The Golden Age · Timeline
1999 to the last night
Every entry is dated only as precisely as its source allows, and labelled by evidence class and by the side that tells it.
Era I · 1999 – early 2000
The opening wars
Six worlds open. One of them has no safe ground, and its earliest powers fight over starter towns.
- Dated to the day
Six worlds open
Asheron’s Call goes live with six worlds. On five, killing other players is a choice. On Darktide, every character is a player killer, for good.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Reference
SourcesAsheron’s CallServers
- Dated to the month
A truce for the starter towns
The Mercs raid defenders at Eastham. Black Rose’s leader and a Mercs leader propose PK-free starter towns. The truce holds only in part.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Black Rose-side
SourcesDarktide’s Past
- Dated to the month
SiN comes for Arwic
A large quest event runs at Frore. SiN, at its strongest, challenges the Mercs for Arwic, and a short truce between Black Rose and the Mercs ends.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Black Rose-side
SourcesDarktide’s Past
- Dated to the month
Fifty at Arwic
About fifty players fight at Arwic, Black Rose against the Mercs. Wands paired with vulnerability spells rule the early fights.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Black Rose-side
SourcesDarktide’s Past
Era II · 2000 – 2002
The Blood years
A guild unites under a character named Blood, takes Kara, and turns the Direlands into a war.
- Dated to the month
Blood
The Keepers of Chaos, a guild that came over from Ultima Online, unite under a character named Blood. The Blood monarchy is born.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
- Dated to the season
Blood comes to Kara
Blood settles in Kara, the town Black Rose had held. The two sides tell it differently: an invitation against common enemies, or a town taken.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side · Black Rose-side
SourcesHistoryDarktide’s Past
- Dated to the season
Seven guilds against one
Black Rose, The Feared and about seven anti-PK guilds raid Blood until, after roughly three weeks, Blood moves its base to Lytelthorpe.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
- Dated to the month
Ayan Baqur is founded
Official lore news describes the founding of Ayan Baqur in the Direlands, near the Festival Stone of Darktide.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
- Dated to the month
A Banner of Flame
The patch “To Raise a Banner of Flame” adds Hollow weapons, and changes what fighters can afford to wear.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Reference
- Dated to the day
The lifestone, every twenty minutes
In a developer chat, a Darktide player reports that the lifestone at Ayan Baqur is raided about every twenty minutes and portal arrivals are camped. The developers confirm that slide-casting stays.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
- Dated to the month
Three weeks at AB
Blood, Red Devil and the Patryns fight a three-week onslaught at Ayan Baqur, and Blood takes Kara back. The Blood side calls these the greatest fights Darktide saw.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
- Dated to the season
Aerlinthe becomes a war zone
A server-wide peace agreement on Aerlinthe Island breaks down. Blood declares the island a war zone, and access comes down to portal ties.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side · Outsider
- Dated to the day
No nerf
The developers say there are no plans to change slide-casting, slide-healing or portal logging.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
SourcesTurbine Games Q&A: Balance
- Dated to the day
No formal wars
Asked about allegiance wars, the developers explain that membership cannot be tracked in real time, so formal wars are not feasible, even on Darktide.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
- Dated to the month
A portal into Kara
A new portal makes Blood’s Kara far easier to raid. The Blood side claims more than 2,000 members by now, a figure no one has checked.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
- Dated to the month
The oath
During Bael’Zharon’s Rampage, Blood swears allegiance to Bael’Zharon at Kara. The antis swear to Asheron. Bael’Zharon is never brought down on Darktide.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Black Rose-side · Reference
SourcesBael’Zharon’s RampageDarktideShadow Warriors vs. Bael’Zharon
- Dated to the month
GEN forms at AB
A new monarchy, GEN, forms at Ayan Baqur from rival PKs, neutrals and one former anti clan, set on rivalling Blood. Blood turns the split to its advantage and takes AB.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side · Black Rose-side · Outsider
SourcesHistoryDarktide’s PastAsheron’s Call: PVP SRS BSNS – Part 1
- Dated to the month
War goals met
Blood declares its war goals met, and many of its members drift away. GEN claims to outnumber Blood but cannot dislodge it.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
- Dated to the month
Interactive theatre
GameSpy publishes the developers’ diary of playing Asheron and Bael’Zharon live: improvised theatre, held to about ten minutes per place by lag.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
- Dated to the year
The Last Stand
The Last Stand (TLS) forms as a coalition against Blood. Every side remembers its founders differently.
