A request of other players, in an ever going research into a mystery

[Trebr Drab]

I need a look at two books that no longer spawn.

-Classic Children tales: Volume One
-Phonemes of the Orcish Tongue (this one is very rare, if anyone has it at all)

In particular, I need to see pages 2 and 3.

If someone can throw up some pictures here, or has a copy that I can see in game, I would very much appreciate it.

Edit to add...I need to see the in-game books themselves. The text here on stratics may not align right.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Did I mention that there's 1,000 pixel crack in it for anyone who helps me out here?

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

Have you tried Martyna's library on the shard we plan on?

-Galen's player

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

You two putting up plans without me ?!

 

[Kri]

Here's the Phonemes. I'm sure I have the other one stored away somewhere too... at one point I made a collection of them all but all I found on a quick search was a few (luckily including this one!)

 

[Petra Fyde]

If you copy/pasted the text from Stratics into an in game book would the aligment match up? We have the text of both books
In Game Books

 

[Trebr Drab]

Have you tried Martyna's library on the shard we plan on?

-Galen's player

Of course I did, that was the first place I went to. Martyna has everything, except maybe these books(?).

I might have missed it though, because Martyna has it well ordered and structured, but these original books seem to be somewhat scattered among the bookcases.

I also tried MalagAste's and Silverbrook's places, but they either weren't there or weren't accessible. I was going to do a search here for libraries (GL's got a lot, I'm sure), but decided to go the easy way with this post for now.

 

[Trebr Drab]

You two putting up plans without me ?!

I've got to tell you, there was a moment in my studies on this that made me think of you, and your Wisp ideas. But at this point, everything seems very much like mere coincidence. Still, enough for me to keep checking it out, but then I'm a sucker for false leads.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Here's the Phonemes. I'm sure I have the other one stored away somewhere too... at one point I made a collection of them all but all I found on a quick search was a few (luckily including this one!)

Thanks Kri! I actually didn't expect to get this book since it's such a rare quantity.

If you copy/pasted the text from Stratics into an in game book would the aligment match up? We have the text of both books
In Game Books

No, they don't line up. Kri's picture shows that and surprises me how far off pasting in the text is. I tried it in game, and then assumed various starting points and such, and came up with a very different setup for the text than what Kri shows. And now that I see it again, I remember that the original was like that, where words could have been continued in an above space but weren't.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Kri's picture shows that the alignment of the words, and so the letters, are quite different than they could be if the text was simply typed in. But anyone who's ever pasted from notepad into a book knows that this can happen and throw things off quite a bit.

Still, I've always wondered about this book in particular. At least, now I remember this after seeing it again.

Here's the thing. If UO was created with the intention of creating one or more ciphers in those original books, wouldn't that be very hard to do, and wouldn't it be a lot easier if one book could be made where almost anything could be put in the right places? That's what strikes me about this particular book. It could be the finisher, the last one that allows for the ciphers (more than one) to be completed without having to actually make words that make sense.

Of course I know it's probably a wild goose chase. And I'm sure smarter people than me have tried what I'm trying over UO's long history. Especially back in the beginning when there were many players like me, seeking such mysteries. People like those of the Mage Tower who solved the riddles of the Prophesies on the Stones, when Order and Chaos were introduced. And those prophesies hit me while I was working on this effort. Because I found things here that are also there. And on top of that, seems to be a possibility in game for something. Something that has always mystified me about something.

Coincidence? Maybe, and most likely. But I won't know unless I try. And this is a very difficult task.

I still need to see those pages from Classic Childrens Tales, Volume One. Also, if anyone on GL has either book, is there a way I can get a copy made with inscription? I can't afford much, so I'm asking for donations of these copies. Just PM me, thanks.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

Sounds like you might be on to something interesting !

 

[Kri]

Well... bad news. I found the collection that I put together circa 2000 and it does not contain Classic Children tales: Volume One (only Volume Two.) I have another friend who built a collection around the same time and I'll check if he has one next time he's on.

Stupid question but you have been checking all the bookshelves everywhere right? If I remember correctly I got most of the ones I had trouble finding off of bookshelves in Fel.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

there was an algorythm back then when UO was much more sophistocated (10 years ago)

if you dropped a quite complete book in a shelve it would be recopied on its own after a while, thats how a few of the known books came to be if I recall well...

