Shards of the Gem

[Trebr Drab]

Some players have shards. I'd like to hear more about this. Where did you get them (I think there were several events that had shards involved).
Did you have to turn them in?
Did the event end with the Authorities collecting them?
If you actually have one or more, how many? And do they do anything? Can you see the world inside them (by double clicking them)?
What's this about "you" determining that state of the world inside the shard?

 

[MalagAste]

Trebr if you want to see one go visit the Museum behind the HC building in Compassion Grove. It sits upon a pedestal in the center of the room.

You may ask Ra'Dian Fl'Gith how he acquired it.

 

[Mapper]

UO.com has some nice info on it.

The final battle with the Shadowlords. Rewards include three “Shards of the Gem of Immortality” (one per Shadowlord), and major artifacts.

“Shard of the Gem of Immortality”
An exceptionally rare item that responds to the user’s karma to play upon the fate in the worlds within

EDIT: Here is the event report on Europa - http://www.europahistory.com/articles/060909.php

In short, Everyone was teleported into one room full of shadowlords (and the 3 large shadowlords that had the gems) alot of people didn't see these 3 shadowlords and tried to leave the main room due to lag, Most died. I for one never saw the main shadowlords and killed 3-4 of the other ones, A VERY laggy event.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Trebr if you want to see one go visit the Museum behind the HC building in Compassion Grove. It sits upon a pedestal in the center of the room.

You may ask Ra'Dian Fl'Gith how he acquired it.

Thanks.

Edit, it doesn't seem to be there presently.

 

[Dryzzid of Atlantic]

There are also pieces of a corrupted Sun Ruby Gem on Atlantic from an EM event.

According to Ultima series lore, Mondain used the Sun Ruby Gem to create the Gem of Immortality.

Just an interesting note.

Also, there is a shard of the Gem of Immortality on display on Atlantic in the furthest South and West house in Luna.

 

[canary]

Thanks.

Edit, it doesn't seem to be there presently.

Yes, it is there, Trebr. It is on the first floor in the center of the floor on a pillow upon a pedestal. You can't miss it. I'm guessing you just went to the wrong home.

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

The shards were obtained from an event called "Armageddon," which was the climactic event of "The Last in Line," the last chapter of the epic Warriors of Destiny event cycle.

You obtained them from fighting the Shadowlords. There were 3 Shadowlords on most servers, and 1 shard per Shadowlord, hence most servers have 3 shards. I'm told that some servers, due to a bug, had 6 Shadowlords. Assuming this is true that means some servers ards have 6 shards.

In addition to the shard Malag's player has pointed out, there's another one in a museum near Luna, head out of the west gate and look on the UO radar map for a building with an ankh on top. It's west and a little south of Luna's west gate.

There's an obvious paradox at work here. The worlds our character occupy, to us players known as "servers" or "shards," are themselves contained within shards of the Gem of Immortality. Yet, on each shard, 3 (or 6) smaller shards of the same Gem exist as in-game objects. And then of course, some shards were cross-sharded, to boot, thus adding to the cosmological confusion.

Does anyone remember the film Men in Black? In that film we learn of a galaxy that's small enough to be put on a little charm on a necklace or dog collar of some such. (I forget.) The point, of course, is scale. The beings living inside that galaxy, or in our case the shards of the Gem of Immortality that were found within the shards we live on, simply do not realize how small they are. It's all about scale.

And then, of course, there's always the possibility that not every shard of the Gem has a world within it. While this would appear to contradict the old UO intro film, remember that the intro film is over a decade old, has probably been forgotten by the UO team (I forgot all about it until recently), and let's face the fact that the film sucked.

More importantly, the narrator in that film could easily have been flat-out wrong. Or, was right at the time, but things have changed.

Doesn't really matter, I would argue, for the cosmology of UO. Not all that much anyway.

To the extent that it'd matter at all, my in-character assumption (Galen's assumption) is that the shards obtained from the Shdadowlords do not have a world within them.

And, presumably, nor does the Crystal of Duplicity, which I think we all assume has some relationship with the Gem of Immortality.

-Galen's player

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thanks.

Edit, it doesn't seem to be there presently.

Yes, it is there, Trebr. It is on the first floor in the center of the floor on a pillow upon a pedestal. You can't miss it. I'm guessing you just went to the wrong home.

Ok, yeah, I went to the "East Wing", but saw it in the "West Wing" building.

 

[Lore Denin (GL)]

When using a shard of the Gem of immortality, the possessors karma can exert great influence on the nature of the world within. Here is the message when held by someone of the highest Karma:

I would argue against the idea that the world and people inside are miniture. The shard would work similiar to a bag of holding, appearing in our world as a container of regular size while containing a large expanse within [again magical theory would suggest that the expanse within the shard is not infinite and that only Sosaria and the space around it exist not the entirety of the Universe - hence there is no earth within the Gem but only lands of Sosaria, the space surrounding it and its moons]. There are a few magical theories on dimensional space that can explain how that can occur.

And yes to go along with your point, our interprtation of our existence is that we ourselves are living in a shard that borders the True Universe. That such a person could hold that shard in his/her hand and exert influence on the world we live.

I will dig around my archives for the story but to summerize Nystul had the stranger move the shards to earth and hide them so the Gem could never be re-formed. There is also an interesting conversation between the Stranger and Nystul where Nystul asks the Stanger how they can be sure they are not themselves living in a shard and simply a reflection of the True Reality.
I found the answer, satisfying and reflects of the UO reality we live.

Although few, if any of the original creaters of the fiction that still work on UO, there are players who started playing in the first days of UO and based their rp on the "Shattered Legacy" and continue to quest for that purpose.

