Visual clues

[Ara D.]

I wish I could get clues about what I can see on a zoomed in map similar to sounds ie you see an elk to the north. I'm some times frustrated when I'm persistence hunting in a large open mire and I lose track of the prey when it runs off screen. My character is able to see that far on the wilderness map so he should be able to visual track prey zoomed in.

[Mati256]

Are you aware you can zoom out the view with the mouse wheel?

[Ara D.]

I play on a laptop sans mouse but even with control 0 or control - on the zoomed in map to max out my zoom I can only see an area about the size of one wilderness map tile.  Where as on the wilderness map I can see much farther

[Signatus]

Where as on the wilderness map I can see much farther

If the terrain allows you to. In the forest you'll only see the adjacent tiles, and hills and mountains block your sight. Daylight or lack thereof also affect this, and I suspect your eyesight does too

This makes sense because what you see on the wilderness map is supposed to be your "long-range" sight, while the zoomed in one is obviously sharper, to the point you can actually see if an animal or person is carrying something, if there's items on the ground, etc.

And you can indeed see animals on the wilderness map... isn't that how you hunt them? Are you expecting to go atop a mountain, look at a tile 5 kilometers to the south and be able to spot a bundle of arrows on the ground?

[PALU]

Note that the OP mentioned open mire, i.e. conditions where your visibility isn't blocked by terrain (and, presumably, not by visibility conditions). I think it would make sense to have visual cues indicating animals seen beyond the range the zoomed in map can display: if you can see them in the distance when zoomed out, you ought to be able to see them in the distance when zoomed in as well as the zoom modes doesn't reflect anything existing in reality, but rather is a means to make the game playable.

It might not be trivial to implement this, though, both because of the line of sight calculations (creature clues would flit in and out of visibility from step to step) and because of the re-balancing that might be needed as the result of having more information available.

It's not a matter of seeing details, but of getting indications of the same long distance things you get from the zoomed out map on the zoomed in one. Thus, the elk you're tracking is seen is the NW, so you can move towards the visible animal, rather than follow its tracks, at the risk of losing it when it disappears out of sight and you don't find the tracks again. Herd animals/robber groups would cause some issue, though, as logically, you'd be able to follow that particular reindeer you've targeted even when just out of the zoomed in displayed range, but further away you'd not be able to make out much details (although you'd still be able to see the difference between a single animal/human and a group, although humans might presumably hide so only a single "bait" is visible).

[More_tribal_interaction]

If the terrain is open mire or pine mire, it should be impossible to lose track of large animals like reindeer or elk?

If the tracks criss cross, I just search in a "Z" pattern in the last general direction while zoomed out and eventually I regain the tracks or I run into the animal again