Sunless Sea gives new players a tough start. You're likely to run out of food and fuel a lot, run out of money a lot, and die a lot. And even if you play it smart and safe, expect a slooooooww griiiiind. And that just might tempt you to quit the game entirely . . .

This guide is meant to instead give you a start that's cheap (as in, low-effort, lazy) and dirty (exploity, inefficient, wasteful [or is it?!]) and quick (as in, from A to Z without worrying much about what's actually between A and Z). This guide borrows a number of the most useful early tips and spoilers from different Sunless Sea guides out there, bringing them all into one place and weaving them in as you play, though actually trying to keep the spoilers to a minimum.


This might seem long for a quick start guide, but you'll be given several crossroads as we go, allowing you to decide whether you want to utilize certain advantages--in fact, you can safely read just the early parts and ignore the rest if you want. Spoilers and details will increase as we go, so you can choose how to balance the game's spoilers with starting speed.

But remember that the game itself is quite long. And in the case of such a large game with such high early difficulty, getting a quicker start may be the best way to play.


Finally, if you want a slower or more thorough guide, you can always use aardvarkpepper's, Mrmac23's, or someone else's.

But enough talk. Here are my quick 'n' dirty tips.

Don't worry about accomplishing anything of substance at first.

Don't worry about your stats, how many times you die, or run out of fuel or food or hull strength or money or going insane. Let it happen--in fact, go out of your way to make some of it happen. Many of the Steam achievements reward this sort of play, so I'm pretty sure this is what the designers intended at the start. Life is cheap on the sunless sea. Start a bunch of throwaway characters. When you die, start another captain. Test out the legacies and everything else. Read the in-game tips. Fight monsters. Throw your resources around, throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. Soak up the knowledge and Steam achievements you get along the way.

Concentrate on exploring places, even if it costs all your fuel and supplies. Get an idea how much stuff costs, an idea of distances and fuel. Go as far as you can. Buy what you feel like. Take the quests, options, and officers you feel like—you won't have any of it for long.

Don't sweat the consequences. Let yourself die 3 or 4 or 10 times. Try to die differently each time—try to learn a bit from your failures, too, so you don't repeat the same death too often. Do random stuff. Have fun.


Get the basics down, of piloting your ship, using your light, even how to buy stuff in the shop, hire crew, get repairs, sleep, etc. Make sure you at least get to Whither and Iron Republic, north and south of London. Hopefully get to Frostfound, the Dawn Machine, Port Carnelian, Khan's Shadow. Maybe get to the other side of the map.

Be unfair right back.


After a few hours you'll probably find your character barely gets by most of the time, but you'll hopefully have had some fun too, maybe helped some guinea pigs, met some post office workers and devils, fought some blemmigans and crabs. Hopefully you'll have an idea what kind of playstyle you like. Trading. Combat. Exploration. Diving into storylines and quests.

Feel you're now ready to start a real character?


WAIT!

Die again, and take the Pupil or Salvager legacy, so you can keep at least 50% of your money. If you can time this to happen while your current character is flush with cash, great. Otherwise, don't sweat it.



Now, it's time for a real quick 'n' dirty tip.

Don't start your real character yet—start another throwaway. Sell all your supplies and fuel and the book you start with.

Meet the Blind Bruiser on the dock and let him give you more supplies and fuel.

MAKE SURE YOU KEEP 1 FUEL,

Then sell the rest of the supplies and fuel.

Sell your gun. Trade your ship in for the cheapest ship.

DON'T sell your engines.

Leave London. Crash into a wall to kill yourself, again.


:3

Now your next captain will start with a lot more money. If you want you can repeat this again a couple times, but it's diminishing returns. Start with 400-500 echoes and you'll be fine for the next part.

Follow this guide for a faster start and lots of legacy items

You should now have a bit of cash to play around with, but now you're at a little crossroads, so pick how you want to play:

A. You can start playing the game, use the bit of money you've made to give you a fighting chance, build a character you like and start digging into the storylines, quests, etc. In that case, you probably don't need this guide any further. Please give me a thumb's up at the top if the guide was helpful to you :)


B. More of this guide, more spoilers, and I teach you how to further accelerate your already quick 'n' dirty start, make a lot more money and get your first legacy items.

Keep in mind that once you obtain a legacy item, its stat-boosting effect will not kick in until your NEXT captain--meaning you need to die again in order to actually make use of it. So if you just play the game normally you'll probably start to feel invested in a particular captain, and once you end up with a legacy item or two you may be more interested in continuing forward with that captain than killing him off to make use of the new item. For me it felt like a very wasteful way for the game to handle legacy items: either waste the captain and spend several more hours going through lots of quests you've already done before--something which will probably start to feel like a pointless slog, especially if you start a new captain each time immediately after you get a new legacy item; or keep playing the captain, and effectively waste the extra stats you could be getting from those legacy items.

Instead, solve this problem with a few strategic spoilers, letting you make use of the legacy items much earlier, and maximize their usefulness.


