Getting Started

Getting Started

General Information

Ultima's Legacy Lives On!

What is Ultima Online?

Ultima Online (UO) is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), released on September 24th, 1997, by Origin Systems, then Electronic Arts and now Broadsword. The game is played in a fantasy setting similar to the other Ultima games that preceded it.

Ultima Online was the game that opened the door for the creation of many new massively multiplayer games. It is online-only and played by thousands of users on various game servers, also known as shards. It remains today, as the longest living MMORPG to date with a still active playerbase.

Because it was released before the DMC Act (1998), technically minded users are able to create and host their own custom freeshards using various UO emulators, like RUNUO. Those people are able to modify and create custom content. Because of this, Freeshards have been growing and evolving since that time.

You can read more about the history of Ultima Online here on Wikipedia

What is Angel Island?

Angel Island is a classic Ultima Online Shard circa Publish 15 with enhancements set in a Felucca ruleset. More important than the era though, is the philosophy behind the design. The Angel Island team has set out to build a solid and robust incarnation of Ultima Online that embodies all the things we loved about early UO while still growing and expanding to create an ever-interesting shard for everyone to play.  

I started out playing on the OSI (Origin Systems) Ultima Online Napa shard in 1998 and enthusiastically played through July 2002 when OSI released the now infamous Publish 16. Publish 16 changed elements of the game which took much of the risk out of the game, and for me, all the fun. What I found fun was knowing that you could lose all your possessions if you died in a dungeon for instance. OSI changed this so that upon death in a dungeon, you were teleported back to safety with all your belongings! I was a roleplayed player killer on Napa (PK). My method of operation was that I was to protect the monsters of the town of Wind (the lich to be exact.) If I found you in Wind, and you were not wearing a red bandanna (a show of respect,) you would be killed. However, I would usually return some of your stuff, give you a book explaining the rules of hunting in Wind, and give you sufficient means to return home. Publish 16 destroyed this. I could kill you but I could not roleplay the rest of our encounter. There were many other unwelcome changes as well, including, many new weapons and armor ill befitting of the time period. Item insurance, and all sorts of crazy enhancements associated with weapons. You could literally have a sword with like ten lines of goofy enhancements.

In March 2000 and before leaving OSI, I wrote up a proposal for a prison system called "Angel Island" and got overwhelming support from the Ultima Online community. Over 1000 members of the Ultima Online community mailed in support of the "Angel Island" prison system, many of them were legends in their own right. Here is the original proposal with many of the supporters listed. (the links are long dead now.)I sent the proposal off to Runesaber, a lead developer over at OSI, and a few others. I later heard the proposal was discussed at an annual OSI event, but nothing was to come of it.It was at this time I left OSI and decided to launch my version of  UO, one set in the Publish 15 time period, and one where roleplayed player-killing was an integral part of the game. I launched the Angel Island free shard in March of 2004 and maintained and developed it for the next 13 years.  My team and I built the Angel Island prison system described in the proposal, and you will find it here today. I had a saying back then, and I still believe it now - life is only as sweet as death is painful.

 

Angel Island adds many new features and systems including new character templates (the Summoner and Slayer,) Townships, Sea Gypsies that will take you on a seafaring quest,  1,400 treasure map locations, themed treasure chests, kin alignment (align with Orcs. pirates, savages, etc.)  A War Ring for guilds, the Angel Island prison system, special seasonal champion spawns, an automated event system, ransom quests (kin protect the ransom and other alignments try to steal it.) Island Siege (an island dedicated to PvP, no murder counts.) A bounty system (where players can place a bounty on the head of their murderer,) anti-macroing systems (CAPTCHA for miners.) Enhanced AI for monsters, and the list goes on...

Server Features

Our Angel Island shard runs on a dedicated PowerEdge T640 with 10 cores (20 logical) with a 1000mbps fiber internet connection. The Angel Island server platform ensures you will have 24/7 access to your UO account!

I hope you all enjoy Our UO. We’ve had a lot of fun putting it together.

"It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change"
-- Charles Darwin

What is Siege Perilous?

