Sure, you’re a salty dog in Sea of Thieves, but you’re also looking for a quick pile of doubloons. The best way to earn cash and unlock rewards is to rank up with the various companies on the map. There are six outposts, and three companies to choose from — the Merchant Alliance, the Gold Hoarders, and the Order of Souls. Depending on your proclivities, you can purchase a quest map from any of these reps, and start earning points to level up.
Each company offers a different type of job, but they all boil down to the same type of mission — you need to go to a place, get something, and take it back to the company men for your gold reward. There are plenty of wrinkles to this simple schema, so we’re going to break down exactly how to level up with each company, and what you’ll probably want to look out for while sailing the seven seas.
More Sea of Thieves guides on Gameranx:
- Sea of Thieves: 11 Facts You Should Know Before Setting Sail | Beginner’s Guide
- Sea of Thieves: Check Out These Mysterious Uncharted Locations | Secrets Guide
- Sea of Thieves: Hunt Gold Chickens For Fast Cash | Easy Gold Farming Guide
How To Level Up Company Reputation | Promotions Guide
Before digging into the specifics of the companies, let’s break down what you’ll be doing for each particular faction.
The entire game is, essentially, about working for the different factions to earn gold. You can only get gold by completing faction quests — nope, you won’t find gold in treasure chests. But, treasure chests are WORTH gold. The idea is, you need to explore the island, hunt for cargo, then take the cargo back to the right faction.
- Order of Souls: The Order of Souls wants skulls, and captain skulls.
- Gold Hoarders: The Gold Hoarders want treasure chests and trinkets found in vaults, or buried.
- Merchant Alliance: The Merchant Alliance wants chickens and other items, to be delivered.
The loop boils down to a few steps: purchase a quest map, go to the location, hunt animals / skeletons / chest, bring cargo back to the company rep and turn your stuff in for gold. Things get complicated when you toss other pirates into the mix.
Other Pirates – Stealing Cargo
Yes, your cargo can be stolen at any time. Here’s the thing — you’ll never lose company reputation or your personal stash of gold. Those cannot be lost, no matter how many times you die. If your ship is destroyed, you get a replacement ship immediately. If you die, you respawn nearby. The only thing you can (and often will) lose is cargo.
If your ship is destroyed, any cargo will float in the ocean above your shipwreck, allowing attacks to swoop in and take what they want. While carrying your items to shore, enemies can kill you and turn in treasure / cargo themselves. A single enemy pirate can even climb onto your ship, raid your stores without you even knowing it, and swim away!
One of the biggest challenges in the game is overcoming a raiding party of enemy pirates. But — it’s also a fun way to raise your rank. Instead of completing missions, you can wait for other pirates to return with treasure, sink them, and loot the cargo for rewards. Not exactly easy, but it is an option.
Company Quest Tips
Not all quests are created equal. Sometimes you’ll get far more valuable quests — in the form of Skeleton Fort raids or more valuable resource collecting — such as hunting Gold Chickens instead of regular chickens. If you’re looking to skip the boring stuff and jump right into the most valuable jobs, simply cancel after purchasing a quest map, and buy another. You’ll eventually, randomly, get more valuable quests after about 4-5 quest map purchases.
If you’re looking for a big raid, you’ll also want to keep an eye out for giant skeleton skulls in the cloud. Follow these laughing specters to find Forts covered with cannons — fight through hordes of skeletons and defeat the Skeleton Captain to earn a Vault Key. The vaults typically give you huge rewards — 20,000$ or more — but you might also encounter enemy players trying to look the place before you can, resulting in a three-sided (or four-sided, or five-sided, etc) brawl on the high seas.
Highest Rank Rewards
As stated in our Beginner’s Guide, there are a couple cosmetic rewards you can earn for totally, completely earning high ranks in each of the three companies. We don’t know what these reward cosmetics look like yet — no one has actually reached high rank, not so far — but they do sound pretty cool.
- Merchant Alliance: Admiral clothing and items.
- Order of Souls: Rogue Sea Dog clothing and items.
- Gold Hoarders: Gold Compass, Gold Shovel, Royal Sovereign clothing and items.
Sounds cool, right? Find a crew and work together, and you just might be able to rank up and get these top-tier rewards.
