The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine Expansion

[Tytus]

Oh god, that generic english female voice #4.

Yup she voiced female Hawke in DA2/3 so you know they scraped the bottom of the barrel to cast voice for Ciri.

 

[Gerrard]

 

[janior]

just finished it, pretty shitty dlc compared to hos

 

[Endemic]

Yup she voiced female Hawke in DA2/3 so you know they scraped the bottom of the barrel to cast voice for Ciri.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0943557/?ref_=tt_cl_t3 hmm...

Most of the cast is theatre and TV mini-series actors, Wyatt is pretty much the only one with a lot of VG work on her resume.

 

[Gerrard]

The attack of an army of vampires was dumber than Ciri killing the ice age. The main quest is way too short, it seems that 90% of this DLC is pointless sidequest shit.

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

Yup she voiced female Hawke in DA2/3 so you know they scraped the bottom of the barrel to cast voice for Ciri.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0943557/?ref_=tt_cl_t3 hmm...

Most of the cast is theatre and TV mini-series actors, Wyatt is pretty much the only one with a lot of VG work on her resume.

And the Witch Hunter Graden is played by the guy who took the role of Paul Artriedies in the Dune Mini-Series and did a pretty poor job, then played Paul again in Children of Dune and was great. He also played an archer in some DLC for dragon age 2, but I don't know how he was in that. But to me to have somebody capable to play such a small part well speaks volumes about the good casting decisions and direction of CDPR team.

Yup she voiced female Hawke in DA2/3 so you know they scraped the bottom of the barrel to cast voice for Ciri.

Imagine if you were the actor and all you had to work with at bioware were try hard lines, cartoon manga fighting graphics and awesome button directing, then at CDPR with their writing, the close facial animated interactions and direction from people who love and understsand the lore. Honestly I can act a bit and after playing the Witchers' and Mass Effect 1 and 2 and Dragon Age 1 and 2 I can quite easily understand why you would phone in a performance for Bioware as the game itself and their designers have already pre-determined how you should speak and when to add a little awesome or badass sauce. In the Witcher 3 the facial expressions and relatable relationships allow a little leeway and nuance to the voice performance, for example Graden always seems to be clearing his throat, that's probably the actors tic to give the character a little depth and CDPR went along with it.

 

[HoboForEternity]

crud, the alchemy lab under the house is bugged.

paparently if you upgrade the house before doing the mutagen stat upgrade quest, you can't interact with the table. god damnit CDPR

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

crud, the alchemy lab under the house is bugged.

paparently if you upgrade the house before doing the mutagen stat upgrade quest, you can't interact with the table. god damnit CDPR

That's my main gripe with the witcher 3. They put so much into such little details they never implimented them right in an open world, who the fuck cares about buying chicken legs or cheese from a bar if a decoction will give you an instant vitality hit from jumping about the place? The Witcher does many things brilliantly but what it doesn't do is give you a sense of dread when you take on a contract and that all the little things matter to save your skin. Jesus I've being playing n deathmarch since the start and I've honestly lost my life more times from attempting time saving short cut high jumps from small heights than anything else.

Witcher 3 would work better if the contracts were approached as when you took them on you couldn't go back until they were fulfilled and used the inception of the contract as cinamatic cut-scenes, in bars etc. just to give you the atmosphere of a real Witcher contract, from then on out it wouldn't matter how the deal turned you as a player would be invested within it. Instead it's almost like a GTA sidequest. I do love the game and it's atmosphere still, but I think in some cases in Witcher 3 less could have been more

 

[HoboForEternity]

Witcher 3 would work better if the contracts were approached as when you took them on you couldn't go back until they were fulfilled and used the inception of the contract as cinamatic cut-scenes, in bars etc.

isn't what you said is basically GTA type missions? in RPG, you usually take a quest, then can do it whenever you want.
while in GTA, you take a mission, and must do it before doing anything else.

anyway found this nice bits from that stolen testicles quest XD

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

Witcher 3 would work better if the contracts were approached as when you took them on you couldn't go back until they were fulfilled and used the inception of the contract as cinamatic cut-scenes, in bars etc.

isn't what you said is basically GTA type missions? in RPG, you usually take a quest, then can do it whenever you want.
while in GTA, you take a mission, and must do it before doing anything else.

anyway found this nice bits from that stolen testicles quest XD

What an odd easter egg.

