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Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny

Walkthrough / Solution

By Jacky Swallia - 2001 - 2002
MightyHamsterX@aol.com

Contents:
1. Introduction:
-About me
-Guide History
-Credits & Legal stuff
2. History of Britannia (brief):
3. Beginning the quest:
-Choosing your path
4. The Walkthrough (semi non-spoiler)
-Suggestions for the journey
5. The Spoilers
-Mantras & Shrines
-Words of Power
-Quests
-The Shrines and the Codex
-The Artifacts
-The Shards and the Shadowlords
-The Final journey
6. Spells & Reagents
7. Potions & Scrolls
8. Weapons & Armour
9. The Resistance and the Oppression
10. The Night Sky
11. Items & Services
12. Moongates & Moonstones
13. Party Characters
14. Monsters & Battle
15. Closing thoughts

1. Introduction:
This is my first attempt at a walkthrough and if I do say so
myself, I think it's pretty good. You will find everything here to
complete Ultima V and then some. If you have any questions, comments,
suggestions, corrections, please e-mail me. If you find this guide
helpful and you like it, please let me know also as I need the boost in
self-esteem every once in a while. MightyHamsterX@aol.com

History:
V 1.2: 8/26/02 - It's been a while, but I finally have new things to add
such as suggestions from e-mails and some other stuff.
V 1.1: 8/13/01 - Corrected some spelling mistakes and fixed the
formatting so hopefully it's more readable.
V 1.0: 8/11/01 - My first attempt so cut me some slack! It's as
complete as I can make it right now, but that does not mean in any way
that I won't be adding things in the future.

Credits & Legal Stuff:
Ultima is copyrighted by Origin Systems, Inc. I am not associated
with Origin by any stretch of the imagination and neither is my
walkthrough, but they defiantly deserve their credit where it's due.
This walkthrough is my work and is 100% copyrighted by me, Jacky
Swallia and is protected by International copyright law. I made this
walkthrough so people can have a complete guide to Ultima V, so please
feel free to use it for your personal use as you like, but under no
circumstances may this be reproduced and/or sold for use of any kind
without MY permission! The most updated version of this guide will
always be at www.gamefaqs.com and www.gamewinners.com and
www.neoseeker.com and http://dlh.net also have permission to post my
guide. If you see it anywhere else, please let me know as I am very
poor and I could use the money for a lawsuit.
For the most part this walkthrough is the result of many, many,
many (and I do mean MANY) hours of personal game play, but some sections
simply could not have been possible without the book "Paths of Destiny"
and of course the Book of Lore.

2. Brief History of Britannia:
I am not going to go into a detailed history because basically,
it's not that important. And the first three Ultima games were a little
before my time and I never really got into them anyway. But here is the
story, as I understand it from the Book of Lore.
In the beginning Britannia was knows as Sosaria. At a time long
ago in our world, a young guy was becoming more and more discouraged by
the way things were going (if only he could see what's going on now!).
The guy goes walking one day and finds a moongate and goes through to
Sosaria and meets Shamino. Shamino decides to call the guy British
because he was from the British Isles. Anyway, British became a great
guy and eventually became Lord British.
In the First Age of Darkness, the main baddie was Mondain, a
generally nasty guy. He kills his father, takes his sun gem and tries
to make himself immortal with it. He goes on a terror spree and Lord
British calls on a stranger to come and save Sosaria. A stranger comes,
defeats Mondain, and all is well for a while.
In the Second Age of Darkness Minax, Mondain's apprentice picks up
where Mondain left off. Again Lord British calls for a hero and a hero
answers the call, comes and defeats Minax and again all is well.
So a while passes and Sosaria then falls into the Third Age of
Darkness. An island appears in Sosaria with fire and evil all around
it. You would think people would notice a fiery island just spring up
overnight. Anyway, Lord British again calls for a hero and this time 4
heroes show up. Exodus is defeated and the city-states of Sosaria
become united under Lord British and the land is re-named Britannia.
Now that three ages of darkness have been overcome, the Age of the
Avatar is among us. Nobody is terrorizing Britannia, but Lord British
feels his people need an example of how to live, so he calls on yet
another hero to go on the Quest of the Avatar conquer the Great Stygian
Abyss and the Codex of Ultimate Wisdom.
All that being said, here we are now. All that evil has been
conquered, but the dungeons are still hanging around breeding monsters
and those monsters are just roaming Britannia and that just cannot be.
Lord British assembles the Great Council and they seal off the dungeons
and raise the Codex. Everything is great, right? Wrong! It seems Lord
British has gotten himself in a little trouble. OK, a lot of trouble.
He's gotten himself lost in the Underworld and with him gone, Lord
Blackthorn has taken control of Britannia. That wouldn't be so bad,
except Blackthorn is under the control of the Shadowlords and they do
not have good intentions. So here, you the hero, are again. Hold on
tight because this Ultima V is going to blow you away.