 

[Trebr Drab]

Well... bad news. I found the collection that I put together circa 2000 and it does not contain Classic Children tales: Volume One (only Volume Two.) I have another friend who built a collection around the same time and I'll check if he has one next time he's on.

Stupid question but you have been checking all the bookshelves everywhere right? If I remember correctly I got most of the ones I had trouble finding off of bookshelves in Fel.

That's a good idea. But from what little I've seen of late, it might be a long search. But maybe, because they've tried to add to the stealing skill, as well as others, by limiting things in this way.

there was an algorythm back then when UO was much more sophistocated (10 years ago)

if you dropped a quite complete book in a shelve it would be recopied on its own after a while, thats how a few of the known books came to be if I recall well...

Huh? Are you talking about player written books and not copies of the original official set? I never knew of that actually being in game, just a suggestion by players.

 

[Trebr Drab]

I need a "T".

Looking at the text here at Stratics on the book
"Classic Childrens Tales, Volume One" (the one I still need)
and comparing it to the actual game book "Classic Tales of Vesper: Volume 1", which is about the same children's tale and commentary, but arranged differently, I can see that there is the possibility that I get a "T".

Now, for what I was working on and what I come up with, assuming that there is indeed a "T" in the right spot.

I was using the Covetous number clues that have never been solved...
3-4-1-5.

I decided to use them as a cipher on each of the original books from the release of UO.
Page 3, line 4, word 1, 5th letter.

I had all but the 2 letters I mentioned to start this thread.
Some words in this place don't have 5 letters in them, so I carried the count into the next word, ignoring the spaces between.
In one book, that line starts with 'Tis, and here I counted apostrophe as a letter. I haven't tried it yet without.

Then I started running it through an anagram program, but it was too long.
So I made an assumption. I looked for UO names, and saw that if I had a "T", I could get "Covetous" out of it.
And I immediately realized something.

• The "T" I needed would have to come from this book, as there is none anywhere close to this spot in the other.
• And this book is the only book that has 2 different versions. And both are written by the same person, one Guilhem.
• And while this tale is written as a tale "of Vesper", it's commentary seems to indicate it might have it's beginnings in Minoc, which is the city associated through the Virtues with Covetous.
• There is reason to think that this author/editor, Guilhem, might have made attempts to mislead through his writtings, as he has appeared elsewhere in UO's history. But that's another story, perhaps.

So, this particular book seems to have some meaning that other books don't. But I don't think that has anything to do with the fact that it no longer spawns. I think the then developers simply thought it was a duplicate they didn't need, and may not have been aware of any ciphers at all. Raph Koster has said that UO's early fiction had no documentation, and as developers came and went, things got lost in the shuffle.

But, even if this was intended, it most likely wasn't finished for release, and probably never was completed. At this point, if it was intended, it might well be nothing more than a curiosity.

And that's a big IF anyways.
Yet, IF there's a "T" there, here is one result of an anagram....

As Levers Seal On A Covetous Order.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

Impressive... yes a player could write a book and then it would start spawning into other bookshelves, the more people read it the more it popped or something...

 

[Trebr Drab]

Still looking for a look at "Classic Childrens Tales, Volume One".

I'd really like to wrap this up as a possible thing or not. If the letter "T" does fall into place, I'll explore ways to validate this. I've already looked at the alphabetic order of these books to see if the letters fall into order that way, but they don't. So I'll be checking for clues in books and elsewhere in UO's history that might give validation to this.

So, if anyone can supply them, I also would like copies of these books on GL if anyone would be so kind.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

I'm sorry that EA lost my collection along with all my server birth rares...

I even lost the mage tower chronicles...

 

[PCByproduct]

Still looking for a look at "Classic Childrens Tales, Volume One".

I'd really like to wrap this up as a possible thing or not. If the letter "T" does fall into place, I'll explore ways to validate this. I've already looked at the alphabetic order of these books to see if the letters fall into order that way, but they don't. So I'll be checking for clues in books and elsewhere in UO's history that might give validation to this.

