We received 12 creative entries from the Origin shard. Of those entries there were 5 memories that received the most votes from our judges.
Here are the 5 winning UO memories from Origin:
My most memorable moment in UO is when I achieved the title Grandmaster Fisherman. It may not seem all that special anymore, but back when I was working 65+ hours a week, I could only dedicate 5 – 15 hours a week to Ultima Online. The magic of fishing up items from a shipwreck or the highly desirable message in a bottle seemed like a fairy tale to me for so long. I never thought it would happen.
Fortunately there was a system known as power hour that helped me get fishing gains around midnight to 1:00AM. I would also use a technique called 8×8 where you move your boat 8 tiles, and fish. If you got a gain, you would stay on that spot, and keep fishing until the fish stopped biting. If you didn’t get a gain, you just moved another 8 tiles.
It was an adventure, because you would travel the seas over all of Sosaria. I got very familiar with the coast lines, the islands, and soon I always knew where I was. Just as in real life, when fishing your mind would wander, you could imagine all the things about the game you loved, or wish you could change. It was very relaxing.
Soon after I became grandmaster, I hunted for these MiBs, and when I found my first one, I pulled out the water-stained scroll to read about some poor soul that got trapped in a squall only to drown going down with ship because they couldn’t abandon their treasure. How nice of them to take the time to leave me this note with the coordinates to find their loot.
It was exciting the first time I used my sextant to find the site of the shipwreck. I pulled up body parts, clocks, boots, and pillows, but I really wanted the large painting. I was addicted. I couldn’t believe it when I the line on pole pulled something heavy out of the sea into my backpack. An unlocked treasure chest, what a relief, because I had no lockpicking.
Later I would pull up more messages in a bottle, and fishing nets to. Today fishing is even more exciting as it was back then. Its an element of this game I hope continues to evolve, as I will never stop playing.
My story about Origin began more than twenty years ago, before the time of the MMORPG, even before the magic we call the internet…
I first journeyed to the land of Sosaria as a lone hero when my cousin brought the first Ultima game to my home in 1986. I ten years old, yet I became a hero when I came home from school, so long as my chores were done. The game was on a single floppy disc for the Apple IIe. The monitor was green monochrome, yet I fell instantly in love with the wench in the tavern, though I think she robbed me blind more than once. I finally traveled back in time to destroy the evil wizard, Mondain.
I set out immediately to find the rest of the series, but, I could only find Ultima IV. When I became an Avatar by reaching the Codex of Ultimate Wisdom, I heard some amazing news: Ultima V was coming out soon. I saved my allowance for several months, and after several weeks of anticipation, the box finally arrived! The artwork on the cover was incredible, with the Avatar facing three evil-looking foes. On the cover was the Origin symbol.
Unfortunately, I was unable to complete my quest. I had arrived at the final dungeon, when my computer stopped working. We couldn’t afford a new one, and it would be many years before I would journey to Sosaria again…
Years later, I discovered that the Ultima series had been collected for the PC. I immediately bought the collection, and more than ten years after I had started the quest, I finally rescued Lord British from the clutches of the upstart Lord Blackthorn!
When I began to play UO, I was scrolling through the different shards, when I suddenly saw a familiar name: Origin! I struggled against Mongbats, and finally used the advanced character token to become a powerful mage. I scraped together my first LRC suit. As I wasn’t doing more than just killing random monsters, I began to branch out and ask the bustling community for a little help. Arafel brought me to her house in Tokuno to help me train my mage skill. She told me to wait at her house, then she ran out and brought back a Hiryu. I didn’t know what I was doing, so I leapt off her porch and was instantly killed. Arafel laughed a little, “lol,” and told me, quite sternly, to stay on the porch and cast two energy vortexes next to the Hiryu. When the vortexes were killed, she told me to cast again. I didn’t have any mana, so she told me to meditate. I knew what meditating was, so I began to slowly take off my metal armor, piece by piece. She burst out laughing, “LOL, Wow, you really do need help!” And she proceeded to contact her friends to make me a proper, medable, LRC suit. That was when Origin became my home.
The Hammer
Lord Blood Ghoul opened the front door of Hanse’s Hostel and took the seat closest to the fire. The chill of autumn’s breeze slowly leaving his bones as the warmth from the flames washed over him. This was his favorite drinking spot, even though he was the only patron he’d ever seen at the establishment. Looking around he notices a rudimentary calendar on the wall and his eyes lock on one day in particular, Halloween.
Opening his pack he removes a piece of parchment, takes out his quill, and begins to write.
Let It Be Known
It was the first year of our world and I resided on a shard called “Eastern.” The shard was plagued with criminals, murderers, and small areas labeled “unused” which no matter how hard you tried you could not walk upon. Life was hard those days and I hold nothing against anyone for what they did to survive.
Blood Ghoul cringed at the thought of how many Nobles he had promised to escort to their desired location, only to lead them beyond the range of city guards to murder and loot their belongings. He looks back down to the parchment and continues to write.
