Recap pages are Spoilers Off by default, so all spoilers were removed. Proceed with caution. You Have Been Warned
"Ah, so you're the one I've been hearin' all this radio chatter about. Name's Roland. I used to be a Vault Hunter like you, until I formed the Crimson Raiders. We'll catch up when I get back to Sanctuary —for now, I need your help. My men tell me Corporal Reiss hasn't returned the power core we need to keep the city's shields running. Bring Reiss back to Sanctuary, and you'll have earned your place in the Raiders."
— Roland
"The Road to Sanctuary" is the fifth chapter of Borderlands 2. The overall objective of the chapter is to reach the eponymous Sanctuary, and, as such, it covers the Three Horns - Divide and Sanctuary levels.
After defeating Captain Flynt, Claptrap and the Vault Hunters take the boat to Three Horns, a multiambient area that comprises glacial land alongside natural flora and fauna. This being Pandora, the flora and fauna here wants to see you dead just because you live and breathe. And if the Rakk and Bullymong population scattered throughtout the area isn't enough, Three Horns is also place to several bandit populations. Luckily for you, after a short trek you'll find one of Scooter's stations. Angel requests you to pick up a core located in a nearby bandit camp in order to make it possible to hack it and generate a vehicle for your needs.
Angel: Pandora is a violent and dangerous place. Sanctuary is...slightly less so. You'll need a car to reach the city gate. Get to the Catch-A-Ride.
After digistructing a vehicle for the first time, you must make your way into Sanctuary, where the local guards (headed by previous vault hunter Roland) want you to retrieve a core held by Corporal Reiss, who was in trouble and requested help. Once the core is retrieved, you're allowed to get into Sanctuary, the last bastion of the non-bandit Pandoran resistance to Hyperion's dictatorship.
Three Horns - Divide is huge, and there's a lot to explore, and a lot of chests and containers to loot, as well as lots of enemies to kill. Sanctuary itself, on the other hand, is full of everyday people, less than no enemies, and is home to several key characters. The sidequests that take place in these areas are "The Ice Man Cometh", "Rock, Paper, Genocide" chain, "Claptrap's Secret Stash", "Do No Harm", "Won't Get Fooled Again", "Torture Chairs" and "Poetic License". The challenges that can be completed in these locations are the following:
- Three Horns - Divide: "Cult of the Vault", "Man's Best Friends"
- Sanctuary: "Cult of the Vault", "Rise of the Crimson Raiders", "Jackpot!"
These missions, sidequests, challenges, and the Three Horns - Divide and Sanctuary areas give examples of:
- 20% More Awesome: The guy selling Hyperion propaganda in Sanctuary claims that the "This Just In" ECHO-cast now has 200% more libel!note
- Accent Relapse: In Moxxi's bar, if you tip her, she will occasionally relate a story of how she used to be part of the Hodunk clan and why she left it. She then starts to slip into a more redneck-like accent similar to the other Hodunks in the game, then quickly corrects herself, and asks you not to tell anyone about it.
- Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole: A mild example. If you tip Moxxi enough she will give you the gun "Good Touch", which she says at one point is her favorite gun because she can use it's secondary function (vibrating) for her "alone time". If you play on a device with haptic feedback
such as a controller with rumble pack, the controller will vibrate as long as you have the gun equipped, something which obviously can't happen with non-haptic devices such as keyboards and mouses. - Amusing Injuries: Dr. Zed and Marcus are introduced during hilarious acts of wanton cruelty towards the common mook. The former is introduced violently sticking a syringe into a Hyperion spy, while the latter shoots in the leg a bandit who was complaining that the weapon he got didn't work.
- Big Sleep: The death of Corporal Reiss halfway through the chapter's main mission in Three Horns - Divide."I'll just take a little nap... Wake me, when we're not on Pandora anymore..."
- Black Comedy: During Marcus's first quest where he trains you on elemental weapons, the targets you shoot have various names such as "cheapskate", "shoplifter", and "competition" when you shoot the elemental weapons at each one.
