Another radio idea

[decoman 45]

Item description:

A portable radio worn on the back of a person, akin to Vietnam war ear PRC radio: http://www.tourofdutyinfo.com/ToDAdvisorwebpages/fieldradio2.html

The radio uses rechargable batteries that will eventually become depleted.

Purpose:

This portable radio offers server wide non encrypted communication with other portable radios of the same kind.

Functioning:

A user is to turn one or more dials or simply input a number in order to transmit over certain radio frequency or over a particular channel.

Friend and foe would be able to listen in on eachother, if listening/transmitting on same frequency/channel.

A greater range of channels for transmitting over would make evesdropping hard, impractical, but not impossible.

The radio can/might have pre-programmed presets, for quick switching between teams on different channels or for jumping channels quickly.

Potential issues:

Too many people involved with a single frequency/channel?

Malevolent disturbance, caused by open mic flooding a particular channel with noise. Could be roleplayed as jamming I guess.

Malevolent disturbance on familiar frequencies/channels, making it difficult for anyone that e.g wanted to use channel 01 to start initial communication.

Malevolent disturbance on any random channel.

If made too convenient, anyone attempting to evesdrop in order to accidentally come across transmissions on a frequency/channel, might spend too much time on this task.

Will be inferior to out-of-game voice comms clients like Teamspeak for example, making in-game battery game mechanics irrelevant.

Fun things:

Implementation of codes, for quickly requesting comms over a given frequency/channel.

Initial contact made on standard choice of frequency/channel (basicly public), further communication is then assigned to a coded frequency/channel (more private)

Spoofing identities (if possible)

The use of a radio can offer a certain initiative to the transmitter/receiver party. When listening for a command to be given over channel xx, the one listening and the one transmitting has the initiative to start communicating, making it relatively easy to communicate brief information without great risk of being intercepted by anyone trying to eavesdrop on any randomly chosen channel.

The aquisition of other peoples radio (as loot) might reveal the preset channels made on that particular radio.

Radios could be a way to socialize people to create groups I think, those who are not already teamed up using other voice comms clients.

Exploit potential:

Unknown

Difficult to code? I have no idea.