic.

Yes. This was touched on but there are no canon details outside of a blurb of Winnipeg and Halifax (Rifter), Denver and Chicago. The Winnipeg Haven would certainly have been in contact with any other haven within it's NORAD network and any within short wave communication.

Now there is something, I'm sure NORAD, at least one of the bases has a SLF antenna that uses the Earth as the atennuator. So they should be able to maintain contact with all other allied bases. Then reguardless of what the books say the internet would not go dead that was the reason that they made the old SIPRNET. The way the Internet works in order to make it go completely silent every single relay would have to be destroyed and why would zombies destroy umanned relays? Why would a thinker zeek even consider it over any other object it isn't like it can see someone using it. So all that communication down crap... especially when considering military SIPR and NIPR nets? It's more likely for those short waves to go dead, because of EMP caused by nuking zeek infested cities.

[azazel1024]

If nothing else you'd have satellite communications for awhile. Even if the C&C sites were taken out for the satellites they aren't going to suddenly drift off, get misaligned or go dead. I don't have enough satellite control systems experience (read none, just some reading on the topic) to know how long you'd have. I'd bet though, you could maintain world wide communications with other satellite phone or satellite radio systems for at least a few months, and odds are you'd be able to relay in some manner for a few years before you'd lose enough links. For the internet though, it probably would be effectively dead. The satellites still utilize ground stations for a lot of their routing functions and all data centers would be off line (few have the resources to operate on secondary power systems for more than a few days). Now you could probably rebuild an "internet" using the satellite communications you had and any live ground stations in other cities, bases, etc that are safe havens. For that matter there is no reason why Winnie wouldn't still have an "internet", it would just be more appropriate to call it a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) as it would likely be isolated from anything around it.

For SLF/ELF antennas, no go. The Soviet Union/Russia has/had a single transmitter near Murmansk and the US has two (both no longer operational). They are decent sized installations and use ground conductivity to form the antenna for transmitting as it takes an installation several miles in size. However, SLF/ELF can transmit through the entire planet (its how deep submerged submarine communications were conducted, however its is receive only for the submarines).

VLF antennas are also huge for transmitting, but are a bit more practical in size (still massive, massive installations), but they only penetrate to a depth of about 20m in sea water. Not sure about Earth penetration, but I'd assume they are fairly well beyond the horizon transmission capable.

Alternately short wave radio has an extrodinarly long transmission range. All the way around the planet with the right ionosphere conditions.

[Zer0 Kay]

If nothing else you'd have satellite communications for awhile. Even if the C&C sites were taken out for the satellites they aren't going to suddenly drift off, get misaligned or go dead. I don't have enough satellite control systems experience (read none, just some reading on the topic) to know how long you'd have. I'd bet though, you could maintain world wide communications with other satellite phone or satellite radio systems for at least a few months, and odds are you'd be able to relay in some manner for a few years before you'd lose enough links. For the internet though, it probably would be effectively dead. The satellites still utilize ground stations for a lot of their routing functions and all data centers would be off line (few have the resources to operate on secondary power systems for more than a few days). Now you could probably rebuild an "internet" using the satellite communications you had and any live ground stations in other cities, bases, etc that are safe havens. For that matter there is no reason why Winnie wouldn't still have an "internet", it would just be more appropriate to call it a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) as it would likely be isolated from anything around it.
I'm sure winni also has service providers within the city, as long as they are up and another surviving city with a ISP survives and there at least two computers, there is an internet. The Internet is not stored in data centers it is massively networked computers. The data centers just store data. Contact from one base to another never crosses a data center unless they're retreiving data from one. IIRC with NIPR/SIPR net they don't even need an public ISP.

For SLF/ELF antennas, no go. The Soviet Union/Russia has/had a single transmitter near Murmansk and the US has two (both no longer operational). They are decent sized installations and use ground conductivity to form the antenna for transmitting as it takes an installation several miles in size. However, SLF/ELF can transmit through the entire planet (its how deep submerged submarine communications were conducted, however its is receive only for the submarines).They still exist, non-operational doesn't mean demilled. You know what sucks? Knowing stuff that can get you charged with endangering national security I'll just say that there is stuff the military has that will allow communications between bases reguardless of EMP, sattelite contact or landlines and it was the only way the President maintained comm on 9/11 with all the phone, cell and sattelite traffic.

