(soon to come, kind of here already) achievement diary

I got this nagging thing about the achievement diary.

Firstly, upcoming changes get this announcement and 'react here' thread.
_I_ don't believe in it's use but it has virtues as it offers (to the least) a vent and more, a 'we listened to the reactions' plan.
[Please make a thread.]

Secondly, it comes with features... some great - and thank you for the gems, others... not so much.
The one that concerns me -the most- is the use of books.
Having 3 explorers plus two geologists fully booked, and the others half way - I foresee the following and am concerned:
two more explorers (ahem, next event fixed to a decent level) will show up shortly - they have good features so books on them, then you need to waste (yes) a ton of good books for
- 3 books in all 2x deposits (coal on tier 6); reminder, 2x is kind of useless as the second find is normal
- 3 books in ore wagon or some such for the explorer; sorry, who sends for titan extra drop?
If there is a way to accommodate all these requests with one specialist I did not find it... so, my problem (and others) 7 booked specialists then you need to throw books on 4 more for ...{nothing here on test, except good feelings}. I don't even make the cost of that in binder time or RBNs.
[again, pls make the thread]

Game suggestion, aka any problem is an opportunity provided you see it that way.

Insert insane resource sink that makes 1550 gems for a full refund of books look appealing for some and less repulsive for others.
Example: execute 10 DB in a week without MMA/buffs, with catch that ls doesn't work and a special discounted 7 days premium token. This (sterilises the excess horse/brew and) gives the opportunity to wash the books off a specialist. Sold as event like material will work well.
Or 20 SA to sterilise mf, or what not for titan (with a titan mine feature)...

All easy to implement and track, fixing the upcoming plethora of complaints about the use of books as described above.

I'll leave it to the gracious forum moderator to move.merge this post to its rightful place.

I have even more nagging thoughts about it.
Now the gems for certain "achievements", that's welcome but really all they are is another type of quest, didn't need a new 'system' for that.
As for the system itself, it may have a certain novelty value for people who seem to like X-boxes, but I'm sure that will soon wear off once they've checked on a few players and seen just how 'samey' everything is.
But the biggest fear yet again (assuming the devs actually get it to work), will be the increased server calls as each check looks for and retrieves the data. If this is live, even worse as not just the voyeur will lag but also the viewee as this interrogates his island. Even if it is historic, and checks the server database at a given snapshot, it is still going to increase load and we will suffer once more as no attempt ever seems to be made to compensate/reverse lag.
Honestly, I feel the time could have much better been spent on other things, like getting the basics right.

I have no interest at all in this, its another boring dull addition

I find myself asking how would a new player view this. On one hand we have the quests, admittedly they are badly out of date. Shoehorning a new quest chain into the current system does not cut it, you have to ask how will new stuff affect that which already present. A question to which we the players have no evidence that BB have asked.

On the other hand we have the achievements a system which dolls out rewards like a candy machine with no regard of how the achievement of them will affect a players progress in the game.

Us experienced players are in a position to make a value judgement of what's best for us. The new player by the fact of their newness has not had the chance to acquire that wisdom.

Just read the posts above.... although the acheivement for newbies could be seen as an incentive to progress faster, this also could be to their detriment in the fact that they may not think of balancing their productions and making sure their economy is working positively. On the upside for those that dont spend money on gems, it at the very least gives them a very real chance to get some of the high end merchant items.
Personally I do not see the acheivement system as another quest chain or series of quest chains as you arent doing anything different to what you would normally do to improve your island and productions anyway.
However, it would have been nice if BB had have fixed some of the bugs that have been here from the beginnings. Also it would be nice to hear about the developments of the new buildings that we have been trying on the Test Server for some time now, but no sign of them. One of which being the Guild Bank, being the owner of a guild it would be much appreciated if we could get some idea as to whether this will ever come to fruitition or is it still a vague promise and a pipe dream for those of us that have already made plans as to how we will incorporate it into our guilds.
Other than that alot of the new improvements have been rather good and I truly appreciate the work the Developers and BB put into this game.

The (partial) implementation of this seems insane. How are people supposed to know if they are getting gems from this or not? And no indication as to what, if any, achievements the system has registered. Knowing the propensity for other quests not to clock, this looks like a recipe for disaster.