A History of Night Ops

[Psychlonic]

I thought this might be of interest to anyone who used to be in the night ops scene, still is in the scene, or might be planning to get into it.

A History of Night Ops
In 2003, a user named Infrared created a thread entitled "nighttime ops (new guy)." He explained his hobby of sneaking into semi-occupied areas at night to see how far he could get, leaving no trace, taking nothing, and was in it for the adrenaline rush. This would spawn a gigantic number of forum threads, separate forums (some hidden), guides, and an equally large legion of people against the concept.
While this idea has been around for centuries, and will be around for centuries after this is forgotten, the concept was collectively named "night ops" by &TOTSE members.

Nighttime Ops (Night Ops I):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1714220

This was the thread that started it all. The basics would be talked about here, and night ops were mostly trial and error with few to no guides on how to perform techniques.


Night Ops II:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1717344

The second topic created by Infrared, this topic would continue to be the place where users would share tactics and stories. It met an early end due to a glitch in the old forum software.


Night Ops III:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1718081

The third topic created for night ops, Infrared would be gone by this point. Some of the most skilled people would begin showing up in this thread.


Night Ops IV:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1720209

After yet another huge thread was forced to close, IV was opened. This thread brought more skilled users, many guides were created, and several separate forums were created by those tired of TOTSE's limitations.


Night Ops V (Part 1):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1722503

Night Ops V (Part 2):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1722802

When IV became entirely too full, V was opened. It failed several times due to software issues on the forum.


Night Ops VI:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1723520

Yet another thread created when V was filled. Towards the end of the thread there is a noticeable decline in interest and skill.


Night Ops VII:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1724774

The final numerical night ops thread, VII was never filled completely and was lost to disinterest.


Night Ops - The Next Generation: Couldn't find a copy of this one, guys.

The last great night ops thread, this topic had a lot going against it. TOTSE was beginning to tire of night ops at this point, plus the coining of the term "black ops" alienated a large number of old users, resulting in their departure. By the end of the topic, night ops on TOTSE was practically finished.


Night Ops III (Trapped In A Box Edition):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1730614

Apparently Trapped In A Box was unaware of the huge history of night ops before making his thread, but in any case he created this semi-successful thread during the downfall of night ops.


Night Operations:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1731756

An attempt by The Torch to renew interest in night ops, it was met with mixed reactions.


Nighttime Operations:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1731226

Another attempt by PsychIonic to not only bring interest to night ops, but encourage higher levels of skill than had been in the night ops community. Eventually failed from users losing interest, and frankly, I lost interest in talking about it as well.


More Night-Time Ops:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1714381

This one was done by Exodus5000 around the time the original thread was still around. It was a side thread alongside of it, and was somewhat successful, having decent stories and basic info.


Many threads tried to capture the momentum of night ops. And they failed. Miserably. Here are a few good examples:
Night Ops VI (DK Edition):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1723092

Night Ops VII (Torch Edition):

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1724805

Night Ops...:

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http://www.totse.com/community/showthread.php?t=2012654

Night Ops Thread:

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http://www.totse.com/community/showthread.php?t=1999587

Night-Ops REDUX:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1730611

Night Operations - The Rebirth:

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1732063

As was mentioned, night ops resulted in the creation of many guides dedicated to the art of stealth, B&E, and evading suspicion after the op.

SkateRadier's "Night Ops: Beginner's Guide":

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http://www.totse.com/community//showthread.php?t=1725732

Infrared's "The Definitive Guide to Infiltration":

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http://www.totse.com/en/bad_ideas/irresponsible_activities/thedefinitiveg171132.html

HARDMAN's "A Tactical Manual for Nighttime Missions":

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http://www.totse.com/en/bad_ideas/irresponsible_activities/atacticalmanua178985.html

ChaosPenguin's "Ghosts":

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http://www.freewebs.com/halfblades/nightops.htm

PsychIonic's "Way of the Shadow":

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http://www.thedisease.net/functions.php?&arcanum=theft/Way_of_the_Shadow.zip

Numerous other things resulted from the term night ops. They include seperate websites, of which all the major ones are offline. Anti-Night Ops threads also appeared by people who hated the thought of kids roaming on their property. These ironically bashed wannabe ninjas while acting as wannabe Rambos. Finally, some websites would shut down certain parts of their websites once it was discovered they were being used by the night ops community.
I doubt that 4 years ago, Infrared would have thought his humble topic would have resulted in hundreds and hundreds of pages on TOTSE dedicated to the art as well as a few highly successful forums, and to that end night ops is by far one of the most successful concepts ever on the website, even against all the hatred towards it.
But now the concept has been twisted and obscured into something it's not, a combination of old users moving on in life and ignorant members bashing the concept of which they only know a few details from. Every now and then, someone will muster the courage to post a thread dedicated to night ops, knowing someone will come in and denounce it.
As I said in the beginning though, night ops have been around for much longer than it's current name. Whether it retains the term or not remains to be seen, but it's certain that night ops were, night ops are, and night ops will always continue to be until the end of humanity.




Hopefully you new guys found this interesting. Honestly I dug up this old piece from &T and converted it to fit better here, though I just wanted it to dig up more stories to add to my Night Op Classics thread.

[mib]

There is a history of being misunderstood and persecuted. I remember a long time ago when the lock picking forum blocked access to some of their material when they determined that people they considered "sketchy" were accessing the information. still pisses me off.

