[SPOILERS] When was Amnoon cleared?

In Daybreak the city of Amnoon gets a ton of branded, there is a huge hecking brandstorm turning lots of people into sparkly grape crystals, yet in Long Live the Lich, the city shows as clean and pristine as usual.

How did that happen? When was the brand cleared? What happened to all the enemies and corruption? Did the story team forget that there was a brandstorm a few chapters ago?? O.o

Thanks for reading

they cleaned it up

After all the enemies died because we killed them they just removed the crystals. Easy

Chapters are usually months apart. I imagine the casino chap used his not inconsiderable resources

The Amnoon we see in open world is stuck at the start of PoF.

The one we see in instances was supposedly cleared up before the brand could spread from the lesser brandstorm created by a dragon minion.

The problem with the "cleared up" notion is that, as the charr can attest to, branded buildings and soil can't just turned back to how it was. It is a pretty massive break in continuity that the buildings that got branded are okay in the LLtL instance.

Killing off all the branded? Easy. We did that in the story instance. Removing and then replacing the giant pyramid structures that are the foundation of Amnoon which got turned into partial crystal? Much harder to do - if they really just cleaned up the branded structures that fast, why can't clear up the effects of a sandstorm just as easily?

But given how bad the quality of Episode 3 is overall, where it feels like almost all effort went into the final instance alone, this lack of continuity doesn't surprise me.

@"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:The problem with the "cleared up" notion is that, as the charr can attest to, branded buildings and soil can't just turned back to how it was. It is a pretty massive break in continuity that the buildings that got branded are okay in the LLtL instance.

because the severity differs branding caused by a brand storm would logically be less evere then branding caused by kralk personally.

Killing off all the branded? Easy. We did that in the story instance. Removing and then replacing the giant pyramid structures that are the foundation of Amnoon which got turned into partial crystal? Much harder to do - if they really just cleaned up the branded structures that fast, why can't clear up the effects of a sandstorm just as easily?on the scale of issues that need adressing "not get murdered by the armies of a rampaging war god" and "dangerous Crystals liter the street" are of higher priority then "some peeps can't get in their house because of sand. also sand is a pain to move

@"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:The problem with the "cleared up" notion is that, as the charr can attest to, branded buildings and soil can't just turned back to how it was. It is a pretty massive break in continuity that the buildings that got branded are okay in the LLtL instance.

Killing off all the branded? Easy. We did that in the story instance. Removing and then replacing the giant pyramid structures that are the foundation of Amnoon which got turned into partial crystal? Much harder to do - if they really just cleaned up the branded structures that fast, why can't clear up the effects of a sandstorm just as easily?As @"derd.6413" said, there is likely a big difference between Kralkatorrik projecting a storm and Kralkatorrik's presence in an area, which causes substantial changes in the immediate area. Since Kralkatorrik has moved south and later off world, I imagine the northern brand has gotten weaker, but as maps are stuck in time, we can't see any of that.Also, the rapidly growing crystals also known as Kralkatite can be broken up into volatile magic. I imagine the commander crushes it, or induces a shock to turn the material back into raw magic. Maybe Aurene could have helped for one or two months in absorbing the volatile magic, which is why we got the mastery to collect volatile magic in Istan.This could be an example of gameplay and story integration, but this is never communicated.

@Castigator.3470 said:As @"derd.6413" said, there is likely a big difference between Kralkatorrik projecting a storm and Kralkatorrik's presence in an area, which causes substantial changes in the immediate area.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Crescent's_Prosperity

This place was hit not by Kralkatorrik, but by his minions in a similar manner as Amnoon. Yet the ground and buildings were all branded. In the instance, we saw buildings and the land turned into and impaled by crystal. Like Crescent's Prosperity, Amnoon wasn't as fully coated, but it was definitely branded. It's unlikely to fix either place up without completely demolishing most if not all of those buildings and rebuilding them.

Since Kralkatorrik has moved south and later off world, I imagine the northern brand has gotten weaker, but as maps are stuck in time, we can't see any of that.Dragon corruption doesn't lessen with the Elder Dragons' distancing.

Also, the rapidly growing crystals also known as Kralkatite can be broken up into volatile magic. I suppose Aurene could have helped for one or two months in absorbing the volatile magic, which is why we got the mastery to collect volatile magic in Istan.

It is possible to break down the branded crystal. This isn't new. But being able to remove it so easily would be, when it changes the landscape. If Amnoon was just a bunch of meteorites like in Istan, then those could be moved and the damaged fixed fairly easily. But it was more than that, particularly around where we fought Qais and the wyvern.

It seems like there's different degrees of branding. Obviously, if Kralkatorrik flies directly overhead, it's game over. Anything directly branded by Kralk's presence is irreparably and instantaneously changed. However, it seems when the brand is spread in other ways, through either the brandscar spreading or Kralk's minions spreading it around, it's less powerful. This indirect branding can be contained and driven back if you're quick enough to catch it before it takes root, and diligent enough to stamp out every crystal. You can see this in the areas in Ascalon where you have to help keep the brand from spreading, the Shatterer's branding crystals you can crack open and free people from, or in the accumulating brand crystals you can shake off in Jahai. I'd assume Kralk's long-distance branding (though brandstones or brandstorms) is this type of indirect branding. If it wasn't done by the big guy himself, you can stop it from taking hold and undo it if you hurry and contain it.

It's not just Long Live the Lich. In Daybreak, the very next step after Amnoon is branded is... to go to the Amnoon docks to book passage to Istan, where it seems everything is business as usual. Dockmaster seems busy, and there just happens to be a ship heading your way that you can board.