Letters from home...

Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:

No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.

If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

**Brother Coa**

Conservationist wrote:Letters would be pretty hard to deliver actually. It could take years just to get the administrative work done. Think, letters to X regiment of XX unit of XXXXX, XXX crusade. It would be tough to manage a million or more regiments. Anyways, citizens on Y planet probably would be forgotten, 99.99% of the citizens in the IoM are expendable and are forgotten as soon as they are born (probably). Think about it, in our world now, the mail can easily get mixed up, in the IoM, mail has to travel many light years to constantly moving regiments. It could easily take a century if the idea of mailing is implemented at all.

I can imagine that they even add something like:

"P.S. The commissars are really, really nice to all of us here."

**Blood Lord Soldado**

I don't see why email wouldn't exsist.

Aren't there whole planets dedicated to communications?

**Taoofss**

Can they just use email? Or in this case, warp-mail.

**Laodamia**

Communication using our form of media technology would not work in space. I read an article a few weeks ago about sending humans to Mars. It was said that it took more than half an hour for radio waves to go from the Earth to Mars. And Mars is literally a doorstep away from us at a galactic scale. Imagine if the Guardsman was in a different sector, or even segmentum! Imagine him being light years away. The message would take ages, maybe decades or centuries to reach his family.

**WARORK93**

Laodamia wrote:Communication using our form of media technology would not work in space. I read an article a few weeks ago about sending humans to Mars. It was said that it took more than half an hour for radio waves to go from the Earth to Mars. And Mars is literally a doorstep away from us at a galactic scale. Imagine if the Guardsman was in a different sector, or even segmentum! Imagine him being light years away. The message would take ages, maybe decades or centuries to reach his family.

IG doesn't use radio except on planet, communications go through via astropath but I'm pretty sure it was said earlier that astropaths were too valuable to use in mail carrying.

perhaps a system could be set up with some sort of warp sensitive servitors? messages are transmitted from one to another and relayed to another who re writes the message and then that is sent to the guardsman in question and vice versa...

I saw something like that in "The Killing Ground" although it was being used by the GKs

**Blood Lord Soldado**

Right but that is assuming we would still be using radio waves in the 41st millenium.

If they have figured out light speed travel and energy fields, it is safe to assume they have made some type of advancement in communications.

Communication is the most essential part of any tactical strategy.

I guess just saying email is not as fun as coming up with timelines for delivering letters 20 light years away, but there has to be another way

**KamikazeCanuck**

In general no. When you're drafted you will never see or hear of your home again until your tour is done and only in death does duty end.

**Laodamia**

Blood Lord Soldado wrote:Right but that is assuming we would still be using radio waves in the 41st millenium.

We are actually still using radio waves in the 41st millenium. As WARORK93 said, the imperial military still uses radio technology for its military communications:

Vox casters are actually using radio technology, IIRC.

**xXSir MontyXx**

I wonder if there are those annoying Cabaret commercials still???

Really though in 40K troops are sent lightyears away from home. The only conceivable way to get messages from your family would be through war communication. Anything less would be pointless.

**BrotherItchy**

In support of the theory that some Guardsmen have loved ones with them, some of the Gaunt's Ghosts novels seem to indicate that the regimental "train" is full of family and general hangers-on. Kolea's kid's hang out there when he, Caff, and Criid are off doing their thing.