Questing Explained In-Depth
Quests are simply where the game offers us an opportunity to score some reward, by accomplishing one or more given tasks. In many cases, a quest will ask us to complete something we might have done anyway as a result of regular game play. However many quests challenge us to complete much more complex tasks that would be quite different, or more difficult than what our regular game play choices would accomplish. FoE quests usually involve (but are not limited to) game activities such as those listed below.
- Astutely solve a problem or riddle.
- Produce, collect, gather, or plunder a number of various resources.
- Spend (we get some game progress) or pay (we get no game progress) a number of various resources.
- Have, produce, or delete a fixed number of military units.
- Make significant changes to our city, including constructing or selling specific buildings.
- Scout, infiltrate, negotiate, or conquer areas on the Continental Map.
- Perform different socially-interactive game activities.
- Research 1 or more technologies.
Always Do Everything For Quest Credit!
Many quests require us to: "collect", "gather", "produce", or "spend" a certain number of a named resource—the required resources to complete these quests are
inputs. Completing quests, as well as many other game activities, can also generate resources—the resources generated are
outputs. As much as possible, we
always want to leverage the output of all other game activity to use as the input (that is, the progress toward completion) of an accepted quest. In fact, it is ideal to have several different quests open (of any type) at the same time that all require the same type of input, so that the output of our other game activity will simultaneously count as progress toward multiple quests where we get to leverage 1 unit of activity output as: 2, 3, or even 4 units of quest input. The different game activities whose output will qualify as input progress toward quest completion includes (but might not be limited to):
- Collecting completed productions from our own buildings (any type of building).
- Plundering completed productions from our neighbor's buildings (any type of building).
- Aiding other players, which pay us a fixed amount of coins for each AID click that scales by the age of our Town Hall. These coins can quickly add up to the final few 100 or even the final few 1,000 coins required to complete a "Collect Coins" quest.
- Conquering a sector or a province on the C map that pays: coins, supplies, or goods as a bounty.
- Completing another quest that pays a reward of: coins, supplies, goods, or units.
- Completing a GE encounter that pays a reward of: coins, supplies, goods, or units.
- Opening a Treasure Hunt chest that pays a reward of: coins, supplies, goods, or units.
- Accepting a goods trade. (However, when we post our own trade and another player accepts it, the goods we receive from the trade will not count as quest progress to "gather" or "produce" goods.)
- Selling a building in our city which pays back a fraction of the coins and supplies required to construct the building.
The Different Types of Quests
There are many different types of quests in FoE. The type of each specific quest we have accepted is usually noted in the title bar of the quest dialog. The different types of FoE quests include:
Story Quests — This is the 1st quest giver slot given to us in the game (do not confuse the order quests are given to us with the order they are listed along the left side of the screen). Story quests lead us through the technology tree and the continental map. Story quests can
never be aborted.
Side Quests — This is the 2nd quest giver slot given to us in the game (again, do not confuse the order quests are given to us with the order they are listed along the left side of the screen). Somewhat similar to story quests, side quests sometimes lead us through the tech tree and the continental map. However, many side quests make us do things like: construct new buildings, sell old buildings, gather or produce different resources, produce or delete units, and many other time-consuming game activities. What, if any, side quests are available to us is a function of where we are in the tech tree. Many side quests re-appear in later time periods throughout the game, only they get scaled both in difficulty and in the rewards they payout according to each time period they reappear in. Most (but not all) side quests can be aborted. If we abort a side quest in one time period, then we will never see that same side quest again in that same time period; however, we could still see an adapted version of the same side quest in a later time period, once we get there.
NOTE: Many side quests are HUGE time wasters; therefore, we should never feel obligated to complete every side quest in our current time period. Instead, we can look at the time and other resources required to complete the side quest, and compare those costs with the total value of the rewards we could score upon quest completion. It is best to apply this general litmus test when deciding to abort or complete a side quest: “Can we complete the quest in 4 hours or less, and are the rewards we might score greater than the total resources cost to complete the quest?” If the answer to this litmus question is “yes”, then we should complete the side quest; however, if the answer to the question is “no”, then we should abort the side quest. There is no sense in completing any quest that results in a net loss of total resources, with no chance at a resource profit. Also, time is always our most precious resource; therefore there is no point in wasting time on completing any side quest (that doesn’t pay incredibly good rewards) when doing so only delays us from (re)unlocking the recurring quests (see later) for our age, which will generally pay us much better rewards.
