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Some skills I have trouble understanding...

what is the benifit of Laser communications vs just using a basic radio?

laser comms are more useful in a space based campaign where you have ship to ship communication using lasers.

Ajax has it right about it uses and limitations.
Part of the limitations would be the degradation of the comm beam due to atmospheric dilution and interference. (iow: the air messing up your signal of a long distance)

as for decoding the signal, both archies (earth and moon) could do it faster then anyone because they think at machine speed. but it is also figuring out the algorithm the people are using to code the messages in the 1st place.

It's good for point-to-point communications when you know the enemy is monitoring the radio. In those rare instances where an enemy could detect that a message was sent from Point A to Point B, they rarely can intercept it and detection of the message will not give a clue of what the message may contain.

It's a fun, but limited skill.

Ok, so there is an added benifit of it (Unlike electronic countermeasures) that if you use laser communications, chances of interception are remarkably low.

So, could 2 PA pilots mount a laser signal to both their PA and while in combat communicate relitively freely? Or is this more of a thing between 2 stationary targets.

Concider this for the advanced technology of rifts, also, are there any examples of this or "laser radios" in the books?

dark brandon wrote:
Concider this for the advanced technology of rifts, also, are there any examples of this or "laser radios" in the books?

In Merc Ops, there are several new radio systems from Wilk's, at least two of them require/use lasers.

And I've used laser communications in Rifts for a while.