C. Like B, but you hit Esc on the keyboard and do a manual save. The starting money has already put you on a good foundation—now you'll go into merciful mode, letting you explore all your options thoroughly, save and reload to your heart's content, to basically create a sandbox game. This is easy mode, and the stakes are a lot lower. And you can still stick with this guide, to help you make money a lot faster. But no Invictus token (necessary for one of the achievements), and where's the challenge, the stakes? And keep in mind: once you make a manual save with a captain, all of the future captains of his lineage will also be on Merciful mode. You'll need to start a completely new game to get the Invictus token back (and you'll lose all legacy items in the process--they don't transfer across lineages).


But also consider that on my first big attempt to play this game I actually chose C, which allowed me a lot of freedom to figure stuff out and play Sunless Sea as a sandbox. Nevertheless, this guide will assume you choose B, and should be plenty to give you a great start even in Unforgiving mode.

Once you make your choice start your new character, and take A Past Wreathed in Shadows.

Before you actually start keep these things in mind, at least while using this guide:

Pick up a port report in every port you stop in. In London, turn them in at the Admiralty's office for fuel and money. Visit the same port later for more reports to turn in.

Always try to sell unneeded cargo first, then turn in port reports, then buy fuel/supplies, or you might risk jettisoning cargo, permanently losing it.

You can probably afford to keep your ship light on and buy fuel when you need it, but generally don't let your money drop below 300 or so. I won't explain terror, except that when you're near land and/or light buoys, terror increases more slowly. Pay attention to the red, orange, or green dots next to terror, and in time you should understand better when to use the light and when it's wasteful.

Avoid most enemies. Enemies with 30 HP or less might be worth fighting. Do so by turning off your light and getting behind them, then firing. Try to stay behind them during the fight so they can't shoot you. For most enemies though, turn off your light and try to go around. You can repair in London.

You'll probably want to do a little looking around and experimenting. But stray too far from this guide and it might make certain paths unavailable. For the most part, avoid unnecessary detours or storylines, unless they're likely to bring supplies or fast money. In fact, sell off most anything that takes up cargo space besides fuel or supplies (items in the upper section of the Hold take up space, while stories, books, and the other stuff in the lower section don't). This run is mostly for money, not discovery or story.

Keep your eyes open for cheap officers to hire, preferably at 50 echoes or less.

Carouse in the Wolfstack Docks in London whenever you can, to try to get a sweetheart. For this, you'll need to make sure you have a Something Awaits You available when you dock in London.

If you find Pigmote Island: side with the guinea pigs. This will give you a buyable source of scintillack, which you will likely need for the Merchant Venturer. Helping out at Pigmote afterwards may reduce the cost of the scintillack--or increase it.

When this character earns secrets, put about ¾ of them toward mirrors and ¼ to veils.

Finally, while in-game you can press Alt-Tab to look at this guide and then get right back into the game, without continually having to boot up and close out the game.

Time to begin!

Read the newspaper in your lodgings. Hold onto the Recent News for later.

Hire crew up to 10.

Set sail. Use the map with C, and head south for Iron Republic. Buy 10 fuel here. Hopefully you can get the Irrepressible Cannoneer. Launch and head south-southeast.

When you hit the coast head east to Port Carnelian. Buy 2 supplies and 8-12 darkdrop coffee beans—just make sure you have around 120 echoes left. Head back to Iron Republic and fill the rest of your hold with fuel.

Head north, dock at the Cumaean Canal, and head to the surface.

Go to Naples and use your Recent News. Carry cargoes around the Mediterranean, but stay on the results screen and look to see how many crew you have remaining. If it's 8 or 9, buy more fuel and carry cargo a second time.

Take the train to Vienna, establish a business relationship, then deliver your coffee. Strike a blow for freedom and take Supplies for the Work back to Naples.

Buy fuel until you reach 14, and buy supplies until you reach 5--which you'll need return to the Underzee, though the game may say otherwise. Return to the Cumaean Canal now. You should have over 1,000 echoes at this point—you should hold onto most of it for exploration, and a certain fee that's coming up.

Head back to London to max out zailors, sell unneeded cargo you've accumulated, and turn in your Anarchist supplies and port reports. You should also repair now if you're damaged either in drydock, or with supplies by leaving port and pressing R.


Taking coffee from Port Carnelian to the surface is a pretty lucrative trade route at this stage, so if you want you could make one more run to buy the Denunciation deck weapon, which will make you a lot more effective against weak enemies.

But don't get attached to the trade route—or most of the money, as a matter of fact. Good trade routes don't usually last long in this game, and much of what you spend on this captain will be lost. Yup, it's a wasteful, dirty thing to make all that money, only to dump it all down the drain. But you'll be better prepared in finances and stats for the next captain.

Anyway, we'll return to the Cumaean Canal later and make it much more profitable, but you have some cash for now so it's best to move on and use the money to explore and get new trade routes going.

When you're ready to explore, make sure you have 5-10 supplies and about 20 fuel, and pick up the tomb-colonist. The rest should be mushroom ale.

