Do ?s ever go away?

[CM1fan]

In an email game, my US opponent and my German forces have been fighting over a small patch of woods for about 15 minutes / turns. His defense started with around a platoon of infantry, and my assaulting force was comprised of a two dismounted PzG platoons, two HMG teams, a StuG, and four half-tracks with MGs.

With none of my units selected, three ?s appear in the woods, one underneath my StuG! As I select my units in or near the patch, two or three ?s appear in different locations in the woods, but rarely very close to the selected unit.

My opponent and I are playing a "friendly" game in which we tell each other what we're doing and what casualties we've sustained. He told me a few minutes / turns back, that my forces had taken out all his units in the wooded patch bar a few stragglers fleeing in the open toward the town about 100 m away.

Do these ?s ever go away? Other than dropping a Nuke or a fuel - air explosive on the wooded patch, is there any way to get rid of those pesky ?s?

[Hister]

Yeah, I also have a minor issue with those...

[~Viajero]

You want to get rid of battle confusion and Fog of War? If there is truly no enemies around the ? I believe they disappear over time no? Now how much time is too much time that I dont know...

[Chris Ferrous]

I'm all for Fog of War but these '?' icons do seem very persistent.

As far as I am concerned their simple absence would equally provide FoW since an assault squad popping up out of nowhere would be even more of a shock!

I'm playing an experimental 4hr battle v AI and I am still getting '?' appearing in places I 'secured' 2 hours ago! If they were supposed to represent sound contacts (as in CMBO especially) that would be fine as sounds would be easy to miss unless you followed every unit every turn, but they seem to be intended to just generally add to the confusion / FoW. So, as stated in paragraph 2, '?' seem redundant unless seen for the very first time*.

* which includes prior intel pre-set by the scenario designer.

[RockinHarry]

Maybe it´s those "?" that did not make it up/down the whole COC yet..even over longer time? :confused:

[mjkerner]

I'd like them to disappear after a few minutes at most. They clutter the game up (I know I can--and do, alot--turn icons off) and I hardly ever pay attention to them after they start to fade out.

[CM1fan]

Hell, I'd be happy / happier if I could just toggle the ?s on and off. Is there any way to do this?

[Vanir Ausf B]

Alt-I. But this also toggles off unit icons. You can have have "?" icons on and unit icons off, but the opposite is not allowed for some reason.

[Ranger33]

What's even worse is that the ?'s convey exactly zero information about what is so interesting there. Sound contact? Infantry movement? How long ago was the sighting? It would be nice if you could click on them and get that sort of information, at the very least whether it is a vehicle or infantry.

As is they are only mildly useful at best.

[Agua]

Well, I think the opacity of the ? is related to the strength of the contact which could be a function of type (sound / visual) and length of time, so it does convey some information.

[Edited to include the following:] Also, I believe scenario designers can include them as a designation of intel level. Absent additional contact, they'll fade following the start of the scenario.

[Vanir Ausf B]

I could be wrong, but it seems to me the opacity is entirely a function of how recent the contact. The only way I can tell if it is a sound contact is if it's in an area I know for sure no friendly unit has LOS to.

[Agua]

You could well be correct VafB. My working hypothesis has been that a sound contact appeared was less opaque than a lost visual contact. I've never tested it and unless I actually saw the silhouette of a positive ID, which could well be missed in the mayhem, I don't concern myself with a distinction beyond being aware that something was there at some point. It either is ID'd again, or it isn't.

[Chris Ferrous]

IMHO There's three types of '?':-

1. Initial intel, and they work fine for this.

2. A spurious unidentified contact during a battle, and as reported before, the first time they appear they do fine for this aspect also.

3. A FOW or confusion or have you really checked over there sort of '?' which can be very persistent indeed, and it's these I find superfluous.

An example from my '4hr battle':-

There was a cornfield through which the enemy were seen fleeing/withdrawing and many were shot down. The same field was then staked out on three sides, fully reconned, and then passed through as a line of advance by an entire Company of infantry. No viable enemy troops remained. An exhausted/depleted Company was left around an objective zone overlooking the field and for the next 90 minutes '?' of varying opacity kept appearing. I ignored them and more support units moved up through there and found nothing. Maybe the '?' represent the moans of the wounded since I can think of no other reason they might keep appearing. And just to make it clear, on several occasions the '?' have disappeared completely but subsequently a whole battery of them appears again. They finally seem to have stopped appearing over two hours after the field was captured. Maybe all those wounded enemy are now dead?