- Blatant Lies: In Sanctuary, you can pick up a pirated broadcast from Hunter Hellquist of the "Hyperion Truth Network", claiming that the bandit city of Sanctuary is crumbling from internal struggle and the assault of brave Hyperion troops. A quick glance around shows this to not be the case.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Claptrap initially tries to provide a diegetic explanation for how the item sharing bank works. He quickly gives up and just says it in plain gameplay terms.Claptrap: I've decided to let you use that stash to share items between my minions. Specifically the ones that.. umm.. that you control. (Look, it's for twinking items between your characters.)
- But Thou Must!: Loot from the vendors in Sanctuary are tied to the level of the story mission. So if you're level 40 for example, and you're wondering why the slot machine in Moxxi's bar keeps spitting out level 34 items, then you should probably finish those story missions.
- Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": In-universe, there's the sidequest "The Name Game" where Hammerlock want to find a new, more book-sellingly exciting name for Bullymongs, and calls them "Primal Beasts", "Ferovores", and in frustration by the end, "Bonerfarts". He eventually decides "bullymong" isn't so bad after all.
- Call-Back:
- When you meet Dr. Zed for the first time, he's sedating a Psycho Bandit... with the same action he used in Borderlands.
- The first Crimson Raider you meet is Cpl. Reiss, apparently some relation of Hank Reiss, the wereskag from the first game's first DLC campaign.
- The music in Moxxi's has the same ambience from her own theme, back in the first Borderlands's DLCs Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot and The Secret Armory of General Knoxx.
- Cloudcuckoolander: There are a couple of un-named NPCs in Sanctuary, from the guy who yells every odd thing he says at the top of his lungs ("I CAN'T HEAR YOU!") to the guy who has several... interesting theories as to what lies behind Handsome Jack's mask."Take off Handsome Jack's mask, and you'll find out he's actually Scooter in disguise!"
"Behind Jack's mask is the entrance to a tiny Vault that you can enter like a portal!" - Defeat Means Friendship: Some of the remnants of the Crimson Lance are now led by Roland as members of the resistance (the "Crimson Raiders") against Handsome Jack. Despite Roland being a Crimson Lance deserter and working with the other vault hunters, they murdered hundreds of them and concretely ended their main employer. Handsome Jack is just that much of a threat. Most of them seem happy to work for Roland, though.
- Developer's Foresight: In True Vault Hunter Mode, the player is automatically given a third fuel cell for the next story mission. Normally, one has to buy product from Crazy Earl as a means of introducing the uses for Eridium bullion, but since his upgrades can potentially cap out or at the very least become very expensive come a repeated playthrough, the fuel cell comes as a freebie given that Scooter's provided Eridium isn't changed.
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Development Gag: One NPC in Sanctuary says "If you're not a fan of Bambugira's latest single you should be shot to death. Just a fact, man." Bamboo is an automatic software deployment tool, and JIRA is a bug-tracking system. - Door Stopper: In Hammerlock's radio commercial for his "Beasts of Pandora" book, he says that if you were faced up against a stalker, you would know to attack it on the underside of its skull (its weakpoint), or otherwise you could just throw the massive book at it and run away while it's stunned.
- Driven to Suicide: Daisy after you deliver to her the love poem written by Scooter.
- Extreme Omnivore:
- According to Scooter, Crazy Earl once ate one of his cars. The whole thing. With a fork and all...
- There is a citizen in Sanctuary that will make claims that his various family members have all eaten various forms of Pandora wildlife... and another who claims all his family members were eaten by nearly all forms of Pandora wildlife.
- Giver of Lame Names: One quest Hammerlock gives you involves changing the name of the Bullymongs for his almanac. After a while he gives up and just calls them "Bonerfarts" (also naming the children as "Bonertoots"), which the game will hilariously update them to for the duration of that quest.
- Gone Horribly Right: A similar quest from Sir Hammerlock involves injecting evolving Varkid cocoons with a mutagenic serum. Varkids are insect-like critters that, when in combat and in the presence of at least another Varkid, will enter a cocoon stage and morph into a flying Adult Varkid. Hammerlock's serum causes them to turn into Mutant Varkids that spit an extremely powerful corrossive acid and take lots of damage before dying. This quest is very hard, and it's actually a good idea to spend some time leveling up before undertaking it.