So, if anyone can supply them, I also would like copies of these books on GL if anyone would be so kind.

Guard tower at the cross roads north of Britain (on the way to Trinny), you can rob/kill the monks there for a random book drop. Wouldn't take long to get a copy of each (just north of the Britain swamps).

GL.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Still looking for a look at "Classic Childrens Tales, Volume One".

I'd really like to wrap this up as a possible thing or not. If the letter "T" does fall into place, I'll explore ways to validate this. I've already looked at the alphabetic order of these books to see if the letters fall into order that way, but they don't. So I'll be checking for clues in books and elsewhere in UO's history that might give validation to this.

So, if anyone can supply them, I also would like copies of these books on GL if anyone would be so kind.

Guard tower at the cross roads north of Britain (on the way to Trinny), you can rob/kill the monks there for a random book drop. Wouldn't take long to get a copy of each (just north of the Britain swamps).

GL.

You mean on the way to Vesper?
Are you sure they drop this particular book, since it seems to be discontinued as far as spawning elsewhere?

I also have a little problem. My characters are all "good" and don't go around killing hapless NPCs. Might have to create an evil one, which is an old idea that I just never did.

Edit, there's no Monks there on GL.

 

[PCByproduct]

You mean on the way to Vesper?
Are you sure they drop this particular book, since it seems to be discontinued as far as spawning elsewhere?

I also have a little problem. My characters are all "good" and don't go around killing hapless NPCs. Might have to create an evil one, which is an old idea that I just never did.

Edit, there's no Monks there on GL.

Have you tried looking at the spawning archives on Stratics? It will tell you what book spawns on what NPC and how to get it... Orcs sometimes carried them, too.

 

[Trebr Drab]

You mean on the way to Vesper?
Are you sure they drop this particular book, since it seems to be discontinued as far as spawning elsewhere?

I also have a little problem. My characters are all "good" and don't go around killing hapless NPCs. Might have to create an evil one, which is an old idea that I just never did.

Edit, there's no Monks there on GL.

Have you tried looking at the spawning archives on Stratics? It will tell you what book spawns on what NPC and how to get it... Orcs sometimes carried them, too.

Is this "the jokes on Trebr" day, or what?

 

[PCByproduct]

Is this "the jokes on Trebr" day, or what?

Just trying to give you some old school advice to achieve the same results. If I were a few items from completion of a collection, it would be cool to complete it how it was originally done. I'd try the Library at Mag (snooping all the NPC's for it and checking bookshelves), the guard towers between major cities, the red camp east of the Desert north of Britain, Trinny library, Occlo's library (wasn't this the largest at one time?)....dunno... Sounds like you could have some fun while you're at it...PK a few fine folks... If you're worried about negative karma, I seem to remember there being quite a few red mobs that carried volumes in Khaldun (actually, I'm positive of that...like the 3rd mob into the dungeon always dropped one).

 

[Trebr Drab]

Well, the Khaldun guys dropped the Khaldun exploration books, and I don't know of any NPCs that drop these books, but those that might (shop types) have yellow names now and you can't attack them anyways.

Alright, I gave up this info in hopes that someone would share. This is a book that any older collectors of books should have, and no one has offered me anything, except for Kri.

While there's very little likelihood that there's anything worthwhile to these kinds of study and this kind of game play, it'll be a cold day in hell before I share again. (Except with Kri, of course.)

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

Thats not a very nice thing to say...

 

[Adora]

Well, the Khaldun guys dropped the Khaldun exploration books, and I don't know of any NPCs that drop these books, but those that might (shop types) have yellow names now and you can't attack them anyways.

Alright, I gave up this info in hopes that someone would share. This is a book that any older collectors of books should have, and no one has offered me anything, except for Kri.

While there's very little likelihood that there's anything worthwhile to these kinds of study and this kind of game play, it'll be a cold day in hell before I share again. (Except with Kri, of course.)

I don't know about anyone else, but I've found this thread to be one of the most fascinating ones I've seen in a long time. I love the fact that there are still people (even just one person) working to decipher potential mysteries left in by the original game designers.

Don't get discouraged because nobody else aside from Kri has responded positively yet. It may be that that the few (if anyone) still active with copies of them have just not seen this thread.

