I just had to cut 2 huge peices outta my grafted Lactea crest because it had this big Brown spots that where flaking and drying out and spreading! I brought the thing home with ME cause i knew it was prob gonna die and get thrown away if i didn't take him home LOL, but i cut the pieces out and he's callousing over fine im sure yours will do the same.

So just the brown spots, or the discoloured bits too? If you look close (at my crappy blurry pic lol!) the red discolouration runs down a bit lower then the brown spots...

Are the spots hard or soft? I was told the hard spots are a result of too much direct sun and will not cause the plant harm. Ugly - yes, but harm, no. I just wanted to mention that before you started cutting them out. Our E. lactea experts will chime in soon with better advice.

Here's what my light colored lactea crest looks like. I have several spots like this. You can see a little red around the brown spots too.

Ohh that's interesting! Honestly, I have not poked them, so I'm not sure if they are hard or not. I'm actually in Australia, so being night now I'll wait til morning and inspect them more closely. Our sun is pretty warm, so a burn would make sense, however we have had a lot of rain recently, so it could have gorn the other way too. I am intending in the next few days to put a hard plastic roof over them due to the rain, (I lost a much smaller succulent this week due to rot so I'm taking precautions). Ohh I hope it's sun spots lol! After I inspect it in the morning I might move it to a slightly shadier spot too. Thanks so much :-)

IDkmaybe mine was sunburned but it hasn't been very sunny in Massachusetts to even get burned, it was like that when i bought it in the store... felt bad for it the guy was just gonna toss him out :-(
Anyway, mine started to spread into a bigger mark and it didn't look to be getting any better so i did a little surgery and he's doing much better..so it's one of those calls you kinda gotta make for yourself after you've exhausted all possibility of what it could be and what will have to be done.

People will help you on here so you can figure it out.

KittieKAT, I don't know if we had the same issue or not, and I am certainly not arguing with you. My spot also spread, and of course I panicked. You can see how it was pretty small and spread, but the spot is now the same size 2 years later. I was keeping my plants in full sun all year long, as I have that opportunity here in SW Florida. My dark green plant did not develop the spots.

If it IS rot, that's a whole different ball game and waiting to see what happens will be the demise of the plant. I just wanted to offer the possibility that it wasn't rot. I guess a hard spot is ok, soft and mushy, not so much!

I had those, and ever worse. The plant heals itself and later over grew it so you can't even tell now. Mine is getting very old. I need to get more up dated pictures.
Here's an old picture of it.

Here's a picture of an offset I removed a few years ago. It is next to a gifted E. lactea 'White Ghost'. Mine grew arms and I hope it revert back to cresta.

Morning! It's a beautiful sunny day and... the spots are hard! (I'm taking this as a good sign!) Lol. So my plan for now, move it to a shadier position, I'm thinking less afternoon sun would be good. And watch it like a hawk! Thanks so much everyone!

Morning! It's a beautiful sunny day and... the spots are hard! (I'm taking this as a good sign!) Lol. So my plan for now, move it to a shadier position, I'm thinking less afternoon sun would be good. And watch it like a hawk! Thanks so much everyone!

Yea!! Here's hoping all goes well with your plant! And thanks to Stush, who told me not to worry about my spots.

@Misselle what happened with this plant?