Treasure Islands

Somewhere in the archipelago, the tide leaves behind more than driftwood. Every few hours a handful of uninhabited shores glint with a faint, golden shimmer, a signal to sharp-eyed Governors that something has washed up beneath the sand.

Raiding

How to take the shimmer: fleets, attrition, and the mechanics of an uninhabited raid.

Chart & Navigation

Reading the region chart and where to watch for the sparkle.

Reports & Dispatches

Where treasure finds and cursed chests are recorded.

What They Are

A treasure island is an ordinary uninhabited shore that the archipelago has, for a time, marked as holding something worth finding. You will see them in region view as islands that twinkle softly. No other indicator, no label, no fanfare. Just the shimmer.

• Only uninhabited islands can bear treasure. A settled shore cannot sparkle.
• The set rotates roughly every 4 hours. The same island may or may not be chosen again.
• The number of treasure islands scales with how busy the world is. A thriving archipelago shows more; a quiet one shows at least a couple.

Claiming the Shimmer

Send a raid fleet to a sparkling shore. If your raid lands successfully and a landing force survives the wild defenders, the island's prize is yours. The shimmer fades the moment it is claimed. Other Governors who arrive afterwards will find an ordinary, picked-over shore.

The prize itself is not guaranteed to be friendly. Most successful claims yield a buried treasure chest worth between 5,000 and 10,000 coins (90% of claims). A smaller share (10%) uncovers a cursed chest. The landing force is lost, but your ships escape unharmed. A minority of claims turn up nothing but sand. Either way, the shimmer is gone.

Why Rotation

Before the rotation existed, any raid on any uninhabited island could stumble into a chest by pure luck. Now the archipelago itself decides where a prize lies: briefly, visibly, and for everyone to see. Speed, scouting, and fleet readiness matter more than repetition.

Marshal Voss: Field order

A shimmer is a clock, not a guarantee. By the time you muster a proper fleet, another Governor may already be sailing. Keep a lean raiding force rigged and ready. The first hull to arrive takes the gold.

Read the Charts Faster

Sweeping the map for a shimmer takes time. Chart-readers need a beat to take their bearings between regions. The Laboratory on your capital island shortens that beat: every level cuts the scouting delay on the world chart. Rivals with a neglected Laboratory will see a shimmer fade before their charts settle, while a well-appointed laboratory lets you leap from region to region almost without pause.

Strategy

• Watch the map. Open region view periodically. The shimmer is your only tell.
• Send cheap landing troops. A cursed chest wipes the landing force regardless of what you sent. Spearfighters die just as surely as stone throwers, at far greater cost.
• Don't linger. The rotation is short. A fleet that arrives after the claim finds nothing but an ordinary shore.
• Spread your raids. Multiple islands sparkle at once. The quickest hand to any one of them takes the gold.

For the full raiding playbook, carry capacity, attrition, and diminishing returns, see the Raiding guide.

Reference

Common questions