No what I meant is this...You take the contract and you are all in no changing armor etc. You go through what the contract entails, perhaps there's a stormy discussion about the beast at the pub and perhaps you have to do something. Sorry I've just realised I can cut a long story short, remember the Ian Livingston choose your own adventure books then each contract should have been like that with peril and also greater reward. Otherwise whats the point of a Witcher if he does a contract for 100-200 coins where as the loot from a bandit camp brings him 1000 gold.
And also if you take the contract you do it before it expires- otherwise beast attack-etc-etc) CDPR did a good job appealing to folks with Witcher, but in the end it's lost that horror of creeping around on dark roads if Geralt is so strong he can take down 12 men/beasts at a time, without breakin a sweat.

 

[Gerrard]

Spoiler

What the fuck is the point of the whole "finding out who the last victim was supposed to be" if she ignores your warnings and dies anyway?

I just wasted 30 minutes replaying the ending because of overwritten autosaves.

E: I went and checked all possible endings. And they are all terrible.

 

[Mrowak]

Finished main quest. I cannot say I was impressed by it - the crazy stuff such as

Spoiler

Mass assault of Vampires on Beauclair

stank of high fantasy D&D pulp. Also the main (supernatural) villain was all kinds of derp. However, I have to say it was very engaging and kept you on the edge of your seat. All in all it was, a major step down from excellent HoS, but still miles above competition (PoE, I am looking at you).

By contrast, the side-content is simply exquisite. This is the first game that had me do quests after main campaign concluded. Stuff such as this is why I play games for:

Spoiler

 

[Orma]

Yeah basically shit happens cuz the villain is very angry and impulsive

 

[Merlkir]

The expansions should've come out in the opposite order, everyone would've liked both of them better.

 

[Carrion]

By contrast, the side-content is simply exquisite. This is the first game that had me do quests after main campaign concluded. Stuff such as this is why I play games for:

Spoiler

The cool thing about this quest is that

Spoiler

although it might initially seem like a very straightforward boss fight with a reward, you actually need to somehow demonstrate all of the five virtues in order to get Aerondight, and there are multiple ways to do that in the expansion.

 

[Malpercio]

The side content is more of the same shit, i.e. quests that ultimately play themselves using your batman sense. I cringed at the "investigative" parts that basically just require you to examine a body, press 1-2-3-4 and then Geralt automatically gives you the solution. May as well make the whole thing a giant CS, who are they fooling.

kek

 

[Orma]

By contrast, the side-content is simply exquisite. This is the first game that had me do quests after main campaign concluded. Stuff such as this is why I play games for:

Spoiler

The cool thing about this quest is that

Spoiler

although it might initially seem like a very straightforward boss fight with a reward, you actually need to somehow demonstrate all of the five virtues in order to get Aerondight, and there are multiple ways to do that in the expansion.

How do you even trigger the quest?

Spoiler

I got the sword but i just happened to swim there and came across the hermit, didn't get the quest before meeting him.
Btw too bad you can't bang her again

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[bonescraper]

Spoiler

did you try to... trigger all notice boards? They are flashing yellow if got something interesting...

Half of them contain NOTHING interesting.

 

[Orma]

P. much, all they had for me were low level contracts.(i'm level 52) Which is why i didn't bother checking them out.

Spoiler

did you try to... trigger all notice boards? They are flashing yellow if got something interesting...

Half of them contain NOTHING interesting.

 

[Carrion]

You can also trigger the quest by eavesdropping on a conversation at the tourney grounds.

The side content is more of the same shit, i.e. quests that ultimately play themselves using your batman sense.

From what I remember, there are precisely three examples of somewhat proper use of the witcher senses in the entirety of TW3, one in the main game and one in each of the expansions:

Spoiler

1. The quest with the "merchant" in White Orchard, where you need to go search for the wagon in the swamp. This was one of the quests that they showcased before the release of the game, and it was criticized for various reasons, but the nice thing about it is that you can actually fail by missing out on the critical clues, and there's a decision you have to make based on your findings. Of course, it's pretty much completely watered down by the fact that Geralt solves the puzzle all by himself as long as you're thorough with the Witcher senses, as he just can't help himself but keeps thinking aloud. Detective quests quite simply would be better if there was some actual deduction involved.

2. In HoS one of the side quests takes you to a near-empty village. It's possible to just follow the quest markers, use the witcher senses when the game tells you to and finish the quest, but in order to actually solve the mystery you need to look around a bit on your own.

