Kingsmarch has been one of the most reliable sources of passive currency in Path of Exile since its introduction in the Settlers league. With patch 3.28 and the Mirage league, the entire system has been reworked in some major ways, most notably, ore now returns currency and crops now return equipment, a complete swap from how things worked before. If you relied on the old Blue Zanthimum-to-Kalguur divine strategy, that's gone. This PoE 3.28 Kalguuran Kingsmarch Shipping guide will walk you through everything you need to know to set up Kingsmarch properly in Mirage league, ship efficiently, and run a profitable Kalguuran mapping operation alongside it.

PoE 3.28 Mirage Kingsmarch Shipping & Kalguuran Mapping Guide

The Mirage league introduces a new ore-based mechanic that spawns thaumaturgic ore encounters directly in your maps. These encounters can drop ores, thaumaturgic dust, and maps — all of which feed into the Kingsmarch system. Because Kingsmarch now depends on ore for its primary currency-generating shipments, this league mechanic and Kingsmarch are deeply intertwined. You will need to actively collect ore in maps to fuel your shipping operation, making Kingsmarch less of a purely idle activity and more of an integrated farming strategy. Mappers still function as before and remain a strong source of passive income. The sections below cover all the changes, the new reward tables, setup instructions, and the best strategies to maximize your returns.

Changes To Kingsmarch Shipping in PoE 3.28 League

Here is a summary of every major change to Kingsmarch shipping this league:

• Ore and Crop rewards have been swapped. Shipping ore/bars now returns currency (divines, exalts, chaos, and potentially mirror shards at high values). Shipping crops now returns equipment (well-rolled items based on port and crop type).

• Ports no longer have a bias toward specific currency types. You will not see a particular port favoring divine orbs over other currency anymore. All ports return from the same currency drop table when shipping ore.

• Favoured Resources (Port Quotas) can now be rerolled for 15,000 gold. This gives you more control over which bonus multipliers are active at each port.

• Ports now grant specific Tattoos and Runegrafts depending on whether you ship to a Karui or Kalguuran port.

• Smelting is faster but costs more gold. Bars are still worth approximately 5x the shipment value of their raw ore, making smelting worthwhile despite the increased gold cost.

• Stacked decks have been removed from Kingsmarch shipping rewards entirely.

• The Mirage league mechanic adds a new way to obtain thaumaturgic dust in maps. When an ore site converts into an hourglass during the Mirage encounter, it yields large amounts of dust (sometimes 100k+ from a single map).

• Kalguuran Scarabs have been buffed, and Astrolabes provide additional ore yield per map, making ore-focused map farming more productive than in previous leagues.

How Kingsmarch Shipping & Mapping Work in PoE 3.28?

1. Getting Started

Once you have some gold, talk to Johan to teleport to Kingsmarch for the first time. After that, it appears as a waypoint destination (available to any character level 50+). Complete the short introductory quest line, then head to Raulf (the Recruiter) to begin hiring workers.

2. Workers

Workers are hired from Raulf's recruitment board for an initial gold fee plus an ongoing hourly wage. Each worker has specializations (Mining, Smelting, Shipping, Farming, Disenchanting, Mapping) ranging from Rank 1 to Rank 5. Higher ranks are dramatically more effective — a Rank 5 worker is roughly 3.5x as efficient as a Rank 1.

• Use the 16,000 gold reroll option when hiring. It guarantees all listed recruits have Rank 3+ specializations, giving you much better odds of finding Rank 4–5 workers.

• Priority hires for currency farming: Rank 4–5 Shippers (you need 6 for a max-value shipment), Rank 4–5 Miners and Smelters, at least one Rank 4–5 Disenchanter.

• Mappers are very powerful but have extremely high hourly wages. Only invest in mappers once your gold income can support them.

• Farmers are now less of a priority if your goal is currency. Crops only return equipment in 3.28. However, if you want Tattoos, Runegrafts, or well-rolled gear, farmers still have value.

• You can hire up to 90 workers total.

3. Gold Management

Gold is your lifeblood in Kingsmarch. Every worker requires an hourly wage paid from your treasury. When starting out:

• Set aside roughly 50% of your gold for hiring workers.

• Put roughly 50% of the remainder into your treasury for wages.

• Keep the rest for currency exchange and trading.

Gold drops scale with area item quantity, so running juiced maps naturally feeds your Kingsmarch operation.

4. Resource Flow (Ore → Bars → Currency)

1. Collect ore in maps — Crimson Iron, Orichalcum, Petrified Amber, Bismuth, and Verisium ore spawn as encounters in map zones. Assign Miners to tag and collect these.