Siege Perilous is a separate shard hosted by Adam Ant which uses a different ruleset than the Angel Island shard. On Siege Perilous, players are limited to making only one account with only one character. This creates an interesting challenge for players as they are still just as limited in how many skill points that character can have. This dynamic enhances player interaction, which brings the community closer. The Siege Perilous shard is currently in an open beta stage of it's development where players are invited to test the shards mechanics.

Historically, Siege Perilous was a shard that was conceptualized during the Ultima Online beta. When it first launched years later, it was stated that the intention was to capture the feel of Ultima Online when it was freshly launched. At that time, there were no highly detailed systems in the game. The developer wanted to create a more challenging version of the game which would be a true test of skill and character.

Staff Listing

Administrators:

Adam Ant - Owner, Admin

Developers

Yoar
Pix

Seers:

Snafu

Game Masters:

Counselors:

WikiMasters:

EvilManfred

Yoar

WebMasters:```

EvilManfred

Community Coordinator

Wrexor

Archive Specialists

Nerull

Grizlok

Hierarchy and Roles

Owner
The Owner has complete authority over the shards and has the final say over all decisions and staff members. The owner is responsible for keeping the shards balanced and fair for all players.

Administrator
Administrators have control over the shards and their contents. They usually also have access to the server on which the shards are hosted, able to restart it or update the functionality of the shards. One of the Administrators is the Coordinating Administrator. That person is in charge of the shards and can make important decisions in the absence of the owner.

Developers
These most esteemed individuals program the game itself at the request of the owner or shard Administrators.

Seer
Game Masters who prove their worth over time become Seers. They have seniority above Game Masters and Counselors, and have some extra duties and abilities.

Game Master
A game master has all the tools for building the world, making a variety of events for player entertainment.

Counselor
The counselor position is given to beginner staff members who are still learning about the game itself, the basics of staffing or the particularities of our shard. Counselors have a small array of powers that they can use, they usually do smaller events, tour new players and help with easier issues. Note that Counselors are not to be confused with Council members, which are players.

Wikimasters
These astute folk are tasked with organizing and presenting shard-related information to users in the most concise, coherent and visually appealing manner possible.

WebMasters
Those with the WebMaster role have the duty of developing and upkeeping the servers web presence.

Community Coordinator
The Community Coordiator acts as a liaison between developers and the players. Their main role is to facilitate that communication and interaction to ensure the best user experience.

Archive Specialists
Archive Specialists are researchers who assist the developers by providing accurate information about the history of the mechanisms or inner workings of the game.

New Player Guide

Once you’ve logged in, you’ll need to know the basics! Here’s a quick guide on how to function in the world.

Creating a character and logging in

Here you can pick which stats and skills your character will start with. For simplicity’s sake, let’s pick the Warrior pre-made skillset. From here you will be able to customize your characters looks and give them a name.

Once you have decided how you want your character to look, press the the green arrow in the bottom right corner and you will be logged into the world.

Note that some client versions allow for the choosing of skills which you typically can't see on the starting skills menu. Any points devoted to these skills will be removed entirely upon character creation. Skills affected by this are listed in Skills.

Starting Equipment

On Angel Island, your starting items are geared toward your starting skills. You may get useful equipment, so be careful to select the skills you believe are important to your character as a whole. See also: Items. You will also get an Unemployment Check which can be used to purchase starting equipment and skill training from NPC's.

On Siege Perilous, every character starts with the same equipment:

   Clothing, as normal (“newbie items”)
   1 dagger (“newbie items”)
   100 gold coins
   25 ingots
   1 shovel
   1 bag, with 10 of each reagent
   1 katana

• Note that on Siege Perilous you can't ask NPC's for skill training.

Moving and Playing

You will appear in the new player training area just outside the city of Britain (walk into the sparkles to enter the city.) This area has some useful information and a demonstration of the artificial intelligence that has been adapted to many of the NPC's you will encounter while playing on Angel Island or Siege Perilous. To move, simply point the cursor in the direction you wish to go and hold down your right mouse button. To inspect items or NPCs, click on them with the left mouse button once. To use an item or to open a door, double left-click over the item or door.