VLF antennas are also huge for transmitting, but are a bit more practical in size (still massive, massive installations), but they only penetrate to a depth of about 20m in sea water. Not sure about Earth penetration, but I'd assume they are fairly well beyond the horizon transmission capable.yes

Alternately short wave radio has an extrodinarly long transmission range. All the way around the planet with the right ionosphere conditions.yup and lots of survivalists have one

[Oberoth]

So all that communication down crap...

I don't recall saying communications went down. I did say that communications networks would go silent ie: no one left to respond on said networks. Remember that 90% of the human population was turned into zombies? How long said networks/internet would last is a question mark and is worthy of debate in this thread. My guess is that GPS/Communications satellites would last a year or more until their positions degrade enough that the system doesn't work anymore. There are also other factors involved too; Solar flares and the like.

This reminds me of the whole Robotech Protoculture debate that has raged for decades. There just isn't any canon "Hard setting" (Or is there? Off to re-read my collection...) as Azazel put it to say one way or another how these large havens and their networks are fairing in the game timeline.

[Oberoth]

Onto page three now. I'd like to thank everyone for their input on this topic. CHEERS!

[Zer0 Kay]

So all that communication down crap...

I don't recall saying communications went down. I did say that communications networks would go silent ie: no one left to respond on said networks. Remember that 90% of the human population was turned into zombies? How long said networks/internet would last is a question mark and is worthy of debate in this thread. My guess is that GPS/Communications satellites would last a year or more until their positions degrade enough that the system doesn't work anymore. There are also other factors involved too; Solar flares and the like.

This reminds me of the whole Robotech Protoculture debate that has raged for decades. There just isn't any canon "Hard setting" (Or is there? Off to re-read my collection...) as Azazel put it to say one way or another how these large havens and their networks are fairing in the game timeline.

Most sat possition control is automated so GPS should take much longer than a year. Sats are also usually shielded against solar flares, the comm with them may go out but they'll still be up there.

Aside from death cults and other humans trying to cut off comm what could the zombies do purposefully to eliminate networks? It isn't like the ISPs and telcos depend on a single line in and out of the city for communication.

[azazel1024]

I understand perfectly how the internet works (that is basically my job as an IT project manager). The thing is, a good 90+% of all websites are hosted out of data centers these days. Also service providers don't necessarily have all of their infrastructure within the metropolitan limits of a city, even regional service providers. Any kind of real distance between cities and you are going to run in to repeaters, routers, switches, etc that are going to be run off other power grids, etc. In the modern internet, a situation like dead reign would likely knock down the backbone that would connect cities together, unless you could maintain the infrastructure between cities.

Now with white space 802.22TM Wifi standard you could pretty easily hookup long range data connections and conceivably do long haul backbones with no hardlines or satellites. You'd just have to maintain small locally powered repeaters between the locations you'd want to connect. I think the expected range is around 60 miles. Unless you need to connect cities half a continent away, it should be easy enough to man and maintain a small service compound and repeater tower. Say a couple of squads in a walled compound with a helipad and blackout ops at night and no noise during the day. Shouldn't attract much in the way of zed attention and have a helo on short standby back at base/safe haven waiting to pluck the group out if needed. Have 3-4 of those and you have a good high data rate (around 22Mbps) connection about 200 miles long. Its not going to be sharing the whole of the current interwebz...but that is plenty fast enough, especially if MiMo operation is possible (as far as I know from the spec, you could do MiMo), could handle a couple of hundred VOIP connections on top of some data sharing.

Now you'd still have an internet as such, it would just be a local affair, or really a MAN.

[Zer0 Kay]

I understand perfectly how the internet works (that is basically my job as an IT project manager). The thing is, a good 90+% of all websites are hosted out of data centers these days. Also service providers don't necessarily have all of their infrastructure within the metropolitan limits of a city, even regional service providers. Any kind of real distance between cities and you are going to run in to repeaters, routers, switches, etc that are going to be run off other power grids, etc. In the modern internet, a situation like dead reign would likely knock down the backbone that would connect cities together, unless you could maintain the infrastructure between cities.

