Patrol Zones & Events

Where missions send you out to find a fight, patrol zones and events are fights the game arranges in advance — a place, or a moment, where the action is guaranteed to be. A patrol zone is a circle on the map that moves each day, inside which every point of damage you deal earns doubloons whether you win or lose. Events are richer set-pieces: tough NPC fleets that spawn at hidden spots for small groups, and the occasional developer-run spectacle that puts a rare ship up for grabs. Both reward stepping into a contested fight rather than grinding a safe one, and both pay better for it.

What a patrol zone is

A patrol zone is a marked area of open sea, in a different place each day, set aside for combat. You don’t take a mission for it — you simply sail in and fight whatever you find. What makes it unusual is the scoring: all the damage you deal accumulates as points, and those points pay out in doubloons. The crucial consequence is that you don’t have to win. Even a fight you ultimately lose still bankrolls you for every broadside that landed, so the zone rewards aggression and presence far more than survival.

Scoring and claiming

Your accumulated damage and the doubloons it’s worth are tracked in the Journal — open the day’s patrol-zone entry to see your running total. The reward isn’t automatic: you claim it to move the doubloons into your warehouse, and a zone resolves on a daily cycle, so claim what you’ve earned before the day turns over rather than leaving it sitting. Think of a patrol session as a shift: fight to build the score, then cash out.

Admiralty events

Admiralty events are repeating set-piece battles that spawn at random spots in the open world — visible once you’re near them, but not flagged on the map, so finding one is part of the draw. Each is rated for a tier of ship (broadly, a smaller-rate event and a larger-rate one), and you bring ships that fit that ceiling. They’re built for a small group rather than a solo captain, and the opposition — a fast, strong NPC fleet — is meant to test one. The payoff matches the difficulty: rich loot chests holding books, upgrades, ship notes, and rare permits. See Loki Runes, Chests & Journal for what those chests hold and how you open them.

Developer-run special events

A handful of times a year the development team stages a special event of its own in a particular region, announced ahead of time on the official Steam channel and Discord rather than appearing on any in-game board. These are the chance to chase things you can’t get any other way — loot found nowhere else, or the notes to build a rare ship. Because they’re scheduled and publicised, the way to catch one is simply to follow the official announcements; this guide deliberately doesn’t list specific event ships, since which ones appear changes with each outing.

Choosing what to do today

Patrol zones and events sit at the contested end of the activity spectrum. A combat mission is the safe, controlled grind; a patrol zone trades that safety for better pay and the chance of meeting real opponents; an admiralty event trades it for a group challenge with the richest PvE loot; and a developer event is the rare shot at something unique. None demands a long-term commitment the way port battles do — you can dip into a zone for twenty minutes and come out ahead — which makes them the natural next step once the mission board starts to feel too tame.