Leave London and go to Hunter's Keep and meet the sisters. Lucy reduces terror by 10, so come here often.

Continue north to Venderbight and sell your mushroom ale.

Continue north to Whither. Now zail east, zig-zagging a bit to explore and dock as you go.
If you come upon Chapel of Lights, you can head north to Avid Horizon and should be able to get a Hunter's Eye, which you can bring back to the Curator in Venderbight for 1,000 echoes I think.

Continue east until you find Mt. Palmerston, where you should definitely refuel and possibly resupply.

Explore for a while east and south of Mt. Palmerston to hopefully find two or three more ports. Then return and resupply again, and then start heading southwest for London. You're trying to find the Salt Lions on the way, so zig zag as you go, and pay attention to the log in the lower left of the screen, which should tell you when you get close to the Salt Lions. You can also use the Z-bat with the Z key, then look at the map for an idea where stuff around you is.

If you don't find the Salt Lions on this trip, leave London again and set off in a different direction to continue searching--the Lions are usually close to London, so you probably won't have to look far. You should probably have all the fuel, supplies, and money you need to find it, but it does take 200 echoes once you find the Salt Lions, so don't use up too much money--go to Port Carnelian and the Cumaean Canal again if absolutely necessary.

When you find the Salt Lions, accept the sphinxstone and transport it back to London. If you have 1,500 or 2,000 echoes at this point you may want to upgrade to the Boadicea engine. It's about 16% faster, with about 1% increase in operational expenses (you can check out my other guide for more in-depth information on engines, fuel, etc: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1397427536).


Hopefully by now you'll have the Merchant Venturer available to speak with in London. If so, then that means you've started on the storylines to get four of the six legacy items in the game: the Anarchists, Merchant Venturer, Hunter's Keep, and the Salt Lions. Remember, I'll try to get you through the start of the game with as few spoilers as possible, but these storylines are all going to get spoiled.

Continue transporting sphinxstone from the Salt Lions, each time exploring a bit more of the map and trying to find new ports, and stop at Hunter's keep every chance you get, using Recent News to talk to the sisters if necessary. If you arrive and Hunter's Keep is in darkness and you smell blood, just leave—you'll be back for this later, and can use your Recent News at the nearby lightship to reduce your terror instead.


It shouldn't take long before a woman asks you to deliver the sphinxstone to the Dawn Machine. At this point, another crossroads. Do as she requests and you'll get 1,000 echoes and a Searing Enigma, which you'll need for one of the legacy items. However, if you choose not to accept her request, you can take the sphinxstone elsewhere and get a legacy item for this quest—but there's a good chance you'll have to do a lot of travel in unknown territory to complete the guy's request.
One time I was able to drop off the sphinxstone in London after all, and another time I had to go all the way to the Chelonate in the southeast corner of the map.

This guide will assume that you take the woman's quest and go to the Dawn Machine, as right now there are more important things to do than traveling around with your hold clogged with sphinxstone. But you do have A Past Wreathed in Shadows, so you could gamble for an easy legacy item right now . . .


Head south past Iron Republic all the way to the Grand Geode to drop off the sphinxstone (approach from the east—the Grand Geode port is a little tough to spot at first). Be sure to keep the Searing Enigma you get from this.

Once the last sphinxstone is delivered, speak to one of your officers about your past, and choose the priest past for 25 hearts, necessary for the Merchant Venturer legacy item.

While you're in the area, go to Port Carnelian and get a bit more coffee, but make sure to leave space for at least 23 fuel, and get your supplies up to 4 or so. Speak to the Philanthropist and begin the quest for the submarine while you're here—you'll need the sub for one of the legacy items. You should use an Extraordinary Implication if you have one, or spend some money, since you should have plenty. Then you'll need to pick up sonar schematics from Khan's Shadow.

For now though, fuel up in Iron Republic and then go through the Cumaean Canal, do your trade up on the surface, and return to London and complete any business there. When you turn in your Supplies for the Work, notice how high the anarchists' supremacy is. You'll transport more of these Supplies sooner or later, but make sure the anarchists' supremacy doesn't reach 7—not yet, anyway. Make sure you carouse in the Wolfstack Docks in London, as well as visit Hunter's Keep or take Recent News to the lightship, if you need to bring down your terror.

Now head out to find Khan's Shadow, if you haven't yet. It could take a while, and you may have to travel far from London. But get port reports along the way, as well as fuel and supplies, where cheap if possible--you could use Mt. Palmerston and Adam's Way on the coast east of Port Carnelian as jumping-off points. Once you get to Khan's Shadow, pick up the sonar schematics.

If I tell you this, I believe it will create a yearning, burning menace in your mind. A couple of spoilers, a couple pseudo-exploits that are typically meant for the late game—it's one of those sorts of things that, once you've learned, you probably can't go back.

Right now, it's just about time to do a bunch of exploration, or at least a bunch of trading. I've already accelerated your start quite a lot, compared to what it could have been. How does the game feel to you now? Are you enjoying it? Do you feel engaged and challenged?

