I Think that Blighttown was sealed off before New Londo

WyrmHero wrote:I'm speculative to the theory because Blighttown has been always referred as the Great Swamp. It's just a pile of sh!t and disease that is home to the pyromancers. How the hell they lived there I don't have a clue.

The Demons weren't sealed in Blighttwon, they ran through Lordran but Gwyn's Black Knights slaughtered them in the chaos war. There seem to be a few survivors such as the Taurus Demon and the Asylum Demons but all the others were contained by the lava from Ceaseless and the Lordvessel yellow gate on the Demon Ruins entrance (near Demon Firesage). Quelaag, her sisters and brother escaped from Izalith when the Chaos Flame exploded and they settle near Blighttown and they were intelligent enough to not go any further.

From everything that I have read/found/heard from npcs, the Great Swamp is a place in the world of the living, not at all present in game. Honestly, I think there is something to this whole sealing theory. Initially I assumed the sealer whose gear you take wasthere to heal the blighted populace simply because she had the power to. However, looking back on the item descriptions and the remedy sorcery, she was there to atone for some past sin... I believed this to be the sealing of New Londo, but you may be on to something here.

While the are no visible mountains of corpses as we see in Drained New Londo , the buildings are clearly constructed in a way that suggests that the water level was once a great deal higher than it currently is in-game. Right or wrong, this is a very interesting theory you have here.

The_Flail wrote:Actually, the Great Swamp is a completly other part of the world, that lies outside of Lordran.

So much potential for more DLCs, so little work....

i think we should get DLC on new londo and it shealing sorceries. prehaps

Spoiler:

WyrmHero wrote:So much potential for more DLCs, so little work....

Ah, well while id be happy for even more content, I really don`t think there will be more. And in my oppinion thats good, really don`t want Dark Souls to turn into the Sims (DLC-Wise).

OK, let put a historically and architecture opinion/fact in the thread.

In the medieval age (that is the major inspiration of Dark Souls) the cities had no sewage system so the sewage of the houses went for two ditches, one running inside the walls and another running outside the walls. That was deliberate, because that way an attacker who tried to cross the ditch could acquire a lethal infection when having his wounds in contact with sewage.

Now, my opinion is that Blighttown was not a real town as you don't see a single abandon or destroyed house in it (in opposition to New Londo where you see the ruins of the city). Blighttown must have been one of the ditches of the city of Anor Londo, and for being an abandoned area was invaded by strange creatures.

I agree that Blighttown may have started as a ditch. But it later became somewhat of a shantytown when the blight for whatever reason appeard.

Eingyi even says the Blighttown was populated with the diseased and the unwanted.

I don't agree that blight town was flooded. Look at the structure of the area itself. almost all of it is wood until you get down to the great swamp. Its like its all scaffolding. I bring this up because if you look at the structure it doesn't really seem to have water damage. Sure there appears to be stains and mold, but isn't the structure itself very old? A massive flood like the one from new londo would have destroyed if not at least damaged the foundation of blighttown itself. I fail to see how it would have been flooded. The dev's certaintly would have put in signs of the flood in the architecture of the town itself. Look at new londo! its entirely flooded and the signs are obvious as to what happened to the once great city.

Codemaste119 wrote:I don't agree that blight town was flooded. Look at the structure of the area itself. almost all of it is wood until you get down to the great swamp. Its like its all scaffolding. I bring this up because if you look at the structure it doesn't really seem to have water damage. Sure there appears to be stains and mold, but isn't the structure itself very old? A massive flood like the one from new londo would have destroyed if not at least damaged the foundation of blighttown itself. I fail to see how it would have been flooded. The dev's certaintly would have put in signs of the flood in the architecture of the town itself. Look at new londo! its entirely flooded and the signs are obvious as to what happened to the once great city.

