map markers for quests?

The map designs are just plain bad in many cases. Major areas connected to the maps are not marked, many hidden areas are not visible, etc. For those on a PC, you could download a map .dat pack and using that instead of the very poor maps that come with the game. These will replace the maps with versions that have more information, similar to the example given by Economizer.

... or so I'm told ...

You will still need to obtain the game map in the usual fashion in order to bring up this better version.