You should have a better engine than you started with, but you still have a small cargo hold, one mid-strength weapon, your ship doesn't have much HP, and you don't have a large crew.

You probably have a pretty good cash surplus. But if you take the slower path, you'll be traveling all over the map, completing the fetch quests that the Merchant Venturer gives you, with your current ship and engine, building up enough money to purchase the Caligo merchant ship.


But, there is another way. Another spoiler. If I tell you this, it will give you the ability to earn pretty much all the money you'll ever hope to want, and you'll have it pretty quickly. Money will probably no longer have much real meaning, and other income sources will pale in comparison.

But if you change your mind, and decide you don't want all the money after all . . . it will probably be a lot harder to forget about it once you know. Consider that, if you don't read it, and later you decide you want more money, you can always come back and read it after all. But once it's read, you can't exactly unread it . . .

In any case though, having lots of money will mean you can get a bigger ship with a faster engine, which will greatly speed up this next section, so it is probably worth it. And even once you know this spoiler, you don't have to use it all the time. You could set a limit on how much money you want to earn.

Enough talk. If you desire the spoiler, read the section below. If you choose to forgo it, for now anyway, then skip on to the next section. But this guide will assume that you use it.


Now that you're in Khan's Shadow, buy some empty mirrorcatch boxes—probably about 12. Return to London and get about 25 fuel and 3 supplies.

Head to the Cumaean Canal, go up to the surface, and fill your mirrorcatch boxes. You can also take cargoes around the Mediterranean.

Leave the Cumaean Canal and make sure your light is off—you want to gain terror. Head to Mutton Island and get rid of your Something Awaits You, if you can. Otherwise, head to London and spend 5 points of admiralty favors to make sure you don't lose your boxes.

Speak to the Blind Bruiser. You may have to accept his fuel and supplies and speak with him a couple more times, but don't accept a high-pressure task. The important thing is to sell your sunlight—at 400 echoes a box, you should hopefully get about 5,000 echoes from him.

Buy the Caligo merchant cruiser if you can--just make sure you have about 300 echoes left. If you can't afford it yet, then head back to the Cumaean Canal and the surface, get more sunlight and sell it as well. Now you should be able to buy both the Caligo and the Avid Suppressor, which you'll need to equip in your Aft slot.

Before you do another sunlight run though, you should go to your lodgings and start sleeping. Keep these things in mind:

Each time you fill a mirrocatch box with sunlight, your Yearning, Burning menace goes up by 5.

If Yearning, Burning hits about 180 you'll be rather addicted to the sunlight. In that state, your character will automatically start consuming the stuff, and losing you money—and if you do it 3 times before you reach London, you die. So 12 boxes is probably fine—but 35 boxes is about the very maximum you could make use of, should you want to buy more.

Also: if you hit 200 Yearning, Burning, you die.

Each time you sleep you reduce your Yearning, Burning a little. But you can only sleep while you still have terror.

So while you're on the trip back from the Cumaean Canal to London, you want to generate as much terror as possible. If Mutton Island has been abandoned then you should be able to do this extremely quickly by exploring the locations repeatedly. You can also generate fear by just sitting out on the ocean with your lights off, though this will also spend supplies. One other way is to repeatedly switch two of your officers back and forth while not in port (they must both be the same type of officer, e.g. engineer and engineer).

But remember that your terror always goes down to 50 when you return to London, so it's pointless to go over that.

You also want to use your Something Awaits You, either at Mutton Island or somewhere nearby, so your ship doesn't get searched. Your Avid Suppressor can help with this. Use it to go almost twice as fast as normal, though you also burn fuel faster (used with the “F” key by default I believe, but I feel “V” is easier, and use “F” for the light, ala foglight).

Or at least reset the SAY counter. I believe you get a SAY 60 seconds after leaving port, so if you get to the next port fast enough, you won't get a SAY.

And if you're doing the Mediterranean mission up on the surface, you may also want to load up with tons of fuel in Iron Republic, or London. Either is cheaper than the surface. Also make sure you always restock your crew while you're in London. Returning to London at half speed will mean you probably can't use SAY's in time.

On that note, you may further want to speed up the process by purchasing the Compulsion engine from Caminus Yards in London--though that's more money permanently sunk in this captain. But combined with the Avid Suppressor you'll be blindingly fast, helpful for both this and future tasks. (Again, check out my other guide for more info: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1397427536.)

In fact, if you use this trade route you should soon be able to afford basically anything you want. But I'd really recommend you hold onto the Caligo for now. This captain actually doesn't have a lot of time left, so it'd mostly just be a waste.

Anyway, you can quickly generate thousands of echoes using these all these tricks together.

Time to begin the Merchant Venturer's missions. Go see him in London--you may want to start by completely filling your cargo hold with fuel and supplies in about a 4:1 ratio, perhaps from Iron Republic and the surface.