Once you’ve familiarized yourself with movement, stand still and double left-click your character sprite in the middle of the screen. This will open up your paperdoll, which is where you can equip your character with weapons, clothes, and armor. It also has a variety of useful buttons, such as your Options menu, your Skills menu, and Log Out button to take you back to the account sign in screen. The War/Peace button will put your character into combat mode, and double clicking any creature will attack it. Be very careful not to attack anything that highlights as Blue, or innocent. This will cause you to become a criminal, and you may be subject to attack by the town guards if you are in an area under their jurisdiction. Note that entering war mode will not automatically make you “grey”. You will not commit a criminal action until you are in war mode and double click on an innocent player or NPC.

Notoriety system: UO has a notoriety system that tells you what is okay to attack and what is not. The basics are:

Blue: Innocent
Grey: Criminal
Red: Murderer
Orange: Enemy (Guild War or Alignment)

You can find out a players notoriety by single-left clicking on their sprite and checking the color of their name.

“Blues” are innocent players and NPCs who you have the ability to attack, but will likely result in the guards being called on you if you are in town and under the protection of the town guards. Monsters are typically “grey” which means they are freely attackable. There is also a “criminal status” for players who have committed criminal acts recently, such as attacking an innocent blue player or stealing from somebody. Criminal status lasts for 120 seconds after the last committed criminal offense and returns to blue status after the timer is up. Note that “grey” players are freely attackable by any player during this duration, within the protection of the town guards or not. Guards cannot be called upon a player who is attacking a “grey” criminal player in town. Finally, there is Murderer, or “red” status. A player who is a murderer is not allowed into any town, and will be killed by the guards immediately after being spotted by a player who calls “guards” or an NPC within the protection of the town guards. Players become murderers by player killing at least 5 human players in game, counted by a “murder count” system. Murderer status can be gotten rid of in one of two ways: waiting for a good amount of time in-game, or going to the Angel Island prison, where murder counts take significantly less time to disappear. More info on Angel Island can be found in the Features section of this website.

Basics and other Misc.

In UO, speaking is as simple as typing and pressing enter. Anything you enter will appear above your character sprite for a few seconds and then disappear. This is used to talk to other players, open your personal Bank chest, call the guards, and interact with NPCs, among other things.

Bank: To open your personal bank chest, be in the vicinity of a banker NPC and say “bank”. In Britain, the bank is in the center hub of the city where your character was created. Each character on your account gets a bank chest, and the contents of each bank chest are unique to that character. Bank chests are safe from thieves, so you can feel safe putting your gold and other valuables in there. Bank contents are universal, as in a character will have the same bank chest no matter what city they are currently in.

Guards: When you are in the protection of the town guards (accordingly noted by a message in the bottom left corner of the screen whenever you enter or leave the protection of the town guards), they will protect you from monsters, player killers, and usually thieves. If you are attacked by a creature or another player while in town, simply say “guards” and the guards will kill the creature or player. Note that guards will not always notice thieves if they are skilled enough, so be wary of holding valuable goods that you cannot afford to lose.

Vendors: Vendors on UO will sell you equipment to help you on your adventure, if you have the gold for it. To buy or sell goods to a vendor, you must find an NPC who has the wares you are looking for and say “Vendor Buy” near them. NPCs have titles such as Tailor or Blacksmith that will tell you what kind of wares they deal in. Similarly, saying “vendor sell” near a vendor will show you the sell menu. Alternatively, you can press shift+left-click to show a small menu of what interactions the NPC is capable of. Some NPC's also offer basic skill training in their fields. You may spend your Unemployment Checks at NPC vendors on Angel Island.

Status bar: To pull up your status bar, left-click and hold on your character sprite and drag away from it. You will pull up a simple grey status bar that shows your health, mana, and stamina, respectively. Double click this status bar to get a more detailed report of your stats.

Mini-map: Once you feel you’re ready to go out and explore, press alt+R. This will bring up your mini-map, which will show you where you are currently positioned in the world within a small area. Press alt+R again to make the map slightly bigger.

