Pollo's Crew and the Quest for El Dorado

Marco Pollo... greatest explorer in the Spiral. He hid something - a map to unimaginable wealth, guarded by some danger of enormous proportions. Each of Pollo's crew has a piece... which may well tell us where we're going for the final six books of the arc.

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The Evidence He Left

We don't know much of Pollo's journey. All we have to collect the seven map pieces is a photo of his crew. While the photo is old and sepia-tone in color, I have added my own, imagined colors here.

Seeing that each of Pollo's crew members holds a piece, the story will naturally take us to all seven of them. If we can pinpoint the important of each one and where they might have gone, we can map out the rest of the El Dorado arc. So who are the members of Pollo's crew? Where are their map pieces? That's what we're about to figure out.

I'll warn you in advance that this post will spoil the story so far, including the map mailer answers and letter from Marco Pollo. I will also speculate on future worlds, but these are only my own ideas. Do get a cup of coffee and kick back for this one - it's a little bit of read. Each part is worth hearing, though, as it provides a context and not only discusses what we know about the crew member, but what we aren't sure of and where that might take us in the future.

Status: Deceased :: Map Piece: Located in his tomb in Granchia, Valencia, and taken by Phule

Marco Pollo has to be one of the most intriguing characters of the El Dorado arc. He can't have possible known what is going on with the Armada and the Grand Design, but he knows all about the mysterious world that we're trying to beat Kane to. And he has ties with wizards. The following is a letter he sent (warning - spoilers):

To my dear friend, esteemed Headmaster Merle Ambrose -

I write these words to you from the shining streets of El Dorado.

It is true! My life's greatest aspiration is accomplished, thanks in no small part to you. As you advised, the Scroll of Secrets in MooShu gave me the key to unraveling the mystery of El Dorado's Stormgate. Your letter of introduction to Cao Tzu opened the way, and with the Sage's help I was able to make my wondrous Map. My Map worked perfectly, allowing me to finally visit the lost city of legend. 

I must also extend warm thanks to Gamma, whose mathematical assistance with my star charts was absolutely essential. 

How can I begin to describe what we have discovered? This is a wondrous place, ancient beyond reckoning. The ancient empires of Krokotopia and Old Azteca are but hazy shadows and dim echoes of the wondrous civilization that thrived here eons ago. I have found carvings here that confirm your suspicions that the vanished masters of El Dorado were closely linked to the enlightened builders of Celestia, and that much knowledge and commerce passed between them.

If you ever come here, I expect you would find a wealth of knowledge that would shed new light on the culture of Celestians before the cataclysm. But I must advise you never to come here, old friend - it is far too dangerous. 

Every adventurer in the Spiral longs to find El Dorado, drawn by greed. There is indeed gold here, more than can easily be imagined, but I fear El Dorado is far more and far less than a city of gold. This glittering isle is a tomb, last resting place of the wondrous masters who built it so long ago, cast down by their greatest achievement. Something terrible happened here, my friend, long ago. I have not discovered precisely what, but I grow troubled. What we found here nearly killed us all.

I have confirmed your theory - the random perturbations of El Dorado's Stormgate are no accident - they occur by design. After the fall of this great city, the Celestians used their magic to unmoor the Stormgate from the fabric of the Spiral, to prevent anyone from ever coming here again.

In my fervor for discovery, I defied their wisdom and defeated their puzzle. But now do I think I have made an error in coming here. I shall devote the rest of my life to hiding the secret that I have uncovered, and working to ensure that nobody ever makes their way here again. I implore you, my friend, make no attempt to come to El Dorado, and keep silent to any inquiries about the City of Gold and its secrets. They are best left unknown. 

My crew, so overjoyed when we arrived (look to the enclosed picture to see how thrilled we were!), barely escaped with their lives intact. They do not know the deeper implications of what we met and fought here - all they know is that they escaped with their lives and a small mountain of gold. We sail away at dawn. I've overheard them making grand plans - most of them intend to take to the skyways in search of glory and adventure, living as pirate kings and queens. I fear such pursuits mean little to me now. I shall retire to a life of scholarship, and work to forget the terrible secret I learned here. I pray it may never threaten you, or your wondrous school. So resolved, I remain

- your dear friend
Marco Pollo

This bit alone tells us infinitely more than we could hope to imagine about the final world. Most people envision some monster protecting the gold, or perhaps greed itself. However, the builders are similar to the Celestians - meaning they must be full of deep, rich history that could host a number of secrets we're yet unaware of. He specifically points out that whatever was there wiped out the entire city - the people had created a giant tomb for themselves. If they made some ancient force, it would not have destroyed them. One thing is clear - the secrets of what was discovered at El Dorado are unknown to the other crew members. The only person who could tell us for certain is dead. 

