The biggest problem which I usually find is that: there are no alternatives to the missions that require exploring a province, conquering a sector, buying a sector, researching a technology.
The creator of the game made the FOE a game to be played "savoring", playing it slowly, quietly, enjoying it ... but seeing how after an event/quest appears soon after another and another later, makes the line of research accelerate, forcing the Age change. The same goes for exploring the map ... many players have no map to explore because of that! And worse, that others, who do have map, can not do anything for lack of materials of the age of that map, for lack of bonus to attack those units so advanced already.
My two cities in the FOE (server 5 and 8 of Spain) are in Colonial. In server 8 I am on the map of Industrial I lack provinces to conquer!
I use the FOE as an educational link, for any concept, science or subject of study you can imagine Primary, Secondary, College... Being able to build many more advanced GEs I don’t commit the aberration of making it appear as if it were an oopart, I respect the historical evolution (historical and translation errors included, like the call "Obelisk" to a Celtic "menhir").
Now the aberration is to fight in territory of Industrial being still in Colonial. The Modern Age is divided into Renaissance and Baroque. It does not make sense to be in Colonial age and not to have made an intermediate map that allowed to conquer the Caribbean and the coasts, like anteroom to the American continent. This would allow to have "provinces" to be conquered in that zone of the world without harming the historical advance, allowing that the evolution was on par with the events and quest that you could launch.
The key is to always put an alternative to these impediments:
Scout a province or ...
Conquer a sector or ...
Acquire a sector or ...
Conquer a province or ...
Investigate or ...
More events, more quest there isn’t a problem if I have alternatives.
PD.- I'm waiting a Quijote Festival XDXDXD