The Smugglers Cove

Upon visiting the Cove on Krawk Island, you may be expecting to find a plethora of merchandise for sale that you can buy. However, this is rarely the case. The Cove does not restock items very often, for several reasons, which I will explain later on. When you arrive at the Cove, you will see a message informing you how many Dubloons you have to spend. Under this, you are likely to see another message just under that informing you that the smugglers have no items to sell at the moment. There are a few things that you have to understand about items that do stock in the Cove.

When a Cove item is released, it is always announced in the news. This means that no, you will not find a brand new unannounced super-cool item that nobody else knows about in the Cove, making you a billionaire overnight. It does mean, however, that you will not miss when a new item is going to restock in the Cove, as long as you check the news page that day. An item released in the Cove will usually say something about a new item that was found somewhere in Neopia when it is announced in the news. The smugglers prefer to keep their dealings secretive, so having their location blurted out over the news for all to hear would completely ruin them. With a little searching, though, you can find the Cove on Krawk Island fairly easily.

Cove items will not continually restock for a set amount of time, either. When a new Cove item does come out, only 120 of this item will be released. This is part of what makes Cove items so valuable. As time goes on, some of the original 120 will disappear from the game. The Cove will not replenish lost goods, however. Once the 120 have stocked, that's it, so you better not go around discarding those Cove items!

The 120 items will also not stock at the same time; that would be far too much business for the smugglers to handle at once, and it may capture the attention of authorities. The items will slowly stock, usually 1-2 of the item per stock. This means that you have to be fairly lucky to even catch a glimpse of the item stocking. If you do manage to see it, be very fast when going to buy it, as there will be competition out there, no matter how secretive the smugglers try to be! You need to be prepared to buy the item when it stocks.

As you probably know, in the normal Neopian shops, items stock for Neopoints. The Smugglers Cove is no normal place, however. Items in the Cove will stock for the currency of Krawk Island, Dubloons. You can buy Dubloons from other users, or sometimes get lucky and find some at Coltzan's Shrine. You are going to need more than "some" Dubloons to buy most Cove items, though. Most Cove items stock for several hundred Dubloons. It is wise to convert your Dubloons into One Hundred Dubloon Coins at the Dubloon-O-Matic in Krawk Island, to save inventory space. If you are not sure how many Dubloons the new Cove item stocks for, keep anywhere from 300 to 600 Dubloons in your inventory, and you should be fine. Once a few of the items stock, you can probably go to the Neoboards, and some other users will have a board up discussing the items. You can go here to see how many Dubloons you will need.

When you are ready to go to the Cove to try to buy that fancy new item, be careful to not get too enthusiastic. You would have to have unbelievable luck to walk into the Cove and see an item in stock. For us normal people, when you go to the Cove, as I said earlier, you will see a message informing you that there are currently no items for sale. You will have to refresh the page until an item stocks. Do not refresh too many times, though, or the smugglers will chase you out of their home. They will shout a little at you, and then you will get the following message:

"Visiting the Smugglers Cove too much is a bad idea... you don't want to attract attention to their illicit activities, do you? They will not let you pass."

This is not a good thing, is it? You will no longer have access to the Smugglers Cove for a limited amount of time. Don't worry too much, though; this temporary ban does not last forever. You merely have to wait 60 minutes before you can go back in and try again. This could happen after just one refresh, or maybe as many as ten refreshes. It is less likely to happen the less often you refresh, but keep in mind that if you don't refresh often enough, you won't be able to grab the item you are after. I would personally recommend refreshing every 60 seconds.

The 120 items will certainly not all stock in that 60 minute time span that you are banned from the Cove. Usually, for all 120 items to be released into the market, it takes at least a few days, sometimes even several months.

So what kind of items stock at the Cove, you may be wondering? Many times, it is a Battledome related item, such as a weapon or a shield. It could be anything, though. As of right now, there have been 55 different items that stocked in the Cove since it was created in Y3. These items range from food to weapons. Nobody can predict what the next item to stock in the Cove will be, or when it will be released. There is also no set time when items actually stock in the Cove once they have been released – It is random.

You now have the knowledge that you need to successfully use the Smugglers Cove. Be sure to check the news every day – You never know when the next item will appear!