A Costly Mistake Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Quest
Suggested level: 18
Group: Treasure Hunts
Location: Velen
To start this quest kill the drowners foraging nearby and take the Smuggler's notes from the corpse lying next to the crashed boat.
Note: The suggested level is far too high. Only level ten drowners are swimming around the treasure chest.
The gradual expansion of literacy in the Northern Realms pleased Geralt greatly, for this meant he happened across more and more interesting notes and missives - such as those he once found on the banks of the Pontar, near Oxenfurt…
Related points of interest
A Costly Mistake (Quest)
Velen / Novigrad
A Costly Mistake (Treasure)
Velen / Novigrad
Quest stages of A Costly Mistake
1. Read the letter you found.
Read the smuggler's notes, and you will learn where you should look for treasure.
Smuggler's notes
Those were the days... You'd smuggle a few bottles of hooch into Oxenfurt, then loiter about the dormitories selling it to students. You'd come away with a hefty sack of coin, and they'd have their spirits fortified for study. Then along came Radovid, who shut down the university, chased the students away and positioned ballistae on the riverbank to sink everything floating up or down the Pontar, swans included.
But there's not been a dark cloud yet that didn't have a silver lining. Yesterday I saw our brave soldiers sink a merchant vessel. Went straight to the bottom, it did, along with its whole crew... and its cargo. A shame about the men, really, but it would just as big a shame to let all those goods go to waste. So me and Martin will fish them out, dry them off and sell them - and maybe at last I'll have something to put in my pot.
2. Find the sunken treasure using your Witcher Senses.
Go to the place marked on the map and dive. Watch out for drowners (10) swimming nearby and find the chest that lies on the bottom near the shipwreck. You will find a silver relic sword - Maugrim, and random quality Redanian halberdier's armor (Medium Armor) in it.
The Redanian soldiers' mistake turned out to be Geralt's good fortune. He rescued several valuable items from the ship they sank, then traded them for a great deal of coin.