- Guide Dang It!: Figuring out the correct murderer in "Won't Get Fooled Again," since two of the three witnesses you can interview won't provide obviously useful information. Moxxi mentions shooting one of them and his shield absorbing the bullets, but the brother with the visible shield on his body is innocent. In fact, the only reliable information as to which brother is the murderer comes from the sheriff, who mentions the victim died to a single bullet to the throat. The only gun that usually kills with a single headshot is a sniper rifle, pointing to the brother with the rifle as the killer. Zed does note that he patched up the murderer, and the murderer has full health while the others don't. In addition, if you look closely, the murderer also has a shield bar.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: As you finish story quests, there is a data pod in Sanctuary where you can hear the latest news. No matter what you did, the newscaster always paints you or your allies in a bad light. Fortunately, you can pick up a sidequest late in the game (once you've reached "Arid Nexus - Boneyard") that allows you to "take care of that problem", i.e. go kill the guy making all those negative announcements about you and Sanctuary.
- Infallible Babble: The citizens of Sanctuary may randomly speak lines when you approach them. One NPC talks about a rumor that Handsome Jack is not handsome and Jack is not his real name. These two details turn out to be true - The Pre-Sequel reveals that he wears a mask to cover his damaged face. During the last chapters of the game, there is an optional mission where you collect ECHO recordings about Jack, one of which reveals his real name as spoken by his boss when Jack was still an employee of Hyperion.
- Lame Pun Reaction: During the mission "The Ice Man Cometh" (in which the player is sent by Claptrap to rig some bandits' furnaces to make them too cold to fight), Claptrap loves making puns.Claptrap: Hey bandits - FREEZE! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
- La Résistance: Sanctuary is an entire town opposing Handsome Jack's oppressive dictatorship led by the former Vault Hunters called the Crimson Raiders. When you enter it for the first time, Roland outright tells you they're losing the fight since Hyperion has access to a lot more resources than they do, not to mention all the robot troops at their disposal.
- Meatgrinder Surgery: The "Do No Harm" sidequest. Your goal is to melee Zed's patient, but just shooting the man works too. Especially hilarious on higher difficulties where you can perform the "operation" with a high level rocket launcher.Zed: Alright: make a small incision just below his sternum, but be careful - we don't want to nick the coronary artery.
(player "performs surgery" with a melee attack, killing the patient)
Zed: Close enough. - Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: "Dr." Zed, is a subversion, as he constantly reminds you of his lack of a medical license despite being genuinely interested in healing people. Doc Mercy is Zed's foil and a straight example: he's a bandit doctor who is far more interested in causing wounds than patching them up, but he at least has a medical license.
- One-Person Birthday Party: The "Claptrap's Birthday Bash" sidequest, where you send invitations to Claptrap's birthday party for him. None of the guests accept the invitation, so you end up alone with Claptrap.
- Overly Long Gag:
- When you land on Three Horns in Claptrap's ship, he'll ask you to organize a party for him and start listing things for you to get. He carries on about it for a few solid minutes if you stay and listen.
- When you're destroying some furnaces that belong to a gang of bandits, Claptrap says "Chill out!" and then, when your character doesn't laugh, proceed to explain in elaborate detail what sort of joke he just made, why it's funny, and then go on into a dry explanation of the entire concept of humor - apparently certain that your character will understand and burst into laughter at any second.
- Police Are Useless: Marshall Friedman is the law in Sanctuary, but on two occasions simply asks you to solve a mystery for him, because he's in bed and can't be bothered.Marshal Friedman: About an hour or so back, I heard a gunshot. Naturally, I ignored it, until someone came and got me.
- Pre-Order Bonus: In-game, one of the radio ads for Sir Hammerlock's wildlife almanac has him touting the bonus content you get for pre-ordering it. Namely, a photo diary (which is mostly him sitting at his desk looking bored) and a special embossed cover that brags about the extra spending money you clearly have lying around.
