Hive of Scum and Villainy
Buccaneer’s Den Past and Present
Long have the pirates of Britannia been a thorn in the sails of honest merchants and valorous adventurers. During the Ages of Enlightenment, these rogues of the waves (who don’t wear rouge, despite how often these two are confused!) converged on a central island SE of Britain. The island would play a pivotal role in aiding the Resistance during Blackthorn’s rule with the illegal Guild providing valuable information … for a price. Buccaneer’s Den would prove essential again during the Gargish conflict as it was here where Homer, pirate captain, was key to obtaining the full treasure map of Hawkins to get the Silver Tablet. By Ultima VII, the Fellowship had taken control of Buccaneer’s Den.
Throughout the years, this town would be central to obtaining items of less than legal nature such as peer gems and “torches???”. Shipwrights and armament sellers were also a common sight in the town. By the days of the Fellowship, the town had added places to explore the more vice-oriented pleasures such as gambling.
Much of the town’s construction and appearance favored traditional styles seen elsewhere in Britannia. The focus was very much on wooden and simple structures, however. By the time of Ascension, much of the island appears to have been flooded and broken in two by the Cataclysm. The town itself is now spread over several islands and built mainly from shanty wooden structures and old ship hulls repurposed as housing. The loss of the Fellowship seems to have ruined the Baths and House of Games, leaving the town more focused on commerce and shipping (and piracy) yet again. The Guild also came back in full force with Samhayne acting as leader of the Guild and the town itself.
A cartographer, pub, and provisioner are the main shops here. Con artists and other highly illegal purveyors are present in the town as well, though they are far less organized than in the days of the Fellowship. The Guild shop, unlike in prior eras, is closed to non-members, so the Avatar must join them to get access to the exotic goods on offer. You will have to wait, though, before you get the opportunity to join the Guild.
Lastly, there is one interesting feature of Buccaneer’s Den left off. The tunnels to Lord British’s own castle. These appear to have been discovered and delved by the Guild likely reusing much of the old tunnels that originally connected Lord British’s Castle to Hythloth. In Ultima VI, these tunnels connected to Britain’s sewer system. During the days of the Fellowship, these tunnels were repurposed, though their connections to Britain seem to be mostly closed off with few knowing the paths through them. By Ultima IX, little remains of these tunnels save a new connection between Buccaneer’s Den and New Magincia, which is run by the Guild.
The Hive
The inhabitants of Buccaneer’s Den are quite a motley collection of grey individuals. In addition to the dark grey of Samhayne and light gray of Raven, there are brigands and muggers abound through the town – some hostile, most at least neutral. And if there was any debate about the town being full of sailors and smugglers, try talking to the generic pirates: “plunder” “pillaging” “..aping” (yeah that word, said by female pirates no less). There is a ginsu salesman (cough con-artist cough) and a lady of the evening. A sailor who is in need of rescue and mentions that his captain was captured for ransom – no sign of this captain in game, so maybe he’s dead already. Oh and of course, a slave auctioneer. The only thing missing is a pirate yelling “we wants the redhead” and we will have a theme park ride. Is it any wonder why U9 feels like the Wonderful World of Britannia – the theme park edition.
There are some good (benevolent and decently designed) features in this town. The cartographer is very friendly and not a con-artist. He even sells you treasure maps, warning they may not be valid only for them to actually lead to treasure. Definitely a nice exploration experience. He also sells additional maps later in the game, which is nice given we return to this town after our visit to Terfin.
There is Herzog the provisioner who is quite happy about the whirlpools drumming up adventuring business for his supplies. Though you would think he would be losing more customers by the whirlpools killing off his steady business of basic supplies. His prices are a little steep and he pays peanuts for gems, too. Might want to hold onto those gemstones until you can get back to Britain.
There is more to the auctioneer as well. Katie was enslaved by pirates who took a ship she was travelling on. You have two ways to handle this situation. If you explored the area before visiting Samhayne, you have the option to deliver her note to Samhayne. Samhayne will deal with the issue (saving another of his many daughters from various ports). Unfortunately, Katie’s subplot doesn’t conclude due to incomplete dialogue. There is a second way to free her: “buy” her (automatically freeing her in the process) and then you can get her a job at Herzog’s. One of the bug fixes I made was to have her end up working for Herzog if you free her using either approach. It is a very unclean method involving messing with several plot flags to trick the dialogue output, but it works.