True enough, but lets look at that a little closer, shall we? As The_Flail just stated, I have to agree that it was likely more of a shanty town than an actual city, yet there is little to no sign of actual shelter beyond the wooden plank rooms found on the scafolding and above the waterwheel (which I am still looking into the actual function of, from what I can tell it is essentially just a slightly primative elevator rather than an actual waterwheel). Who is to say that, in the flood, the shelters and impromtu-houses, which were likely little more than wood and cloth shacks, were simply washed away. The debris is likely just below the poisonous waters of the swamp, presumably along with th ebodies of those who died in the flood itself.

Just out of curiosity, if anyone happens to be an expert on Lordranian botanology, but what do you guys make of the trees growing into the swamp itself? were they there before the waters turned toxic or have the roots simply broken into the area over time?

Dark Souls botany segment: Those trees are actually branches of the Great Hollow and other great trees from Ash Lake. Those are most definitely ancient, so I guess their branches have been there for a long time. They seem to be immune to the poisonous waters since we can see the same kind of branches/roots in Lost Izalith/Demon Ruins and they ignore the lava.

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A problem with the theory of the flood is that it seems that water can only come from The Depths (or from the sky)...There's a big wall on one side of the Swamp and a cliff on the other side (which separates it from New Londo)

I think it would still be possible to have flooded it, they simply would have had to have damned up the river flowing through the Valley of the Drakes... Ok "simple" might be the wrong word for that task... But still perfectly possible.

Even if there were shanty cottages and such, with a massive flood similar to new londo you should still at least see scattered debris and water damage.

As I said... if you look to the depts, it is obviously a sewer. In blighttown we can see part of that sewer structure, and some "stone pipes". The Blighttown was probably the place where all those sewer goes for... plus, the "blight" in the name must have come from the diseases that the sewer spread across the people banned to blighttown (as the key to the depts clearly says that some people were banned to the depts).

As for the wood planks structures, I think it was made by those swamp-things we saw using plank-armor and firing poison darts at us. Another interesting thing is that the Plank Wood Shield, starting equipmente for the deprived, is found in blighttown, wich makes me think that blighttown is the actual home of the deprived (as almost all classes have a homeland).

FellipeMariano wrote:As I said... if you look to the depts, it is obviously a sewer. In blighttown we can see part of that sewer structure, and some "stone pipes". The Blighttown was probably the place where all those sewer goes for... plus, the "blight" in the name must have come from the diseases that the sewer spread across the people banned to blighttown (as the key to the depts clearly says that some people were banned to the depts).

As for the wood planks structures, I think it was made by those swamp-things we saw using plank-armor and firing poison darts at us. Another interesting thing is that the Plank Wood Shield, starting equipmente for the deprived, is found in blighttown, wich makes me think that blighttown is the actual home of the deprived (as almost all classes have a homeland).

And maneater mildred lives in Blighttown/Depths, she looks like a depraved aswell. I think you are right my friend.

Actually, the Depths are more likely a storm drain. Heck, even the castle uses chamber pots, so its not like they have toilets. Plus, sewers typically don't have ampetheaters large enough to fight a dragon in.

Shkar wrote:Actually, the Depths are more likely a storm drain. Heck, even the castle uses chamber pots, so its not like they have toilets. Plus, sewers typically don't have ampetheaters large enough to fight a dragon in.

Never seen a toilet in this game so good point, also never seen any chamber pots tbh where are they?

Also the arena where you fight gaping dragon has a huge waterfall in it where he climbs up from, I imagine this is where all the excess water drains.

Mr_Bungle50221 wrote:

Shkar wrote:Actually, the Depths are more likely a storm drain. Heck, even the castle uses chamber pots, so its not like they have toilets. Plus, sewers typically don't have ampetheaters large enough to fight a dragon in.

Never seen a toilet in this game so good point, also never seen any chamber pots tbh where are they?

Also the arena where you fight gaping dragon has a huge waterfall in it where he climbs up from, I imagine this is where all the excess water drains.

They are in the bedrooms in the Chapel in Anor Londo.And while it's possible that he waterfall is for excess water to drain out (can't remember if the end is straight or broken), it still doesn't really explain why there were stairs leading down there, balconies, and such a high ceiling..