2. Smelt ore into bars — Assign Smelters in Kingsmarch. Bars are worth approximately 5x the shipment value of their raw ore equivalent, so always smelt before shipping.

3. Ship bars for currency — Load your ships with bars and send them to ports. The quantity and rarity of currency rewards scale with the total effective amount of ore/bars shipped.

5. Shipping Mechanics

• Minimum shipment value: 50,000

• Maximum shipment value: 50,000,000

• Risk increases with shipment value. Assign Rank 4–5 Shippers as crew to reduce risk to 0%. A full crew of six Rank 5 Shippers caps risk at 10% for Kalguur and 0% for all other ports.

• Favoured Resources (Port Quotas) give a multiplier (+20% to +100%) to both the shipment value contribution and the effective quantity of matching resources sent. Completing quotas also awards a bonus unique item. Quotas refresh upon completion or can be rerolled for 15,000 gold.

• Currency reward scaling: At ~700,000 effective ore/bar value, there is roughly a 50% chance of receiving a Divine Orb. At the maximum of 50,000,000, the average return is approximately 2.5 Mirror Shards per shipment.

• Currency cap: 800 currency items per shipment (reduced to 500 if only one type of resource is sent). To hit the 800 cap, send at least two different types of ore/bars.

• Ships operate on real-time timers and continue progressing even while you are offline.

6. Thaumaturgic Dust

Dust acts as a wildcard that inflates shipment value. It adds to your base shipment value on a 1:1 ratio up to the base value of your non-dust resources. Beyond that, diminishing returns apply:

• If Dust ≤ Base Value: Total Value = Base Value + Dust

• If Dust > Base Value: Total Value = Base Value × (1 + √(Dust / Base Value))

Example (Base Value = 10,000):

Dust does not affect Tattoo or Runegraft rewards. It does not count toward Port Quotas. Its generic reward contribution is split proportionally across the types of resources in your shipment.

How to get dust: Disenchant rare or unique items at Rog. Higher-tier uniques with quality, corruption implicits, or influence types yield far more dust. Each 1% quality adds 2% dust, and each corruption implicit or influence type adds 50%. The Mirage league also provides dust when ore sites convert to hourglasses during map encounters — this is now one of the fastest ways to accumulate dust early on.

7. Kalguuran Mappers

Assign workers with Mapping specialization to a Kalguuran Map Device. Drop alchedmaps into the queue and your Atlas Runners will clear them over time, returning loot including currency, divination cards, Valdo's boxes, and league-specific uniques.

• Death risk: Hover over a map in the device to see the crew's chance of dying. Keep this below ~4% to avoid constantly replacing expensive mappers.

• Six Rank 5 Mappers can handle Tier 17 maps most of the time.

• Atlas Runners are not affected by your Atlas passive tree or Atlas scarabs. Unique maps cannot be used.

• Cost warning: Mappers have extremely high hourly wages. A typical setup can increase your hourly costs from ~19,000 to ~68,000 gold per hour. Only activate mappers when your gold income can sustain this.

• Tip: Hold CTRL while clicking "Discard All" to bypass the confirmation prompt when collecting loot.

8. Boss Encounters

Occasionally, pirates or bandits will interfere:

• Admiral Valerius — Commandeers a ship during shipping. You can Rescue (fight him), pay a 50,000 gold Ransom (lose your shipment but keep crew), or Abandon (lose everything). Always fight — paying the ransom loses your shipment.

• Sasan, the Bandit Lord — Takes Atlas Runners hostage during mapping. You can pay the ransom or fight him. Fighting rewards gold and can drop The Living Blade.

• The Black Knight — Found in Starfall Crater entrances that randomly appear in maps with ore deposits. Guards Verisium Outcrops and can drop Svalinn.

PoE 3.28 Kingsmarch Shipping Cheat Sheet (Rewards)

The table below shows what each reward returns when shipped to each port:

All ore types return currency at every port. Crops return equipment that varies by port and crop type. For currency farming, focus entirely on ore and bars.

How to Set Up Kingsmarch Shipping in PoE 3.28?

Here is a step-by-step setup process:

Step 1: Accumulate Gold

Before entering Kingsmarch, farm some gold by running maps. Having at least 200k–500k gold makes the initial setup much smoother.

Step 2: Hire Workers

Visit Raulf and use the 16,000 gold reroll to find:

• 3–6 Rank 4–5 Shippers (your top priority — you need crew for every ship)

• 3–6 Rank 4–5 Miners (to tag ore in maps)

• 2–4 Rank 3–5 Smelters (to convert ore into bars)

• 1 Rank 4–5 Disenchanter (for dust generation)

• Mappers (only if you have 500k+ gold to sustain their wages)

Spend roughly 50% of your starting gold on hiring.