Then there is Aneassa and Bjorn over at the tavern who have some very fun dialogue between them. Even more, they contribute to each other’s conversations that you have with the other, which is a nice feature of the dialogue scripting. It is here (and only here) that we learn that the Avatar left Britannia some 200 years ago (was this U7P2 or U6?). Time is very rough when travelling between worlds, but the timeline is rather scattered. While 200 years seems more correct than 20 years, you almost wonder if he didn’t mean the 200 years between U6 and U7 and he is just out of the loop about your Black Gate adventures. I think 50-80 years since the beginning or even ending of Serpent Isle feels more in-line with the Trilogy’s plotting and information – even if the Guardian is a red-handed liar.
We get some good information from Aneassa about Buccaneer’s Den and the current situation. We also learn that the Silver Serpent must be in the Guild’s hands thanks to the presence of Serpent Venom for sell. You even later tell her about Samhayne, which causes a good bit of alarm on her part. Samhayne certainly seemed to be well-liked by the community… of pirates, smugglers, and vice sellers.
The Guild
Speaking of the Guild, there is old Warrick who runs the only Guild shop in Britannia. He has quite the spread of exotic items – available only when/if the Avatar joins the Guild 5/8s of the way through the game. Toot-Toot! Let’s hope this ride doesn’t jump the rails.
By the way, the last map from the Cartographer (available once you buy the sea charts from him) leads us to the Guild’s Hideout. It is quite fortunate that you don’t get the map until after you are part of the Guild. Pity, I like to explore so much and found the hideout anyway – on my first playthrough. It is so painful being cut off from one of the Blackrock armor pieces and the only non-buggy seller of mandrake root in the game. I walk into the shop, only be accosted for freeing the Serpent … way too early in the game’s plot. Maybe they needed to block off the hideout until you get the map because it sure seemed like you should free the Serpent not long after getting the quest to do so in Britain.
As for the Guild itself, well these guys seemed to die off between U6 and U7 only to be revived quite strongly between U7 and U9. There are multiple shops in Britannia that give you a discount if you are Guild member. One problem though with the Guild Shopping experience: you don’t get any discounts. The buy scroll doesn’t change when you are a Guild member and there doesn’t appear to be any multipliers when buying or selling either. You just get a bit of extra dialogue.
Furthermore, the Guild certainly has some interesting operations and dangerous characters in their employ. Listen to the exchange between Aria and Duncan in the Hideout. Not sure who is in more danger, the serpent or Aria… okay, we all know its Aria – cause just look who walked in – THE AVATAR. In addition to selling dangerous Serpent Venom and selling exotic goods, it would appear the Guild manages trade throughout Britannia. Given the number of pirates still operating, there must be a lot of trade not run by the Guild. Between the Whirlpools and the Pirates, there are really only two options: be a Guild affiliate or be a plundered sailor (or an unlucky one going down in a whirlpool). Regarding Samhayne: something to consider is he probably has to do some bad acts to manage his unvirtuous subordinates, but Samhayne being the least evil of the Guildmasters doesn’t make him a good guy.
Exploration
For this last segment, I would like to discuss yet another feature of the game: open world exploration. For as many obstacles and blockages there are, Ultima IX is still a seamless, open-world game. If you can make the jumps, build the bridges, and climb the bread-towers; you can go anywhere you want. It might break the plot, but you can use and abuse the physics in this game. As with U7, the world is seamless with no loading screens or multiple map-scales blocking your path and even the dungeon maps are a barely perceptible transition away. Ultima IX’s world is further designed and built to encourage and reward exploration from the main railroad. Think of this train less like a steam engine and more like Doc Brown’s time train. Each segment of the plot is a different time period, which must be completed before you can move on; but within a time period, you are free to move around.
On the isles of Buccaneer’s Den, you can explore the town. Fight the crabs on the little islets in the lagoon. And hit the back country regions. There are hostile pirates and an old, haunted lighthouse. For a bit of rum, the ghost will tell thee where to find his old ship and its haunted crew. You can loot it but be careful of ghosts and drowning. A blue potion would help with this particular dive.
You also have a couple of encampments plus the cannonade defenses to find. There are of course several secret areas that can discover by yourself or with the help of treasure maps. There is the tunnel near Samhayne’s that leads down to the beach with a pirate cave (and a huge gemstone). There is an old, barricaded tunnel that holds the Gauntlets of Fury – just fire a cannon at it to break into the tunnel. And then the Guild’s secret Hideout complete with a pirate ship and sea access. As you can see, there is plenty of potential in terms of interesting loot and hand-crafted locations. Certainly not the kind of thing you see in Elder Scrolls. Quality over Quantity; Hand-crafted vs RNG generation. There will be more of these little asides to good exploratory finds in Ultima IX – in case you missed it on your playthroughs.
In our next article, our explorations continue through the Guild tunnel into the ruins of New Magincia for even more exploration! There is much to see and do in the Humility segment, so we won’t be rushing it.