Combat: First thing you want to do before entering combat is to pull up your targets health bar exactly as you bring up your own. Left-click and hold, then drag away from the sprite. Once you have their health bar up, you can engage them in combat. To engage in melee combat, you must enter war mode. When you are in war mode, your in-game cursor will turn red and your character will go into a combat stance that is clear to you and everyone else around you. To enter war mode, you can either hold the tab button or press alt+C. Once you are in war mode, simply double click on the monster (or player) that you would like to attack. Standing on any adjacent tile to the monster or player will cause you to swing at them automatically.

Healing: As a warrior starting out, the easiest way to heal yourself is using bandages. Bandages can be cut up from bolts of cloth bought from the tailor NPCs using scissors. Alternatively, you can go to the cotton fields and pick some cotton, run the cotton through a spinning wheel to make balls of yarn, then run the balls of yarn through a loom to make bolts of cloth to cut up with scissors. This is cheaper, but more time consuming. To heal yourself, you must be hurt at least 1 hit point worth of damage. Double left-click the bandages in your backpack and it will bring up a targeting symbol on your cursor. Place the cursor either over your health bar and left-click once, or place it over your character sprite and left-click once. Bandages will take anywhere from 10-15 seconds to heal yourself depending on your dexterity stat, and can be interrupted by being hit in combat. If you are struck in combat while applying a bandage, you will receive the message “Your fingers slip!”. If you are at very low health while fighting a monster, it is advised that you run away for a screen or so while your bandage finishes healing up.

Macros: In UO, there are some small shortcuts you can take to make your gameplay experience a little bit smoother, called “macros”. To reach the macro menu, double click your sprite to open your paperdoll and go to the options menu. In the options menu, click the circle with the arrow in the bottom left and that will bring you to the macros tab. Macros can cast a spell from your spellbook, say a string of words you use often, and many other things. I will leave you to experiment with macros yourself, but I think an important one you will use often is “lastobject”. Lastobject will initiate whatever action you last took that involved a double-click. The easiest example that I can think of for this is using your bandages. Once you double click your bandages, you can simply press your “lastobject” macro (in this example, the F1 key) and it will pull up the cursor used to target yourself with a bandage. It can save you a lot of time and hassle instead of going to your backpack, double clicking bandages, and going back to single click on your character sprite. Experiment with macros and see what useful shortcuts you can find. Once you set a macro you want, make sure you press “apply” at the bottom of the options menu to finalize it.\

Logging out: Finally, after a day of exploring and killing monsters, you will need to log out. To log out, you will need to find an Inn. Inn’s are noted by the signs on buildings that have a candle on them, such as the one in the screenshot. To log out properly, you will want to stand somewhere within an inn, open up your paperdoll by double left-clicking your sprite, and pressing the “log out” button. If you choose to log out anywhere else but an inn, your character will be left vulnerable for several minutes after you log out, after which you will “time out” and disappear until you log back in. Note that you cannot log onto another character onto the same account while one of your characters is still in the world and not logged out properly. Logging out will take your back to the account sign-in screen, where you can log back into your account and pick a different character or close the client to play again another time.

Newbie tents

Newbie tents work like low functioning houses. You can’t lock items down or decorate the interior, you can’t increase storage, etc. You place your tent, and you have a housing spot and an extra storage container in the wild. But don’t forget where you placed it!! Note that tents are only available on Angel Island and not Siege Perilous.

Tents count towards your 1 Housing space per account, so if you lose track of where it is placed, you’re in trouble!

Attributes

• Size: 8×8
• Can be placed anywhere a small house can be placed.
• To unpack: double-click the tent bag and target the ground where you’d like to place it.
• Vendors can be placed in tents (note: you must use a ‘contract of employment’ – vendor rentals don’t work).
• Can be dyed (dying changes the color of the tent bag, the tent’s secure backpack (see next item), the tent roof, but not the tent walls).
• Once placed, the tent contains a backpack that is locked down and secure. It must be emptied before the tent can be packed up again.
• Tent bag is newbied
• Cannot be purchased from NPC vendors
• When a tent decays, everything in the backpack also decays.
• Given to all characters once.
• Cannot be placed if the player already has a house.
• To pack up: double-click the bedroll.
• When packed up, the tent bag ends up on the ground (where anyone can pick it up).
• Decay time banking is similar to house banking, up to five days. In other words, if you place it and log out for five days, it will decay, but if you continue to play, it will not decay. Housing and Newbie Tents on Angel Island don't require use to refresh besides just playing normally.
• Default tent bag color is beige (like a bedroll).
• Default tent roof color is light gray.
• Tent wall color is light blue.

