Yellow Horse,

What limits the range is the sensitivity of the reciever and its ability to reject "noise". Doesn't matter how much energy you dump on the reciever , if the reciever is not sensitive enough, or the noise rejection it to high, to recieve the signal. Conversely, givena "standard" reciever characteristic, the more IR energy that you can put behind your signal, the farther away your transmission can be recieved.

That in mind, and just between you an me, if you are using emitters scavenged from LaserTag pistols, you are, most likely, using overdriven high output emitters ( or, at least, that has been the case in my experience). Replacing same with collimated IR Laser diodes, will give you much more output power, at the cost of: a more sophisticated driver circuit which can be modulated by your existing battle circuit, and, more power input required (but not really that much). I have used 'IR Laser Illuminators' (laser diodes) to transmit intelligable information over 100 YARDS in broad daylight, down here in Texas.

Oh Darkith, little buddy, your destiny is calling....