GE – Sanctuary Strategy Shop

FoE Advanced: Guild Expedition Negotiation Analysis

PURPOSE

This post summarizes the results of data tracking for the amount of Expedition Points (EP) gained through negotiating Guild Expedition (GE) encounters.

Conclusions

SUCCESSFUL NEGOTIATIONS
The amount of EP gained through successfully negotiation a GE encounter is based exclusively on the following:

The baseline fighting points for each encounter. These values are determined by the player’s age, the number of units that are defeated, and what GE segment the encounter is in. See FoE Advanced: GE Fighting Analysis for more details.
The number of negotiation offers made (note: not negotiation rounds). The EP rewarded is determined by the baseline fighting EP for the encounter times a multiplier, m. The multiplier is as follows:
- m = 100% + 1.67% x (n– 10); where n = the number of offers made

NOTE: There also appears to be a slight correction factor applied to the baseline fighting EP values of 100.021%. However, since this is such a small value, and the results without it are only off by a few EP, this correction factor can reasonably be ignored.

Example 1:
If you completed a negotiation with a perfect selection of only 5 offers (i.e. you got all 5 right in the first negotiation round) you would make:
m= 100% + 1.67% x (5-10) = 100% + 1.67% x -5 = 100% – 8.35%
m = 91.65%
Therefore you would only make approximately 92% of the EP value obtained from fighting.

Example 2:
If you completed a negotiation with 13 total offers you would make:
m= 100% + 1.67% x (13-10) = 100% + 1.67% x 3 = 100% + 5.01%
m = 105.01%
Therefore, you would make approximately 105% of the EP value obtained from fighting.

As the values for a winning a GE encounter negotiation depend on the number of offers made, there is some variability in the overall point totals possible to achieve for negotiation. However, the approximate breakdown for the Progressive Era is:

Level 1: ~6.5% of total
Level 2: ~12.5% of total
Level 3: ~28.0% of total
Level 4: ~53.0% of total

The following has been confirmed NOT to impact the number of EP earned for successful negotiations:

The total number of goods, previous or current era, spent
The total number of coins, production, or medals spent
The number of negotiation rounds it takes to succeed
The number of failed (red) negotiation offers
The number of mismatched (yellow) negotiation offers

FAILED NEGOTIATIONS
The value of the points earned for a failed negotiation is confirmed not to be scaled to the current GE segment, and appears primarily effected by the number of correct (green) offers made before the negotiation was abandoned. These point values are trivial (~50 EP for 4 correct offers in the Progressive Era), and are therefore not useful for generating a meaningful increasing in the overall score a player can make.

Methodology

The following were tested and tracked in an Excel file (attached at the end of this post):

The number of EP awarded per negotiations (successful and failed)
The number of goods/coins/production/medals required for each offer
The breakdown of correct (green), mismatched (yellow), and incorrect (red) offers made each negotiation round
The total number of negotiation rounds
The total number of goods/coins/production/medals spent per negotiation

The above data was collected by taking iOS screenshots, and then manually entering data into the Excel file.

The ratio between the recorded EP earned by negotiation and the recorded EP earned by fighting was then calculated for each encounter. To better control potential differences in these values due to rounding, separate ratios were also calculated for the smallest values that would round up to the reported values (i.e. -0.5 EP), and the largest values that would round down to the reported values (i.e. +0.4 EP).

The variability in point values were then compared to the various metrics recorded. This included the number of negotiation rounds, the number of negotiation offers, the number of incorrect (red) offers, the number of mismatched (yellow) offers, the total resources spent, and the cost of each negotiation offer.

Once the element that could be correlated with the variability could be determined, the minimum and maximum possible multipliers were calculated using the minimum and maximum ratios calculated using the various worst-case unrounded values described above. The overall minimum and maximum multipliers were then determined by the limiting case multipliers which would cover all ratios of a given type.

The multiplier was then determined experimentally by comparing the recorded negotiation EP values to the rounded values calculated by applying the multiplier to the worst-case lowest unrounded, the reported, and the worst-case highest unrounded fighting EP values . The multiplier was considered “close enough” when the values calculated through this process had at least one of the three calculated results match the recorded negotiation EP values.

