Expeditionary Force

What is an Expeditionary Force?
An Expeditionary Force is the most efficient way to conquer a region of Vana'diel. You are basically signing up with your country's Conquest Guards to go to an un-owned region and earn a bunch of Region Points by finding Beastmen Banners and fighting the Beastmen that are spawned from them. The goal in doing this is to try and take control of the region for the next conquest tally. If it is successful, each participating member of the Expeditionary Force, or EF, can receive a number of Conquest Points for themselves as well as gaining Regional control.

Restrictions

 * First off, all players in an EF group must have Rank 3 in their nation (or higher).
 * You cannot do an EF for a nation that is not your own. You also can't do an EF for a nation that is controlled by an allied country. So if San d'Oria was in first, and owned enough regions that Bastok and Windurst were allied, a group of Windurstians could not do an EF for a Bastok controlled Region.
 * You must gather a group of 4 to 6 (the number varies with your nation's rank) of your countrymen and speak with your National Conquest Overseer guards. You can only take EF missions from the guards in your home city; you cannot take them from Jeunoan Ducal Guards or the Consuls in other countries. The required number of members is:
 * 1st Place: 6 members
 * 2nd Place: 5 members
 * 3rd Place: 4 members


 * When you speak to the City Conquest Guards and look at the list of EFs available you will see an number next to the Region name. This is the level minimum.
 * EF's have level caps. You can see what it is for each region in the chart below. You are only capped once you actually spawn the NMs, so be prepared with the right equippment before touching the Beastman Flag.

How it Works

 * Conquest Overseer- City Conquest Guards:
 * Speak with a city Conquest Guard according to your allegiance and choose the option to do an Expeditionary Force. You will be offered a selection of Regions to Conquer. To be offered a region you must have visited at least one zone in that region, most likely the Outpost zone (not sure on this), and your country must not currently be in control of the region. All members of the party must speak to the guard and activate the EF.


 * Once your party all chooses an EF to join (it must be the same one), you must all speak to the guard again to receive your Glyph and be teleported to the zone in the Region in which you will be fighting. The Glyph you receive, Windurst Woods Gate Glyph/Bastok Mines Gate Glyph/Southern San d'Oria Gate Glyph is essentially a free Warp back to your city, so make sure you have inventory space or else you have a long walk back. You should also recieve a key item " EF Insignia." You will have this insignia, and be "flagged" for the EF until the next conquest tally.


 * If you have more members than the "required" number, each group must be the exact size for the EF and be teleported out to the region seperately. Once you're in the Region you can form an alliance. If you don't have the right number of players to form 2 seperate groups, you can can have players who have already been teleported disband and warp back with the Glyph. Just party up with the remaining members that need to activate the EF and "sign up" again.


 * Once you arrive in the zone your party must hunt down a Beastman Flag. These randomly spawn in one of five static spawnpoints found throughout the zone.


 * Once you find a Beastman flag, gather everyone together to buff up before the battle. Then have one player, preferably with high evasion or blink, go and click on the flag, which is targetable. This will spawn 4 Beastmen NMs that you must defeat. When the banner is touched, everyone in the party/alliance will become level capped, so be sure you have the appropriate gear on.


 * To be successful in an EF, you must be able to quickly dispatch this group of monsters and then find the next Beastman flag and fight once again. This has the effect of a Conquest Chain. I.e.: the more flags you can defeat in succession, the more influence you will earn for your nation in a region. It takes about 5 minutes after the flag despawns for it to reappear at one of its other locations. However, the EF is technically active as long as you have the insignia. You can still gain Region Points in this way until the next conquest tally.


 * After you've defeated the NMs, you have about 30 seconds to click on the flag to remove the level cap. Some people claim you need to keep the level cap on to get the Conquest Chain, and others say it doesn't matter - that it's the time in between flags that affects the Chain. So it's up to you whether you want to remove you level cap after each battle or not. If you choose not to remove the level cap, it will wear off after about 15 minutes.


 * You can also gain influence in the Region by going to the local regional dungeons and opening treasure chests and coffers. This only counts while you have that Region's EF Insignia. Since you carry the insignia until the next conquest tally, you have until then to open any chests and coffers (in other words, it doesn't need to be done in the middle of your EF battles).


 * If you and your group are able to influence the region enough that it is controlled by your country at the next conquest tally, you can then go to your National Conquest Guard to receive your reward, which is a large number of Conquest Points.

Arsienne's Guide Pride of Bastok

Comments

 * It is recommended that most EFs are done with about 10+ players.
 * Bards are a good job to bring as the NMs can usually be slept.
 * Be wary of AoE attacks/spells and DoTs. If you are planning on sleeping the NMs, these will make that impossible.
 * It is very helpful to have a designated person call out which target to attack. That way the other NMs can be slept and everyone can focus on just one. It can also be helpful to use an assist macro to make it easier to attack the right mob. /assist PlayerName
 * The NMs that spawn can be of any job type that is available to the type of Beastman. It is random as to which jobs will spawn.
 * The NMs can and will use two-hours. These can be pretty painful from some mobs, such as Summoners.
 * If you're fighting a Beastmaster, do not kill its pet until the Beastmaster is dead. Otherwise he may Charm a party member and make things uglier than they need to be.
 * You will gain XP as if you were not level-capped. So if you would normally gain XP off of the NMs you are killing, you will. If not, you won't.
 * If you die while level capped, you will lose the amount of XP you would at the level you are capped at.
 * You can do EFs for more than one Region over the course of the week. The more Regions you do, and conquer at the next conquest tally, the more Conquest Points you will recieve as a reward. However, they are just added together. If you gain control of two regions that would normally give you 3,000 CPs each, you won't get 6,000. You'll get 4,500.
 * If you leave in the middle of an EF and your country takes control at the next conquest tally, you will still be able to get the CP reward.
 * Two countires can be doing an EF at the same time in the same zone.
 * The Region Points for killing the NMs goes to whichever country spawned them. If Bastok and San d'Oria are both doing an EF in a Region and Bastok spawns the NMs, but San d'Oria ends up killing them, Bastok will get the credit.

Locations and Rewards
Source and Maps