- Rouge Angles of Satin: Roland refers to a "cachet of weapons", rather than a "cache", which is a bit immersion breaking - it reminds the player that Roland is actually some guy in a recording booth.
- Schrödinger's Gun: "Torture Chairs", the quest where you have to collect Tannis's ECHO logs in Sanctuary, regardless of the order in which you retrieve the ECHO logs, has the audio being played in sequence, as Tannis records her story from start to finish.
- So Bad, It's Good: An In-Universe example in the guy in Sanctuary handing out the "This Just In" Hyperion propaganda ECHOes, who finds said ECHOes to be rather hilarious. He's well aware of what it is, and finds the humor in the fact that they would go so far as to spread such Blatant Lies, since everyone in Sanctuary knows what really happened. Apparently, he's alone in this though. They're not selling so well.
- Sophisticated as Hell:
- Zed after the Doc Mercy quest.Dr. Zed: After watching you waste those bandits with that E-Tech weapon, I have come to the following medically sound conclusion... E-Tech is friggin' dope!
- Sir Hammerlock is full of this trope. It's wonderful to hear his clipped British accent enunciate words like "douche" and "Bonerfart".
- Zed after the Doc Mercy quest.
- Status Quo Is God: Sir Hammerlock has a quest where he asks you to kill bullymongs in order to investigate them and see if he can come up with a better name. He initially calls them "Primal Beasts" (and their in-game title also changes) when he finds they have a primate-like body and some intelligence, but isn't yet quite satisfied. Then, after killing some more, he renames them "Ferovores" due to their ferocity... however, that name is trademarked, so he snaps and calls them "Bonerfarts" (with the young ones renamed "Bonertoots"). After killing a few more, Sir Hammerlock just gives up and reverts to the good old "Bullymong" moniker.
- Story Breadcrumbs: As in the first game, ECHO recorders are strewn around the landscape, as both side quests and just items that fulfill Badass rank requirements.
- The "Torture Chairs" sidequest deals with the physical and psychological torture of Patricia Tannis at the hands of Hyperion personnel.
- The "Rise of the Crimson Raiders" challenge of Sanctuary deals with the formation of the Crimson Raiders, after the events of 1.
- Stylistic Suck: Scooter's poetry. The first girl subjected to it responds by expunging it from her brain - with a handgun.
- Suicide as Comedy: One of the quests for Scooter involves helping him write a poem to woo a lady, and once it's complete, he has you play the recording for the woman. After listening to the poem, she asks to be excused, and then she enters the house she's standing in front of, closing the door behind her. Moments later, a gunshot is heard. Upon completing the quest, the text states that "Everyone's a critic."
- Surprisingly Easy Mini-Quest: The "Claptrap's Secret Stash" quest in sanctuary lampshades this heavily, with Claptrap assigning you a number of mind numbing and/or ridiculously difficult tasks before "accidentally" revealing the location of the stash about three feet behind you. Also: The stash itself has "CLAPTRAP'S SECRET STASH" vibrantly on display on a sign right above it with an arrow pointing right at it.
- Twinking: This is Lampshaded when you gain access to your shared stash. Claptrap tries in vain to come up with a story-friendly explanation for where the items are coming from and going to before giving up and saying, "It's for twinking items between characters, okay?"
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Pandora is not a nice place to be. Upon entering Sanctuary, bastion of peace and safety, you'll be treated to introductory cutscenes of Marcus (shoots a customer for asking for a refund), Dr. Zed (stabs an insane patient in the chest with a needle, hard), and Scooter (confuses you for a Hyperion robot at first, and then tells you to go hit up the black market). This is all just to establish the setting.
- Vengeance Feels Empty: You can do a sidequest for Sir Hammerlock where he asks you to kill the thresher that tore off his arm. After you do it, he realizes that he doesn't feel any better, but still considers it a job well done.
- Victoria's Secret Compartment: Moxxi apparently keeps both beer and guns tucked into her considerable cleavage.
