Getting Started

It all starts at Carlos Harbour. So head there and enter 'The Knarr', this towns wretched little dive. Our man Theofilus Yost is drinking at the table on your right. If you are level 50, you will be offered 2 missions:

~ Gold Digging
~ Can you dig it?

We will come back to Can you dig it? later. Hand in Gold Digging right away and receive your first three maps! Are you ready to dig? Let's get started.

Access your personal inventory and right click on the Riddle Me This map. Choose 'use' from the drop down menu. You will be offered the mission in a pop up window, accept it. Now scroll down to the bottom of your inventory. In the Usable Items section you will find all your unrolled maps. right click on these and your map will appear. Do this now for Riddle Me This.


As you leave the tavern you will see a man on your right by the name of Samuel Bunn. He is leaning against a pole eating an apple and has bare feet with a shackle around his right ankle. He misses his boots! He will offer you the mission:

~ Me Only Boots

Like Gold Digging this mission is available at the Carlos Harbour Coxwain. We will come back to this one later as well, if you do not have room in your journal, do not bother accepting this one quite yet.

 

Riddle Me This

Head out to the Open Sea and turn right and head towards the marked location. If your countdown timer for this particular map has disappeared, it can be refreshed by right clicking the map in your inventory again.


Once you arrive at the correct location you will need to be completely stationary, before pressing ‘x’. There is a countdown bar before you enter the mission. You will see this bar again many times!


This map is a simple word puzzle, I urge you to solve it for yourself*. However I have provided the solution below:

The first set is between man and earth. The decoy left a broken corpse once the prize tested its worth. Dig next to the barrels (the prize) not next to the ship (the broken corpse). You will find a small copper key.

The second decoy abides in life. The prize lurks near death; tread slowly as you near it lest you draw your final breath. Activate walk when you pass the weathered old signpost. You can run through this minefield and not die, but it ruins the RP, no? Dig the sandy passage beneath the skeleton (near death) not by the tree. You will find a second copper key.

The final prize I buried ‘neath where I rest me head. The decoy is near at hand ‘neath where I store my bread. Dig by the madman’s Cot. You will receive some random junk loot and a pair of ‘Madman’s gloves’

Madman’s Gloves:

*This whole mission can be completed by just running through it all and digging everywhere, using bandages to heal up. This is harder if you are a lower level and don’t have all that HP to spare. It also isn’t any fun doing it this way.

You have completed Riddle me this! When you exit you will be ported back to Port St Joe.

 

Dig Dog

This is a nice set piece but the mission is extremely straight forward. ie, just walk straight forward, rescue the dog, then follow him to the treasure, stabbing and shooting any Dread Saints that get in your way.

You will receive some very random junk loot and around 6000 dbs.

When you exit you will be ported to Havanna.

 

Finders Keepers

This mission is even more basic than the last. The dig site is 77yrds away right in front of you. Head there and start digging! 

Ack! Some Crazy old Coot is beating on you with a broken shovel! Cut him down and then continue to dig.

Your reward for completing this mission is a Water-logged old boot. It is placed in your personal inventory. If you right click on it however… there is a giant skull shaped gem. Ooh! Now right click on this gem, and receive the mission:

~ From Rags to Riches

Now when you exit this mission you will port back to La Isabella, which is nice because you want to sail back to Carlos Harbour now. And hand in From Rags to Riches.

You will receive 10,000 dbs.


Now you are at the Carlos Harbour Coxwain, it is time to do those next two missions.

 

Me Only Boots

See that piece of meat in front of you? Gross. Pick it up. Now as you round the next corner, you will see a sleepy Puma. If you know what is good for you, feed it the meat you just found.

The right boot should be in the hole next to where you found the Puma. Around the next corner the Puma will help you tear apart some Swampcat ruffians.

As you follow the track you will come across a campfire, with more Swampcats guarding it. When you defeat them they call for help and more come, including the ‘Captain of the Bayou’. Once you have defeated him he will drop some junk loot. Whilst fighting here, do not stand in the fire, as it will set you alight, meanwhile it is possible to manoeuvre your opponents so that they burn instead, a nice little bonus for your effort.

The Left boot is in the next hole just past the campsite.

Mission Complete!

Once you hand this mission in to Samuel Bunn, you discover that these aren’t actually his boots after all. Oh well, you have unlocked a new clothing item! You also earn around 4000 dbs.

Dirty Old Boots: 
~ Clothing customisation option.

 

Can You Dig It?

Cadric Milnes is gesturing desperately for your attention, you should go and speak with him. Buttering him up with politeness nets you the same information as if you insult him, so be a jerk if you want, but read what he has to say.

Now speak to all your fellow Treasure Hunters. You may recognise some familiar faces. Flattery gets you everywhere. I urge you to read all the dialogue here, it is really rather amusing. Once you have spoken to everyone, Theo makes his speech and the games have begun!

To begin, head over to Siv Fedorov. Use your ‘L’ map if you are having trouble finding her. She is sitting under the tent while her friend, Geir Egorov, is digging on the beach. She offers to show you where the treasure is. Fall for her ‘trap’ and follow her into the jungle. Her friend will try to help you but she will attack you both and you are forced to kill her, reducing your field of competitors by 2.