Now with white space 802.22TM Wifi standard you could pretty easily hookup long range data connections and conceivably do long haul backbones with no hardlines or satellites. You'd just have to maintain small locally powered repeaters between the locations you'd want to connect. I think the expected range is around 60 miles. Unless you need to connect cities half a continent away, it should be easy enough to man and maintain a small service compound and repeater tower. Say a couple of squads in a walled compound with a helipad and blackout ops at night and no noise during the day. Shouldn't attract much in the way of zed attention and have a helo on short standby back at base/safe haven waiting to pluck the group out if needed. Have 3-4 of those and you have a good high data rate (around 22Mbps) connection about 200 miles long. Its not going to be sharing the whole of the current interwebz...but that is plenty fast enough, especially if MiMo operation is possible (as far as I know from the spec, you could do MiMo), could handle a couple of hundred VOIP connections on top of some data sharing.

Now you'd still have an internet as such, it would just be a local affair, or really a MAN.

How much power do those repeaters need? Can it be done with a Battery powered, Solar recharged unit like "Giant Voices" on some military bases? If not a large boost maybe reduce the distance and increase the number of repeaters. Heck even if they do have good range you'd likely want to put some overlapping to provide redundancy. With Helos it would be east to put these things out and guard the maintenance crew while they're putting it up. One Chinook with the mast and maintenance crew and two assault choppers of some kind flying patrol at 1/4 and 1/2 miles and when the chinook is unloaded it can take up perimeter at 1 mile, just to observe, until it is time to pick up the maintenance crew. If these masts also had a proximity sensor and were constantly monitored, electronically or otherwise, for denial of service it would make a great EWS.

[azazel1024]

Most of them couldn't be battery powered with a small solar panel. You wouldn't need a huge installation, but a little 5w panel and a deep cycle 20amp-hr lead acid battery won't be enough. Most of the mainline routers and repeates pull down in the range of 10-50w depending on the kind of load they are built for, copper or fiber, etc. That does mean they don't need much, but you are still talking probably around a 200w panel and around 2-3kw/hr of battery storage assuming you want to ensure enough power and storage for cloudy days, a couple of days of snow obscuring the panels, etc.

The existing infrastructure would be hard to get running in a low maintenance manner. However, I haven't work specifically in telecom before, so I honestly don't know. You might be able to use the existing lines and modify how the trunks are used and install new routers or repeaters that are lower power draw or what not since I assume you are going to have vastly less traffic and many fewer potential recipients (smaller routing tables, fewer packets to route and less repeating going on, etc).

[Zer0 Kay]

Most of them couldn't be battery powered with a small solar panel. You wouldn't need a huge installation, but a little 5w panel and a deep cycle 20amp-hr lead acid battery won't be enough. Most of the mainline routers and repeates pull down in the range of 10-50w depending on the kind of load they are built for, copper or fiber, etc. That does mean they don't need much, but you are still talking probably around a 200w panel and around 2-3kw/hr of battery storage assuming you want to ensure enough power and storage for cloudy days, a couple of days of snow obscuring the panels, etc.

The existing infrastructure would be hard to get running in a low maintenance manner. However, I haven't work specifically in telecom before, so I honestly don't know. You might be able to use the existing lines and modify how the trunks are used and install new routers or repeaters that are lower power draw or what not since I assume you are going to have vastly less traffic and many fewer potential recipients (smaller routing tables, fewer packets to route and less repeating going on, etc).

The more and more work that goes into that makes it seem like the short wave is much better for simple voice com. Any hope of a network would have to be fiber with forts at the repeaters.

