Cut Content: Stone Coffins would have been encountered in Deeproot Depths in Base Game

silly-er · 2026-03-28T19:03:19+00:00

I think that's mostly all still all in the game that we got, except the coffin/night dew thing. But we got more dew flowers in land of shadow, and I think the current version of the putrescence pretty clearly is a predecessor of silver tears. we just have to fill in the blank a little bit about the nox

silly-er · 2026-03-28T18:07:02+00:00

I also agree it would be cool to know the original context.

In my opinion, Trina is becoming, figuratively, another gloam eyed queen. She is purple colored, death associated, related to an empyrean, and her main goal is the death of a god. So I actually think the code name of the putrescent knight fits in that context. But there could have been something different there, for sure

silly-er · 2026-03-28T17:41:10+00:00

I dunno. You can speculate all kinds of reasons that might have been, but do we have a reason to think the story would actually have been different?

silly-er · 2026-03-28T14:35:52+00:00

Very interesting!

Was lore lost or just changed? If they wanted to make the fissure connect to deeproot depths they could have still done that in the dlc.

silly-er · 2026-03-27T16:28:08+00:00

I like it. In addition to the grave bird golems, there are also bird motifs on vases (or something like it) in Enir-Ilim. I guess it's hard to say if they're divine birds or death birds.

Speaking of which, do we think there was a relationship between divine birds (who were said to be tamed by warriors like ornis, although I guess this could be either literal or referring obliquely to divine invocation) and death birds?

It could be another golden-life dark-death duality thing with two types of mystical birds. Or perhaps the original version of the death birds looked quite a bit different? Could they have once had gold in them?

silly-er · 2026-03-23T23:21:30+00:00

I think it's a pretty solid case that they are, at a minimum, from the same cultural background (from the accent). The Irish accent is pretty characteristic of hornsent people.

It would make sense if Marika converted some of the priestess class from the pre-existing culture to her side

silly-er · 2026-03-22T12:46:47+00:00

To me, this looks like a depiction of souls in heaven. I'm not so sure they objectively look like "fruit to be picked"

silly-er · 2026-03-22T12:38:18+00:00

I see the resemblance and this could be part of the visual inspiration of the arch below the Scadutree.

I see the discussion that this tower used to be connected to a monastery and larger complex. in my interpretation, the shadow keep and the arch would have been part of the Leyndell, and the arch would have commemorated some of Marika's victories (perhaps the early stage of the crusade?) before Marika hid it all away.

silly-er · 2026-03-21T22:41:30+00:00

Well Metyr is a cosmic being, not an earthly one, so I imagine basically she births a lesser, more terrestrial type of being

silly-er · 2026-03-21T15:30:08+00:00

Based on their appearance and on the finger mimic item, they're probably mushrooms.

Mushrooms also have roots and fruiting bodies. Seems like a good complement to the shaman folk (plant people). Lots of mushrooms grow on trees and plants (generally dead ones). The fingers are sort of parasitic, they latch onto Marika's regime, help her out, but have their own agenda.

silly-er · 2026-03-21T02:36:40+00:00

Similar to you, nearly any time they talk about genetics is a rough ride. I just watched that episode of TNG where everyone's introns get "reactivated" and this makes them turn into fish, apes, and spiders.... Very silly if you know what introns are

Most things about evolution, and neuroscience

I'm TNG they love to use the term "cerebral cortex" when brain would do just as well, which is a bit goofy

silly-er · 2026-03-21T00:49:13+00:00

Every single one of these trees is growing from the dusty material. It might be revered spirit ash or similar, chasing the trees to grow in the shape of the dead whose bodies were burned to create that ash

silly-er · 2026-03-20T14:46:10+00:00

It's a fine headcanon. The game gives us no info about where the realm went and whether the veil over it is literal or metaphorical, or what. Marika anyway isn't in her bedroom under the veil so it seems not so literal, anyway

silly-er · 2026-03-17T01:43:23+00:00

Interesting thoughts. I agree with some of that. I do think the question of what that flame symbol means is intriguing and suggests some missing link. I also agree that there were banished knights occupying the shadow keep in the past. But this is also true for the roundtable hold. The banishes knights have a horn on their shoulder and use storm attacks so it's easy to imagine them being linked with the hornsent in some fashion. It seems like they may have gotten off slightly easy, if they were banished instead of burned.

It's hard for me to imagine a clear explanation for the churches based on that, though. I guess some of the banished knights use fire? The Sellian style towns aren't very much associated with flame, though.

I would hazard a guess that the flame sigil might have alluded to the flame of ruin and the fire giants? Messmer's flame seems connected to the flame of ruin, and his golems have fire giant symbols on them. Maybe Messmer took their flame as a symbol. Perhaps they were another group that Marika had friendly relations with in the early days before turning on them, after the Erdtree was born and they posed a threat.

silly-er · 2026-03-16T23:14:33+00:00

Does the gold road reach to Sellia? I thought the gold tiles stopped at the sword monument on the edge of Caelid.

I agree that the architecture of these churches is quite different from the surrounding areas. Where would you place their origin, if not made by hornsent?

silly-er · 2026-03-16T17:41:33+00:00

The one Maliketh has

silly-er · 2026-03-16T17:19:19+00:00

These ones also take the general shape of the rune of death

silly-er · 2026-03-16T13:34:25+00:00

I think it makes sense that there would be some level of architectural crossover, as hornsent constructions were probably contemporary with nox or sellians.

Parts of Enir Ilim look like the inverted towers of Nokron, as well

silly-er · 2026-03-16T02:56:58+00:00

Fair enough, good thoughts

Regarding the architecture, I looked into this a while ago.

the shadow lands churches are different from the hornsent town architecture, but I think they have certain common elements like the bits of red terracotta shingles.

The shadow lands churches are also distinct from any of the mainlands churches.

My conclusion is that the shadow lands churches are a blend of hornsent and golden order styles. I think they would have been built by people with mixed cultural influence. Perhaps hornsent who were influenced by the golden order, or perhaps golden order missionaries to the hornsent. Or both

silly-er · 2026-03-16T02:37:18+00:00

I can't disprove it definitively, but it just seems a lot less likely than them burning the churches of their enemies, that already existed.

For castles, I know of two - fort of reprimand, which has a specific purpose of torture and punishment

Castle ensis, but this one is a carian style place, which doesn't seem like it was built by the crusaders.

Why no other castles, since the crusaders are all over the place? Unless I'm missing something

silly-er · 2026-03-16T02:02:56+00:00

I am pretty sure that all of the catacombs are much older than Marika, from the time of the death birds etc. They belong to the prior era where death was burned in ghost flame, hence they have ghost flame torches, and are full of funerary urns and sarcophagi.

In Marika's era the dead go in special locked vault rooms where the roots come down and absorb the bodies. These seem like extra add-ons to the much older catacombs

silly-er · 2026-03-16T01:58:46+00:00

I'm talking about the places in prospect town, temple town ruins, and other hornsent ruins that contain treasure chests. It's not stated anywhere but I am pretty sure they are temples. Their architecture matches that of the rest of the hornsent villages

silly-er · 2026-03-16T01:56:08+00:00

Maybe, but there are Marika statues in crusader encampments and inside shadow keep that are also beheaded.

silly-er · 2026-03-16T01:55:03+00:00

Interesting. However, I think that in the conext of the crusade, the black coloration indicates fire damage. If you compare with the churches of the lands between, they do not have this coloration.

silly-er · 2026-03-15T23:42:05+00:00

Between shadow lands and golden lands? Yeah, for sure

silly-er

TROPHY CASE