I had been walking around the land outside of Britain when I came across a large group of others gathered around a peculiar looking individual. This person was instructing the group that it was Halloween and the undead in the cemetery were amassing a formidable force. The entire group began running to the north until we reached the cemetery where I stopped in my tracks at the sight. Ghouls, Zombies, Skeletons, and numerous worse undead were wandering the area.
The fighting was brutal and long. All of my training in the wilds came into use and when the last of the undead fell I surveyed the carnage. Bodies of both the living and undead littered as far as the eye could see. In those days when someone fell in battle you could take all the belongings from their corpse. I believe the overwhelming number of “heroes” who came to stop the undead spent their time participating in that repulsive act.
The strange individual we had followed to the undead stood in front of the crowd and congratulated us on a well earned victory. He then stated one warrior was to be recognized for bravery and called my name. He asked me to approach and I was handed a named magical war hammer called “Heavy War Hammer of the Dead.”
The world was difficult and I ended up losing my prize. I heard it passed through many hands over the years and ended up on the shard called Drachenfels but it has since slipped into history. I have searched many shards but to no avail. I fear my hammer is lost forever.
Lord Blood Ghoul gets up from his chair and approaches the bulletin board. Posting his most memorable moment he then heads back out into the autumn’s chill.
It was one early morning 1998 when I woke up for class. I thought to myself let’s see what the world of Ultima Online has to offer before I head out the door. I logged onto my 56k AOL connection “eeeeawwwwewwwwwaaaaa, chssssss, chssss” and there I was sitting in the brittania mint. My character was named Strider and he was almost a 70 something Swordsman/Smith. I have the Ultima Online classic music just cranked up in my apartment running around the brittania bank and then I run across a character and his name was Oslo. We talked for a good hour about everything under the sun and near the end of the conversation he said “Hey let me see your house” . I was very proud to show my 7×7 home off to someone that did not have a house, so we ran to my house. It was right before we entered my home that I noticed my key was missing! Oslo says “The Thief King strikes again” and then runs…… I pursue him trying to type and run at the same time “Wait, Wait!” but before long he has vanished. I return to the scene of the crime and behold Oslo shows up. I immediately attack him but am no match for this thief and he quickly kills me. At this point I have missed a college class (later finds out that I missed a pop quiz and coincidently fail the class). I return to the brittania mint and find no other than Oslo looking for his next victim. I beg him for the return of my key to my house and he replied “Whats in it for me?” I literally gave him the clothes/armor on my back in order to retrieve my key. In the end Oslo and I became good friends and played Ultima Online together for 10 years before he had to leave the game. In the end it turns out missing that class, failing a quiz/class and getting man handled by a thief led me to 10 exciting years of Ultima Online and a great friendship
From Farmer to Lord – My Story
I guess you can say I was born on the islands of Jhelom, well at least that’s where I first obtain my consciousness. With nothing but the shirt, pants and shoes I had on I wandered the streets for days not knowing what I was supposed to do other than knowing my name was Orion. I particularly remembered a day approximately 2 weeks into my conscious existence that I came across a large farm. There was a small house that looked like a shop of some sorts but behind it was a massive forest. I stopped by the shop for a glass of water since that was all I could afford and had the urge of wanting to take a stroll into the forest. I found a path leading into the forest and began walking. It was about 20 minutes into the walk did I hear loud claps of thunder. It didn’t make sense to me at first because it was a clear blue sky so naturally I was even more drawn to the source of that sound. I walked another 200 yards or so before I saw this old man dressed in a robe summoning what it appeared to be lightning bolts and fireballs out of thin air and directing them towards these 2 large silver serpents. What he didn’t see was a giant spider slowly creeping up behind him and was in a position to pounce on him. Needless to say I was scarred but also excited at the same time and out of my mouth I yelled to the old man “there is a huge spider getting ready to eat your ass – look behind you”. He turned with incredible speed for his age and muttered some words and next thing I knew he was next to me. He then muttered some more words and a bluish looking pool appeared in front of me. He grabbed me by the shirt and tossed me into the pool and everything went black.
I woke up in a bed in this giant room decorated with what looked like expensive things and at the foot of the bed stood the same old man I met on the island. He looked at me with a smile and said “welcome Orion, how are you feeling?” I didn’t know what to say at first other than “huh?” He smiled some more and said “well I guess you must be wondering what is going on, so let me do the talking and fill you in”. He began telling me his story about how he was a high wizard in Lord British’s court who worked all of his life and was never married. On that particular day, he was trying out some new combination magic spells and was careless not paying any attention around him and would have probably died until he heard me yelling. He thought that was a sign from above and decided to adopt me as his child. While I was unconscious from the moongate traveling (my first time of course), he found out from the locals that I was an orphan and just appeared out of nowhere one day and had been wondering around the streets for days. He then said he will teach me everything he knows and that his fortune was not made through magic or service to the throne but through antiques trading- for he as the foremost expert on antiquities.
Over the years he has taught me many lessons. I’ve been on countless quests under the services of all the Britannia rulers from Lord British to Lady Dawn and established long time friends. And when my adopted father passed the title of Lord was bestowed upon me as the sole heir of his estates. To honor him, I changed my name to that of his family crest which was a creature of a lion with dragon wings – Manticore. So when you asked what this world means to me, the answer is simple, “everything