The Silver Hoard

Walkthrough

Getting the quest

This quest opens at level 9 (every character in the party has to be level 9). It starts at Argynvostholt in either of two ways, and both put it at Asked:

• Ask Sir Godfrey Gwilym in his room on Argynvostholt, Upper Floor "A dragon's house. Where did he keep his hoard?" He explains the Dragon's Tithe: the dragon gave his silver away, a coin on every doorstep, every Midwinter. The last tithe was chested in the undercroft the night the house fell, and its keeper went down to it and never came back up.
• Or examine the draught under the servants' table in the servants' hall, at the east side of Argynvostholt, Ground Floor. This way works even once the knights are at rest and Godfrey is gone.

Step by step

1. Go down to the undercroft. Once you've been told about the tithe, a stair opens under the servants' table and leads down into The Undercroft. At the far end of the vault, The Gilded Knight sits on the tithe chest, grown over with four hundred years of silver, counting. He challenges you as you come close.
2. Talk to him. Your options:
   • "Godfrey sent us. It's time it went down to the valley." He refuses: the valley belongs to the count now, and he won't let the count's people have the dragon's silver.
   • Insight DC 15 ("Watch his hands on the chest") shows a squire's shield cut nearly in two at his feet. Somebody tried to carry the tithe down the hill that night, and he stopped them. A failed Insight can't be tried again, but it costs you nothing.
   • "Let them go home." is only offered if you know the dragon's last words: from his echo in the chapel, or by clearing Ioan's name with Godfrey in The Squire (reading Ioan's headstone alone, as when Cosmin goes home after the beacon, doesn't count). It reaches him. He wants the silver off him but can't let go, so you still have to fight, but he starts at 140 HP instead of 178. Use it if you can.
   • "Then we'll carry it down ourselves." starts the fight at full strength.
3. The fight. The Gilded Knight (The Gilded Knight, AC 19) rises with three An Escort's Harness (Animated Armor). It's the same fight at every level. He swings twice with a silvered longsword, can paralyse one of you with his Covetous Glare (Wisdom save DC 16), turns two failed saves a day into successes, and between your turns gets two extra moves, either a sword stroke or a step. He regenerates 10 HP every turn unless fire or radiant damage hit him, so put fire or radiant on him every round, and save your best save-or-suffer spells until his Legendary Resistance is spent. Winning moves the quest to Fought.

4. Open the tithe chest. Use it once he's gone. In what's left of his armour you find a Golden Idol of Good Fortunes, and then you decide what happens to the silver.

Choices and endings

• Delivered: send it down to the valley, as the dragon meant. You get 250 gp. Godrick +3, Kip +3, Liriel +2, Wren +2, Thistle +1. If the knights still walk, Godfrey has them carry it up and ride it out at Midwinter. If they're at rest, you carry it to the villages yourselves. Either way, weeks later you see old dragon coins on strings around children's necks.
• Kept. You get 1,200 gp. Godrick -3, Kip -3, Liriel -2, Wren -1, Ratatouille +1.
• "(Leave it for now.)" lets you come back and decide later.

If you're stuck

• No option to ask about the hoard? Godfrey only asks once everyone in the party is level 9, and only from his own room (not while he travels with you). The draught under the servants' table works too.
• The stair down isn't there until Godfrey or the draught has told you about the tithe.

Rewards

• Golden Idol of Good Fortunes
• 250 gp or 1200 gp, depending on how it goes

What your companions think

• Godrick Pendlebrook: +3 you sent the dragon's last tithe down to the valley; -3 you kept the dragon's tithe for yourselves
• Kip Smudgewick: +3 you sent the dragon's last tithe down to the valley; -3 you kept the dragon's tithe for yourselves
• Liriel Dawnsong: +2 you sent the dragon's last tithe down to the valley; -2 you kept the dragon's tithe for yourselves
• Wren Featherfoot: +2 you sent the dragon's last tithe down to the valley; -1 you kept the dragon's tithe for yourselves
• Thistle: +1 you sent the dragon's last tithe down to the valley
• Ratatouille: +1 you kept the dragon's tithe for yourselves

Fights

• The silver on the tithe-keeper's armour rises like hackles, and round the walls the escort's empty harness…, in The Undercroft: The Gilded Knight, Animated Armor. Scales with your level.

Journal

Related

• People: Sir Godfrey Gwilym, The Gilded Knight
• Places: Argynvostholt, Argynvostholt, Upper Floor, Argynvostholt, Ground Floor, The Undercroft
• More in Argynvostholt: The Dragon's Beacon, The Order of the Silver Dragon, The Squire