Now, if anyone who has them has seen this thread... you should be ashamed of yourself for not stepping up. If I had copies of these books, I'd give them to you in a heartbeat. I'll certainly let you know if I ever see them anywhere.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

You might not have the two books, but you have two of the most amazing...

...

eyes !

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thanks Adora. Yeah, I'm probably overreacting. It's just that, on a scale of things, you know....
Spring Trade Ins > A Great Mystery.
Of course, it doesn't help that great mysteries don't seem to be a part of this except as just a curiosity or a backdrop. So how can I blame players? Why should they care?

 

[Basara]

If you can find a way into Blackthorn's Britain castle, I remember seeing a copy of the orcish phoneme book in the shelves there long after it quit spawning elsewhere. So, it's possible the other books might be on the shelves too.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thanks Basara. I don't know if I can get in there, but I'll give it a try and look around if I can.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Well, I got into Blackthorns castle and looked everywhere, including crates and barrels. No such luck.

 

[Lorax_Pacific]

I looked through my book collection and couldn't find it and went through both houses plus bank. I have volume one listed as a book I have, but I remember years ago thinking this is the ultimate rare book and I will put it somewhere safe...Safe from me as well.

-Lorax

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

doh, they indeed were rare because I tought they weren't even part ofr the game so often I seen volume two...

 

[crjfrank]

Here are pages 2 and 3 of Classic Children's Tales, Volume 1.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Here are pages 2 and 3 of Classic Children's Tales, Volume 1.

Thank you, crjfrank.

That blows this idea up, but are you sure it's an accurate inscription copy from an original?

For me to get the "T" I need, the word "Night" would have to be on the 4th line of page 3. In this, it's on the 2nd. A couple of extra empty lines between "THE RHYME" and the rest of the text gets me there. And since these are blue books, they were copied obviously. But are you sure from inscription directly from a game book? Or could it be from this site's archives?

You can see how close I am, yet so far away. Unless you are absolutely sure.

 

[crjfrank]

The book is located in the Silent Rose Library PaxOku, PaxLair Statehood, Homare-Jima, Tokuno, Chesapeake. That is all the information I have. Sorry.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thank you.

So, still hope. Because a complete set of blue books indicates that it's more likely they were simply copied from Stratics. Why copy them if you bought them, and if you are going to copy them why go to the trouble of searching for the right books instead of just using Stratics? Unless that person was like me and a stickler for the correctness of it all, of course. But we just don't know that.

Still need that book, "Classic Children Tales: Volume One".

 

[Kri]

You know, now that you mention it, mine is a blue book as well. It seemed odd that it didn't match the rest of my collection but I didn't give it much thought. It is very possible that mine came from the same source since I compiled my collection on my original shard which just so happened to be Chesapeake.

 

[Trebr Drab]

You know, now that you mention it, mine is a blue book as well. It seemed odd that it didn't match the rest of my collection but I didn't give it much thought. It is very possible that mine came from the same source since I compiled my collection on my original shard which just so happened to be Chesapeake.

LOL, nooooooooo!

The thing about yours is that I seem to remember the words not ending right in the original book, like yours shows. The words could have been up in the previous lines, sometimes. And that seems the way it was. But then again, my memory could easily be based off of a "wrong" copy too. Heh, this is looking hopeless.

 

[Kri]

Here's something interesting: I just tried to reproduce this and I am unable to do so. I can't type a title as long as "Phenomes of the Orcish Tongue" into the title of the book ("Phenomes of the Orcish" is the most you can type) which leads me to believe the copies must have been made with inscription (unless there was a client change somewhere along the way.)

Also, the friend I mentioned earlier who also had a collection (which he sadly lost in a house collapse a few years ago) spent a lot of time in Paxlair so I'm guessing he probably got it from someone there (or copied it) and gave me a copy as well. I wish I was more certain but this was over 10 years ago.

The mystery continues...

But if shifting the text down a couple of lines makes the cypher work why not go with it and see if it continues to make sense?

 

[Gheed]

This it?

If so I googled the name of the book and found it located in the Kingdom of Dawn on Baja. Thank you Wildstar for logging in and pointing me in the right direction.

