The Witcher 3 Pre-Expansion Thread

[Malpercio]

Man, the

Spoiler

Haunted House

Quest pissed me off. Shit literally played itself. What's the fucking point?

 

[RK47]

Man, the

Spoiler

Haunted House

Quest pissed me off. Shit literally played itself. What's the fucking point?

Novigrad is when everything starts to fall apart.
The decline is gradual but you know it's a series of irrelevant tasks that you undergo just to advance. the. fucking. plot.
Right after Haunted House you'll be sent into a wild goose chase around town.
I hope you enjoy it

 

[cw8]

Novigrad is definitely no Velen.

Spoiler

Had fun though, killing every Witch Hunter and Torturer in Menge's stronghold then slowly burning Menge to death with Igni. Thought he could do well with some Karma.

 

[Jick Magger]

The Novigrad segment is probably the weakest section of the story, yeah. Issue is that it takes a very System-Shock approach to its objective progression. Multiple paths that shoot off to multiple objectives involving a dozen seperate characters chasing a dozen separate bread crumbs that ultimately amounts to fuck-all because Dandelion doesn't know where Ciri is. Making the whole venture feel like a gigantic waste of time.

 

[Surf Solar]

Holy shit, that segment with the

Spoiler

battle in kaer morhen

was fucking well done. I thought the game was over, but its still going on. So good.

 

[Malpercio]

I'm confused about Ciri heritage, I understand

Spoiler

she's the emperor's daughter, but then Geralt says she was conceived by the Law of Surprise

Typically this ends up being a child concieved and/or born while the father was away and more often than not,

so uh, how does it work? She counts as the emperor's daughter even though he didn't directly father her?

 

[Rivmusique]

http://witcher.wikia.com/wiki/Duny

Edit: That didn't really say what the deal with the Law of Surprise is so:

• After curing him from his curse, Duny offered whatever Geralt of Rivia asked for. Geralt asked for "that which you already have but do not know": Pavetta and Duny's daughter Ciri.

• Geralt unknowingly names Ciri as his reward a second time when he saves the life of Yurga, for while the man was away, his wife took in the orphan girl.

 

[MiX]

To answer your question,

Spoiler

Duny (aka Emhyr) married Pavetta (Ciri's mother) through the law of surprise. Then Geralt saved Duny's life which led to Duny letting Geralt ask for the law of surprise as well which was Pavetta's unborn child (Ciri). Geralt says he will come back in 6 years for the child but when he does it turns out Duny and Pavetta died at sea (Obviously, Duny survived and turned out to be Emhyr but that was a big reveal in the books). Geralt said he didn't believe in destiny and decided not to take the child, who he didn't know was a girl. Geralt ended up saving a peasant Yurga who also let him use the law of surprise which led to Geralt meeting Ciri again who was taken in as an orphan by Yurga's wife. So basically Geralt's fate was intertwined with Ciri's twice. Also, the scene where Geralt finally finds Ciri in the game where it shows the little girl Ciri and Geralt running to hug each other is directly from the books. Geralt and Ciri promised to be together "forever" which is when their strong father/daughter relationship started. You sort of have to read the books to understand why Geralt and Ciri are so close.

 

[NotAGolfer]

Started playing it yesterday and so far (White Orchard, a couple of hours spent there) I really dig it.

Random pros and cons so far:
+ love the atmosphere and the mature, multilayered stories/characters
+ worldbuilding seems great
+ I don't think I'll ever get tired of Witcher sense detective work, even though it's braindead; I see it as a great way to use environmental storytelling and to make sure that the player doesn't miss all the work put into that aspect, not as a minigame that's supposed to be challenging
+ combat is kinda fun so far

- don't like how you can collect everything that's not nailed down, the game rewards me for being a thief
- Death March is the new hard? Really? Ffs!
- MMO equipment leveling is lame
- crafting system seems to be just as obsolete as in Witcher 2, also staring at that level 13 blueprint on level 1 is depressing
- controls outside of combat indeed feel a bit like steering a tank but like some people said, walking on default with occasional sprints makes it bearable

So far I have no conclusive opinion about the combat. I'm playing on Death March and it really is deadly which is great. But why do you always have to choose the highest difficulty level nowadays to get a challenge?
Btw, rolling still seems to pretty much guarantee invulnerability, but it's better than in Witcher 2 because rolling around prevents me from getting into a good attacking position so in most cases it just drags out fights without accomplishing much. Still have to learn the moves, there must be another way to win fights than rolling out of reach and igniting the enemy.