[azazel1024]

Probably. Of course all things considered, if you have the will, it frankly isn't that "impossible" to just launch satellites for com and data. Now I am not that knowledable of it, but I'd suspect you'd have to grow a lot of industries like microchip production and/or design, etc that would take a long time for really nice stuff. However, I'd think with some knowledable people, and a willingness to possibly lose some rockets, you could slap together some satellites and rockets from "homegrown" stuff that could get the job done resonably for a cheap economic investment in the grand scheme of things. Might not be elegant, might not be reliable, and might have a potentially short service life (maybe a few years before a solar flare knocks it out due to low or ineffective shielding), but you could do it.

Beyond that, you could develop a data transfer spec for shortwave. I certainly don't have the technical knowhow, but look at it this way, wifi operates in 20mhz slices for 150Mbps transfer rates, real world of around 70-80Mbps in near ideal conditions. That is around 4 bits per cycle and theoretical of about 8 bits (1 byte) per cycle. If you used the 9.4-9.9mhz band, and all of it, that gives you maybe a theoretical transfer rate of around 4Mbps. Short wave, especially at longer ranges has a a lot of transmission quality issues, so your real transfer rate is probably even lower though.

However, nothing saying you can't get in to a lot of the DOCSIS stuff and be using character sets (I believe that is also how CDMA works, though I don't know all that much about the CDMA spec), etc to increase the data rate.

That is still real slow, but unless you are planning on P2P file sharing over short wave, it would be plenty to host a few low quality VOIP telephony sessions as well as some low speed data connections for "internet" connectivity to far remote sites. For closer in stuff that isn't feasibly within the protection of the city itself (making running hardline, or operating the existing hardline infrastructure) 802.22 spec sounds like it has a lot of promise as I mentioned earlier. Theoretically around 22Mbps transmission rates and vaguely 65 mile maximum ranges in ideal conditions. It would be ideal for long haul stuff, but a single repeater in the middle and you could be transfering data ~130 miles between two locations and only have the single "fort" with a repeater at it to protect.

[Zer0 Kay]

Probably. Of course all things considered, if you have the will, it frankly isn't that "impossible" to just launch satellites for com and data. Now I am not that knowledable of it, but I'd suspect you'd have to grow a lot of industries like microchip production and/or design, etc that would take a long time for really nice stuff. However, I'd think with some knowledable people, and a willingness to possibly lose some rockets, you could slap together some satellites and rockets from "homegrown" stuff that could get the job done resonably for a cheap economic investment in the grand scheme of things. Might not be elegant, might not be reliable, and might have a potentially short service life (maybe a few years before a solar flare knocks it out due to low or ineffective shielding), but you could do it.

Beyond that, you could develop a data transfer spec for shortwave. I certainly don't have the technical knowhow, but look at it this way, wifi operates in 20mhz slices for 150Mbps transfer rates, real world of around 70-80Mbps in near ideal conditions. That is around 4 bits per cycle and theoretical of about 8 bits (1 byte) per cycle. If you used the 9.4-9.9mhz band, and all of it, that gives you maybe a theoretical transfer rate of around 4Mbps. Short wave, especially at longer ranges has a a lot of transmission quality issues, so your real transfer rate is probably even lower though.

However, nothing saying you can't get in to a lot of the DOCSIS stuff and be using character sets (I believe that is also how CDMA works, though I don't know all that much about the CDMA spec), etc to increase the data rate.

That is still real slow, but unless you are planning on P2P file sharing over short wave, it would be plenty to host a few low quality VOIP telephony sessions as well as some low speed data connections for "internet" connectivity to far remote sites. For closer in stuff that isn't feasibly within the protection of the city itself (making running hardline, or operating the existing hardline infrastructure) 802.22 spec sounds like it has a lot of promise as I mentioned earlier. Theoretically around 22Mbps transmission rates and vaguely 65 mile maximum ranges in ideal conditions. It would be ideal for long haul stuff, but a single repeater in the middle and you could be transfering data ~130 miles between two locations and only have the single "fort" with a repeater at it to protect.

Making the rockets and the sat stuff is the least of your worries. NASA and every other space agency has a rediculous amount of assets assigned to tracking the crap we alread have in our orbital junk yard. So the worst thing is finding a vacancy in the trash heap. Of course most of the crud gravitates to an equitorial orbit. So the Earth is another planet in the system that has a ring... ours is just made of trash instead of frozen gasses.