Now that you are in the jungle you need to find the treasure! At the northern most point of the Jungle you will find a cache of 5000 dbs. This is not THE treasure, but a nice little bonus.

Head back out to the beach and talk to the Merryman Wilham Barnet. This is the key decision here, if you want the ‘Greatest Treasure Hunter of All Time’ title, donate the 5000 dbs to the orphanage. Otherwise you can be a mean spirited scrooge and keep the measly horde.

Now let’s go talk to Chryses. It appears that some of his servants have selfishly died on him and he needs your help. Follow him about and help him, it doesn’t get you anything but a broken shovel, but it does progress the mission.

Now, Poor lefty Ortiz has decided to have a lay down, go and talk to him. It turns out he was attacked and someone has stolen his digging hook! Offer to help him for a cut of the treasure.

What a Farce! No treasure at all? Time to leave and get some answers from Theo himself!

Mission Completed.

Head back the the Tavern and talk to Theo. After handing in Can You Dig It? and if you donated the money to the orphanage you will have two missions available:

~ The Greatest Treasure
~ Stress Testing

These are simple hand in reward missions and you can complete them immediately. The Greatest Treasure rewards you with the title:

Greatest Treasure Hunter of All Time:
~ Title.

Handing in Stress Testing will reward you with three shovel based weapons that Theo has constructed out of all of your broken shovels.

You have completed all of Theo’s Quests. For now!

 

Howling Howell Davis

If you are a Pirate it is time to head to Tortuga! You are looking for Manfred Roque, he is standing down the corridor directly North of the Harbour Master. You will receive the mission:

~ Howling Howell Davis

If you are a national however you need to head to these respective towns:
 

"Howling Howell Davis is nationalized. The Tortuga source is correct for Pirates, but for British they would find it at Jeanette Denot in Port Royal, Spanish would find it at Isabel Fandino in San Juan, and the French would find it at April Hather in Roseau. The Broadsheet Peddler would also direct you to these people if you haven't accepted it yet."

 

This mission sends you to Oranjestad to the Brouwer’s Brewery to talk to Zoe Wansink. She will talk at length about her good friend and send you to the Dutch Admiralty Office to find clues. Once you leave the tavern, the Mission Door will be visable on your ‘L’ map. Head there and enter it.

Once you get inside you will be immediately attacked by some very angry Dread Saints. Kill them all. Now picking up all seven pieces of paper reveals a secret pressure panel underneath the book shelf. Press it and enter the hidden room!

Kill the next two assailants and retrieve the 3 hidden documents.

Mission Complete!

Handing this mission in to Zoe rewards you with the two treasure maps and she offers you a third map in the mission Dye Marker.

 

 

Pay Dirt

This mission is easy. Head into the jungle and start digging wherever. You will find the treasure and the Trap will be sprung. Put your avcom buffs on before talking.

This mission unfortunately is the standard ‘Kill everyone and escape to the Longboat’ scenario. This is very disappointing because so far these missions have been of a very high quality; this was a bit of a let down. Oh well.

The reward is pretty terrible too. Just a mere 2000 dbs, and I received only 2 bits of Junk Loot.

 

 

Dye Marker

You will want a small fast boat for this mission. The objective is to get to the beach and land, don’t bother trying to sink the NPCs if you don’t want to.

IMPORTANT: Make sure you avoid the suicide Barrels. One hit from those guys takes a lot of structure away. You can suddenly find yourself nearly sunk if you try to do this in a ponderous warship. My Fallen got through unscathed, whereas when I did this in a Poseidon it got a bit scary!

Once you reach the beach move through the shipwrecks to your left until you find the cross. Dig and retrieve your prize. A flask of dark liquid will be placed in your personal inventory.

Right click on the Flask and accept its mission immediately. HINT: Beware for those PvP flagged or if there is a red zone, exiting this mission drops you into the OS outside St Johns, not into the town itself. Not a great moment to go AFK.

Once you return to Oranjestad Zoe offers you yet another mission On Paper. You will also receive the two maps for having handed over the dark flask. Make sure you accept On Paper now. Make room in your inventory if you need to.

 

 

Needle in a Haystack

Head towards the cross and start digging! Although do stop and enjoy the scenery first, this is one of my favourite rooms in the game. A very cute little beach indeed.

Once you have dug and discovered nothing head down to the beach and click on the tracks. Follow the tracks in and enter the cave!

Click on all the clickables and read the story. This is a great little mission. Well done atmosphere and morbid humour. I love it.

Also your reward is a very substantial 16,000 dbs! Plus extra Junk loots! Huzzah~!

Exiting this mission ports you to Spanish town. Now it is time to sail to Guanica.

 

 

On Paper – Part One

Once you arrive in Guanica head to the Tavern and speak with Simon Jones. A brief conversation reveals that the next part of this mission is in Santiago. We’ll get back to this later. Time to activate your Dandy Surprise map.

