Difference between revisions of "Lord British"

Revision as of 17:02, 27 September 2008

Lord British was once the King of Britannia. Initially, he was played by Richard Garriott, who is the creator of Ultima Online, and the creator of the single-player games upon which UO is based.

In the past, the NPCs of UO consistently, and with apparent sincerity, discussed their love of and respect for their King, which added to the fiction that the realm was well-governed and that Lord British was a benevolent ruler.

The fiction was that Lord British was somehow from the real world, as was the Avatar. He made his home in Castle Britannia which also served as his seat of power.

Lord British originated the Virtues. His friend and political rival, Lord Blackthorn, invented a competing belief system called Chaos. Blackthorn eventually became corrupted and evil. Before Blackthorn's Damnation, however, the fanatical followers of each man fought in the streets as part of the Chaos/Order PvP system, while they themselves played chess together amicably and discussed philosophy.

Lord British had been unseen for some time prior to the announcement, which was made on March 30, 2000, that Richard Garriott had left OSI. After his initial departure, Blackthorn, furious with his not being appointed to the throne in Lord British's stead, struck an alliance with Exodus and turned "true evil."

Lord British returned again during the early days of the Age of Shadows for a plotline involving attacks by Minax. However, it was not Richard Garriott that played Lord British in this instance. Garriott allowed UO to use his character on a temporary basis so as to develop an explanation for Lord British's long absence and permanent departure. Accordingly, Lord British left to take a powerful artifact (said to be shards of the Gem of Immortality that powered Mondain) into the Ethereal Void, which would secure it beyond permanently Minax's grasp.

Some weeks before his departure, Lord British held a memorial service for Blackthorn, wherein British stated, among other things, that he was abandoning his goal of unifying the Shards under the Virtues. And thus, Blackthorn effectively "won" the Order/Chaos conflict, in death.

In his stead, the realm is now ruled by the Britannian Council, which is loosely parliamentary, and/or by the role-played High Councils that exist on various, but not all, shards.

Since the Royal Council Massacre, part of the Warriors of Destiny event, the Britannian Council is dead and splattered all over the walls and floor of their meeting room. Basically, at the time of writing (late Summer 2008), no one is running the government.

Trivia

Blackthorn is unharmed!		During a speech on August 8, 1997, Lord British was killed. It was during UO's beta version when Lord British was killed by a player. The character Rainz has just stolen a firewall scroll and used it on the wall where Lord British (controlled at the time by Richard Garriot himself) and Lord Blackthorn stood.
		While Blackthorn was unharmed as he stood directly in the flames of the scroll spell, Lord British dropped dead upon entering the flames. It appears that Garriott forgot to turn on his "invulnerable" flag.
		Rainz was allegedly banned, for this and other naughty things he did during the beta test. Garriott also challenged his killer to a rematch in his more recent game project, "Tabula Rasa." So far as anyone knows, the challenged has not responded.
		This event was used in the fiction for the Royal Leggings of Embers artifact.
		Killing Lord British was often a built-in puzzle in the Ultima single-player games.

And the cry rang out, "HE DIED."

See Also

• Timeline
• Wikipedia article on Richard Garriott
• Wikipedia article on Lord British
• Codex of Editable Wisdom article on Lord British
• Extremely detailed UO timeline NOTE: Japanese language site
• BNN article on Lord British's memorial service for Lord Blackthorn