As a beta player and even as a live player, when we play in events and I examine the quests, I try to look at a couple of things - how much time/effort does it take the player, is it fun? and with high importance - what is the long term impact if every event has this quest a multitude of times in it (such as we see for scout, gain relics, solve encounters and buy KP)
So today I had
Buy 15 KP
Workshop 9 hour x5
Gain lots of gold
Gain 9 relics
Gain lots of gold
But 15 KP
Gain 5 VV
Produce toolboxes x3
Beyond the fact that I find Buy KP loathsome, they are currently at 58k gold (reasonable for most) about 1k T1 to 300 T3 in goods.
For provinces - I was freshly started in chapter 7 meaning I had completed no provinces beyond those required - so that is 130, to exit the chapter requires 160.
I have not completed provinces for the gain relic/solve encounter quests, only going to 7 as I am wary of completing them then having to do a full province if we have the complete a province quest come up - however for 7 of 8 completed I have - 8.5; untouched I have 3 which means I need to start more.
I am only willing to do the first level of spire as beyond that it becomes too costly. Tourneys I do use for both relics, solve encounters (though where I am at, that is beyond 9 provinces and at chapter 7 it is a huge drain on my resources) and potentially for enchants.
I look at what it costs me in scouting, province completion and resource drain to look at sustainability as I will have 3-4 events while I am in chapter unless I progress more quickly than I expect. These quests have a continuing impact on my play for future events as the more denuded my resources are the longer it takes me to recover from tourney or event participation and the less likely I will be to participate in a future event.
For relics, solve encounters, I have proposed that they be scaled based on chapter level as a person in chapter 1-5 gain 9 relics has a huge impact and solve 35 tourney encounters probably takes 3 or more days. At chapter 7, I can do 7 tourney provinces without draining my resources and 8 on a daily basis if I am willing to drain more resources than I am comfortable with, whereas someone who is in chapter 10 or above those same 35 provinces are time consuming (and probably boring unless they actually like battles) the cost is minimal. On live, multiply that by participating in multiple cities and it leads to higher levels of burnout for events.
@Karvest One of the reasons I would prefer buy KP to be gain KP is it offers players more choice on how to solve it. I would expect many players take the instant route and buy KP, others would save KP from carting libraries and AWs and use it when the Gain KP quest comes up. I like quests that give me a choice on how I can resolve it far more than ones that limit me to a single path. Granted production quests are always limited, however they are core game play, buy KP is not.