[Bertram]

There is a 4th category of "?" I find even more irritating: the killed and disabled enemy armor that has been out of the field of view of a unit even for a single second. Those guys know it was a killed Panzer, they observed it, identified it, but the moment they turn their back on it, the contact reverts to an unidentified "?". Rather annoying, because now I, as player, need to remember which contact my guys should be able to remember .

[Vanir Ausf B]

That's interesting, because the only time I can recall seeing the "?" mark permanently disappear is when the unit that made it is destroyed. In fact, this seems to be a way to see through FOW. If you are area firing near a "?" and it disappears you can be sure that unit just got wiped out.

I suspect, but am not 100% sure, that the "?" marks left by knocked-out tanks are actually made by the bailing crew.

[Baneman]

I think you're right re. the bailing crew, but sometimes they leave a spurious "?" even if you shot them down as they bailed

Also, it would be nice if destroyed tanks/vehicles/guns would remain visible after the fact -columns of smoke from invisible spots on the map just looks weird.

Although this may be a factor of how spotting was programmed and not easy to change.

[Ranger33]

The "?" for destroyed tanks will be there even if the tank was knocked out before the scenario starts (ie just there for decorations). This always make for silliness when your men can see friendly abandoned vehicles on the other side of the map, but not a previously knocked out enemy tank that is slightly obscured but sitting right next to the setup zone.

[sgtstinky]

I wish the "?" had a short shelf life, I'd like to see them fade out over time if the unit has moved on, or have them stay solid if the unit is visible but can not be identified.

[WinOrLose]

They should disappear if you scout the area on the map.

At the moment you have a bunch of guys saying there is a bunch of krauts in the farm house and you have a squad in the farm house saying there sure as s**t aren't.

Yet the ? still remains.

[MikeyD]

By coincidence just today I was playing a game. (?) aplenty on the far side of the hill where I once saw Shermans. As soon as I sent someone to the crest to take a peek the (?)s simply evaporated. If (?) remain after positive confirmation perhaps its a chain of command thing. No comm linkage for your scout team to tell your CO on the far side of the map that the farmhouse is empty.

[Vanir Ausf B]

I have to take back my earlier idea that "?" markers only go away when a unit is destroyed. An enemy Schreck team in a crater took a casualty (I saw the red cross) and the "?" disappeared. A few turns later the survivor popped up and started shooting again. Unless it was a different Schreck team that just happened to be in the same spot...

[7thGalaxy]

I think you're seeing different ?s for different levels in the C&C - I see it as an attempt to simulate the confusion of situation reports in a battle.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Well, there is nothing simulated about the confusion it is causing people playing the game

[Rake]

I think you're seeing different ?s for different levels in the C&C - I see it as an attempt to simulate the confusion of situation reports in a battle.

I agree. When I first began playing, the multitude of question marks was quite confusing. Over time, I’ve become used to them and feel like I have a decent idea of what they represent.

Since I play wego the vast majority of my games, I have all the time I want to click around the map and get a good idea of what is actually where. With no friendly units selected, it seems that there is a “?” designating the last suspected position of nearly every enemy unit on the map.

As individual units are selected, question marks will appear, disappear, shift slightly or become spotted units. I think this happens as information travels up and down the chain of command and as a unit puts eyes on an area. Just because one unit can see that no enemy unit exists in a certain spot doesn’t mean this info has reached another friendly on the other side of the map that may have just heard from the platoon leader that there are targets “somewhere over there”.

I had a recent game where a jeep was destroyed and the occupants were all killed. When any of the nearby friendlies were selected, the question mark disappeared. I noted that after the platoon that destroyed the jeep moved on, the "?' never appeared when these units were selcted. But, when I picked units on the other side of the map, the "?" remained for the rest of the scenario.

I can see where the presence of a lot of “?” can be a problem in RT, but I don’t feel it’s an issue in wego.

[Crushingleeek]

I think you're seeing different ?s for different levels in the C&C - I see it as an attempt to simulate the confusion of situation reports in a battle.

Yes, if you hate the ?'s, you have to play on a easier level.

If you notice, if you click a unit that is right on top of or near a ?, it will disappear. This is because that unit knows there is nothing there. But the rest of your formation hasn't been relayed that information, so intel is such that there still may be something there. You'd probably argue that your unit in that vicinity should have relayed that info after some reasonable time, but just imagine all the information that has to be relayed across an entire company/btn/regt. Just see it as galaxy says, the confusion of situation reports.