Wild West Pioneers Guide
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Where to pick up the shovel for the buried treasure

The shovel is back home in Dust Creek, your first settlement. The scouts reach the treasure spot, the party realises nobody brought one, and the objective switches to fetching the shovel left behind in Dust Creek: find it on the ground near your houses, click it, then go back to the dig site and dig.

Wild West Pioneers | Let's Play With MartyToplitz Productions · 36:13 · from 31:13The scouts reach the dig site, discover there is no shovel, and head back to Dust Creek.

How you end up at a dig site with no shovel

The quest starts at home. While a house is going up, one of your settlers turns up an old treasure map, and following it is a side mission for your scouts. Once they reach the spot and try to dig by a pile of stones, the dialogue reveals that the shovel never left town. If you have not built a Scouts’ Cabin yet, that comes first; the scouts page covers expeditions and their supplies.

The exact wording of the new objective can vary, but it always points to the same place: the shovel left behind at Dust Creek. Dust Creek is the name of your starting settlement, shown at the top of the screen while you are in it.

Where exactly the shovel is

It lies somewhere around your buildings, and it is small. The publisher said it sits next to a wooden house, with an arrow over it: “The shovel is not easy to find, but an arrow above the shovel should make the search easier.”

It is easy to miss. One player, going to look for it after his expedition returned, remarked, “It's a little difficult to see, but there it is.” Zoom in, pan slowly around your houses, and look for the arrow rather than the shovel itself.

The in-game Journal over Dust Creek, listing Debt Owed and Fortune in the Foundations objectives
The Journal: under Fortune in the Foundations, the one objective left is to pick up the shovel left behind at Dust Creek. Above it, Debt Owed lists gold under the rocks in Sand Storm and 100 Gold Bars for Dust Creek; the current game asks for 50.

The objective sits in the Journal under its own heading, Fortune in the Foundations, so if the Journal is closed, open it and look for that entry rather than under the main debt quest. The second tier of the Journey’s Progression tab also has a Treasure card for completing the side task Fortune in the Foundations. Its Steam achievement, X marks the spot, names where the treasure lies: “Find the treasure buried in Hidden Grove”.

Do the scouts have to come home?

No. The publisher explained that the scouts don’t carry the shovel: they can wait at the treasure spot, you find the shovel in the settlement, and then you go back to the spot without sending them again and start digging. Bringing the scouts home and sending them back out once the shovel is picked up can also work, but it costs another trip, and one player’s group vanished after being called back, so letting them wait is the safer choice.

If the game still says you have no shovel

Some players hit a bug where the dig refused to start even after they had picked the shovel up. The publisher’s workaround was to send the scouts back to the settlement and then out to the treasure location again. It is the first thing to try if it happens to you.

What the treasure gives you

Gold: the party digs up 5 gold bars, which the expedition brings home as cargo. Gold is what the debt storyline keeps asking for, and the Journal’s Debt Owed quest wants 50 gold bars delivered to Dust Creek (100 before the third hotfix). How the rest of the debt gets paid is on the gold page.

Expedition cargo panel with a rider icon and 5 gold bars
The expedition's cargo panel after the dig: 5 gold bars.

Related

Still early in a run? The first two hours guide gets you to the Scouts’ Cabin in order. Exploring the map also earns journey points, and scouts and expeditions covers what else the map holds. Other side quests that stall on a hidden object are on side quests: where you get stuck.