6. Trade Posts

Every island has a trade post, and the price of a good is different at each one. Buy low at one island, sail it somewhere it is scarce, sell high. That run is the trade loop, and it is the most reliable way to turn a voyage into doubloons.

The goods

Twelve commodities trade, in three families of four tiers:

The tiers are priced apart on purpose: a top-tier good is worth many times its bottom-tier cousin, so a hold full of mithril is a far bigger cargo than the same hold full of tin. Since every unit takes the same space, the way to carry more value is a dearer good or a bigger ship.

These are the same resources the rest of the game uses. Nothing here is a separate trade-only currency: what you haul is what you would otherwise be crafting with.

The islands

Ten posts, each with its own prices:

Coffer Cay is the one at the docks. The other nine are out on the water: Azuria, Coralei, Lucaya, Marisol, Ondimar, Palmura, Selvara, Sundari and Verano.

Coffer Cay trades against your account: doubloons and the resources in your stash, with no ship involved. The nine at sea trade against your ship's hold, in a match.

While you are ashore at the docks, keep an eye on the treeline: small wood branches lie scattered in the forest around the town. Walk up to one and press F to pick it up for one Oak Log, straight into your stash and sellable at any trade post like the rest. A fresh branch grows back somewhere in the forest about a minute after one is taken, and greedy hands will find the supply has limits.

The Stash at the inn

Gus the Innkeep tends bar at the inn by the Town Crier, and he keeps a bank: the Stash, 16 slots of safe storage for your goods. Talk to him and you will see your bag on one side and the stash on the other. Drag an item across to deposit it, or click it and use the button; either way the whole stack moves, and dragging it back (or clicking WITHDRAW) returns it. A slot holds one kind of item, however large the stack, and depositing more of something already stashed piles onto the same slot.

The stash takes materials, fish, and anything else that stacks in your bag. It refuses what makes no sense in a bank: gear you are currently wearing, ships, and blockchain-backed items.

If 16 slots run short, Gus will clear another shelf. A one-time payment of 50,000 nuggies adds 16 more slots, for 32 in all.

How prices move

Each post prices each good on its own. Buying pushes the price up as you drain the post's stock; selling pushes it down as you flood it. So a big run moves the price against you partway through, and the last unit you sell is worth less than the first.

Prices also drift back toward normal over time. A route everyone has been running flattens out and then slowly recovers, which means the map of profitable runs is never the same two days running. There is no fixed best route to memorise.

Buying and selling at the same post carries a spread, so you cannot make money standing still. You have to move the goods.

Cargo

Your hold has limited space, and each unit of cargo takes one unit of it. Doubloons in the hold count too: every 250 aboard fills one unit. How much space depends on the ship: a raft holds 5 units, a dinghy 32, a Clockwork Brig 160 and a Wraith Brig 200 (see Ships). A full hold refuses new cargo, whether it comes from a trade post, a chest or a fishing line.

Filling the hold with cheap ore is a different bet from filling it with mithril: the ore run is safer per doubloon lost if you sink, the mithril run pays more if you get home.

You can also bring goods from your own stash instead of buying them. Before you sail, Take Cargo lets you load doubloons and any resources you already own onto the ship. Loaded doubloons take hold space at the same 250-per-unit rate. Nothing is deducted at that point; the manifest is applied once the match is live.

Getting paid

Cargo profit is settled when you extract, not when you sell. Sail to an extraction portal at your faction's port island and everything aboard comes home with you.

If your ship goes down first, the cargo goes down with it. That is the whole tension of the loop: the run that pays best is the one that keeps you out longest.

When a crew has pooled money into the cargo, the settlement returns each person's stake before anyone takes profit. Nobody loses their principal to a crewmate's good run.

Courier work

The Town Crier at the docks posts delivery jobs: sell a set quantity of a named good at a named island, get paid on top of whatever the sale itself earns.

The board is yours alone and it refills once per day at 16:00 UTC. Ten jobs are posted, you can hold three at a time, and refreshing the screen will not roll you a better one. The board for a given day is fixed the moment it is generated.

Once a job is running, a small tracker on the left of your screen during a match shows what you still owe and where it goes. It only appears if you have taken courier work.