First time player. Took the train to Ashbury, found the haunted castle, working thru the basement. Not sure, but I might be able to finish with my current party.

Is there a quest I should have gotten first? I hate to miss quest goodies if there are any.

As far as I remember, there was no quest, just some (magical) goodies. But I've only played the "official" version. Maybe the unofficial patches added something....

That's good enough. I ran around Ashbury some first and didn't get quested, so I'll just assume it's a straight treasure run.

Thanks!

Yeah I remember some NPCs telling me about the castle but no one giving me an actual quest. So I assumed it was just one of those things where you are told about an area to explore so you can loot it for treasure.

Yeah, there are a whole bunch of those areas which you get from rumors in Ashbury. The castle, the Ancient Ruin (the one with the altar to Moonrindal), the skeleton + skipwreck, the patch of winter place north of the mountains. Maybe there are some others too.

I always had the feeling, especially for the castle, that a lot of those areas were intendet for quests, that never made it in the game.

I never did a full playthrough with the unofficial patch (yeah, I know, shame on me), but maybe it fleshed some of those areas out.

The unofficial patch does not add a quest for the castle in Ashbury. I don't know about other places though... I've never played the game WITHOUT the patch.

I'm playing without the patch (although on official pause), and I also always thought that castle felt like a left-out quest more than most other rumor areas. Of course, the Ancient Ruin is a mixed case, since it has bits for wider quests.

One shipwreck has an item that can be used to solve a different quest, although in the unpatched version there's no hint to suggest this (it's just a copy of something I had assumed to be a unique item).