Chaos (philosophy)

For other uses of the term Chaos, see Chaos.

The concept of Chaos in Ultima Online was created by Lord Blackthorn the Deceiver as a counter to Lord British's system of Virtues. It stresses individuality and difference. Several in-game books describe the philosophy further.

According to an in-game book by Sherry the Mouse, Blackthorn supposedly invented Chaos after overhearing a conversation wherein it was revealed that Lord British, the King of Britannia, wished to get everyone to follow the Virtues, even though this would result in integration of the shards. Lord Blackthorn feared that integration would mean that the people living on each shard would be basically blinked out of existence. Therefore, he created Chaos to help insure that Virtue would literally never conquer all. As long as one person followed Chaos instead, the shards would never be integrated.

Some of Blackthorn's writings, for example note "On the Diversity of Our Land," make it clear that Blackthorn would extend fundamental rights to such creatures as Orcs. After Blackthorn turned evil, partially under the influence of Exodus, Chaos took on a more sinister overtone than diversity and difference. It became one of the lack of moral standards, decay, murder, and death.