Oh and I guess I have to change my playstyle to keep enjoying it. Completionist behavior, meaning clearing out every question mark on the map and looting every house, seems rather pointless and unfun.

edit:
Is it normal that wolves insult me verbally when attacking? I mean maybe they are magic wolves...

 

[Cromwell]

The Novigrad segment is probably the weakest section of the story, yeah. Issue is that it takes a very System-Shock approach to its objective progression. Multiple paths that shoot off to multiple objectives involving a dozen seperate characters chasing a dozen separate bread crumbs that ultimately amounts to fuck-all because Dandelion doesn't know where Ciri is. Making the whole venture feel like a gigantic waste of time.

Spoiler

I think the problem is not that Ciri is not thereor that dandelion or the baron both did not know where she went (same goes for skellige) but that in all 3 main regions you dont really pick up a trail. The story should have let ciri do something of note that helps him find her or which ties in the overall story. But theres nothign really going on, the hunt has no impact at all apart from two villages in velen and in skellige which they raped.

There are only two things of note happening which are tied to the main story, ciri beeing found, and you fighting the hunt. Everything else is not related, there are no twists, there are no new insiights since you know from the beginning why the hunt wants her. Thats also a problem which presents itself during novigrad. You start at the orchard you get the main quest, turns out the baron doesnt know anything, shit happens, but then you finish novigrad and again nobody doesnt know shit about shit, at this point you start to get burned out and you know skellige will be the same.

When you finally find her you hope for something more but the only thing you get is "well I was bored thats why I am not save anymore, lets go fuck the hunt" and thats it to the end. So the whole story is far to boring and theres no real payoff, and you start to suspect it after novigrad. at least thats how it was for me.

put it in spoiler after realising its the release thread sorry

 

[Zep Zepo]

Welp...Ony real complaint I have is...

While the open world was HUGE...you only ever found anything interesting at the "Question Mark Areas". Otherwise it was just a lot of wasted space.

As the *-Fag points go:

I'm am explore fag..so that was kind of disappointing.

The storyfag in me is OK with it.

The combat fag in me is sorta OK with it.

the "rpg fag" in me is kinda...confused. Did it really matter?

the c&c fag is wondering if anything "really" mattered (esp. with the timed bullshit).

Zep--

 

[Carrion]

Spoiler

I think the problem is not that Ciri is not thereor that dandelion or the baron both did not know where she went (same goes for skellige) but that in all 3 main regions you dont really pick up a trail. The story should have let ciri do something of note that helps him find her or which ties in the overall story. But theres nothign really going on, the hunt has no impact at all apart from two villages in velen and in skellige which they raped.

There are only two things of note happening which are tied to the main story, ciri beeing found, and you fighting the hunt. Everything else is not related, there are no twists, there are no new insiights since you know from the beginning why the hunt wants her. Thats also a problem which presents itself during novigrad. You start at the orchard you get the main quest, turns out the baron doesnt know anything, shit happens, but then you finish novigrad and again nobody doesnt know shit about shit, at this point you start to get burned out and you know skellige will be the same.

When you finally find her you hope for something more but the only thing you get is "well I was bored thats why I am not save anymore, lets go fuck the hunt" and thats it to the end. So the whole story is far to boring and theres no real payoff, and you start to suspect it after novigrad. at least thats how it was for me.

put it in spoiler after realising its the release thread sorry

Spoiler

The curse is what connects those early quests, although it plays such a small part and only gets mentioned so late that it doesn't really manage to build up any kind of real tension, at most just raise a couple of small questions. It's just too blurry that you could make any real deductions about it, too vague to make you want to learn more. Some aspects of it, like finding Uma, are also just pure accidents rather than direct results of your actions, and they mean nothing to you until much later on.

I think one problem with the approach they took with the early parts of the main quest was that they went for a BioWare structure, meaning three different areas that can in theory be done in any order, although the level gating means that you don't get all that much out of the structure. It's very easy to guess right at the start that you'll need to go through all of the three main areas before you're able to find Ciri, which takes away a lot of the intensity from your search, especially when you realize the size of the game and that by the time you've found Ciri you'll have probably done 90% of the content of the game. If you were just sent to Velen at the start of the game without any mention of the other places, there'd at least be some uncertainty about where Ciri might be and at which point of the game you could expect to find her.

In any case, I did enjoy the early parts of the main quest a whole lot and actually think the quality of the story dropped a bit after finding Ciri, although that's partially related to the pacing of the game (almost all of the exploration in the game is in the very first act) and not just the plot itself.