I think Sunless Sea was built for long, looping journeys, where you leave one port and go a bit out of your way to dock at another nearby and then another, rather than going in straight lines. It's an excellent technique for searching and exploring, which is what you'll need for the Merchant Venturer. Not only do you get more port reports doing this, but it also means you have more opportunities to advance the story. Keep that in mind for the Venturer—and probably for most general exploration as well.

What you need to do at this point is start going out to pick up goods for the Merchant Venturer, bringing them back to him in London, for which he will pay you, and then going out for more. This will take a while. You might want to entertain yourself by pursuing a few of the other little sidequests available to you. But probably only a little.

A quick guide to where to find some of the goods: Scintillack is available at Port Cecil in the Principles of Coral, and Pigmote Island if you sided with the guinea pigs. Sapphires are in Port Carnelian. Zzoup, Devilbone Dice, and Lamentable Relics are in Mt. Palmerston. Lamentable Relics can also be found in defeated zeemonsters, or bought in Irem. Outlandish Artifacts are in Khan's Shadow. Some items can be bought in London and sold to the Merchant Venturer at a loss, which may be worth the time saved.


At some point you'll probably have enough money to buy the Caligo merchant cruiser, which you should do—but make sure you unequip your Boadicea engines first. You should also buy an Avid Suppressor, equip it and use your ship's boost--it will use more fuel, but less supplies. The cost almost evens out, but money shouldn't be nearly as big an issue anymore, and using the Suppressor will let you travel almost twice as fast. You'll need to remember to get more fuel than previously though. Again, my other guide can help: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1397427536.

Hopefully by now you've already had a sweetheart in London for a while—if not, keep carousing in the Wolfstack Docks, and eventually it will happen (you'll need to have Something Awaits You available when you arrived in London). They'll be great to help reduce terror. But if you have an affair with an officer while you're out on the sea, while you also have a sweetheart in London, the sweetheart may find out and leave. So it's probably best to just end the affair.

Hopefully sometime around in here you and your sweetheart will have a child together. If so, then it's time to buy an Elegant Townhouse in London, Note that this will greatly cut into profit from your trade for Unparalleled Wealth, however, so you may wish to wait a bit and you should also get an Ironclad Will while you're at it. Then start telling your child sea stories and such to increase their zee fever, and they'll soon become a scion, giving you 2 legacies on death. This means that you'll be able to keep all the money you have at the end of this captain. I'd strongly recommend trying to get a scion before this captain ends, as it will give your next captain a lot more starting money. In fact, the scion itself is a legacy item (though not one of the six I mentioned previously), so if you get one in one game, you don't need to do it again (though I believe there are story-related ways to lose the scion).

As you travel, you should try to visit Iron Republic and Adam's Way in the south, Mount Palmerston in the north, and Fallen London in the west for most of your fuel—what you can't get for free, that is. For supplies, Demeaux Island and Mandrake College in the Melting Isles are good. Port Carnelian and other places sell them relatively cheaply.

Adam's Way is great for reducing terror, if you still have Recent News—you'll need to go to the showman's exhibition. Lightships will also reduce it a bit with Recent News. You can check out other places as well.

To the degree you can, you should continue trying to make money here and there--but opportunistically, as a secondary objective. Selling mushroom ale in Godfall is profitable for a while. Clay men transported from Polythreme to London bring 20 echoes a head. Coffee from Khan's Shadow or Port Carnelian is profitable in Fallen London. Coffee is even more profitable if sold on the surface, until the route ends--just keep the Anarchists' supremacy under 7.

Once you've completed all the main tasks the Merchant Venturer gives you, he'll give you one final task, for which you'll need 40 spare cargo.

Before you do this though, it's time to wrap up some other bits with this captain.


You should already have the Caligo with Avid Suppressor. Completely fill up your crew, and then head for Port Carnelian again. Turn in the sonar schematics, and you'll now be able to use the submarine. Then load up a bunch of coffee, but make sure you leave at least 30 spaces or so free.

Head to Iron Republic to buy sufficient fuel, then to the Cumaean Canal and the surface. Do the Mediterranean cargo mission for a bit, but if your ship drops below ½ crew, your ship speed will also be ½ once you're on the outside. Sell your coffee and pick up more Supplies for the Work.

Return to London, but don't turn in your Supplies for the Work yet. First, check in your Journal under Supremacy. You need to see how high the Anarchists' supremacy is. If it reaches 7, much of Fallen London will become inaccessible. Turn in the supplies if it's 5 or below, but hold onto them if their supremacy is at 6.

Now, I've tried to keep this guide cheap and quick and dirty. But here's where it's probably going to become its most tedious. Unless you have a great memory, you're going to need to grab a pen and paper, or maybe open a text file on your computer, using Alt-Tab to switch back and forth.

As you've gone around the map, you should have encountered many abysses here and there around the ocean, represented as round swirls on the map of the zee. Now, it's time to start revisiting these.

As you encounter each abyss, deep, or rift, write its name down. Then, put your ship directly above the abyss—it's time to use your zubmarine!

