The productions can come from any building and will still count, you can have 4 different buildings and if each of them is doing a 24-hour production then it will count. If I'm not mistaken you might also be able to have 4 buildings set aside with completed 24-hour productions, collecting them after you have accepted the quest should count.
Yes, they do count. That is one thing that people will learn about these events. There are always the 'usual suspect' quests that you can prepare for ahead of time.
1. Set at least 2 techs where they can immediately be opened. Have all FP's and Goods necessary placed, just leave them on the blue $.
2. Set your continent map so that you have at least 1 negotiate sector open and ready to complete. Again have your goods necessary.
3. Try to set a province so you can easily jump to a 'scout' quest if necessary. Do you need goods for negotiate, or armies to conquer? Get them ready before.
3. Provinces should have at least 3 sectors that can be infiltrated.
4. Set at least 5, 24 hour productions and try to leave them uncollected (need to pay attention here). Collect immediately when the quest appears.
5. Set an 8 hour and a 24 hour production, and leave them uncollected, as above.
6. Take care w/polish and motivate. Leave at least 20 people open at all times, or you may find yourself waiting 24 hrs. to visit.
7. Try to recruit at least 3 current units and 4 previous units and leave them uncollected.
Again, these are things that you learn after participating in 2 or 3 events. The next event should take place at Halloween, so plan ahead for the 'usual suspects'. (Oh yes, FYI, in past events, the production had to be all of the same type building. eg; all from blacksmiths, or all from alchemists or all from goat farms etc. Now
that was a real pain. Also, there was no options for using previous age building/units etc. for quest completion. If you just entered into an age, you were pretty much screwed as far as climbing the tech tree to get to what you needed - both in FP's and goods production).
. . . mk