 

[Gheed]

Same Library had the other as well. Both were the small red books:

 

[Gheed]

Ugh sorry those were probably copies as well.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thank you Gheed! Those are it and original books.

Unfortunately, it ruins my speculation. But I can use that to rework it, but it seems pretty hopeless from looking at it.

Disheartening. As always, I think I was onto something and then BOOM! The bottom falls out. I don't know when I'll ever learn.

Can you give me directions to get there? I'd like to get the pics so I have them, so I can work with them if something starts to look promising.

 

[Gheed]

Baja; 118o 8n, 63o 0 e in fel. Very close to Wrong. Easiest way there was to buy a sextant and hit a dungeon teleporter in Luna. I only mention they may be copies because you can buy the little red books from an NPC as well.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thank you.

So you know, those covers are the original books. The only ones they've added with those covers are:

Quest of the Virtues, by Autenil (Volume 1)
Quest of the Virtues, by Autenil (Volume 2)
The Shattering, by Nystul

And players can't copy into those books by any means.

 

[Kri]

Actually, they aren't. I just went there to make copies for myself and they are the small red books you get when you create a character. The books also have blank pages all the way to page 20 (some go to 40 - I think those are the old newbie books.) NPC books stop at the end of the "story."

But this library is AWESOME! Well worth the trip!

I was confused by the bags above being the same but they are not - there are two different bags and each one only contains 1 red book - the ones in question. In the screenshots above they were highlighted so it was really hard to tell.

Also even more unfortunately, I tried and cannot copy locked down books

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

Thank you Gheed! Those are it and original books.

Unfortunately, it ruins my speculation. But I can use that to rework it, but it seems pretty hopeless from looking at it.

Disheartening. As always, I think I was onto something and then BOOM! The bottom falls out. I don't know when I'll ever learn.

Can you give me directions to get there? I'd like to get the pics so I have them, so I can work with them if something starts to look promising.

*ahem*

You actually confirmed your early suspicion of an imaginary wild goose chase ...
or phantom easter egg ...
or an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato.

classic ...

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thank you Gheed! Those are it and original books.

Unfortunately, it ruins my speculation. But I can use that to rework it, but it seems pretty hopeless from looking at it.

Disheartening. As always, I think I was onto something and then BOOM! The bottom falls out. I don't know when I'll ever learn.

Can you give me directions to get there? I'd like to get the pics so I have them, so I can work with them if something starts to look promising.

*ahem*

You actually confirmed your early suspicion of an imaginary wild goose chase ...
or phantom easter egg ...
or an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato.

classic ...

Well let me point out to you, Fayled, something important about life.

I quote:

As a young man, Abraham Lincoln went to war a captain and returned a private. Afterwards, he was a failure as a businessman. As a lawyer in Springfield, he was too impractical and temperamental to be a success. He turned to politics and was defeated in his first try for the legislature, again defeated in his first attempt to be nominated for congress, defeated in his application to be commissioner of the General Land Office, defeated in the senatorial election of 1854, defeated in his efforts for the vice-presidency in 1856, and defeated in the senatorial election of 1858. At about that time, he wrote in a letter to a friend, "I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth."​

And

Socrates was called "an immoral corrupter of youth" and continued to corrupt even after a sentence of death was imposed on him. He drank the hemlock and died corrupting.​

Obviously, this doesn't bode well for me.
(I'm burnt potato fragments)

 

[Gheed]

Actually, they aren't. I just went there to make copies for myself and they are the small red books you get when you create a character. The books also have blank pages all the way to page 20 (some go to 40 - I think those are the old newbie books.) NPC books stop at the end of the "story."

But this library is AWESOME! Well worth the trip!

I was confused by the bags above being the same but they are not - there are two different bags and each one only contains 1 red book - the ones in question. In the screenshots above they were highlighted so it was really hard to tell.

Also even more unfortunately, I tried and cannot copy locked down books

It is an impressive library. That guild seems very active. I wandered around their town and see it updated with many current items.

Plus Wildstar logged into one of the houses while I was nosing around. I think she has accounts both on stratics and uoforums. So it probably wouldn't be difficult to contact her if you wanted to get more details. She may even know of other libraries or collectors.