Difference between revisions of "Shard of the Dead"

Revision as of 00:48, 21 October 2012

The Shard of the Dead was a special event shard created for Halloween in 2005. It featured magic pumpkins, costume gates and other Halloween-related content. It also allowed characters to alter their skills and stats at will.

2006 - Shard of the Dead II

In 2006, for the second year in a row, the developers created a Test Center style shard with a Halloween theme. Many different events and activites could be found for a spooky good time. On login, a player received either a light black or dark orange death robe. Developers could be found sometimes causing their own chaos, such as large scale explosions at the bank or unleashing monsters on unsuspecting players.

Costume Gates

Orange gates are for costumes and grey gates remove them.

Special orange moongates could be found throughout the land, including a few hidden in East Britain, that changed a character's form when entered. A character could become a Daemon, Dragon, Gazer, or many other creatures. This lasted until a different costume gate was entered or by stepping through the costume removal gate.

List of Halloween 2006 Costume Gates

Zombie Plague

A zombie virus infected NPCs and players alike. If a zombie dealt melee damage, the attack would result in the zombie sinking it's teeth into the victim. The affected target would forever be under the spell of death, having their hit points decay at a steady rate. Once they died, their corpse had a chance to resurrect as another zombie which will go on to infect others. The new zombie bore the name of the deceased.

The newly raised zombie would equip all the items left on the player's corpse and the corpse would disappear. A player had to kill the zombie to reclaim their items.

Technicolored Tower

The Technicolored Tower of Awesome is a spiraling structure that towers over West Britain Bank. At the top is several Paint Station dye tubs which can be used to dye any item, player, or pet. Many players enjoy the more flashy and neon hues that are not normally available on production shards. To set the dye tub you need to know the number code of the color you want, this can be found using InsideUO.

JIB's Mazes

The only way out is forward.

Easy Maze

Obviously created by UO developer JIB, the entrance gate to this maze could be found in Castle Britannia. The maze itself is about 4x4 screens large and not very difficult. It changes its shape every 20 minutes, providing a new challenge each time. There is no reward other then being able to exit the maze. However, you can use other means such as Recall and Sacred Journey to leave.

Your reward is in another maze!

Ultimate Maze of DOOM

This maze is a lot larger then the first. It is about the size of the entire Covetous Dungeon. It keeps going on and on and on. Sometimes you think you are on the right track but then reach several dead ends. At the end there is only a teaser telling you that the reward is at the end of the Really Hard Maze.

Really Hard Maze

The explosion takes up the entire screen and you get a special title

About 3 times the size of the Ultimae Maze of DOOM, this maze is the most challenging. Once completed you get a real prize: an empty box of Tokuno Minor Artifacts. Actually they were probably all taken already. In addition, you can double-click a gravestone to see a huge explosion go off around you. Your name becomes subfixed with the "A-MAZE-ING MAZER" title and your body hue changes randomly, similar to Coelacanth's ugly armor. You also have a light source which follows you around like a snake.

Coelacanth's Maze

One player has almost finished the maze!

Named and created by UO Developer Coelacanth, this lava pit maze could be found on the southwest side of Luna. Players must traverse a hidden path through the lava while it reveals itself to you. One wrong mistep and you get sent back to the beginning while taking a little damage. If you get caught at a dead end, the ground will disappear from your feet. At the end of the maze is special colored platemail armor bearing Coelacanth's name. This armor changes its hue every few seconds and is turely an eyesore. Any player who finishes the maze can pick it up off the ground. They will then be sent back to the start and a new piece of armor will appear.

Vampire Wars

The slayer base is quite a corpse festival. It is no wonder they are winning.

It is a vampire verse slayer all out bash. Players can pick their team and fight the opposite in a Factions style battle taking place in Felucca Trinsic. Each team has a couple of bases located in and around Trinsic that players can signup at by double clicking the signup stone. Each base stone also acts as a ressurection Ankh. Each side has a scoreboard gravestone which tracks each side's kill count.

Rewards

Killing a vampire NPC gives you a chance to get a cursed artifact
Turning an NPC into a vampire gives you a chance to get a minor artifact
Bringing 10 unique vampire heads or 10 unique vampire slayer souls to a faction stone gives you one of the following rewards randomly:
- Major Artifact (not cursed)
- Glass Weapon - Weapon that can be used once but does insane damage.
- Bombs - Each faction has a bomb that when used causes an area effect explosion similar to the ones at the faction stones. The explosion only affects members of the opposite faction.

Vampire

Standing too close to the vampire base will quickly cause you to join their ranks.

Vampires can not heal and take damage slowly. Luckily they can heal themselves by attacking other NPCs and players. They receive full health upon turning another mobile into a vampire. Vampires can turn vampire slayers into vampires by doing a certain amount of damage to them (the amount of damage is tweakable by me, right now its at 50%) Vampires can not attack other vampires. Turning a player vampire slayer into a vampire awards you with his soul which can be used for special rewards. The only way to rejoin the living is to die and ressurect. -- Supreem, UO Programmer

Slayer

Slayers get a bonus to damage against vampires. This makes up for the fact that vampires only need to get you to half health to turn you. (Currently Slayers do 175% damage to vampires) Killing a player vampire awards you with his bloody head which can be used for special rewards. The only way to leave the slayers is to die and ressurect. -- Supreem, UO Programmer

Non-participants do 50% damage to slayers and vampires
The slayers ended up winning by a few thousand kills.

Purple Turtle Medusa

Strange creatures named Purple Turtle Medusa are spawning outside the Trammel Hedge Maze. A gate to the location can be found on the second floor of Castle Britannia. The medusas can turn you into a frozen statue for several seconds. They also change your color to a bright neon green. Other abilities and rewards are unknown, but sometimes a Medusa's Mirror can be found on their corpse.

The Technocolored Tower

Additional Images

Zombies have invaded a shop in Zento.

Slightly useful indeed.

2010

A pvp-centric shard was created with a special ruleset just before Halloween in 2010. It was announced as limited-time only, through December 2010.

Some of the special rules included:

No guards or justice-zones, except the city of Britain
Dark Towers of Death guarded by hordes of undead minions
- One in the Desert of Compassion
Glass Swords of Shattering(one-hit kill)
Accelerated skill and stat gain
One Advanced Character Token per guest
Permanent worldwide darkness
Kill and death stat tracking
No item insurance or blessed items, except spellbooks and runebooks
Double gold on most monsters

To get a Glass Sword of Shattering, players have to stand atop a Dark Tower(found near Virtue Shrines) for 30 seconds without being killed.

Original announcement of Shard of the Dead 2010