Bonus (Story) Quests — These quests are triggered when we are able to scout certain bonus provinces on the various Continental maps. Bonus quests are like story quests in that they cannot be aborted. This is the 3rd quest giver slot in the game. The first time we receive bonus quests is just past the first two provinces of EMA, when we get a new, 3rd quest giver slot for the Barbarian Quest Line; this quest giver slot goes away after we complete the entire Barbarian Quest Line. The next bonus quest line comes between the LMA and Colonial Age on the Continental Map. However this time, after we complete this bonus quest line (given to us by Princess Mycenia), we actually get to keep the 3rd quest giver slot until the end of the game. This 3rd quest giver slot works just like the 2nd quest giver slot—it can either offer us: side quests (see above), bonus quests, or recurring quests (see below).
Recurring Quests — Recurring quests do not get their own quest slot along the left side of our screen—they always share the same slot(s) as side quests. At any point along the tech tree for our current time period, it is possible that we run out of available side quests (which are always tied to our overall technology progress); in such cases the game will offer us a recurring quest in place of a side quest. Every time we advance our technology (that is our Town Hall) to a higher time period, the recurring quests will get scaled so as to be much harder to complete, and the new period's recurring quests must be unlocked by completing or aborting all currently available side quests for the new time period. Recurring quests
can always be aborted; however unlike side quests, recurring quests will reappear to us again, during the same time period, over-and-over an infinite number of times. Whenever we complete or abort a recurring quest, that same quest will be offered to us again, after we have either completed or aborted all other recurring quests one time, as well as any new side quests that may have been recently made available to us.
NOTE: Contrary to popular belief, recurring quests do NOT appear at the end of a time period—we can unlock them immediately upon entering a new time period by simply completing or aborting all currently available side quests. The transition between side and recurring quests goes both ways and it all depends on our tech advancement within the same time period. If we subsequently unlock another technology any time after we have already unlocked the recurring quests for our current time period (and after we either complete or abort our currently accepted recurring quest), then a previously unavailable side quest might become available. In such cases, we need to complete or abort any new side quests in order to once again unlock the recurring quests for our current time period.
Event Quests — We see event quests only in: Historical Events, Special Events, and Seasonal Events. An event will give us either one or two additional quest giver slots. The first event quest giver slot usually offers us a daily quest; often, these daily quests will still be available if we do not complete them on the day they are given — the daily quests stack up behind the quest we currently have open. The second event quest giver slot, if there is one, will offer us an overall event quest and a special prize that is usually event-specific; we must always complete all of the event's daily quests in order to complete the overall event quest. Sometimes the two different event quest slots will use the same quest giver, but sometimes they have different characters that give us the two different quests.
Complete List of Recurring Quests
Below is a complete list of all recurring quests in the game. More-less, the same recurring quests exist in every time period throughout the game; however they each get scaled in difficulty for each higher age.
Spend N Forge Points (“Spend FPs” for short)
This quest simply requires us to spend a fixed number of FPs, which could be accomplished by: donating FPs to a great building, filling a technology with FPs, accepting trades from friends or neighbors that each cost 1 FP to accept. The quest scales in difficulty by increasing the total number of FPs to spend in each age; for example, it is "Spend 8 FPs" in the Bronze Age and "Spend 99 FPs" in the Future Era.
NOTE: We should always dial up this recurring quest any time we swoop in to secure a donation reward slot on a great building, and we then donate FPs the target GB one-quest-at-a-time. Likewise, any time we complete a “tech sprint”, we should alternate between the "Spend FPs" quest and the "Research 2" quest.
Research 2 Technologies (“Research 2” for short)
This quest always requires us to simply
unlock 2 technologies in the tech tree. The quest scales in difficulty since unlocking technology in later time periods will always cost us far more resources, including: FPs to fill the technology, as well as coins, supplies, and goods to unlock the technology.
NOTE: Any time we completely fill up a technology with forge points, which we should be doing during a "Spend FPs" quest, we should always click the “Unlock Later” button and wait until we have two technologies ready to unlock at the same time. Then, we should dial up the "Research 2" quest and unlock 2 technologies at the same time to complete that quest. Any time we “tech sprint” up to higher time period, we should always try to alternate between the "Spend FPs" quest and the "Research 2" quest.
Collect N,000 Coins (“Collect Coins” for short)
This quest simply requires us to collect a fixed number of coins. The quest scales in difficulty by increasing the total number of coins to collect in each age; for example, it is "Collect 1,800 Coins" in the Bronze Age and "Collect 800,000 Coins" in the Future Era.
Collect N,000 Supplies (“Collect Supplies” for short)
This quest simply requires us to collect a fixed number of supplies. The quest scales in difficulty by increasing the total number of supplies to collect in each age; for example, it is "Collect 1,500 Supplies" in the Bronze Age and "Collect 1,000,000 Supplies" in the Future Era.