Results

Once the data was compiled, it became fairly clear that the number of negotiation offers made was the principle factor accounting for the variability of the EP reward in comparison to the baseline fighting EP. The following graph demonstrates the direct correlation between the EP (as a percentage of the baseline fighting EP) and the number of negotiation offers made.

The minimum multiplier was determined to be 1.66854% per offer above or below 10, and the maximum multiplier was determined to be 1.67113%. In the process of looking at the multipliers, it was revealed that the baseline fighting EP values were between 0.01% and 0.043% higher at the for the baseline negotiation value at 10 offers. Therefore, a correction factor was applied to the baseline fighting EP values.

Ultimately, a multiplier of 1.67% and a correction factor of 100.021% were determined which resulted in every encounter having at least one correct rounded EP result per encounter, and a total of 137 out of the 234 calculated rounded results, or 59%, being correct.

Additionally, it took 733 previous era goods, 878 current era goods, 41,192 gold, 34,264 production, and 650 medals to negotiate all 64 Progressive Era encounters. These numbers are only intended to be illustrative of the scale of goods required to negotiate GE. Luck and negotiation skill will cause these numbers to vary. See the below graph for the cumulative costs vs GE encounter:

The following Excel file contains all of the analysis and plots for perusal (yellow highlighted cells are missing or uncertain data):

GE Points Tracker – Negotiate Download

The following charts visually represent some other relationships, or lack-thereof, between the EPs earned and the corresponding data (these are from the above Excel file):

FoE Advanced: Guild Expedition Fighting Analysis

PURPOSE

This post summarizes the results of data tracking for the amount of Expedition Points (EP) gained through fighting Guild Expedition (GE) encounters.

Summary

SUCCESSFUL BATTLES
The amount of EP gained through successfully fighting a GE encounter is based exclusively on the following:

The player’s Age
The current GE segment (see GE: Basics)
The number of enemy units (See Contemporary Era/Tomorrow Era discussion at the end of this section for unique circumstances)

The following has been confirmed NOT to impact the number of EP earned:

The amount of damage the player receives
The number of units the player loses
The attack and defense bonuses of the enemy
The amount of Combat Points earned for the battle
The age of the the player or the enemy’s units, nor the specific units

As the values for a winning a GE encounter battle are fixed, there is no variability in the amount of points available when successfully fighting (excepting lost battles). In the Progressive Era (PE), the successful fighting point totals are:

Level 1: 10,853 EP (6.5% of total)
Level 2: 21,049 EP (12.5% of total)
Level 3: 47,207 EP (28.0% of total)
Level 4: 89,252 EP (53.0% of total)
TOTAL: 168,361 EP

The following table summarizes the point values for PE battles from the collected data. Note that the Point/Enemy Unit value does not appear to increase at a constant or predictable rate, and some error is introduced due to the only data being reported to the player being rounded. While the values below show the Point/Enemy Unit for PE, the included Excel file provides these values for the Iron Age, Modern Era, Post Modern Era, and Contemporary Era. The “Point Increase over Previous Segment” is constant across eras, but the initial Point/Enemy Unit value for Segment 1 increases based on the age of the player at the start of GE.

Progressive Era Fighting EP Summary
GE Level	Segment	Approx. Points / Enemy Unit	Point Increase over Previous Segment
1	1	83.55	–
	2	87.75	105%
	3	91.89	105%
	4	100.25	109%
2	5	108.61	108%
	6	121.14	112%
	7	133.60	110%
	8	150.33	113%
3	9	167.00	111%
	10	192.06	115%
	11	217.13	113%
	12	250.51	115%
4	13	283.93	113%
	14	325.68	115%
	15	367.43	113%
	16	417.50	114%

CONTEMPORARY/TOMORROW ERA WEIRDNESS
The initial analysis was conducted in the Progressive Era. Additional data collection for the Iron Age, Modern Era, Post Modern Era, and the Contemporary Era has been conducted to verify the behavior is the same across ages. With the exception of the Contemporary Era (discussed below), the results of the Progressive Era analysis have been verified to hold true for other ages.

