Barrier of Khorinis

The Barrier of Khorinis was a magical barrier acting as a prison around the ore mines of Khorinis.

Creation

Many years before the events of Gothic due to the worsening situation in the war against the orcs, King Rhobar II ordered the most powerful magicians of his realm to create a magical barrier above the Valley of Mines, a penal colony in which magical ore was mined.

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  Creation of the barrier

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  The barrier suddenly expands

As the Sleeper, a powerful archdemon, was resting below the valley, he interfered with the creation of the Barrier. It not only turned out much bigger than intended, enclosing its creators, it also made it impossible for the magicians to open and close the Barrier as originally intended.
The cause of this disruption was only discovered by Xardas and never communicated to anyone else besides the Nameless Hero.

Age

There is conflicting information regarding the age of the Barrier:

• A nameless digger ambient dialogue states that not much has changed in the last 20 years.
• Grimes say that he has been here for 10 years.
• In the comic the Barrier was created around 20 years before Milten's imprisonment. In Gothic Lester states that he has been in the colony for 2 years. As Lester had been imprisoned at the same time as Milten this results in an age of around 22 years.
• The intro of the 0.94k press demo states that the Barrier was created 10 years before the start of the game.
• The Gothic 3 manual states that the Barrier was made 10 years before and destroyed 1 year before the start of Gothic 3, meaning the Barrier existed for 9 years.

Number of mages

The intro states that 12 magicians created the Barrier.
In the game there are 6 fire mages in the Old Camp and 6 water mages in the New Camp. In the fourth chapter Saturas informs the Nameless Hero that, contrary to popular belief, there was a 13th magician called Xardas who controlled the other magician's energies.
But as one of the fire mages, Milten, only became a fire mage after being imprisoned in the Barrier, there seems to be one mage missing.
Mike Hoge has addressed these questions by stating that Saturas' dialogue is an error and that there really were just 12 magicians.

Unofficial motive

In Gothic II the almanac in the monastery basement states that Xardas convinced the king to create the Barrier telling him that it would prevent any escape by prisoners, but his real intention was to get the ore out of the reach of Beliar's servants.

Consequences

This incident resulted in many changes. Firstly, as soon as the situation was understood by prisoners, the former miner Gomez took control of the Old Camp. Later he established an exchange between the Old Camp and the king. The convicts regularly sent Rhobar loads of ore, and in return received goods from the outside world. It was also common to send prisoners inside the Barrier.

Secondly, while the mages tried to find the reason for the Barrier's expansion and a way out, they split into two factions. The water mages left for the New Camp and created their own escape plan: collect a huge amount of ore and create an explosion to break the Barrier from the inside.

Thirdly, Xardas suspected that demonic forces were behind the Barrier going out of control and thus he turned to the study of summoning demons and got expelled from the Old Camp, leaving the position of Arch Magician of Fire to Corristo. Studying the culture of the orcs, he came to the conclusion that the Sleeper, the demon residing under the temple of the orcs, is responsible for the failure of the spell. Years later, the Sleeper presented himself to Y'Berion as a god who can set them free. Consequently Y'Berion founded the Swamp Camp in order to worship him.

The barrier collapses

In the end of Gothic, the Nameless Hero banishes the Sleeper, resulting in the fall of the Barrier. The Barrier collapsed with electrical discharges reaching the Earth and total chaos. The trapped prisoners left the Valley, causing an invasion of bandits on the island Khorinis.

Gameplay

The magic Barrier serves as a natural restriction for the player. He can't traverse the barrier, excluding glitch abuse. When coming close, the Nameless Hero first has lightning particles appear around his body and finally takes damage by lighting and is knocked backwards.

The magic Barrier is centered upon the Old Camp. It's true center-point (on the XZ plane) is situated over the house near the highest tower, as shown on the image below.

The center of Barrier

While most of the time the magic Barrier remains invisible, it can appear in the sky 3 times per game day or every 15-20 minutes in real world time. During this phase, it fades in for about 0.25 seconds, stays visible for 25 seconds and fades out for about 0.25 seconds. When the Barrier is visible, sometimes the player can also notice a thunder lighting, striking at each of the four quadrants of the barrier. Each quadrant has a different rate in which it plays thunder effects:

Quadrant	Activation Delay	Landmarks in Quadrant
1	every 8 Seconds	Orc-Town
2	every 6 Seconds	Orc-Graveyard/Swamp Camp
3	every 14 Seconds	Monastery ruin/Exchange
4	every 2 Seconds (actually 4)	Old Mine

Gothic Playable Teaser

The barrier has a different look, but its function remains the same.

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  Magic barrier in Gothic Playable Teaser

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  The barrier creation from cutscene

Trivia

• Although the Barrier was intended to protect the mines, its center is above the Old Camp.
• The Barrier works only on the player character. If an NPC or monster runs through it, they will not be struck by lightning or stopped.
• Another way to pass through the Barrier in the Valley of Mines without using marvin mode is by using the scroll "Transform into a bloodfly". Since the bloodfly receives no knockback, it can pass through the Barrier despite being struck by lightning.
• In the second demo there is a different kind of Barrier. Around the Old Camp there are invisible walls with signs informing the player that further terrain is not available in the demo version.