Shkar wrote:

Mr_Bungle50221 wrote:

Shkar wrote:Actually, the Depths are more likely a storm drain. Heck, even the castle uses chamber pots, so its not like they have toilets. Plus, sewers typically don't have ampetheaters large enough to fight a dragon in.

Never seen a toilet in this game so good point, also never seen any chamber pots tbh where are they?

Also the arena where you fight gaping dragon has a huge waterfall in it where he climbs up from, I imagine this is where all the excess water drains.

They are in the bedrooms in the Chapel in Anor Londo.And while it's possible that he waterfall is for excess water to drain out (can't remember if the end is straight or broken), it still doesn't really explain why there were stairs leading down there, balconies, and such a high ceiling..

Japan Rainwater Drain System in Tokyo:



Looks very similar to the part of the Depths were you fight the Gaping Dragon.
The stairs were for maintenance acess, the balcony for observation of the water flow and etc. I saw a documentary about this Japan Rainwater Drain, and all that elements (balcony, high ceiling, stair and etc) were mentioned.

I'm not sure what relevance it is to all this but you know the area with the chest with a dragon scale in? It's a massive cylinder shape running all the way upwards (past the parasite with power within) and I rpesume into the depths. The area at the bottom with the chest looks like in controls water flow how the slopes and walls are and there is a slope where the parasite is as well. Aslo the area with all the blowdart snipers and fire keeper souls also looks similar.

Yep it definatly seems to me that the depths are a storm drain. From its location underneath a town, the shape of the place and of course all the water.

Also if you look at the sides of blighttown you see some stacks of bricks. They could be parts of the buildings in blighttown which survived the flood as they are partly sheilded by the walls. While i too beleve blighttown is at least now a shanty town it wasnt neccesarily always so. in fact from the cobbles in Quelags domain it seems to me that it may have been a passageway to access Iselith in the good ol' days.
just a thought

Okay guys, just played the DLC and i think that my theory is very well backed by the DLC. The DLC is based sometime after the rekindling of the flame by Gwyn. The bridge from oolacile sanctuary seems to be the bridge to Artorias' grave where you fight Sif. The river under you is full, leading east. If you all know the map of dark souls and trace the map back with your head from that location, that is the different in which the depths are, which would leave me to believe that is also where blighttown was. The water in the DLC is current diverted to Blighttown. As you have noticed, with the exception of maybe the guardian, there are no demons in the DLC. Not one. All the demons were produced from the flame of chaos which burst forth as the flame was dying. There are just small pools of water where the lake should be in the DLC. My guess? The wall that divides that river under the bridge, where you can find souls is brought down once the Kings are corrupted by the Abyss. Their corruption was probably sometime after the demise of Oolacile. The Kings probably wanted to build over the abyss and study the remains only to find Kaathe buried in a section of the abyss that was under them. He corrupted them and created the Abyss again in the form of New londo, which was then sealed to prevent the spread of the Abyss which was a much greater threat than the spread of demons.

I've always thought the Civil Engineers in Lordran were kind of suspect. Izalith and New Londo are both built underground, at least to my knowledge. That's a little strange.

Anyway, I think we are assuming that blighttown was built before it was flooded. It's quite possible that the structures you see in game were erected sometime afterwards, if there was indeed a flood. Also, most of the structures seem to be built on the side of the cliff, which may explain why the supports aren't rotten through. I've never done a full exploration of blighttown (because screw that place) but I can't really recall any other structures besides that.

A possible explanation for the toxic mud may simply be that its water that's stagnated over centuries. Water gets pretty gross after a few days of not moving around, there's no telling what kind of bacteria would grow in a swamp that's more or less underground. Especially if you have the diseased and the unwanted living there. Now, all of the sudden, you've got to deal with the bodies.

Also, I think the radiation analogy fits for the chaos flames. Many of the enemies in Lost Izalith appear to formerly have been statues. In fact, if you look closely when walking around, some of the statues remain unchanged.