I like the idea but I see a problem as well.
On life I am scratching at the end wall so I just scout what even I can but I don't collect them.
At this moment I have 11 province waiting to be claimed and that will become more and more every 5+ days.
Here on Beta it takes me just short of 24h to scout 1 province but I am at the orcs (CH8)
That imbalance is just to much in favour of lower chapter players.
I partially disagree. The problem is that with the changes in Tourney and Spire low-chapter players can't get any of these badges and that's why there should be a way for them to collect them in my opinion. This change was a serious oversight on the side of the Dev-team.
On beta I'm at about 28 hours and still looking for expansions, so I'm not saving them anyway.
However, my main account on the liveservers is at the end of the techtree with something like 50 provinces scouted but no encounters done. No need as I'm not gaining any more expansions from them anyway, so I save them for eventquests. The Scout's Tavern at least has reduced my scouting times from 7+ days to just over 3 days, so I tend to scout and move on. But then again, once one has advanced that far the regular encounters aren't needed as Tourney and Spire provide more than enough.