Press T, and your ship will dive down. You might want to move around a little, get a feel for how things look beneath the waves. Then, click the story option for “An Abyss . . .” And then, "Dive."

You'll get a description about the abyss. There are four possible descriptions. One speaks of an abyss like a garden, with plant life and fruit. There's an abyss with some sort of rock carvings, of people sailing away from a city. One description speaks of underwater fires. The last speaks about grave goods and coffins.

So, next to the name of each abyss, write down the type of abyss it is.

For an abyss with food and plant life, write “Food” next to the name.
For the one with rock carvings, write “Welcome.”
For one with fires, write “Fire.”
For the one with grave goods and coffins, write “Grave.”

Then, use the rite at each abyss. After the single-word description, also write the effects of the rite performed there: for example, +20 veils, -10 hearts. So each entry should look something like this:

Wolf's Rift . . . . . . . . . . . . Fire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . +20 irons, -10 veils


Once you have found at least one abyss of each of the four types, it's time to continue.

At this point, you may be guessing that this has something to do with Hunter's Keep—and you're right, but there's also more to it, though it won't come into play until your next captain.

It's time to choose one of the rites and use it. I don't know if the rites are randomized from one game to the next, but I'd recommend using a rite that increases your mirrors or veils, without decreasing the other stat—such as +20 veils and -10 hearts. If that's not available though, then take one that increases mirrors or veils by 20, and reduces the other by 10. So go to the abyss with the right rite, and use it.

Next, if you have more than one officer available for certain job positions, you can move the officers around to increase your veils and mirrors as much as possible. In fact, you could even spend a little time searching around for officers. In London there's an option for new recruits that will often let you pick up officers.

After that it will be time to get a tattoo in London, either veils or mirrors. Finally, use your remaining secrets to increase mirrors and veils. Try to aim for about 50 veils and 70 mirrors—mirrors should be about 20 higher than veils. If you can do higher on each, then great.

In fact, you could also visit Irem, in the northeast part of the map, where you can buy secrets for 999 echoes each. If you have tons of money, getting more secrets will improve your chances at Hunter's Keep. But the money you put into secrets for this character will mostly be wasted, when you could use it for future characters. So, no worries if you don't want to buy secrets. If you fail now at Hunter's Keep, you'll still have more opportunities to get the legacy item with later captains.

Now go to Hunter's Keep. It should be in darkness, with the smell of blood around. Go up to the house.

You should have two choices: The Thing in the Kitchen and The Silent House. Choose The Silent House, and then Search the House—you may need to do this more than once. Finally, Save Phoebe. Again, if you fail, don't worry. You'll have more opportunities soon.

If you did successfully save Phoebe though, you should now head back up to the surface and to Naples. Give her some money and send her on her way, and you should have your first legacy item, giving +25 hearts to your next character.

Regardless of the outcome at Hunter's Keep though, now is the time to finish the other tasks.

These are the final things you should have before the end of this run.

You should probably return to one of the abysses to nullify whatever rite you're using. You should DEFINITELY do so if the rite you're using reduces hearts.

You should have the Caligo. If not, then you will at least need a ship with 40 spare cargo spaces, and that's in addition to about 20-30 fuel and 5-10 supplies you'll need.

You will want to have a scion in Fallen London, if at all possible.

Visit the study in your Elegant Townhouse. Near the bottom of the options, you might be able to create an heirloom or two. You should probably do so. Also, make sure you have an Ironclad Will.

Hopefully you have at least 10,000 echoes--this is enough for your next captain to get a Caligo and Avid Suppressor, and still have some decent operating/trade capital left. If you don't have a scion, then you should have about 20,000 echoes. If you need more, you should sell more coffee up on the surface—from Port Carnelian, Khan's Shadow, etc—and do Mediterranean runs. You can also sell coffee in London once you can't do so on the surface. You can also purchase supplies on the surface and sell them at Abbey Rock. It's pretty tedious to do so, as you have to click over and over to first buy and then sell each supply, but will bring 15 profit for each. On the other hand, you can take mushroom ale from London to Godfall, where you can sell it in batches of 5 at a profit of 9 echoes each. Keep in mind that the more money you make now, the less you need to make at the beginning of your next run.

Make sure you get your hearts to at least 50, hopefully a little higher, whether by moving officers around or getting a couple more secrets, or maybe even using an abyss.


The last thing you'll want to do is cash out. Keep fuel and supplies, but sell pretty much everything else in your possession, unless you can take it with you to the next run. The Alarming Scholar will buy a bunch of stuff from you—but be certain to keep your Searing Enigma. If you have the Voracious Diplomat available they'll pay good prices for Moves in the Great Game, Strategic Information and Vital Intelligence. Otherwise give them to the Admiralty.

You should have one Searing Enigma at this point. If you don't, buy 5 Foxfire candles and a flare.

Once you have all of these things taken care of, turn in the final Supplies for the Work--you may have to return to the surface a few times to do this. Then the Anarchists' questline should complete, giving you a legacy item for +25 iron on your next captain.

