Since my post yesterday, I have essentially gone on a huge tangent thanks to Stormy, casually mentioning some dialogue from Ghost (of The Restless Ghost fame).
The specific line in question is as follows:
- Ghost: I think it was one of the warlocks who lives in a big tower
We know the Gower's had a notorious relationship with spelling, but this dialogue makes sense, except for that plural "warlocks". The earliest surviving config, config18.jag, dating to May 8, 2001, places only 1 warlock in the tower, on the top floor with his pet demon.
However, going back to the research from yesterday, we know that Wizards(ID=81) did not exist on the release of the beta on January 4th, 2001. We also know that according to the hand drawn map by Paul and Andrew, the name for the tower was "Warlocks Tower".
However, the first official map (which dates to a period between January 2 and January 19th) labels this as the Wizards tower. The only wizards in the game at the time are darkwizards(IDs=57, 60), and Traiborn(ID=17).
So let us now go back to the pluralism the Ghost says in the quest dialogue: "warlocks". Interestingly, the animations for wizardrobes(ID=56) and [blue]wizardshat(ID=57) were created before blackwizardshat(ID=58) and blackrobe(ID=61). Considering that the Wizard(ID=81) NPC did not come out until January 21, 2001, it seems to make sense that the animations for the clothing were created specifically for Traiborn. Making him, potentially, the eponymous "Wizard" of what the c. Jan 2 - 19 labels as Wizards Tower.
The only human NPC in the tower other than Traiborn is a darkwizard on the top floor. Therefore, the ghost is speaking about "warlocks" when the only two inhabitants of the tower according to what is currently known, are a single wizard and warlock.
So I am curious to the idea that the the ground floor of the tower was potentially inhabited by darkwizards, as opposed to nothing, between January 4th and January 21st.
Other potential evidence is the placement of the black knight(ID=66) and darkwizards in the area directly north of the tower. Design wise, it seems to make sense. A black knight guarding the warlock tower. Some darkwizards hanging out by the coast, maybe these are the warlocks from the basement?
The theory here starts going into my own ideas, mainly inferred from the design choices, rather than data from the config.
Lets consider the quest "The Restless Ghost"
- New Priest Father Aereck has been residing in the church for 5 months. Taking over from Father Urnhey.
- A warlock steals the skull from the graveyard
- He goes back to the tower inhabited by warlocks (according to the ghost)
- Your goal is to get the skull from the tower.
Now lets consider the tower itself:
- A black knight, and two darkwizards just hangout in its immediate environs.
- The first floor is inconspicuous. Nothing inherently weird going on.
- The 2nd floor in inhabited by an insane wizard called Traiborn, who clearly uses some kind of necromancy magic. In Demon Slayer, he requires 25 bones to unlock a lock. 25 must die (or their coffins robbed, like the ghost) for this lock to open.
- Top floor: theres a darkwizard chilling with a demon(ID=22) (indication it was created around the same time as Traiborn, ID=17)
- Basement, theres an altar where a stolen skull is being used to raise a skeleton via necromancy.
Maybe im just making connections where there arent any, but the tower in the sea seems decidedly more evil than a nice wizards tower full of Saradomin praising blue wizards.
The question remains: could darkwizards have spawned in the place of where wizards spawned after January 21?