Night ops is just the name we've given it. there's more to it than we could ever know. in all likelihood it's been around since the beginning of human civilization.

[Psychlonic]

I'd wager it went back even farther, back when a "caveman" or primitive equivalent couldn't get his own food so he "opped" someone else's home and took theirs.

[Secant]

There's a few more guides, etc on the resource page:

http://no.surgen.org/resources.html

A bit outdated now, but the info's still valid.

[Captain Winky]

I'd wager it went back even farther, back when a "caveman" or primitive equivalent couldn't get his own food so he "opped" someone else's home and took theirs.

I agree, but that wasn't as the night ops we know it today, back then it was still thievery and burglary, that, and your example is a black op.

Black ops have been there through the ages, When the human became more curious, that's where Urban Exploration began.

What we did was cultivate (I don't think I'm using the right word, damn my English >.>) Night Ops, and made a community. A community which I hope, will be there throughout the years, in a hidden position behind the timeline.

But who knows, perhaps one day the NOCOM (Nighttime Operations Command, a systemized version of Nightops.net, allmost organization like. Never passed the theoretical phaze) Might one day become one of the major criminal organizations in the future.

Or even legendary Like the Illuminati.

but now I'm thinking of the future

[hX_]

NOCOM hmm.

Sounds like an ok idea but would lack the troops lol.

[Captain Winky]

As long as we're spread enough, 10 men in America, Europe, Asia and Astraliä works better then 300 men in America

[hX_]

1 for the UK here.

And when I looked to check where you were from I jumped like hell as I mistook "Somewhere" for a place name very close to me XD.

[Evil_0ne]

1 from america...

[Blackcell]

I remember Infrared, that dude had some genius information. Its pretty amazing how much its taken off since then. If we were able to organize it would be worth while. Meet and greets would be fun to.

[Ghost]

I remember Infrared, that dude had some genius information. Its pretty amazing how much its taken off since then. If we were able to organize it would be worth while. Meet and greets would be fun to.

Heh, i guess you weren't around for all the NOPCON talk a year or so ago. I'd still be willing to meet up with anyone in the pacific northwest, but an organized night ops convention wouldn't be a very good idea at the moment.

However, that being said - a privately planned meeting between as many members as wanted to go would be pretty sweet.

[Blackcell]

Yea , Theres noway itd be a post and greet. People could show up claiming they op , end up being a cop.

[Evil_0ne]

florida would be damn sweet location because my family goes there every summer and I could just skip out on talking to family, lol.

[darktorn]

Id be up for the NOCOM, risky but worth it. One from UK (scotland)

[nomadx]

florida's my home too, but the paranoia is always there.

as has been said, the moment ordinary citizens find out about your night opping hobby they look at you as a completely different person, as if you punched them in the face.

it's more than a hobby for some, it can be a lifestyle that is very fitting for the personality type that sees walls, doors, and locks and cctv like an elaborate puzzle that is solved in the mind's eye. while some choose the path of least resistance and do the 9-5 job, others see it as just another obstacle and think "there must be a way around"

in older times when cops were nothing more than the extension of the local army garisson, there were ale houses and private homes that were known as thieve's guilds. people would come under the cover of darkness and under the cover of their cloaks, regularly coming together to relax, drink, tell tales of mischief, exchange tips & techniques. modern communication technologies like the car, radio, telephone, and computer have made the moving of knowledge and people at blinding pace. personally i would have preferred the old fashioned ways.

the internet has formed a synthetic replacement for them, and it's not going away. i humbly acknowledge and respect all who came before me, but in this activity even the internet has supplied only whispers and vague speculation on one of the old dark arts. when i think about the guys who started it on totse, the reason it took off was because young boys and men have been sneaking around getting into mischief or worse since the dawn of civilization. you could even argue that it's instinctual, for young humans to want to experiment and try new things.

for those who live off their agility and wit, i salute you.

[Borninshadows]

Now that Totse is gone, does anyone have archives of these threads?

[Ghost]

Yes, i've archived in raw format every major night ops thread on totse and compressed them into an RAR. It's fairly small, about 725kb, but be warned when i say raw format, i mean literally copy/pasted from totse into .txt documents.

Contents -

Nighttime ops (new guy) AKA night ops I - complete thread

Night ops II - complete thread

Night ops III - complete thread

Night ops IV - complete thread

Night ops V #1 - complete thread

Night ops V #2 - complete thread

Night ops VI - complete thread

Night ops VII - incomplete

Night ops IX - complete thread

Night ops X - complete thread

You'll notice a few things here, one of which is that there is no Night ops VIII. The thread was never made, so no need to worry about that. Also, i was literally frantically copy/pasting from the night ops threads i didn't already have as the site was going down, so i was unable to get all of Night ops VII. If anyone has this thread, in any format, please send me a pm.

I believe that's everything, so without further stalling, here it is. enjoy.

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http://www.4shared.com/file/94426143/82670d6e/History_of_Night_Ops.html

If anyone would be interested in editing all of the excess information up and neatening them up a bit for a more polished feeling "final version", i'd be more than happy to work with one or more of you to do that.

[Borninshadows]

I love you.
I'll try to edit it down a bit, I've got plenty of time on my hands.

I'm putting a -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In between posts, and Italicizing quotes.
I'm also deleting signatures

[darktorn]

Good job saving those threads, much appreciated.