After that, talk to the Merchant Venturer and agree to take him to Avid Horizon, which should be in the north, north of the Chapel of Lights.

Finally, I'd recommend that you fill whatever space is left in your hold with mushroom ale. Leave London and go to Venderbight, where you can sell the mushroom ale, but also your Recent News and Visions of the Surface. You should also visit the Curator and see if you can turn in any colors. Depending on what you get from the Curator, you may want to sell some more. Also remember that if you get Captivating Treasures you can return to London and turn them into heirlooms.



At this point, if you don't have a Searing Enigma you should first go out to Nuncio, which should hopefully be somewhere in the north east. This will take a little while--I'd suggest you just enjoy this story and look around Nuncio, rather than rushing through. Then use 5 Foxfire candles and a flare to complete the story. At the end you should obtain a Searing Enigma. There might be other ways, but this is one relatively easy path.

When all this is done, proceed to Avid Horizon, which should be north of the Chapel of Lights. Go with the Merchant Venturer through the gate. You will get another legacy item.

Choose both the Pupil and Salvager legacies.

Of course we're at another crossroads. You should have 2-4 legacy items left to get, and you should get 1-3 of them with this captain. Of course, you could instead choose to forgo this guide further. But you've already come so far, and this captain will take far less time than the previous one, and with such a big boost in your stats, I think there's little reason to skip these items.


When you start your new character, take A Past Wreathed in Shadows again—unless you happened to get the legacy item from the Salt Lions last time, the Manual of Miracles. In that case, go with the mirrors background, natural philosopher.


First things first: read the morning paper, and Write a Will.

Now, I'd advise you to buy another Caligo. You could go for something more expensive, but remember that you won't get the costs back, and this run is likely to be short anyway. But you probably should buy an Avid Suppressor and a Boadicea engine, or possibly a Compulsion, to speed things along.

Either way, you should have plenty of money to get this character started. And if it's not enough, don't worry, as we're headed for Port Carnelian almost very first thing.

Very first thing, though, is Hunter's Keep. If you didn't save Phoebe and get the legacy item last time around, then get Hunter's Keep started early, and remember to hire officers where you can.

Next, Port Carnelian. You can have your ship instantly turned into a zubmarine here, since you had the modification done last time.

Now buy up about 80 coffee and then on to Iron Republic for fuel, and then the Cumaean Canal (you can transport Supplies for the Work if you want, but again don't let the Anarchists' supremacy hit 7). You should probably get about 25 supplies from the surface and about 90 fuel from London/Iron Republic, as you're about to do a bunch of exploring—whether or not you succeeded at Hunter's Keep last time.

Once again, you should go around the map to search for abysses, deeps, and rifts. You're also trying to find the Salt Lions—but that's actually secondary, so when you find it just keep searching for the abysses.

You need to do exactly what you did last time with the abysses, so you may want to go back and read that section again. In short, write down the name of each abyss you come across, and whether it's food, fire, welcome (with the rock carvings), or grave. Once you find all four types, proceed to the next section.

Try not to go more than halfway across the map for these if you can help it—stick to the abysses closer to home. I've found there are usually several abysses in the area east of Whither, so that might be a good place to start.

Once you've found all four types of abysses and written them all down, now starts the next phase of this run. Return to the Salt Lions, or find them if you haven't, and begin running sphinxstone to London. Hopefully you've burned off most of your fuel, and so you should easily be able to take multiple loads of sphinxstone to London each time—I'd recommend 4, in case you need room for fuel and supplies for the last load. Remember to stop at Hunter's Keep every time, if you haven't obtained that legacy item, to progress that story until the keep is in darkness.

On the last load of sphinxstone, turn down the woman and accept the man's offer this time. I don't know where he'll send you—one time he had me zail all the way to the Chelonate, at the southwest of the map, and another time I was able to deliver the stone in London after all. Whatever the case, once you finish delivering it you should have even more money available—as well as yet another legacy item. This will give +25 veils for your next character. You should also speak with an officer about your past and be a natural philosopher for +25 mirrors.


It's now time to complete the Hunter's Keep quest. Basically you just repeat exactly what you did on the last run. Try to get your mirrors to about 70 and veils to about 50, though higher is always better. Remember to get a tattoo in London, move your officers around to maximize mirrors and veils, and spend all your secrets as well. Also remember to use one of the rites you'll find in the abysses—choose a rite that will increase mirrors or veils by 20, and preferably doesn't reduce the other stat.

Then give Hunter's Keep another go. There's a good chance you already succeeded last time, but if you didn't, there should also be a good chance you complete it this time. If you obtain the Scarred Sister, take her up to Naples on the surface to get your legacy item. And if you fail this time too . . . there's always your next captain, and you'll also have the +25 veils from the Manual of Miracles to help. You won't have to travel to all four abysses that time though—just find one that gives you mirrors, and make sure you choose natural philosopher.

