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Sailing the Sea of Thieves is all about making as much gold as you can. Emissaries are the best way to stack earnings quickly, although there are both pros and cons to donning the flags of one of the game's five trading companies.

These are the Gold Hoarders, fans of all things shiny, the Merchant Alliance, fond of yummy boxes of tea (the less soggy, the better), the Order of Souls, who have a creepy affection for skulls, the Athena's Fortune, for only the most skilled pirates, and the Reaper's Bones, for those who prefer to sink ships rather than dig for treasure. Here's everything you need to know about emissaries in Sea of Thieves.

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How Do Emissaries Work In Sea Of Thieves?

Sea Of Thieves Emissary Improvements
Sea Of Thieves Emissary Improvements

Emissaries are essentially a method of structuring your gameplay for your next long Sea of Thieves session. Each emissary will require something different of you: for example, while flying the flag of the Order of Souls, you should prioritize quests that reward you with skulls, as these sell for a greater value with the Order of Souls. Each emissary is different.

Emissaries will gift you lots of different cosmetics for leveling up with them. Here's how to sign up for an emissary, and which emissary is best suited to your style of play.

How To Sign Up To Become An Emissary

Emissary Table in Sea of Thieves

Four of the emissaries (The Merchant Alliance, Order of Souls, Gold Hoarders, and the Reaper's Bones) are available for any player to sign up for on one of the starting Outpost islands. The Athena's Fortune is also available at the Outpost, near the tavern, but can only be accessed once you reach the rank of Pirate Legends.

There are a couple of prerequisites you need to complete before you can sign up to the other four emissaries as well:

  • For the Gold Hoarders, Order of Souls, and Merchant Alliance, you must reach at least rank 15 for each emissary. The flag can then be purchased from one of the emissary representatives found on the starting Outposts. Only one player needs to purchase the flag, which means you can raise the emissary flag if one of your friends is of a higher rank.
  • Reaper's Bones can also be signed up for on the Outpost, or at the Reaper's Bones Hideout. This costs a flat rate of 20,000 for the flag.
  • Athena's Fortune is only accessible to Pirate Legends. Pirate Legend status is awarded when you reach at least level 50 in the various emissary ranks. That being said, you do only need one Pirate Legend in your crew to access the quests.

Getting to rank 15 is fairly simple, and you should start to gain rank points via completing quests for the emissaries. Once you hit rank 15, the progress you make in terms of gold and emissary levels starts to skyrocket.

Related: Sea Of Thieves: How To Become An Emissary

Raising The Emissary Flag

emissary ships with flags and cosmetics

The emissary flags denote which emissary you and your crew are sailing with. This doesn't work like a flag that flies at the top of your crow's nest, but rather at the back of the ship. To raise it, you just need to get all the crew members to vote for the flag at one of the tables allocated to the emissaries. Lowering it works the same way, although you probably don't want to lower it before you sell all your hard-earned treasure.

Things to remember about raising the flag:

  • Raising an emissary flag of any of the companies will instantly make you a greater target out on the Sea of Thieves. You're basically shouting into the wind that you've got loads of treasure on board, and likely a valuable flag for any nearby Reaper's ships.
  • Ships sailing under the flag of the Reaper's Bones will always show up on the map, although they can also see every other ship on the map and their emissary value once they reach the highest emissary level. Be wary when you see a ship on the horizon flying the flag of the Reapers, and make sure to keep an eye on the map below deck to be aware of your surroundings.
  • You can lower your own emissary flag to sell back to the emissary you were sailing under. You get a nice chunk of gold for a grade five flag. Once your ship sinks, because that is usually a fairly regular occurence on the Sea of Thieves, your Broken Emissary Flag will float to the surface, waiting to be picked up by you, or the pirates that sunk you. The broken flag is sold to the Reapers for a hefty profit.

Which Emissary Should You Play As?

Sea of Thieves Trading Companies

Each emissary has a unique playstyle. To reach the rank of Pirate Legend you will need to play as all of them eventually, but here's a rundown of each emissary, and the sort of quests, missions, and tasks you'll be doing for them.

Gold Hoarders

Gold Hoarders, as you might have guessed, are concerned with all things gold. This means they'll send you on quests to dig up treasure chests, with up to three Gold Hoarders voyages available in your inventory at any given time.

You can earn emissary reputation when sailing under an emissary flag by completing all sorts of events, including picking up treasure chests and mermaid gems, completing the riddle maps, or defeating the Megalodon. You earn ordinary reputation by selling treasure to the Gold Hoarder representative at an Outpost. You don't need to be flying their flag to sell treasure to them.