Idea with the short wave and internet... parallel transmission. Multiple shortwaves sending packets on different frequencies. It would be like a new type of modem PLUS they don't have to worry about congesting the frequencies and could actually use the ranges that are reserved... as long as someone else isn't using them.

[azazel1024]

I don't know enough about shortwave to know how well the various parts of the shortwave spectrum propegate, but you can always move to one of the shorter wave lengths and occupy that for transmision. I was simply using the most commonly used bandwidth as an example (I think shortwave goes down to around 20Mhz or so) and that would give you a huge boost in transmision rate, though it might also lead to more packet loss as it may not propogate as well.

[Oberoth]

Well i'm sure we can all agree that satellites in the long run are unreliable for any survivor networks. So short wave would be the ticket with the possibility of a short wave internet network. What about road networks?

Lets take Winnipeg and Denver as an example. Winnipeg has been detailed a bit in this thread as far as population and resources available to them. Denver on the other
hand I have very little details to give other than it's approximate road distance from Winnipeg, that being roughly 1100 miles. It seems reasonable to me that the two haven's would have been in contact with each other for some time. Initially by the regular networks before they failed and later by short wave.

Would they have a road rout or two cleared and maintained for trade or emergencies?

[G]

Well i'm sure we can all agree that satellites in the long run are unreliable for any survivor networks. So short wave would be the ticket with the possibility of a short wave internet network. What about road networks?

Lets take Winnipeg and Denver as an example. Winnipeg has been detailed a bit in this thread as far as population and resources available to them. Denver on the other
hand I have very little details to give other than it's approximate road distance from Winnipeg, that being roughly 1100 miles. It seems reasonable to me that the two haven's would have been in contact with each other for some time. Initially by the regular networks before they failed and later by short wave.

Would they have a road rout or two cleared and maintained for trade or emergencies?

Hmm the longer after the dead start to walk the more likely it is to have a route clear.

Also having a trade route means you could be starting a convergence on where you are going.

Then there are the road warriors and bandits you have to worry about...Which is probably just a GM decision that we can't make overall for everyone.

[Zer0 Kay]

Well i'm sure we can all agree that satellites in the long run are unreliable for any survivor networks. So short wave would be the ticket with the possibility of a short wave internet network. What about road networks?

Lets take Winnipeg and Denver as an example. Winnipeg has been detailed a bit in this thread as far as population and resources available to them. Denver on the other
hand I have very little details to give other than it's approximate road distance from Winnipeg, that being roughly 1100 miles. It seems reasonable to me that the two haven's would have been in contact with each other for some time. Initially by the regular networks before they failed and later by short wave.

Would they have a road rout or two cleared and maintained for trade or emergencies?

The sats should be reliable for at least two years.

[Zer0 Kay]

Well i'm sure we can all agree that satellites in the long run are unreliable for any survivor networks. So short wave would be the ticket with the possibility of a short wave internet network. What about road networks?

Lets take Winnipeg and Denver as an example. Winnipeg has been detailed a bit in this thread as far as population and resources available to them. Denver on the other
hand I have very little details to give other than it's approximate road distance from Winnipeg, that being roughly 1100 miles. It seems reasonable to me that the two haven's would have been in contact with each other for some time. Initially by the regular networks before they failed and later by short wave.

Would they have a road rout or two cleared and maintained for trade or emergencies?

Hmm the longer after the dead start to walk the more likely it is to have a route clear.

Also having a trade route means you could be starting a convergence on where you are going.

Then there are the road warriors and bandits you have to worry about...Which is probably just a GM decision that we can't make overall for everyone.

That would be why your vehicles would have to be armed and travel in caravans. This is where those air assets would best be used. You have several attack fighters like A-10s or F-15Es on alert and ready to take off when a caravan calls. That is only part of it because the bombs and strafing runs will only soften up the target and scatter them. Helos would need to come in to clean up. The best thing for a single trade route would be to have fort/outposts at regular intervals each with 1 or 2 helos. Of course the helos would have to have their FLIR modified to Thermal so on their regular patrols they can find targets (was it ever determined if zeeks produce heat... what about when they're in stasis?) in the woods. Another thing that should be done for safety reasons is to clear trees and brush from the sides of the road out to about a quarter mile and avoid bridges or roads that run along the bottom of raised areas (i.e. mountains, hills, etc.).

