Just to add to the knowledge, I'm on my way to the hover tanks in one of my cities and can advise the following:
1. For completeness, yes as others have done I avoided scouting the two CE and three TE provinces (I do wonder if avoiding the three TE provinces matters but am not keen to conduct that experiment) - you do end up scouting one of the CE provinces as part of the CE story quest
2. I have pretty much fought the entire CE and TE maps so fighting or negotiating these maps I don't think matters
3. When reaching the FE map, I scouted and negotiated one sector of Agador (the first province) before completing the PME blocking story quest
4. Completing that PME quest leads you into the CE storyline. I got exactly the same quests and order that Onyxblack detailed in post #48. Except I also got ( I think onyxblack just left it off his list) at the end "Dictator's Death", which is the story quest before "King of the Desert"
5. Completing "DIctator's Death" gave me a PME side quest, ending up with 3 PME side quests and no story quest.
6. Completed/aborted PME side quests until I got to RQ's, completed a RQ and .... got another RQ! (not expected)
7. Went to the FE map, negotiated the rest of Agador, completed a RQ and got the desired "Eyes Ahead" in the FE story quest.
I do think the critical elements to avoiding "King of the Desert" are:
a) avoiding the two provinces in CE (until someone tests taking the entire TE map I wonder if avoiding the three TE provinces is necessary)
b) reaching the FE map and scouting the first province BEFORE completing the PME blocking quest (as I remember this was what Raino said in his video, but to be safe I negotiated one sector of Agador before completing the blocking quest)