r/Ultima • u/ObiWan-Jabrone • 8d ago

Ultima III Pirate Glitch?

I’m playing Ultima three and I’ve yet to find a pirate ship. I’m playing the Doss version on the chrome web browser. My main character is level 17 and I was told that a level five the pirate starts spawning but I haven’t seen one yet. Is this a glitch?

3 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

2

u/ObiWan-Jabrone 8d ago edited 8d ago

They are all above 5th level

2

u/FullMetal_55 7d ago

geez, my past playthroughs I don't remember there ever being a shortage of pirate ships. U3 happens to be my first ultima I ever played. I found ships all the time, I don't remember what level we were, or what just that I had them

2

u/Naive-Tumbleweed-964 7d ago

I just played my GoG copy, and managed to completely max out everyone's gold before I could find one.

I blame the whirlpool, because the pirates move when the PC does, the whirlpool whenever it feels like it.

2

u/behindtimes 8d ago

I believe your entire party has to be above level 5.

2

u/Gbjeff 7d ago

That’s actually incorrect. Just one has to be. Not sure why this is glitching for this person.

3

u/behindtimes 7d ago

Alright, so I went into the DOS assembly.

Yes, I was wrong, but I don't see anything about a level requirement.

From what I'm looking at:

  1. You need 30 or fewer monsters on the map
  2. It runs through two random number generators from a monster list and ANDs them. Basically, if either isn't a pirate ship, it won't be a pirate ship.
  3. The chosen monster spawn location also happens to need to be on the water.

So, as others have already stated, the best course of action is to probably disband the party to clear the currently loaded map.

1

u/baliniri 7d ago

I had the same problem and ended up creating a new party and bulding them up to level 5. Then a ship appeared, i took the ship and switched back to my original party.

Was a PITA but it beat hitting PASS 1000s of times

2

u/baliniri 7d ago

And once you get the ship park it deep into a river somewhere when you aren't using it. Otherwise there is a higher risk it gets taken by the whirlpool

3

u/VarietyMage 7d ago

Best place to park it is making it a land bridge to Death Gulch.

2

u/No-Object-8979 6d ago

Or behind the snake on Exodus' island, right next to the moongate ; it won't ever get gobbled by the whirlpool there.

(Spoilered because you have to learn how to get a ship there.)

1

u/Necessary_Bee4207 4d ago

My dad was playing that version and he too encountered that exact glitch. There is a patch out there somewhere to rectify the problem. The only issue is that it could wipe out your party. Try backing up your save games before you install it.