Order Of Souls

The Order Of Souls sends you on bounty voyages, on the hunt for bounty skulls. These are usually a bunch of different maps that lead to the location of pirate captains, with the captains becoming harder to defeat depending on the level of the voyage.

At rank 25, you can purchase a Ghost Ship voyage which sends you off to take down a ghostly ship and their crew. These reward Ghostly Skulls which can be sold back to the Order Of Souls representative. To earn rank reputation with the Order of Souls, just sell Mermaid Gems and any Skulls you find lying around.

Merchant Alliance

There are a variety of different voyages available from the Merchant Alliance representative, found on the docks of any Outpost. These could be collecting lost treasure, delivering goods to another Outpost, or collecting trade goods, like locking up a pig from an island and delivering it to a set location.

Completing voyages for the Merchant Alliance is a laidback affair, and because you likely won't have much valuable treasure onboard, you aren't a direct target of any loot-hungry enemy crews.

Reaper's Bones

Unlike the other emissaries, the Reaper's Bones do not offer voyages. It's left up to you to decide how you want to serve the company, usually pillaging other crew's loot and completing ordinary world events. You can sell just about any treasure you want to the Reaper's which makes them an easy go-to emissary if you're just looking for a quick Sea of Thieves session.

Be wary of the Reaper's Hideout, however, as this is the only place where you can sell treasure. Many, many other crews hover around the Hideout, waiting for treasure deliveries. You can check out our full guide to the Reaper's Bones here.

Athena's Fortune

Voyages for the Athena's Fortune comprises elements of all the other emissaries, eventually leading towards a Chest of Legends, one of the most valuable treasures in the game. You'll end up doing all sorts of things, like digging up buried treasure, hunting down skeleton captains, and solving riddles. Ideal endgame content for experienced Sea of Thieves players.

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Emissary Rewards And Quests

sea of thieves order of souls ship set, ship sailing on the ocean

The whole point of flying an emissary flag is to get more gold. Between the five grades of flags, by the time you reach the final grade (grade five) you are making a massive 150 percent extra on any rewards turned in, which means gold, emissary reputation (for your emissary rank), and emissary value.

This can turn an ordinary Vault run into an absolute fiesta of gold. Here are the exact values of how much each grade offers:

Emissary Grade

Reward Modifier

Grade One

Base Level (No Change)

Grade Two

+33 percent boost

Grade Three

+67 percent boost

Grade Four

+100 percent boost

Grade Five

+150 percent boost

As well as the rewards you earn from completing tasks and selling goods to the emissaries, once you reach grade five there are also a number of unique quests that offer up huge treasures.

  • Reaper's Bones - Once you reach the level five grade of the Reaper's Bones, you will be able to see the emissary crews of every other ship on the server. This makes hunting down other ship's much easier, ideal if you want to try your hand at PvP. Remember, though, your Reapers flag is still worth plenty of gold to other Reapers so keep your eyes on the horizon.
  • Gold Hoarders - Reaching grade five with the Gold Hoarders will give you four treasure maps, each leading to a site with five Captain's Chests. Each chest can sell for a maximum gold amount of around 2,700 if you take it back to the Gold Hoarders with your grade five flag still intact, which makes this a great value set of quests.
  • Merchant Alliance - An emissary best suited to the pacifist players that like to take it slow, shipping goods from island to island, the final reward for a grade five flag is two maps that lead to a bunch of cargo crates. Nothing too special here, really, but more of the same if you like collecting cargo.
  • Order Of Souls - Extra bounty maps, the ones that send you to find various skeleton captains, that reward four Villainous Bounty Skulls in total.
  • Athena's Fortune - Probably the most valuable of the emissaries grade five rewards, reaching this point will give you a bunch of different quests that all reward Athena's Fortune Treasure. Yummy. Gold!

Emissary Ledgers And Long-Term Rewards

emissary ledger rewards set on different ships

All your hard work for the various emissaries can pay off in the long run. All Pirates are entered into the Emissary Ledger, basically a game-wide leaderboard for the most successful emissaries of the month.

If you find yourself in the top tiers of emissary value at the end, you will unlock unique cosmetics depending on which emissary you climbed to the top with. Once you've got your rewards, it's all reset and you have to start all over again. Yo, ho, ho, a pirate's life for you.

NEXT: Sea Of Thieves: A Guide To Selling Fish