The Contemporary Era (CE) introduces the Missile Artillery Unit, which has a unique ability called “One Shot.” After attacking, this unit is removed from the map. If the battle is lost, the unit is destroyed, else the unit survives. As shown in the Excel file below, Missile Artillery units which are allowed to fire in the last wave of a battle are effectively removed from the EP point calculations. For example, if you win a one-wave battle with 8 enemy units, one of which is a Missile Artillery unit which is allowed to attack, you will only get EPs rewarded for 7 enemy units. However, if you are in a two wave battle, any Missile Artillery from the first wave are considered “destroyed” regardless of their status, while any Missile Artillery units that were allowed to attack in the second wave are removed from EPs calculations.

This was verified through the use of flying units such as Attack Helicopters and Combat Drones, which are not targetable by Missile Artillery. See the Excel file included below for the raw data collected demonstrating this relationship.

As the Missile Artillery unit is the only unit in the game with “One Shot,” this only impacts GE for the Contemporary and Tomorrow Eras.

FAILED BATTLES
The value of the points earned for a failed battle is confirmed not to be scaled to the current GE segment, and appears primarily effected by the amount of damage done to enemy units. Further testing is required to confirm these relationships.

Methodology

The following were tested and tracked in an Excel file (attached at the end of this post):

The number of EP awarded using different age troops for battles
The amount of damage done to the enemy
The amount of damage received
The number of units lost
The attack and defense bonus of the enemy troops
The ages of the enemy troops
The number of waves in the GE encounter
The number of Combat Points awarded

The above data was collected by taking iOS screenshots, and then manually entering data into the Excel file.

Once the data was compiled, it became fairly clear that the principle factors impacting the EPs earned were the segments and the number of units. Therefore, the approximate Points/Enemy Unit was calculated by determining the widest possible range the unrounded EP value could be. The minimum unrounded EP value was calculated by subtracting 0.5 from the EP and the maximum unrounded value was calculated by adding 0.4 to the EP. (i.e. if an encounter rewarded 969 EP, the minimum unrounded value is 968.5 and the maximum unrounded value is 969.4).

These minimum and maximum unrounded EP values were then divided by the number of enemy units to calculate the range of Points/Enemy Units values which, when rounded, would result in the EP values recorded. For each GE segment, the narrowest range which fit all of the data points was determined. Then an average value of this range was calculated.

A final check was done with this average Points/Enemy Unit to determine if the value, when applied to each segment, would result in the rounded EP values recorded. With the exception of segment 2, encounter 8, all of the final rounded values match perfectly.

Finally, in an attempt to determine the impacts of each segment, the average Points/Enemy Unit values for each segment were compared to the values from the previous segment.

Results

The following Excel file contains all of the analysis and plots for perusal (yellow highlighted cells are missing or uncertain data):

GE Points Tracker – Fighting Download

The following charts visually represent the relationship, or lack-thereof, between the EPs earned and the corresponding data (these are from the above Excel file):

FoE Basics: Guild Expedition

Guild Expedition Overview

Guild Expeditions (GE) are broken up into four (4) levels. Each level is comprised of 16 encounters, which in turn are broken up into four (4) segments of four (4) encounters. The last encounter in each segment is of a higher difficulty. Individual awards are given to the player after each encounter, and the guild gains crowns through various mechanisms.

Level 4 of each GE is considerably more difficult than the previous levels.

Only guild members who have researched joined before the start of the GE can participate in that week’s GE.

The first GE Level is automatically unlocked at the beginning of each week, but Levels 2 through 4 require the guild to spend goods to unlock, determined by the age of each eligible guild member. See the FoE Wiki for a current breakdown of the costs. This is part of the reason Guilds stress the importance of Arcs and Observatories, collecting from them covers your cost to unlock GE expeditions (and GvG, do be discussed later).

There are two (2) aspects of scoring in GE, detailed below:

THE CHAMPIONSHIP

*The GE Championship Screen. Note that over 100% completion is shown as “on fire!”*

The only thing that matters is the total number of encounters completed by all eligible guild members. The number of encounters necessary to achieve 100% completion is determined by the completion of GE Level 3, or 48 encounters, by all guild members. The completion percentage can exceed 100% through the completion of GE Level 4.