Player recollectionVoices: Blood-side · Outsider
- Dated to the month
Walls go up
The Dark Majesty expansion brings housing. Allegiance villas and mansions come with barriers and recall points.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Reference
SourcesHousing; Dark Majesty
- Dated to the day
One armour, many copies
The Zone announces that every copy of a unique armour duplicated on Darktide will be deleted in the February patch, on Darktide alone.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
- Dated to the day
Seven hours for a crystal
The Defense of the Cisterns runs on three worlds, Darktide among them. One Darktide group spends seven hours destroying a single crystal.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Official
SourcesThe Defense of the Cisterns
- Dated to the year
The founders move on
The core of the Keepers of Chaos leaves for other games and hands Blood to its successors.
Original-era evidenceVoices: Blood-side
SourcesHistory
Era III · 2003 – 2004
The turn
The game changes hands and the rules that powered the war are rewritten.
- Dated to the month
PvP without a price
Player Killer Lite, an opt-in PvP mode without death penalties, arrives on the other worlds. It never comes to Darktide.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesPlayer Versus Player; Player KillerLand Control; Olthoi Play; Derethian Combat Arena; Lesser Battle Dungeon
- Dated to the month
New hands
Turbine buys the franchise from Microsoft and takes over operations in 2004.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesAsheron’s CallServers
- Dated to the day
The jostled server
During a datacenter move a Darktide server is physically knocked. Items vanish from more than 150 houses and the world is rolled back to its 19 January backup.
Later evolutionVoices: Official · Reference
SourcesThursday Evening Darktide Crash and ResultsAllegiance Experience; The Madness of Men; Mirror, Mirror; Apology Token
- Dated to the month
The chains break
“The Madness of Men” overhauls allegiance experience and ends long experience chains. It adds PK battle dungeons and lifestones in towns.
Later evolutionVoices: Official · Blood-side · Reference
SourcesAllegiance Experience; The Madness of Men; Mirror, Mirror; Apology TokenThe Future of PvPHistory
- Dated to the day
The Future of PvP
After a hard reception for its March PvP changes, Turbine writes to players about what made Darktide work, and what was wearing it down.
Later evolutionVoices: Official
SourcesThe Future of PvP
Era IV · 2004 – 2017
The long evening
Darktide keeps fighting, on fewer players and fewer reasons, until the lights go out.
- Approximate dates
The Last Stand on top
Players remember The Last Stand as the strongest allegiance on Darktide from about 2004.
Player recollectionVoices: Outsider
Sources(Darktide) Who was the person you hated the most in PVP?, page 2
- Dated to the month
Kill me if you can
Live-event staff log in on Darktide and dare its players to hunt them.
Later evolutionVoices: Official
- Dated to the day
Barrier-down nights?
Turbine floats ways to loosen housing barriers: scheduled nights with the barriers down, or a rare key that drops one.
Later evolutionVoices: Official
- Dated to the day
The walls stay
The developers decide the barriers stay, and say there are no plans for a new PK world.
Later evolutionVoices: Official
- Dated to the month
Land Control
Keeps that player killers can capture arrive with Land Control.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesLand Control; Olthoi Play; Derethian Combat Arena; Lesser Battle Dungeon
- Dated to the month
Olthoi Play
Olthoi Play offers instant high-level PK characters with restrictions: a fast road into the fight.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesLand Control; Olthoi Play; Derethian Combat Arena; Lesser Battle Dungeon
- Dated to the day
Maintenance mode
The last content patch ships. The game enters maintenance mode.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesAsheron’s Call
- Dated to the day
A patch for Darktide’s stability
A hotfix ships with Darktide’s server stability as its stated aim.
Later evolutionVoices: Official
- Dated to the month
Silence
Darktide has lost all its global channels, allegiance chat included. Players blame abuse that crashed the server, and say most of the population has moved to Verdantine.
Later evolutionVoices: Official · Reference
SourcesRequest for allegiance chat on DarktideAsheron’s Call
- Dated to the day
The end is announced
The shutdown is announced. New accounts stop, and the game is free until the last day.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesAsheron’s Call and its sequel will sunset as part of the Turbine/Standing Stone split
- Dated to the day
The lights go out
Every Asheron’s Call world closes, Darktide with them.
Later evolutionVoices: Reference
SourcesAsheron’s CallAsheron’s Call and its sequel will sunset as part of the Turbine/Standing Stone split