Step 3: Fund the Treasury

Deposit about half of your remaining gold into the treasury to cover hourly wages. Check back periodically to top it up, workers stop when the treasury runs dry.

Step 4: Set Up Mining

As you run maps, ore deposits will appear. Your Miners will automatically collect tagged ore. Focus on marking ore types with higher bar values (Verisium and Bismuth are the most valuable per unit).

Step 5: Set Up Smelting

Assign Smelters at Dannig's forge. They will automatically convert your ore into bars. Bars are worth ~5x the shipment value of raw ore, so this step is mandatory for efficient shipping.

Step 6: Prepare Shipments

Once you have accumulated bars:

1. Talk to Tujen (the Harbourmaster).

2. Select a port — check Favoured Resources and pick a port with a high multiplier on ore/bar types you have in stock.

3. Load bars into the shipment. Use at least two types of bars to access the 800 currency cap instead of 500.

4. Add Thaumaturgic Dust if you have it, up to the point of diminishing returns.

5. Assign Rank 4–5 Shippers as crew until risk is at 0%.

6. Send the ship.

Step 7: Repeat

Send all three ships as often as you can. Ships operate on real-time timers. Check back to collect rewards, refill the treasury, restock the map device, and send new shipments.

PoE 3.28 Best Kingsmarch Shipping & Kalguuran Mapping Strategy

Best Shipping Strategy: The 50 Million Ore Shipment

The most profitable shipping method in 3.28 targets the 50 million maximum shipment value using a combination of bars and thaumaturgic dust. At this value, the average return is approximately 2.5 Mirror Shards per shipment.

How to do it:

• Accumulate roughly 25 million in bar value - use equal amounts of all 5 bar types to ensure you send at least two varieties (hitting the 800 currency cap).

• Add 25 million in thaumaturgic dust to reach the 50 million cap.

• Assign six Rank 5 Shippers as crew to achieve 0% risk (10% at Kalguur).

• Ship to a port with strong Favoured Resource multipliers on your bar types. If no good multipliers are available, reroll for 15,000 gold or complete existing quotas to refresh them.

Downside: This takes considerable time to build up — potentially a week or more of ore farming and dust accumulation. If you cannot sustain 50 million shipments, smaller shipments in the 100k–3 million range still return divines and other currency, just at lower rates. Community reports indicate that even 100k–150k value bar shipments can occasionally return a divine.

Best Kalguuran Map Farming Strategy (S Tier)

This strategy combines Kalguuran Scarabs with map juicing to maximize ore drops per map, feeding directly into your shipping operation. It also doubles as a Svalinn hunting strategy (The Black Knight boss drop, worth ~40 divines).

Setup:

Requirements:

• Must run with 4 Voidstones. Running 3 Voidstones cuts Nightmare Map drops in half.

Tips:

• Crimson ore is the best target. Gather all mobs spawned by Crimson Ore, lead them to the most isolated Crimson nodule, kill them there, and repeat. Eventually the other nodules will "sprout" and begin spawning additional mobs, dropping many more maps and ore.

• Tier 16s are the most popular farming tier this league, meaning more Nightmare Maps will be generated and fewer consumed — expect Nightmare Maps to be much cheaper than T17s in past leagues.

• The Mirage league mechanic adds thaumaturgic dust drops from ore encounters in maps, so you are building dust passively while farming ore.

• If you want a chance at Svalinn, keep the Verisium node active. If you only want pure maps and ore, remove it.

• The combination of buffed Kalguuran Scarabs, Astrolabes, and the Mirage mechanic makes this ore farming strategy stronger than equivalent setups in previous leagues, even with the loss of the Settlers map craft.

Mappers as Supplementary Income

While your ships are in transit, keep your Kalguuran Map Device running:

• Feed it alched T16 maps (or lower tiers if your mapper ranks can't handle T16 safely).

• Six Rank 5 Mappers can handle T17s most of the time.

• Returns include divines, Valdo's boxes, divination cards, and various league-specific items.

• Only run mappers if your gold income comfortably covers the ~50,000+ additional hourly wage.

Quick Income Priority

1. Ore farming in maps → Smelt into bars → Ship for currency (primary income)

2. Kalguuran Mappers running juiced maps passively (secondary income, high gold cost)

3. Dust accumulation from disenchanting and Mirage encounters → Add to shipments to inflate value

4. Port Quota management → Reroll or complete quotas to maximize Favoured Resource multipliers on your bar shipments

With a well-oiled Kingsmarch operation running all three ships regularly, supplemented by active Kalguuran Mappers, you can generate a steady stream of divines and high-value currency with relatively minimal hands-on time between map sessions.