The quest line hasnt rly been that bad. They removed so many of the problematic quests like 'complete a provenience' and 48 productions. So naturally they are left with a smaller list of available quests. So some times it might seem repetitive. And with the exception of the fist 5-10 'simple' quests, there hasnt been a need for spamming t1 buildings either.
I also like how the exchanging/using of the key currency is a lot faster then the old 'pick one of three chests' style.
However.. i am concerned about the artifacts. Im thinking i might not be getting them all this time around. (and iv gotten them for every evolving building so far.) But im on quests 70~/90~ and just used half my available currency. And i only got two artifacts. And the same held true on my second city. (and i was goign specifically after artifacts). So i see some seriouse luck being a factor on whether i get 9 or not. But its easier to see it failing to happen then to happen right now.
I do like the format; mainly for the speed at which i can cash in currency.
As for the artifacts, i got 2 artifact strictly from cashing in 1745 keys. Im not counting the two artifacts you get as bonus from quest rewards. If i estimate another 2 artifacts from my remaining currency then id be at a grand total of 6. - Would i be able to get 3 artifacts from they keys won from the remaining quests i have to do plus the daily keys? That would be the question on whether or not i would be able to evolve the owl fully.
Granted.. i dont have any plans of placing the owl in my city right now. I honestly havnt placed a single evolving building they have released since the fire phoenix. But i do make sure to at least acquire them all, and the artifacts to evolve them should i one day change my mind.
Over all i like the event set up/machinics. The only thought i really had while doing it was that the cost and use of the 'examine 2 squares' and the '2x' where a bit inefficient if your looking at it from a planning strategically mind set. Id rather see them both at say 8; as opposed to 15 and 17. That would be one use after unlocking half a board. I think that would make it a more enjoyable system, at least to me.
Update on some of this i posted a while back.
My concerns about being able to get 9 artifacts seems to be valid. However that seems true mainly because i missed one important detail in the beginning. When i cashed in my first round of points on the mage squads, i was not aware that when you completely unlock all 16 squares on the event board and its forced to Auto-shuffle... that doesnt cost any keys. I only just noticed that today; a tad late. I had assumed that a manual shuffle or the auto shuffle would cost the same amount of keys. So for that first round, i was after the one or two higher present rewards and then shuffled to a new ticket. So i lost some over all present progress there. And i think that might have been the difference between me getting 8 artifacts in total vs 9.
Know that i know that, i cant undo what i did, but i can look at the new event reward system with better eyes. And i do like the system more then any of the ones in the past. - Had i of known about the free auto shuffle, then it would have likely been a rly good chance at getting the 9 artifacts just by clearing everything on the board. The only over all strategy would be how to use the 'view 2 squares' and the '2x reward' the most efficiently. Which i can appreciate because its horrible to work at it for a month or so, doing 90-120 quests (depending on the event) and in the end not even getting the full reward despite doing all the work. So i like they system from that perspective.
I also like the system because it is so much faster to cash in your event currency then any of the other kinds (especially the 3 chest version). I hated taking an hour or more cashing in jsut part of my currency. And then knowing i have to do it again on another account. There comes a point where it becomes incredibly tedious and far to time consuming. So this current system i can be done pretty quick. And i can be done that quick without sacrificing strategy or efficiency or rushing through. I can take me time and still finish cashing in fairly quick.
So over all, i think its a good reward system to work with.
As for the quests themselves.. honestly, i wont complain much. Iv said ever event for the last year or two that i can clearly see inno trying to make adjustments to quests based on feedback. And most of the harder or massively time consuming quests have been removed. And yes, that does mean the available pool of good quests becomes a little bit more repetitive.. but thats the cost of making the pool smaller. So i dont fault them for that. (Unless they go repetitive crazy. If you have the same quest 5 times in a row.. then yea, problem. But aside from that, they did a good job.)
The quests that annoyed me this round:
Use pet food x2. - It is simple and easy (if you have pet food). But i only have placed one building that used pet food (the original fire phoenix) and im very picky about feeding it to max out usage in its time limit. So having to use two back to back i find annoying in breaking that efficiency. And no way i want to disenchant a pet food. - I guess thats more a personal mental issue then a game program issue. And as long as there is a viable alternative, then i guess its not a big deal.
Buy kp: I say this every event because i continue to hate this one for a long time. For me, this is the worst quest (now that so many others have been removed). Mainly because the cost of kp does not reset like the cost of goods in the trader. It goes up and up forever. - Iv stayed put in my chapter progression while i work on other things for the last year or two. So im not upgrading my main halls and increasing coin storage. So every time that kp cost goes up, it becomes harder and harder to do that quest. And i only buy kp for event quests. I dont buy them any other time. In time this will become a big problem for me. (which is a little odd, because on the surface, it is a simple quest premise.)
Solve 10 encounters/spire encounters/tourney encounters. - We had the same issue with this before. And inno did change it, which i loved. But for some reason its back to the old way this event... Please, do not use 10. Reduce it back to 8. - 10 is normally a great number and easy to think with. But the spire system is based on 4 encounters a floor. Thus 8 encounters is 2 floors. The main map encounters are based on 8 fights to clear it. Which could be broken down to 4x2 if needed. And with the new tourney system, 10 encounters is a full day for many mid/low level players. Due to the difficulty now increasing drastically after that. - Basically, the majority is done in groups of four. So that final number on the quest of 'solve xx encounter type' should also be done on a basis of four. (In this case, four or eight).
Solve 10 irritates me every time. 10 on the map is a full provenience plus a couple. 10 in spire is 2 groups plus a couple.. Just make it equal. Reduce 10 back to 8. Solve 8 encounters, solve 8 spire encounters... so much more user friendly then 10.
But again, over all i think the reward system this time is a massive improvment. And the over all quest line is a massive improvement over what it was a couple years ago.