Produce N <name of 24-hour supply production> (“Produce Supplies” for short)
This quest simply requires us to produce a fixed number of 24-hour supplies productions for a specific, regular, supply production building, or for a combination of 2 different supply production buildings. This quest scales in difficulty three ways:
- The named 24-hour supply production, corresponds to a specific regular supply production building, which we cannot build until we unlock that technology.
- Regular supply production buildings generally get larger, compared to available land, in each later time period. Additionally, most supply production buildings in Progressive Era and later require 2-lane roads, which makes constructing several of them less practical.
- The total number of required productions changes as we advance to later time periods.
- Produce 2 x 24-hour supply productions in Bronze Age through Colonial Age.
- Produce 4 x 24-hour supply productions in Industrial Age.
- Produce 5 x 24-hour supply productions in PE through AFE.
NOTE: There will always be one produce supplies quest corresponding to every regular supply building in each time period. While most time periods have three different regular supply production buildings, some periods only have two; in such periods, there will be a third quest to: "Produce M x <name of 24-hour production from building A> and Produce N x <name of 24-hour production from building B>". This third "produce supplies" quest actually doubles the total number of required 24-hour productions to complete it, so it is a complete waste of time to work this quest—just abort-cycle past it.
The Produce Supplies quest is actually the
easiest of all recurring quests to complete—we only need to build a large number of regular supply buildings that is evenly divisible by N, and set them to 24-hour productions each day. Then when our city is ready to collect, we dial up the correct recurring quest before we collect N of our supply buildings, collect only N of those buildings, then abort-cycle around to the same "Produce Supplies" quest and keep going until our city is collected.
In the Heavy Questing Strategy, we engineer our city and plan its road layout so as to fit as many regular supply production buildings as possible into our available land. The smaller a regular supply production building is, the less land and population it requires for construction, the more such buildings we can construct in our city, and the more such "Produce Supplies" quests we can complete each day. In later eras, we must consider if a supply production building requires 2-lane roads or 1-lane roads, and also if it grants our city a positive or negative happiness side effect. With all factors considered, here are the best building recommendations for each period:
- Produce 2 x Helmets (Blacksmiths, 2x2) in the Bronze Age
- Produce 2 x Meat Skewers (Butchers, 4x3) in the Iron Age
- Produce 2 x Bear Hides (Tanneries, 3x3) in EMA
- Produce 2 x Saltpeter (Alchemists, 3x2) in HMA
- Produce 2 x Many Barrels of Beer (Brewery, 3x3) in LMA
- Produce 2 x Turret Clocks (Clockmakers, 3x2) in Colonial Age
- Produce 4 x Gatling Guns (Gunsmiths, 2x3) in Industrial Age
- Produce 5 x Industrial Lighting (Lamp Factories, 6x3, 1-lane) in PE
- Produce 5 x Church Hats (Hatters, 3x3, 1-lane) in ME.
- Working "Produce Supplies" quest is unfeasible (with any building) in PME.
- Working "Produce Supplies" quest is unfeasible (with any building) in CE.
- Working "Produce Supplies" quest is unfeasible (with any building) in TE.
- Produce 5 x Anti-grav Carriers (Levitation Outlets, 3x4, 2-lane, +120 Hap) in FE
IMPORTANT: There is no "Produce Supplies" quest for any premium or special supplies production building—the "Produce Supplies" quest always requires a regular supply building. Therefore, in all Heavy Questing time periods (ME and below), it is far better to store any premium or special supply production buildings we have scored in our Inventory for possible renovation or use later in the game. Some special supply production buildings have many solid advantages over regular supply production buildings, which can include: a much smaller land requirement, a much smaller population requirement compared to the supplies produced per-tile of land, or 1-lane roads to connect it to Town Hall (most late-era supply buildings require 2-lane roads). The following supply buildings are incredibly efficient compared to regular, or even premium, options: (Large/Huge) Confectionary, Foeberge, and the Reindeer Paddock—all of these buildings are incredibly valuable when they are age-locked to late-game eras (above ME), especially since working the "Produce Supplies" quest becomes much less efficient, or even altogether unfeasible. However, constructing special or premium supply buildings in ME or earlier is a complete waste of land, since the value of quest rewards will greatly augment the efficiency of regular supply production buildings in those periods.
