fetch quests changelog
Changes and updates to a quest log for the modern technical worker
February 21, 2026
Quest Mechanics: Sniping and Slot Controls
After more thought on competitive multi-slot quests, I realized the original design had a gap. If multiple Farmers can work on the same quest simultaneously, and one Farmer regularly swoops in at the last moment to claim rewards from quests others have been working on, that creates a toxic dynamic. The platform now tracks this behavior as sniping. Farmers who repeatedly win rewards on quests where other Farmers were already actively working earn negative reputation for doing so. This negative reputation decreases their Incentive Share payout probability and appears publicly on the leaderboard under a Negative Reputation section. The goal is to discourage opportunistic behavior that undermines collaboration without eliminating healthy competition entirely.
Givers now have more granular control over quest slots. A Giver can limit a quest to single-Farmer mode, meaning only one Farmer can work on it at a time. Doing so increases Giver reputation, increases the probability of receiving a Community DAO bonus on stale quests, and has a chance of reducing the protocol fee by 0.5%. This incentivizes Givers to create fairer quest structures when appropriate. Competitive multi-slot quests still exist for bounty-style work, but the tradeoffs are now explicit.
Quest Restrictions: Rank and Skill Requirements
Givers can now restrict quests to Farmers of a specific rank or higher. For example, a Giver might specify that only Professional Farmers or above can accept a particular quest. This allows Givers to match quest complexity with Farmer experience. However, rank-restricted quests have decreased probability of receiving the Community DAO stale quest bonus and the 0.5% fee reduction. The platform nudges Givers toward openness while still allowing restrictions when genuinely needed.
Givers can also restrict quests to Farmers who have demonstrated experience with a specific skill. Skills include programming languages like JavaScript, Rust, Python, Go, TypeScript, Solidity, C++, Java, Ruby, Swift, Kotlin, and Haskell. They also include frameworks and specializations like React, Vue, Angular, Node.js, Django, Rails, Spring, blockchain development, smart contract auditing, web development, backend systems, full-stack engineering, mobile development, DevOps, infrastructure, data engineering, machine learning, and cryptography. Skill-restricted quests have lower Incentive Share chances, lower fee reduction chances, and lower stale quest bonus probability. The tradeoff is intentional. Open quests benefit from stronger platform incentives, while restricted quests trade those benefits for precision in matching work to workers.
Skills are extensible. If a Giver lists a skill that does not already exist on the platform, perhaps a new programming language, a niche framework, or an emerging specialization like quantum cryptography, the system generates a badge and skill acquisition pathway for it automatically. The new skill follows the same Dreyfus-based ranking structure as all other skills, and Farmers can mint badges for it once they reach the relevant thresholds. This keeps the platform adaptive without requiring manual curation for every new technology that emerges.
Farmer Collaboration: Benevolent Mechanics
A Farmer can now choose to help another Farmer on an open quest without claiming any reward for themselves. When a Farmer delegates their share of the work to another Farmer, they earn reputation toward Benevolent Farmer status instead of quest rewards. This mechanic creates a path for experienced Farmers to give back to the community in a way that is visible, trackable, and rewarded. Guilds can do the same, helping individual Farmers on quests to earn Benevolent Guild status.
Benevolent status follows its own tier system. A Farmer or Guild that delegates rewards 100 times earns Benevolent rank and can mint the Benevolent badge. At 200 delegations, they reach Good Benevolent. At 300, Mass Benevolent. At 400, Extreme Benevolent. At 1000, the highest tier, Anorak Benevolent, named after the legendary genesis creator from Ready Player One. Each tier increases Incentive Share payout probability substantially. The platform rewards generosity because generosity makes the ecosystem healthier.
There is a prerequisite added to the Master Farmer rank. A Farmer cannot reach Master Farmer without first achieving at least Mass Benevolent status and holding the corresponding badge. This ensures that the highest-ranked Farmers on the platform have demonstrated a commitment to helping others, not just personal achievement. Mastery includes mentorship.
Skill Badges and Portable Credentials
Farmers can now earn skill badges that are separate from their general reputation rank. When a Farmer completes quests requiring a specific skill they had not previously demonstrated, they earn progress toward that skill badge. Skills follow the Dreyfus model just like Farmer ranks. A Farmer might be a Professional Farmer overall but an Expert in Solidity and a Novice in Python. Each skill has its own progression, its own badge mintable at each rank, and its own visibility on the Farmer’s profile.
Givers can specify skill rank requirements on quests. A quest might require Professional-level JavaScript but be open to all Farmer ranks otherwise. If a newer Farmer completes that quest successfully, they earn credit toward Professional JavaScript skill rank, effectively bootstrapping their credentials in that area. This creates paths for Farmers to build specialized reputations even if their overall Farmer rank is still early.
As with all badges on the platform, skill badge minting costs are covered by the Farmer. The badges are wallet-portable, on-chain verifiable, and belong to the Farmer permanently.
Negative Reputation and Public Accountability
The leaderboard and Oracle now track negative reputation publicly. This includes sniping reputation for Farmers who repeatedly claim rewards from quests where others were actively working, and malicious dispute reputation for Givers who develop a pattern of disputing completed quests in bad faith. Negative reputation affects Incentive Share probability and appears on the leaderboard in a dedicated section. The goal is transparency. If someone has a history of bad behavior, that history should be visible to everyone considering working with them.
Demonstrated Benevolence: The Highest Standing
The highest and most favorable standing on the platform is Demonstrated Benevolence. This applies to both Farmers and Guilds. A Demonstrated Benevolence Farmer or Guild is one who has maintained a streak of only helping others, never claiming quest rewards for themselves, and earning all income exclusively through Incentive Share payouts generated by their Benevolent activity. This is a standing, not a rank, meaning it exists alongside the Farmer or Guild’s existing rank and Benevolent tier. It represents the purest expression of the platform’s cooperative values.
Demonstrated Benevolence status generates the highest Incentive Share probability weighting on the platform. It also earns a unique badge and a featured position on the leaderboard. The status is lost if the Farmer or Guild claims a quest reward, resetting the streak.
Conflict of Interest Limiter
To prevent gaming, there is now a conflict of interest limiter for Benevolent activity. If a Benevolent Farmer or Guild repeatedly helps the same Farmer over and over, they can trigger a conflict of interest flag. This temporarily decreases their reputation for two consecutive Seasons. The goal is to prevent reputation farming schemes where two parties collude to inflate Benevolent standing and then extract value off-platform. Genuine benevolence is distributed across many different Farmers. Concentrated benevolence looks like collusion and gets penalized accordingly.