Winning is based solely on the completion percentage, with the first place guild receiving 125% of the GE crowns collected (detailed below), 2nd place receiving 115% of the GE crowns collected, and 3rd place receiving 110% of the GE crowns collected. All other places simply receive the GE crowns they already collected.

GE Victory Screen, showing the base number of crowns collected over the course of the GE, and the bonus (in this case 115% for 2nd Place)

EXAMPLE:
If you had 10 eligible guild members, the total encounters needed to achieve 100% completion is 480 encounters. If 8 members completed 48 encounters, one (1) member completed 36 encounters, and one (1) member completed 64 encounters, the total would be:
(8*48) + (1*36) + (1*64) = 484 encounters
This results in a total completion percentage of (rounded):
100% * (484 / 480) = 100.1%

Expedition Points

In addition to the GE Championship, each guild member also adds points to a collective pool to unlock guild crowns. The progress to unlocking the next level of guild crowns, and the remaining points needed to unlock that level are indicated at the bottom of the GE screen in the GE Meter. Crowns are awarded to the guild as each new GE Meter Level is unlocked, and the total number of crowns obtained in GE is what is used to determine the size GE Championship bonus.

The number of points required to unlock the next GE Meter Level, and the amount of guild crowns rewarded are both determined at the beginning of each week’s GE based on the levels of the age of the guild members eligible to compete in GE. The points required to unlock the next GE Meter Level start low and increase over time. In general GE Meter Level 18 corresponds to the points earned if every guild member completes GE Level 3, and Level 25 (the maximum) represents the number of points earned if every guild member completes GE Level 4.

For more details, see the FoE Advanced: GE Meter analysis.

Clicking/tapping on the “Current Crown Reward Level” shows the total crowns already collected, and how much will be awarded at the next level.

The number of points each player gets per encounter is based on their age, the GE segment they are on, and whether they fought or negotiated (detailed below). Of these, the players age plays the largest component.

However, as the reward requirements scale to the total cumulative points the guild could possibly achieve, if all players complete GE, then the maximum reward will be still be awarded.

However, a player of a higher age will ultimately have more of an individual impact on the overall progress.

EXAMPLE
You have two (2) members one age apart. Let us assume that the higher aged member gets 150% of the lower aged member’s points.
The total points your guild could possibly get is then:
Lower Age Total + 1.5 * Lower Age Total = 2.5 * Lower Age Total
In this way, if the lower age player completes all of their encounters the most they can contribute to the overall point total is 40% [1/2.5], while the higher aged player would be capable of contributing 60% of the total.

FIGHTING: The number of expedition points received for fighting is determined only by the GE segment and the number of Enemy Units. As there are no performance based modifiers to the expedition points awarded, this is considered the “baseline” value. See Foe Advanced: GE Fighting Analysis for a complete analytical breakdown.

NEGOTIATING: The number of expedition points received for negotiating is determined by the number of “offers” you have made. 10 offers results in the baseline fighting value (or close enough). Every offer above 10 increases the expedition points by approximately +1.67%, and every offer below 10 decreases the expedition points by -1.67%. (i.e. If you make 12 offers to win a negotiation you would receive ~103.3% of the fighting expedition points value, and if you had a perfect negotiation and won with your first 5 offers you’d earn ~91.7% of the fighting expedition points value). See FoE Advanced: GE Netotiation Analysis for a complete analytical breakdown.

PLAYERS AGE: Below is a table summarizing the differences in total expedition points between the ages. Note that the baseline EP points for Ages written in red are calculated based on the final point totals of guild members who completed 64 encounters over the course of 27 weeks, which includes some variability due to point differences between fighting and negotiation, and failed guild expedition encounters. IA, PE, ME, PME, and CE values are all baselined to the fighting EP for 64 encounters from the collected data in Foe Advanced: GE Fighting Analysis. As more data is collected, these values will be refined. Regardless, they still provide a general magnitude of baseline point differences between the ages.