Have 4 Military units of Type A + 4 Military units of Type B ("Produce Units" for short)
There will always be three different variations of the Produce Units quest in every time period. All 5 types of regular military units from each time period will be used in at least one variation of this quest; one unit type will be used in two variations. These quests are actually quite easy to complete over and over in the same day, since most units take 4 hours or less to produce; we just need 2 barracks of each type of unit for the specific variation we wish to work. Each variation of this quest can be hidden from the recurring quest cycle by simply owning 3 or more of either type of unit that variation of the quest calls for. The inverse of this is also true—we can trigger the different variations of this recurring quest to appear in the recurring quest abort-cycle, by deleting enough of both unit types the variation of the quest calls for, until we own 2 units each of both types.
NOTE: This quest counts both attached and unattached units to determine if the quest should be: shown, hidden, or completed. So not only does producing attached units affect this quest, but this quest is also affected by acquiring unattached units from: Treasure Hunt, Guild Expeditions, collecting an Alcatraz, or even by completing some Story or Side quests that pay units as a quest reward. It is usually impractical to work this quest once we own an Alcatraz, since we want to stockpile more and more unattached units for use in: GE, GvG, Plundering our Hood, or conquering the C Map. For this reason, as well as to have more land available, it is advised to delay construction of Alcatraz until mid-Colonial Age. After Colonial Age, the sheer size and population cost of most unit production buildings make working the "Produce Units" quest impractical anyway.
"Pay X Coins + Pay Y Supplies", which is named "Unbirthday Party" (“UBQ” for short)
This quest simply requires us to pay Ribin the Jester a fixed number of coins plus a fixed number of supplies. The quest scales in difficulty by increasing the total number of coins and supplies to pay in each age; for example, it is "Pay 500 Coins and 600 supplies" in the Bronze Age and "Pay 250,000 Coins and 250,000 supplies" in the Future Era.
This is
the hidden gem of all recurring quests; any player who tells you differently, is
NOT a
"heavy quester" and was never coached by me. This quest is
excellent for converting coins and supplies into:
refined goods, blueprints, medals, and forge points. Many of the different tweaks I've made to this strategy are centered around being able to easily afford to spam UBQs in any age or era. This quest is unique in that it does not require any specific buildings for completion—any source of coins and supplies production will work as an input. However, what we truly need is a city that can produce both coins and supplies in a highly efficient manner; as such, this quest will heavily influence our GB construction and leveling priorities.
NOTE: Since the output of UBQ could be any random reward, and since we can complete as many instances of UBQ as our available stockpiles of coins and supplies will allow, we can somewhat reliably utilize the output of UBQ as the input to complete other quests such as: "Collect Coins", "Collect Supplies", as well as any Story/Side/Event quest to: "gather goods" or "produce goods".
Random Quest Rewards
Many different types of quests pay a "random reward"; this includes all recurring quests. The pool of possible random rewards, and the percentage to pay each reward, is exactly the same for any quest from the same time period that pay random rewards.
Based on my own numerical analysis, which involved recording 1000s of random quest rewards over a period of months, below are my
estimated percentage chances to score each possible random quest reward. I have taken some liberty in rounding my empirical data to the nearest whole percentage point and I estimate my margin of error to be +/- 1% for any specific reward.
- 30% = 5 random goods from our current age (Château Frontenac bonus applies)
- 15% = Small Coins Package (scales by age, Château Frontenac bonus applies)
- 15% = Small Supplies Package (scales by age, Château Frontenac bonus applies)
- 10% = Large Coins Package (scales by age, Château Frontenac bonus applies)
- 10% = Large Supplies Package (scales by age, Château Frontenac bonus applies)
- 8% = 1 random blueprint from 1 random GB, our current age or lower (no Château Frontenac bonus)
- 6% = 5 Forge points (inventory pack, no Château Frontenac bonus)
- 6% = 20 Diamonds (1st time only each quest and each age, Château Frontenac bonus applies) - OR –
Medals Package (any time after 1st time each quest and each age, scales by age, Château Frontenac bonus applies)
NOTE: The last random reward "prize slot" pays out one of two possible rewards, depending on if the given quest has already paid us 20 diamonds or not during our current age. Stated another way: a specific quest, such as the "Collect N Coins" quest, will only pay us 20 diamonds 1 time in each age—the first time that specific quest lands on the diamonds/medals prize slot. Any subsequent instance when the same quest lands on the diamonds/medals prize slot, that specific quest will pay us a medals package, which is scaled to our current age. So any quest, that advertises a random quest reward, that is currently paying us a medals package, has already paid us diamonds 1 time in our current age. This is not a case of: "I think this is what happens", this is a case of : "I know this is what happens, because I've done it 100s of times myself and I have also sent many other players through this process 100s of times and I have documented what we learned each time."