3. Beginning the Quest: Choosing your path
If you've played Ultima IV, then you know how this works. But for
those who have not, here's how it goes. You're walking and you meet the
gypsy who's going to help you choose your path. You are asked a series
of virtue related questions and you are asked to choose between one
option and another. In Ultima IV what you chose determined your
character class and where you started the game, pretty important stuff.
But in Ultima V, you start the game as an Avatar in Iolo's Hut
regardless of what you choose. It's strictly personal preference here
and as far as I can tell, it does not affect your character much what
you choose.

4. The Walkthrough (semi-spoiler free)
I have decided to write a semi-spoiler free walkthrough for a few
reasons. For those people who want to explore on their own, but just
want a hint here and there, for those people who just want to be
reminded of one point in the game and for those people who don't want to
be complete cheaters. For those people who want someone to hold their
hand and tell them every detail, don't get your panties in a bunch. I
have plenty of spoilers later in the guide. Remember, this walkthrough
is only a guide, it's not carved in stone. I am simply presenting all
of the things needed to complete the game. How you go about doing these
things is entirely up to you. You can go any order you want. It won't
hurt my feelings if you want to do things different than I have here.
OK, so here goes.
Probably the most time consuming part of the game is getting your
Avatar up to level 8, which is 6,400 experience points. This takes a
long, long, long time and there are no real shortcuts I have found, so
just battle away.
The next task is not nearly so difficult, but just as time
consuming. This is the task of visiting each shrine and going on a
quest to the codex. You're going to need a ship to even start this one
because the Codex is on the Isle of Avatar and there is no other way to
get there. Before you attempt this you're going to need to find all the
mantras also because the shrines don't appreciate you meditating with
the wrong mantra. The mantras are pretty easy to find, but if you need
help for this task, check the spoiler section on shrines. Once you have
a mantra for a virtue, go to its shrine and meditate. The shrine will
tell you what to do next. Do this for each shrine and when you finish,
you will get an important message revealing a little about what's to
come.
This task is actually a series of small tasks. Not only do you
have to rescue Lord British from the underworld, but you've got to take
him a bunch of stuff he left behind also. This wouldn't be so bad,
except that the stuff he needs is scattered throughout Britannia and
you've got to find it.
The first item you need to find is Lord British's Crown. The crown
is in Lord Blackthorn's castle and if you get it early enough in the
game, it can be very useful to you before you go into the Underworld
also.
The next item you need to rescue is Lord British's scepter from
Stonegate, the keep of the Shadowlords. This is one of the more
difficult items to recover, so good luck.
Next, you need to get the sandalwood box. This is in the top of
Lord British's castle, behind a hidden wall and some magically locked
doors.
And finally you need to get Lord British's amulet from the
Underworld. I saved this one for last because you really should not be
roaming the Underworld early in the game anyhow. But remember, you can
do these in any order you want and if you need more help see the spoiler
section on quests.
Something else that should also be completed later in the game is
obtaining the shards from the Underworld. I cannot stress how dangerous
the Underworld is and you should really wait a while to attempt this.
In any case, if you've paid any attention to the NPC's in the game, you
know that each Shadowlord is the spawn of a shard and there are three
shards: Falsehood, Cowardice and Hatred. The shards are the remnants of
the gem of Mondain, if you're familiar with the earlier Ultima games.
Anyway, the shards are in the Underworld and the Underworld is huge and
it's a whole lot of nothing. Plan on spending the majority of the later