With Gamma's calculations being described as essential, in addition to Cao Tzu's assistance, would that mean that we've got to visit Wizard City? One way or another, Pollo's piece is in Kane's hands - confirming at least one more visit to Valencia, though I'd guess that we still have two yet to come.

Status: Deceased :: Map Piece: Hidden in Scorpion Rock Cave, taken by Captain Blood

Christopher Clark is the second member of Pollo's Crew no longer living. His son Meriwether Clark tells us that the map piece is hidden in a chest in Scorpion Cave Rock, but not until we rescue him from some angry Bison. And from there, Cool Ranch takes up five books - one fourth of the entire El Dorado arc. And that's not including Port Regal, where we're rescuing Mustang Sally in an effort to obtain the same map piece. We take countless detours in Cool Ranch while attempting to find Captain Blood and progress through a number of major stories before finally beating Blood in Miranda, only to find that he's not keeping the piece on his person.

We then journey to Motherlode Mine to defeat our first major clockwork - Spymaster Deacon. It is there that we acquire Pollo's ship and photo, along with Clark's piece of the map. It is at this point that we realize our mother was also part of the crew. After five long books (not including Port Regal) in a twenty-book arc, we obtain Clark's piece of the map.

Status: Hidden away in Yakooza Cave, MooShu :: Map Piece: Stolen by General Tso

Our trip to MooShu had two purposes - track down Egg Foo Yung's map piece and find Cao Tzu to interpret our map once it's completed. Egg is secretly leading the Yakooza, and promises us his map piece if we assist him in his goals and prove ourselves worthy. And so we run around Khotan skyway correcting all sorts of injustice only to find that his piece was stolen by General Tso, who resides in Khotan. 

In our encounter with Tso, we witness him selling his map piece to General Rooke, who escapes with it as we're left to beat Tso by threatening his chicken. This leaves us with an issue - the armada now owns two of the map pieces, to our two as well (Clark's and some piece from Gunn). At some point, this means that to reach El Dorado, we're obviously going to have to return to Valencia and best the clockwork elites. Blind Mew confirms that we'll have fought all of them before the arc is over. 

In terms of the remaining worlds of the arc, this is where things start to get curious. In total, we're going to have about twenty books in the first arc. That means there are six left. Cool Ranch alone took five, while worlds like Marleybone and Aquila were only one. However, we're almost certainly headed to Valencia next, and seeing that we wouldn't fight Kane with a fourth of the arc left, I'd guess we'll be returning there again. Two trips to Valencia... how many books does that leave?

Status: Happily smuggling, pirating, and joining your crew! :: Map Piece: Acquired from Finn

Catbeard. Perhaps one of the most lovable characters in the game. And by lovable, I mean humorous. There's nothing to love about what he's put us through. First in Port Regal, where he and Mr. Norrington were hiding out, attempting to join Gortez in freeing Napolenguin (I just know this'll come back to bite us) and in the meantime rescue Mustang Sally before rejoining El Toro. All while starting a war. While there, we encountered Phule, locked up a cell near Napolenguin. He was apparently captured after having taken Pollo's piece - did he deliver it to Kane in time, or is it in the possession of Marleybone?

Oh, what a mess. What a mess indeed. Much later on, we return to deal with that same war in Marleybone. Catbeard, after running low on pickled herring, made a break for it and was captured and taken to Marleybone. He wasn't one for prison life. Book 13 was spent earning him his way out after a court trial, following our duties in turning the tide of the entire war we started in Port Regal, and at the same time taking down Rooke, whose confidence was his ultimate demise. We did run into Bishop, but he escaped. 

Upon freeing Catbeard, we learn that he lost his piece of the map in a wager against Captain Gunn. It was later acquired by Finn and going to be sold to a group of clockworks who'd then send it to Deacon and then to Kane. We intercepted it after Monquista. We spent an entire book cleaning up after Catbeard only to find that we already had his piece of the map.

Status: Guarding the gates to the Labyrinth in Aquila :: Map Piece: Taken by Ulysses to Ithaca

Freeing Catbeard was good for one thing - he could point us to Argos, the cyclops in the photo. Quite clever of them to have Argos bleeding off of the page. The single eye would have given away Aquila and that leg of the story. While Argos doesn't particularly look like a cyclops in this image, there's no doubt in your mind once you hit the mythology-based skyways of Aquila. 

Argos is occupied with hunting the Minotaur and holding the gates of the Labyrinth. We must complete a few errands for him and get Hawkules to take his place before braving the Labyrinth ourselves and defeating all three Minotaurs. After assisting him, however, we learn that his piece was taken from his home by Ulysses, who we must chase to Ithaca. 