 

 

Dandy Surprise


Once you make landing, put on your avcom buffs and walk through the south-west passageway. Once you start digging you will be interrupted. I don’t think there is any difference in outcome with the different text options. I generally just like to tell the fellow that I am digging for treasure, and then clobber the fool with my shovel.

Once you have done the number on him, start digging again and find your haul!

You receive a questionably useless unique item~

Overly Polished Planking

Once you exit you will be ported to Cabo Raphael.

 

 

 

 

On Paper – Part Two

HINT: Ship Combat Ahead! If you have been using a very small fast boat up to this point, you are going to need to swap it out for something with a bit of firepower now.

If you are already in a level 39 boat or higher, sail for Santiago now. Once you arrive, enter the mission through the Coxswain in the usual fashion. Now sink all the Spaniards and board their flagship! After this you can talk to Captain Taylor and he will happily give you his half of the treasure map.

Exit the mission and then enter ‘Your Ship’ through the Coxswain to talk to Simon Jones and complete On Paper. Simon will now offer you the mission Canvassing Nassau. Accept it.

Time to activate your Don’t Drink and Dig map.

 

 

Don’t Drink and Dig

Oh, Come on! How much of a clue do you need? Sheeeesh.

Head to the location.

Once you arrive and dig here, Spectators start to arrive… Follow the conversation, and when the Crocodile makes his appearance, run for the longboat. If you don’t attack anyone, you can get out of here without too much aggro. 

Personally I just bloodied my shovel with their heads.

This mission also drops a unique item

Slightly Dodgy Boots

Now it is time to sail to Nassau!

 

 

 

 

Canvassing Nassau

Once you arrive in Nassau enter its tavern ‘The Frog and Lobster’ and speak to the bartender, Horace Moss. He directs you to see the magistrate. According to the Magistrate, most of La Bouche’s personal belongings are now in a local mansion… Hmmm.

Enter Woodes Rodgers house and head straight to the drawing room. Mr Rodgers is inside and fairly unhappy to see you, he gets distracted by a noise and now you can search for what you are after. Head to the bedroom and rummage through Woodes things. Start examining paintings and you will hear a commotion in the parlour, go back and kill those Dastardly Dread Saints intruders.

The painting at the furthest right from the main door is the one you are after, examine it and you have completed the mission! But wait, don’t exit the mission yet, talk to Simon Jones and hand it in, on completion he offers you:

~ All for the Hamiltons

Guess what? You gotta go to Port Royal now. Sigh.

HINT: I would highly recommend leaving your boat here and sending something fast to Port Royal, you are going to need a battle ready ship in the Bahamas again very soon.

 

 

 

All for the Hamiltons

Once you are in Port Royal head to the marked mission door (it is in the northern most part of PR) and enter. Follow the mission prompts to the Hamilton Estate. Once you are at the mansion, converse with Charles Hamilton until he tells you what you need to know. He directs you to the Diving Bell Operator. Result.

HINT: You need to talk to the Operator, then click on the Diving bell machine to start the mission. This trips a few people up.

Once inside the wreck, defeat the ambushers and retrieve the lens. Once you exit the mission, make sure you talk to the diving bell operator again. If you don’t do this the mission will not progress and you will be stuck.

I hope you have left a boat up in the Eastern Antilles, because it is time to hand in the mission to Zoe in Oranjestad.

Handing in the mission gets you the three new Treasure Maps, and a fourth map for the mission, Shovel Ready. Also the unique general ship mod~

Hexham's Figurehead

HINT: Leave a ship in Oranjestad now, you need to keep coming back here.

 

 

Shovel Ready

This mission starts with 3 ships bearing down on you from behind. They have the weather-gauge so just turn and sink them with your pewpew. At the end of the fighting you discover that your ship has been holed beneath the waterline and that you need to beach her fast! Sail towards the little beach and click on it.

Talking to your First Mate furthers your objectives, you are now required to explore the far shore of the island. Hop to it.

Oh noes! Cocklyn has laid a cunning trap, return to your camp and make plans with your First Mate. When Planning, I set my First Mate to patching the hull and took the Bosun and the Gunner with me into the Jungle. I’m sure you can pretty much do whatever you like and this mission will work, but take the Gunner and her Pistoleers into the Jungle, they are very tough.

HINT/EXPLOIT: I discovered that using the ‘Follow Me’ command on the crew members I had set to repair the ship then followed me into combat anyway. So I guess you can set everyone to repair the ship and then drag them off to fight. Useful to know.

Once you have uncovered the treasure and have killed Cocklyn’s men, return to the longboat and launch your ship. If you just turn to the right and stay still, You can sink Cocklyn through the nose while he tries to close haul his Oliphant at you. Ignore the Gunboats. It should only take two or three broadsides to kill him and complete the mission.

You will be ported to Cat Island. If you have left a boat in Oranjestad, you can Port there and hand in Shovel Ready. Zoe will give you a follow on mission for this, As promised in Tortuga. We will head there in a moment. Firstly, activate your Holes of Heresy map.