This run is almost over. First though, you may consider trying to get a scion if you didn't on your previous run—it will require having a sweetheart in London for a while, as well as an Elegant Townhouse. It could take some time, but if you can obtain a scion, it will let you keep 100% of your money instead of 50%. Once more, if you have a scion then you should also have about 10,000 echoes, to use with your next captain. If you haven't been able to get a scion, then you're probably going to need around 20,000 echoes. Without these numbers, you're going to need to do quite a bit of money earning with your next captain, and you'll probably have to do it with the starting ship, rather than the Caligo. So it's best to get it done now, taking coffee up to the surface or whatever.

Also, it's now time to cash out again. Go to the Alarming Scholar and sell off everything there, and sell pretty much anything else you can as well. Venderbight will buy some of your unnecessary stuff too.


Now, it's time to return to the abysses. If you want to figure this out on your own, skip the section below--although it will probably take some time. Otherwise, go ahead and read the spoilers.


This time, you need to go to the abysses in a certain order.

First, go to the nearest “Welcome” abyss. Perform the rite available there. Next, dive deeper. And now, perform the ritual associated with that rite. After that, leave and head for the closest “Fire” abyss.

Do the same thing there—first get the rite, and then perform the ritual below.

Do this in turn with a “Food” abyss as well, and finally with a “Grave” abyss.

And now your captain should end, and you should have yet another legacy item.

There is only one legacy item left to get, and it's the one I myself haven't yet obtained. Once I do, I may return to update this guide.

However, it may not be necessary for me to do so. I know that this legacy item takes quite a bit longer than any other. It requires you to go waaaaay out of your way to begin, out on the eastern edge of the map, in the Empire of Hands. Once there you must explore one of the largest locations I'm aware of, with several branching directions to go, and I think all of them need to be explored. Then you must return all the way back to Fallen London, and then return again to the Empire of Hands. Then you need to do more story activities, and bring a whole bunch of goods to the Empire. Then you'll have to make yet another trip to London, and yet another trip to the Empire.

All of this means you will probably at least need the Caligo, the Avid Suppressor, perhaps the Compulsion engine, and possibly the frigate, for even more speed. Also, with the previous five legacy items, each of their stories was relatively short. You could breeze through pretty easily without spoiling much of the game. But, having been to the Empire of Hands a few times across a few different captains, I know that there are a lot more story options and possibilities.

Considering the distances required to travel, the amount of spoilers and story activity involved, everything that needs to be delivered, and the fact that you've now obtained 5 of the 6 legacy items already, and the fact that it will once again end your game when you get it, as with the Merchant Venturer and Lady Black . . . this might be one item you want to obtain in a bit less quick 'n' dirty manner. I myself plan to integrate it more seamlessly into my next upcoming captain, when I'll play for the story, with the benefit of money and legacy items.

What you may want to do—what I plan to do—is use my next captain to come full circle. Now that I have a scion, higher stats, and so many ways to make money, I can start completing stories I've already gone through in new ways, do random things, exploring lots of different possibilities, seeing several different stories through to wacky and risky conclusions, once again throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. Then, when I'm ready, finish the Empire of Hands. And after that, start a new character that I'll be more invested in, playing more carefully and considering the longer-term repercussions.

Nevertheless, you can read mrfluffy's guide “How to Obtain Legacy Items” for more specific details. In fact, you can look at a number of other guides for more in-depth information on the game if you wish, since this one exists just to give you a faster start.



For now though, I'm finished with this guide. Along the way, I've helped you to obtain tens of thousands of echoes and learn how to make more, helped you get five legacy items, as well as a Scion and Ironclad Will. There are dozens more quests and storylines available in this game, and with the help of this guide, you should actually be able to get into all of it. I've given you many tips on how to generally survive and enjoy Sunless Sea. I expect you've obtained 20 or 30 Steam achievements as well, and a good dozen more should easily be in your reach, mostly by using the zub for a while.


One last note: I find it interesting how easily this guide actually came together. While it might seem rather simple to read and accomplish the tasks in this guide, there were any of a number of points where game restraints might have made this a lot more difficult. For example, I didn't go into the Cumaean Canal until after I'd already played Sunless Sea for probably 70 hours. I think that normally it's a bit more of a mid- or late-game location, since you need 22 fuel and 2 supplies to enter, and probably won't know just how risky it might be. But by exploiting the Blind Bruiser a couple times and restarting, you can get up to the surface very early. Same story with the Salt Lions: I think I frequently bumped into them in the course of generally playing, but either I didn't have 200 echoes to spare for the sphinxstone deposit, or didn't have much room available in my hold. But this guide lets you overcome such high barriers to entry much sooner. I think it's pretty amazing just how elegantly it gets new players through the game's painfully difficult start.



Apart from that, I hope you feel my guide has been useful, and has greatly accelerated your game of Sunless Sea. If so, please give it a thumbs-up at the top.
Iconian



P.S. Since I already had the advantage of quite a bit of knowledge while writing and playing through this guide, it's possible I omitted some important information along the way. If so, please leave me a comment if there's something important I failed to include in my guide.