The one significant piece of information we collect from the ending here is the Rosetta Stone - a relic from Krokotopia. It can used to decode the inscriptions on the mechanical birds, which might play a key role in locating the Toymaker or whoever has been sending the birds across the Spiral. If we head to Valencia next, however, we may eliminate that need entirely. I don't think they'd plant that seed and NOT have us go to Krokotopia at some point. Mirage has the potential to be within Krokotopia, even a hub, I'd say. Rajah, as we've established, would be a slightly different area. When asked if we'd go to Darkmoor, Rajah, or Krokotopia, Blind Mew confirmed that we'd be visiting two of the three - though he didn't say when.

 Status: Unknown, suspected to be trading around the Spiral :: Map Piece: Unknown

Erika the Red is shrouded in mystery. She's a bear originating from Grizzleheim - that much we know. Because Blind Mew says that three of seven of Pollo's crew are dead, and we know that Pollo, Clark, and our mother have passed, we must assume that Erika is alive. However, as Blind Mew is so kind as to remind us, the bears of Grizzleheim are active traders, and may be present anywhere in the Spiral.

So we've got two visits to Valencia, Krokotopia, Darkmoor, and now Grizzleheim? Or perhaps Erika is elsewhere. However, what would be the odds that we'd stumble upon her in the first world we checked if she is as elusive as Blind Mew makes her appear? Whatever the case, our chances with her sound promising. In terms of whether or not she'd be a companion, Blind Mew says, "Who knows what the future holds?"

With the number of worlds and lack of information on her at this point, it brings up an important pacing question - we spent a fourth of the arc in Cool Ranch. And that was with some pretty significant direction on getting Clark's map piece. We have no clues for Erika, so will it be realistic for us to obtain her map piece, visit Valencia twice, and potentially also go to Krokotopia and Darkmoor in just six books?

Status: Deceased :: Map Piece: Unknown location

Our mother is perhaps one of the characters we know least about but would like to know the most about. She was also on Pollo's crew, but as I suspected and as Blind Mew confirmed, she had an adventurous life after returning from El Dorado, meaning that the possibilities for where she currently rests are just about endless. In Marleybone, we did get a little piece of information that she was spotted in Rajah. Though that would mean we're not going to Krokotopia, which seems quite likely given the numerous hints we've been given. Or perhaps we're not going to Darkmoor... expect for the fact that there are multiple pieces of concept art confirming it, in addition to the words of Blind Mew.

During a quest with the immortals in Aquila, Hades says that our parents are shunning the underworld, waiting to speak with us. Now we can get a little creative. We may go to Krokotopia to investigate our parents' whereabouts or to work with the Rosetta Stone, but what about Darkmoor? What if we need to contact our parents about their map piece to save endless Spiral searching? Would Darkmoor not seem the perfect environment in which to look for the undead?

Allow me to muddy the waters a little more, though. Blind Mew is very likely still playing with the first arc. It would make sense that he wouldn't be a quarter storyline ahead of development. And he's said that players will take their time getting to Polaris - essentially confirming Polaris for us. Perhaps it'd do well as a side world, right? Napolenguin would play an interesting role there. The only problem is that Blind Mew has said that he really dislikes the idea of side worlds, especially in the sense that he'd rather focus his efforts on the main story. So now we've got Polaris, two Valencia visits, Krokotopia, Darkmoor, and Grizzleheim. And that's assuming we find everything on our first try. Six books left. I'll let you ponder that.

The Mysterious Eighth Member

Think you're an expert on Marco Pollo's crew? Think again. Recently, on the boards, a user asked this question: "In Marco Pollo and his crews picture in El Dorado, if there all in the picture, who took the picture?" Blind Mew responded:

Good question! I have an answer, but it's not ready for prime time yet.

Let's consider this - if it were something so obvious as a timed camera or whatever else, why cloak it in mystery? It would seem that there was an eighth member of Pollo's crew. Who? We can't say for sure, but whoever it is will become infinitely more significant in our quest to find the remaining map pieces - they may even have one themselves. 

While it is quite possible that this is a character not yet introduced, I like to think that's it someone we know. Avery? Our father? Another member of Skull Island that would require us to return there (as seemingly indicated by the teasers)?

As unlikely as that might seem, think about this - all of the members of Pollo's crew we've talked to and even had join our crew have yet to tell us anything about El Dorado. Blind Mew suggests that there's a reason for that, and so it's reasonable to believe that whoever was the eighth member, even if it's Avery, would have no use for making that plain to anyone else. Who is this mysterious, eighth member?

End-of-Arc Planning

With only about six books remaining, we've got a lot to do and a lot of places to go. My guess is that it'd be pretty difficult to lay out the remaining story because Blind Mew has suggested that there are parts of the story and plot that have not yet been introduced or accounted for. Beyond that, he states that if the budget allows, he'd like to do more books like our first trip to Valencia, in which we visit multiple areas or worlds in a single book. That's exactly the "mad rush" I was hoping for.