3. In B&W there's the quest where you escort Count Beledal through the forest looking for animals, and you need to use witcher senses to locate them. I've only played through the quest once so I don't know if it really affects the final outcome, but you may avoid some combat encounters if you pay attention.

That's about it. All of that is really basic stuff, of course, something that should barely deserve a mention, but it's weird how they never even tried to deviate from the completely brainless "hold RMB and examine everything that glows red" approach when it comes to a central game mechanic that is present in almost every quest. Just giving you the opportunity to fail once in a while, not to mention make deductions yourself based on your findings, would've massively improved things.

 

[Eirikur]

Finally a German (partial) version of the Lullaby of Woe. Prefer the cockney English accent though.

 

[RK47]

You can also trigger the quest by eavesdropping on a conversation at the tourney grounds.

The side content is more of the same shit, i.e. quests that ultimately play themselves using your batman sense.

From what I remember, there are precisely three examples of somewhat proper use of the witcher senses in the entirety of TW3, one in the main game and one in each of the expansions:

Spoiler

1. The quest with the "merchant" in White Orchard, where you need to go search for the wagon in the swamp. This was one of the quests that they showcased before the release of the game, and it was criticized for various reasons, but the nice thing about it is that you can actually fail by missing out on the critical clues, and there's a decision you have to make based on your findings. Of course, it's pretty much completely watered down by the fact that Geralt solves the puzzle all by himself as long as you're thorough with the Witcher senses, as he just can't help himself but keeps thinking aloud. Detective quests quite simply would be better if there was some actual deduction involved.

2. In HoS one of the side quests takes you to a near-empty village. It's possible to just follow the quest markers, use the witcher senses when the game tells you to and finish the quest, but in order to actually solve the mystery you need to look around a bit on your own.

3. In B&W there's the quest where you escort Count Beledal through the forest looking for animals, and you need to use witcher senses to locate them. I've only played through the quest once so I don't know if it really affects the final outcome, but you may avoid some combat encounters if you pay attention.

That's about it. All of that is really basic stuff, of course, something that should barely deserve a mention, but it's weird how they never even tried to deviate from the completely brainless "hold RMB and examine everything that glows red" approach when it comes to a central game mechanic that is present in almost every quest. Just giving you the opportunity to fail once in a while, not to mention make deductions yourself based on your findings, would've massively improved things.

Don't want to make people use their brain lah.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

Witcher sense is a result of trying to make the game realistic. In a normal game clues and tracks would be instantly visible making player look for them in the game world. In reality however nobody would hire a Witcher to find something that is perfectly obvious to normal people so we are left with going from one gloving red objects to another. Combat suffers from the same problem. Animations are needlessly long (because obviously that's what a real Witcher would fight like) which makes fights a slog and forces player to rely on shit like Quen and becoming immortal during sidesteps.

 

[Mrowak]

Witcher sense is a result of trying to make the game realistic. In a normal game clues and tracks would be instantly visible making player look for them in the game world. In reality however nobody would hire a Witcher to find something that is perfectly obvious to normal people so we are left with going from one gloving red objects to another. Combat suffers from the same problem. Animations are needlessly long (because obviously that's what a real Witcher would fight like) which makes fights a slog and forces player to rely on shit like Quen and becoming immortal during sidesteps.

About Quen, with proper build you can practically forget about it.

I replayed the final B&W boss fight today. On my first playthrough I heavily invested in magic - result: I was barely able to do any damage and was shread to pieces by the bossess' special attacks that pierced through Quen. Hell, I had to lower the difficulty.

However, upon quick respec into Alchemy with a dash of Fighting tree my Geralt was back into murder machine mode. I could chuck hectolitres of potions and decoctions which increased my resistance and healing capabilities to such a degree that I was able to shrug off most attacks. And that skill that lets you ignore ALL damage sustained while dodging is broken as fuck.

Later I faught some bandits and the results were sublime - instead of strafing and slashing back and time again I could enter into thick of the fight slaughter a bunch of enemies with minimal wounds. Me like.

So yeah - balance. The Sign skill tree becomes progressively useless through the game. At the start it's clearly the strongest choice as it offers renewable dramatic effects that enable crowdcontrol. However, at the endgame there are so many more better options for crowd control than signs, plus, with alternatives, you have much higher damage output to boot.