A blue force tracker shows where your own forces are. Armies use dedicated hardware for it. In airsoft and milsim the same idea works on the phone every player already carries: each phone reports its position, and every player on the side sees the whole friendly picture. TacLink is built as that kind of tracker.
What you see
- Every friendly position on your side, on the event map the organizer drew.
- The age of each position, so a teammate who dropped out of range is marked as old and not shown as current.
- Your squad with its own filter, so you can hide the rest of the side when you need to.
- Enemy markers your side placed, each with its age.
- Orders from the Commander or Squad leader, with a point on the map.
- Player status: Alive, Dead or Medic.
Who sees what
Visibility is per side. A side never sees the other side’s positions or status. The Commander and staff see the whole side. Organizers and staff can see all sides, which helps them run the game.
Without signal, the side’s phones exchange data over Bluetooth. Those payloads are encrypted with a key for that side only.
Hands free
A tracker is only useful if it keeps running. TacLink keeps sharing with the phone locked or another app open, for the whole event. Android shows a notification while it runs, iOS a Live Activity. Players keep the phone in a pocket and look at it when they need to.
When there is no signal
Joining needs signal; the meeting point usually has it. After that, the map and the event data are on the phone. Phones near each other on the same side keep each other updated over Bluetooth, with tens of metres per hop and phones relaying for each other. One phone with signal bridges the side to the server and fills in the rest of the picture.
Mesh range extenders and watch apps for Apple Watch and Wear OS are coming soon.
Getting started
The organizer creates the event on the web and prints one QR code per side. Players scan their code at the meeting point. Free for players, no ads, and free for events up to 15 players. Larger events cost the organizer one price per event; see pricing.