part of the game down there. Now, I'm not going to leave you hanging
like that. I spent a long time writing a very detailed walkthrough to
getting each shard so you don't have to suffer like I did. It's later
in the guide under shards & Shadowlords if you need help. Of course,
you're free to try to find them yourself. If you do this, plan on
spending a long, long, long time in the Underworld.
Once you get the shards head back to Britannia and to the three
main keeps. From here go to the flame for each castle and summon the
Shadowlord opposite the principle of the keep by yelling it's name.
Once it appears, cast the shard into the flame and both the Shadowlord
and the shard are gone forever.
The above tasks are the required tasks to complete the game.
There's no skipping any of them. Once you complete them, Lord British
will appear to you in one of those apparitions he's famous for. He will
tell you your time has come and to come and get him.
This next part is just some suggestions for the long journey ahead
and some information on how to get some items and so forth. I promise,
it's still pretty much spoiler-free, but as always more details can be
found later in the guide. This game is pretty difficult to write a
traditional walkthrough for because it's not linear and there are
optional things, so all I'm offering here is suggestions. Take them for
what you will.
You start the game in Iolo's Hut, regardless of what you chose in
the intro. Iolo's hut is south of Yew, so that's probably a good place
to start heading towards. Jaana is here waiting for you underground,
hiding like the rest of your party members will be. It's probably a
good idea to get her right away because you need a magic user. To the
west of Yew is Empath Abbey. Go here next and get the grapple from Lord
Michael right away because this is such an important item and it's often
forgotten. Julia and Toshi here will also join your party, if you want
them.
You're going to want to start making the rounds of the various
cities. There is so much information in each one that you should really
talk to everyone. If you talk to someone and it seems like they're
holding back information, odds are they are. You just have to know what
buttons to push to get people to talk. The guards, however, will not
talk to you except to take your money. Unless you don't mind losing a
lot of money, stay away from the guards in most towns, especially in
Minoc because they will take half your gold there. Really, they're not
too hard to evade, but if you do run into one and you can't or don't
pay, you will be arrested. If this happens, go quietly because if you
try to fight the guards you will probably lose very badly. Either way,
you will be taken to the prison in Yew and it's really not too hard to
escape, but remember when the guards arrest you, they take your keys.
While you're checking out the cities, every once in a while you'll
enter one and you'll get some spooky music and some text that says "An
air of Hatred/Falsehood/Cowardice doth surround thee..." This means that
there's a Shadowlord in town and it's best just to leave. People will
attack you or lie to you or steal from you or overcharge you in stores
and moreover, you'll probably run into a Shadowlord in the middle of
town and they will kill you. (NOTE: I had previously written that it
is impossible to kill a Shadowlord. I have since gotten an e-mail from
Andy who says it is possible to kill them in normal combat [but VERY
hard] and the glass sword also works on them.) The Shadowlord only
stays in town for one day, so the next day it will probably be safe,
unless a different Shadowlord invades, which is entirely possible too.
There is a way to predict the Shadowlord's invasions. The best people
to ask about this would be astronomers, but for more on this, check out
the section on the night sky.
I suggest trying to get to Minoc pretty early because in the
northwest corner of town there is a lone tree and if you search it you
find 5 skull keys. Each day this supply is replaced so you can always
go back for more. Skull keys unlock magic doors and the sooner you get
them, the better. There is also a spell that can unlock magic doors,
but you probably won't be at the fifth circle for quite some time.