[dargo83]

i was thinking of the whole thing if a zed produces heat as well. they use thermal sencers to find bodies in the ground that have been buried with in a few days to weeks due to that when a body rotts and decays they produse heat.

[glitterboy2098]

So all that communication down crap...

I don't recall saying communications went down. I did say that communications networks would go silent ie: no one left to respond on said networks. Remember that 90% of the human population was turned into zombies? How long said networks/internet would last is a question mark and is worthy of debate in this thread. My guess is that GPS/Communications satellites would last a year or more until their positions degrade enough that the system doesn't work anymore. There are also other factors involved too; Solar flares and the like.

actually, GPS wouldn't last a fraction of that. we hashed that out over in the chaos earth forum awhile back. long story short, while the orbits are stable, it takes near constant monitoring from ground stations to keep the signals in sync, and thus useable for navigation. GPS would likely be totally unusable within a week. the receivers would still report locations, but the degree of error in those outputs would be horrendus.

[Zer0 Kay]

So all that communication down crap...

I don't recall saying communications went down. I did say that communications networks would go silent ie: no one left to respond on said networks. Remember that 90% of the human population was turned into zombies? How long said networks/internet would last is a question mark and is worthy of debate in this thread. My guess is that GPS/Communications satellites would last a year or more until their positions degrade enough that the system doesn't work anymore. There are also other factors involved too; Solar flares and the like.

actually, GPS wouldn't last a fraction of that. we hashed that out over in the chaos earth forum awhile back. long story short, while the orbits are stable, it takes near constant monitoring from ground stations to keep the signals in sync, and thus useable for navigation. GPS would likely be totally unusable within a week. the receivers would still report locations, but the degree of error in those outputs would be horrendus.

So what your basing this off of Wolfe?

Folks it's not going matter one single bit how long the ash is up there when it comes to the GPS system.
The damage has been done already.

The satellites are only a part of the whole.
The GPS system HAS TO BE continuously monitored and maintained from the ground monitoring and control stations or it will degrade significantly and I'm not talking by a few feet here either.

As you loose these stations the system will degrade, and the longer they are down the worse it gets.

You loose the master control station completely (Schriever Air Force Base who itself is just south of NORAD) and you really no longer have a viable GPS system you have a bunch of metal in orbit.

Then there's also the SDI sats killing each other and everything else up there at the same time as well, so your looking at even more degradation of the system.

By the time you are able to get a clear signal through the atmosphere, there's nothing useful to recieve.

I mean come on the guy refers to NORAD as a location!!! Should tip you off that this guy doesn't know what he's talking about. Why would SDI sats kill each other off? If multiple nations get SDI sats up... they're usually programmed to shoot down nukes... as we can tell they didn't do a very good job. The sats are automated, they are just tracked, just in case their orbit needs to be altered. As far as signals... they'd be "hard wired" they wouldn't expect to change or alter the frequencies so it would likely all be encased crystals. Unless acted on by an outside force those sats would probably maintain their proper orbits for their expected lifespan. As far as Schriever being the only location of a "master control station" uh... yeah the military doesn't believe in producing assets with single point of failure issues. Dual redundancies at the minimum (two spares), tripple is better. Never, never ever, never put all your grenades in one basket, never count your rounds in the middle of a fire fight and if your not sure always tactical reload just in case, it's better to drop rounds in a magazine to pick it up later than to be out of ammo in the one you have loaded when your trying to shoot something. What does all that mean? The view of the GPS system you have here is unlike the military even with the lowest bidder.

[Zer0 Kay]

i was thinking of the whole thing if a zed produces heat as well. they use thermal sencers to find bodies in the ground that have been buried with in a few days to weeks due to that when a body rotts and decays they produse heat.

Right but are they decaying when they are only active or when they're in stasis to save energy for activation or do they decay the entire time?

