Radio messages
 

What's the point of sending status and contact messages back to my homebase?
I quess that sending contact reports could make a friendly sub nearby get there and help me out, though I have never seen that ingame.
And are there any risks with sending status/contact radio messages?

Also, why does all radio messages recieved contain X's instead of the real numbers or names? Bug or indended? and if its indended how do I get the complete names and numbers in radio messages?

Contact messages usually generate "bonus" objectives such as "Decimate convoy escort" and "Sink the Freighters". Status reports I don't really get. I've never had any response from HQ on a sent status report.

Status reports can prompt COMSUBPAC to assign you a new mission goal if you've radioed in after you've completed your current one.

Contact reports can do the same. If you radio in a contact report and they tell you to go after the convoy, that becomes your new mission goal. (I believe you need to sink 10,000 tons of shipping to complete the "attack enemy freighters" goal...unsure of how much you have to sink on the "attack enemy escorts" goal) If they tell you to break contact, you can either do that or go after the convoy anyways.

As far as risks to sending messages, I believe direction finding is modelled in the game, so yes, there is a chance of basically broadcasting your position to the IJN when you send radio messages, just like there would have been in real life. I know from painful experience that this was modelled in SH3.

The X's are stops on the radiotelegram and not a bug. This is where a new line would begin if you were actually transcribing from a telegraph machine. I imagine they're included for flavor and atmosphere. I'm not sure what you mean by "real names and numbers." You're supposed to just ignore them as they're not supposed to be part of the actual message.

I assume the 'X' in the mesages means 'stop', like a period. "Blah blah blah" stop "blah blah blah"

That's correct.

X :know: X