Making Money

Begin the game in Britain and head north to the cemetery for some easy money for equipment. This will help you train your skills and stats.

Some skills are free to train and are good for gaining stats, such as hiding which will gain your Dexterity/Stamina, or Arms Lore which will gain your Strength/HP.

Once you are ready to start training, move on to the following sections for advanced gold farming starter-build information.

Note that skill and stat training on Siege Perilous can only be completed so quickly, as it has a different Return over Time (RoT) based system that limits daily gains.

Bard Warrior

You can nearly build this template for free, and it is capable of bringing in great amounts of gold once you master it. Take a look at The Bard's Table to find out the difficulty of the type of monster you wish to slay.

I’d start the character with 50 healing and 50 resist.

First and foremost travel to the cotton fields east of Skara Brae, or West of Britain and collect as much cotton as you can hold. Inside the tailor shop you can use the spinning wheels to spin it into thread and then looms to process it into cloth. Use your scissors to then cut it into bandages.

Training Weapons Skills

Purchase the training weapons of choice in a quantity of about 10. The training weapons for each skill are

Fencing= dagger Swordsmanship = skinning knife Archery = regular bow bought from NPC Macing = shepherd's crook

Hire a fighter from across the west bridge in Britain. To do this stand next to one of the fighters and say “<name> hire” or use the drop-down context menu. (shift + click the NPC) Then drop the amount of gold requested or more onto the NPC directly after it tells you it's rate. Note that hireling NPC's cost more on Siege Perilous.

Have the NPC follow you to a safe area. Set up a macro in razor that looks something like this-

Double Click Bandage Wait .5 seconds Target NPC Wait 8 seconds

-and set it to loop. You may need to adjust delays for lag.

Now command the NPC to attack you with “All Kill”. Quickly type “all stop” followed by “all follow me”. If you did this correctly your NPC should be standing there mindlessly while you swing away and heal him at the same time. This will take you to GM weapon, tactics, anatomy, and healing if you decide to train that long.

Training Musicianship

Next I would purchase about 10 instruments from a vendor and find a safe place to macro. Create a razor macro that looks like this-

Double click instrument (set by type) wait .3 seconds Use skill peacemaking wait .3 seconds Target Self wait 11 seconds

-and set it to loop. Again, adjust any delays for lag. This should raise your musicianship and peacemaking to GM if you macro overnight on Angel Island, but not on Siege Perilous since you can't get to GM in one day there.

Now you could have a character whose skills look like this:

100 Weapon 100 Tactics 100 Anatomy 100 Healing 100 Musicianship 100 Peacemaking 50 Resist – You can probably raise another skill like hiding to 50 for the time being, it won’t work every time.. but is nice if you need to go AFK (away from keyboard.)

Getting that Gold!

Start off by farming a graveyard or other overland spawn until you have enough money for decent player-made armor and weapons. Beware other players who frequent these areas with the intention of hunting new players for sport; plan an escape route to the nearest guard zone. The peacemaking skill is very useful, you can just use it, target a monster, and begin attacking worry free! Use this time to practice how the template works (i.e. how long it takes you to heal yourself, and how long peacemaking lasts on a creature before it becomes aggressive and needs peaced again). Remember to practice caution around mages, because you are still a newbie with 50 resist.

Once you can afford GM/magic weapons and armor, you will be able to take on plenty of the larger game out there and pocket bigger gold. Once you master your peacemaking abilities you could even take on Ogre Lords with your weapon. Save some gold for making a mage next if you intend to participate in any player versus player combat.

That's it! You're now a capable adventurer, ready to enjoy all that Angel Island and Siege Perilous have to offer!