[Oberoth]

It specifically states in the book that zed's don't show up on any type of IR equipment. But we are moving off topic again. So what about tunnel networks between city havens or small havens?

[azazel1024]

Not likely. Tunnels are hideous resource intensive to construct. I could see a tunnel network between outlying forts, bases or pillboxes and the fortified safe haven, but anything over a couple of miles long is just going to take too long and too many resources.

I think a likely scenario is going to be road or rail network link between safe havens and mining/resource gathering centers (salvage will last awhile, but even with good recycling you are going to need some mining and resource gathering).

Since zeds, even with a thinker (they aren't THAT bright) aren't likely to tear up rail road tracks or put things on the track that would need clearing, rail roads should be a viable option. Armored train cars that are armed as well with previously mentioned air assets should do it. Heck train cars could support a couple of light weight helos for aerial spotting ahead of the trains and a few flexible MGs with maybe a couple of light cannon and mortars should make a rail train just about impregnable (with at least a good 1/2 armor plate on all cars).

For roads you could run convoys of road trains that have a turreted/gimbled MG on each cab and one at the rear, light cab armor and a few escorts. Modified pickups or SUVs with light armor and a hatch/turret with a heavy MG on it. Maybe a flat bed tractor trailer hauling a light Helo (and OH series of some flavor) for aerial spotting to call in air resources. You could work on fortifying the road network by building retaining walls along the length, though if the safe havens are far apart that would be pretty cost prohibitive. Longer distance road/rail networks could have fortified outpost along the way. Basically wall in the outpost and that section of road/rail for overnight stays (zombies are more active then and can see life further) and breakdowns. Some mine fields, barbed wire to slow the zeds, MG pillboxes every 400yds around the perimeter about 50yds out from 15ft, 3ft thick steel reinforced concrete retaining walls with tunnels connecting the pillboxes back to the fort itself. You could utilize some lighter than air spotting platforms, either with people on them, or better yet remote operated tethered platforms with some sensors such as visible and PLA to spot coming zeds with a few hundred feet of extra height to increase LOS from the fort. You don't have to worry too much about humans with a rifle taking pot shots at them, though of course bandits and retros you may have to worry about a bit.

A few light artillery tubes in the fort with some mortars, a helo pad and a couple of light helos, a couple of medium transport/gunship coverted ones as well for SAR, spotting and fire support. Probably something like a battery of 75s, 25pdr QF, or 105s (4-8 tubes) and maybe a battery of 6-8 81mm mortars with around a double company (240-320) soldiers to operate the artillery, man the walls and pill boxes and provide some patrols of the immediate area and provide local support to any convoys that come under attack.

Of course you could have smaller forts as well more frequently if that is feasible instead.

[glitterboy2098]

So what your basing this off of Wolfe?

no i'm basing off research i did during that thread to figure out of wolfe's statement about constant monitoring was right. long story short? he was, more or less. the atomic clocks on the sats are so sensetive to relativistic effects that even orbital velocities mess them up enough to ruin the positioniong ability, and without regular (read, roughly every day) synchronization of their clocks to a non-orbtial one, and updated orbital data uploads, they cease to be useful as a navigation tool.

the ability to plot locations is based on the time signals and orbital data from the sats..and even minor discrepiancies can generate huge errors due to the nature of the calculations.

I mean come on the guy refers to NORAD as a location!!! Should tip you off that this guy doesn't know what he's talking about. Why would SDI sats kill each other off? If multiple nations get SDI sats up... they're usually programmed to shoot down nukes... as we can tell they didn't do a very good job.

please note which forum that comes from. Chaos Earth. a setting where NORAD is a hyper advanced command and communications facilty and headquarters of NEMA, and (as shown directly in MiO), orbtial kill sats were programmed to shoot down anything in orbit, not just ballistic missiles. (given that the S, Russia, and china in real life are all working on ASAT tech to shoot down each others sats should a war go hot...not all that impluasible.)

oh, and btw, in chaos earth there were no exchanges of nuclear missiles between the world powers. the only canon nuke exchange was between two south american nations..neither of which appear to have even had space programs much less SDI programs.