I'm inclined to believe that, in whatever books worlds may fall into, our journey takes us in an order similar to this:

1. Valencia Part 2: Locate "Cagliostro" in Cadiz Skyway, and find "G" - he'll teach us how to defeat Kane 

2. Polaris: Napolenguin comes back into play, and we visit this world for reasons unknown, other than the fact that Blind Mew has confirmed it as a world 

3. Grizzleheim: A brief visit to the colder side of this world takes us on a search for Erika the Red and her piece 

4. Krokotopia: We visit Mirage in Krokotopia seeking information on our parents' whereabouts and translations for the Rosetta Stone obtained in Aquila 

5. Darkmoor: We look for methods of locating our parents from beyond the grave to learn the location of their map piece in a world that bridges life and death 

6. Valencia Part 3: Our showdown with additional clockworks and stealing of the remaining map pieces, followed by a brief visit to MooShu to do the Celestial computations with Cao Tzu (and Wizard City?)

7. El Dorado: The final leg of the journey ending in shocking discovery and the final showdown with Kane (though he and the others, particularly Phule, may not be defeated at the end of the arc)

Suppose we got really crazy and said that Cao Tzu was taken or killed by the Armada and we needed Gamma to assist with the numbers and Merle with the computations, as he helped Pollo? A swing by Wizard City, perhaps? The possibilities are endless.

One of the major questions I've had is "Why Grizzleheim and Krokotopia?" Well, Blind Mew has said that the set of five companions that are based on where our pirate was raised will not do their final promotion involving our parents until we've visited all of our home worlds. Our parents have played a huge part in getting to El Dorado, so it'd be pretty strange if we didn't learn at least a little bit more about them through these promotion quests. We've been to Skull Island, Marleybone, and MooShu, but have yet to visit Grizzleheim and Krokotopia. If we are to learn more of our parents in this arc, we'll need to first visit these worlds.

Polaris - why? Mew specifically said we'd take our time getting there, but my suspicions are that we're about due. Not only would it be a great place to look for Erika the Red, but you surely don't imagine we've seen the last of Napolenguin, do you? Our whole affair with him and Catbeard has led to any number of issues, and breaking out one of the most dangerous minds in the Spiral can't be entirely safe. If I was forced to take a guess, I'd guess that the little emperor is extending his influence into Monquista a little bit more than Gortez is comfortable with, coupled with the fact that there's turmoil within Polaris after Napolenguin's return. Or it could also be that we're just looking for Erika.

The final question relates to Darkmoor. What is our purpose there? It's already a confirmed world, plus the fact that between Darkmoor, Krokotopia, and Rajah, Blind Mew again stated that we'll visit two of the three. I'm assuming, then, that Rajah is the one left out. I'm not entirely sure why we're headed to Darkmoor, but there's too much evidence not to. I'd guess that Vadima will play a role in getting us there to seek out our parents with the help of someone there - potentially even the eighth crew member.

And then I also hear - Why this order? Truthfully, the order of some of the ealier story segments could be rearranged with just the adjustment of a single line of dialogue. For example, if Avery knew Pollo's helmsman was Argos, or if another crew member had, we could have done Aquila before Marleybone. However, we have very few crew members left. I'm assuming Blind Mew is introducing them in a way that saves the best for last. That means our mother. Erika must be next, then. She's been saved because there's so little information on her and her "occupation" could take her anywhere.

A Lost City of Gold and Mystery

El Dorado has more tales to tell than we've heard. What could be so powerful that it destroyed an entire realm, while actually having been engineered by the people there in the first place?

Sure, we can say a giant monster lives there that wiped everybody out. But how exciting is that? Besides, this secret, as we can infer from Pollo's letter, brought ruin to the entire world. El Dorado was "cast down by its own achievement."

In terms of epic monsters, though, I do have one theory. There's a character that keep recurring in every puppet show, and that might just be there to be humorous, but I can't help but notice Cthulhu. He's the squid-looking guy, who's actually considered a "cosmic entity" from one of H.P. Lovecraft's short stories.

Release the Kraken Test Realm!

Whatever the case may be, our next update is surely just around the corner. We've been getting teasers for months now, and I can't wait to see what the Pirate101 team has put together for the next leg of the journey. Even if it's simply an extension of Valencia, the content there will be central to the entire arc and not just the errands of the moment that we found in some earlier worlds.

What are you expecting from the next update? And more importantly, how and where will we find the remaining crew members, both known and not?

Thanks for reading and see you in the Spiral! Credits: Cthulhu image created by "karichristensen" on DeviantArt. Thanks for feedback on Pollo's photo from AluraRB and D.S. Devereaux. "Eighth member" question originally asked by Captain Kingsley on the official message boards.