This is all OOC stuff, but one day I hope our characters meet in game to discuss the Quest of Order, and the nature of reality.

-Lore's Player

 

[Warsong of LS]

what happens if you hold it while you are a dread lord/lady?

 

[Promathia]

what happens if you hold it while you are a dread lord/lady?

 

[Scarst]

Now we only need to see 0 karma.

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

Thank you for posting the pictures.....I had no idea about that, had no idea the holders had such a personal experience.

One thing both interesting and disturbing about both of those scenes is that they are in the past tense.

-Galen's player

 

[Promathia]

Now we only need to see 0 karma.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Thank you for posting the pictures.....I had no idea about that, had no idea the holders had such a personal experience.

One thing both interesting and disturbing about both of those scenes is that they are in the past tense.

-Galen's player

We also have to obviously conclude that the holder has a personal view. The same shard being looked at by two different people would show different outcomes, as Promathia is showing.

I think this was most likely a mistake by the Devs who made this. But we don't know for sure. At any rate, as the old saying goes...

"It happened."​

So now we have to conclude that not only the shard but the holder also determines what world we see within a shard. In other words, a shard is not a world, it's a portal to vie a world. And the world viewed is determined by the person doing the viewing.

And again, while it looks like an oversight, we don't really know that for sure.

It raises a question. Remembering the story by Nystul of his viewing of a world in a shard. He saw a world that went back and forth, from ruin to rebuilding to ruin and rebuilding again, repeatedly. What does this say about the viewer, Nystul the great mage of Britannia and Lord British's royal Mage. And the mage who created Trammel.

 

[Martyna Zmuir]

Its called inconsistent fiction Trebr, reading in to this level is where things go astray.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Its called inconsistent fiction Trebr, reading in to this level is where things go astray.

And therefore it should be completely thrown out? Forget the whole lore thing in UO?

And as I said, that's the likely thing here. But not 100% definite.

IF it's not "inconsistent", are we to tell them how the story goes? On the other hand, if it is a mistake, can we allow them to fix it?
Because the alternative is just that, forget the whole thing.
Go to shinies. Items. Numbers. Grind. Theme park. Where have I seen that before?

I want something different. A world. That's the only reason I'm here. All the other **** "is what it is".

Most MMO players seem to like **** though. Maybe they're onto something.

 

[Lore Denin (GL)]

Thanks for posting the other karma effects on the shard. The character who possess my shard would never allow it into the hands of evil so I have never been able to see what that would be like.

Treb it is possible that the holder of the shard uses the shard as a means to view a world that matches his karmic standing but it may also be that the nature of the world locked inside the shard is influenced directly by the karma of the possessor.

Such a possibility may cause a person to question, one's signifigance in a world contained within a shard. I recently saw a preview for Inception where they say something along the lines of "You never realize how strange things are in a dream until you wake up"

I would think that it must be the same for life within a shard, never realizing your life is one born of magic, a reflection of reality, rather then one of truth. It is only through the outside intervention of the Timelord that such even became a known possibility. We can see the influence on another world but most would deny that possibility exists for their own existence.

OOC there is no truth just possibility perhaps the Timelord was right, perhaps wrong, perhaps Lord British was fooled by another being, perhaps it was right and is now wrong, etc.

However, What a sad existence it would be were that to be true. It is no wonder so few embrace that philosophy.

-Lore's Player

PS: Treb do you have a link to that Nystul story, 3-4 comp changes, countless moves in the last 12 years have left me with few of the old stories. I remember the one you write about and think Nystul never handled the shards with his hands. Is that pre-fiction to the fiction where the SL arrive and attack Nystul with powerful and strange magic? Is it possible the Shadowlord arose from that very shard he was observing?

 

[Trebr Drab]

PS: Treb do you have a link to that Nystul story, 3-4 comp changes, countless moves in the last 12 years have left me with few of the old stories. I remember the one you write about and think Nystul never handled the shards with his hands. Is that pre-fiction to the fiction where the SL arrive and attack Nystul with powerful and strange magic? Is it possible the Shadowlord arose from that very shard he was observing?

My memory is struggling too.
Here's part, Clainin's writings from the AoS lore.

I'll look around for what I think I remember of Nystul's writings. What you said, that he never handled the shard, strikes me as familiar. I have this picture in my mind of only one shard, in some kind of case or something. It was British's shard, and Nystul was merely looking at it to study it, if I remember. But all that could be a mish-mash of other stories, a trick in my mind. I just don't remember for sure now. It seems to me that it was at some close point before Clainin's. Close being relative in terms of story releases.

 

[Trebr Drab]

PS: Treb do you have a link to that Nystul story, 3-4 comp changes, countless moves in the last 12 years have left me with few of the old stories. I remember the one you write about and think Nystul never handled the shards with his hands. Is that pre-fiction to the fiction where the SL arrive and attack Nystul with powerful and strange magic? Is it possible the Shadowlord arose from that very shard he was observing?

My memory is struggling too.
Here's part, Clainin's writings from the AoS lore.

I'll look around for what I think I remember of Nystul's writings. What you said, that he never handled the shard, strikes me as familiar. I have this picture in my mind of only one shard, in some kind of case or something. It was British's shard, and Nystul was merely looking at it to study it, if I remember. But all that could be a mish-mash of other stories, a trick in my mind. I just don't remember for sure now. It seems to me that it was at some close point before Clainin's. Close being relative in terms of story releases.

I found THIS, but this story is about Power Crystals. I'm afraid I mixed things up between this and the Clainin shard story. I'll still look a little more, but I think that's my mistake.