 

[Tigranes]

The main story is definitely much weaker, which is where TW2 shines. TW3 has all the right ingredients, but doesn't use them. The bloody war that everyone's talking about? Well, it was nice to have Nilfgaard oppress the peasants in White Orchard, but we don't see enough of that in Velen at all. Why the hell didn't they make all of Velen show this, like Gothic 3 did with orcs subjugating humans? So much opportunity there lost, and Velen would look 90% the same if it was still Temerian. And as you guys mention with Ciri, there simply is not much of a story there:

Spoiler

When you finally meet her and she gives you the lowdown, you don't actually need to hear it. It's boring and tehre's no new info. Oh we ran around a bit yeah and now we might as well just kill the Hunt. *shrug* From the beginning I found myself playing for each individual quest and the story it tells - rescuing Dandelion is a lot more fun when you focus on the city politics involving Menge and the four underworld lords, for example, and the Baron story is an excellent stand-alone one. Skellige would similarly be cool if the main story arc there wasn't so lukewarm.

 

[Jick Magger]

I do appreciate all the various kinds of equipment they put in the game, it's just a shame I wind up never using any of them. Whole array of gambeson's I'll never wear, plate armors I'll never wear, silver swords I'll never use, and steel swords I'll never use, because the Witcher Gear is almost always a better and more viable alternative. There are some schematics for weapons that are even better than the Witcher gear, but you can't use any of them until you're around level 35-37, and you're already pretty much a god of death by the time you hit level 31, so it seems kinda unecessary.

Have a feeling the writers had a real hard-on for the Wolf Witcher gear you wear, seeing as its plastered all over the promo material. Shame that it's your starter armor that you'll probably quickly abandon the moment you get anything with slightly higher stats. Also shame that most of the other witcher gears look like shit compared to it, in my opinion.

 

[RK47]

I do appreciate all the various kinds of equipment they put in the game, it's just a shame I wind up never using any of them. Whole array of gambeson's I'll never wear, plate armors I'll never wear, silver swords I'll never use, and steel swords I'll never use, because the Witcher Gear is almost always a better and more viable alternative. There are some schematics for weapons that are even better than the Witcher gear, but you can't use any of them until you're around level 35-37, and you're already pretty much a god of death by the time you hit level 31, so it seems kinda unecessary.

Have a feeling the writers had a real hard-on for the Wolf Witcher gear you wear, seeing as its plastered all over the promo material. Shame that it's your starter armor that you'll probably quickly abandon the moment you get anything with slightly higher stats. Also shame that most of the other witcher gears look like shit compared to it, in my opinion.

 

[Minttunator]

Have a feeling the writers had a real hard-on for the Wolf Witcher gear you wear, seeing as its plastered all over the promo material. Shame that it's your starter armor that you'll probably quickly abandon the moment you get anything with slightly higher stats. Also shame that most of the other witcher gears look like shit compared to it, in my opinion.

Yeah, you can upgrade it once but you'll probably still end up replacing it before level 10. They released a Wolf Armour DLC a few days ago but that's a separate set of armour and doesn't look as good.

 

[RK47]

Not sure how they come up with their weapons at times...

 

[Starwars]

Not really surprising given that graphics and atmosphere seems to be CD Projekt's forte, but Novigrad is pretty impressive as far as RPG cities go. Still, the size of it and the world around makes it feel a bit empty of content in a way.

Vizima from the first game is probably still my favorite though, that was just awesome in how shitty it felt.

 

[Gerrard]

If anything the Novigrad in the game is way too small. It was supposed to be a city with 30K+ population.

 

[Carrion]

The game really needs drinking games with commoners and proper mechanics for getting drunk as fuck. Novigrad is surely impressive, but there was just something special about Vizima that neither Vergen nor Novigrad managed to capture. Maybe it's just that both TW2 and TW3 were so focused on quests, whereas TW1 had lots of random and not-so-random people you could just talk to, and especially the inns and the taverns had some fun game mechanics tied to them as well, like drinking games (combined with real C&C, like having to walk through half of the town home at a snail's pace and hobbling from side to side because you drank too much), fist fighting (available in the other games too, but in a more limited form), lots of dice poker opponents (now you just play a game of Gwent with the innkeep and you're pretty much done), and an actual need to buy alcohol as well as rent a room for meditating. It was just fun to hang around there between quests. Novigrad is full of life and just looks amazing at times with some parts of the city completely changing based on the time of day, but most of it is just a backdrop, and you don't really get that same feeling of a city adventure that you got in Vizima.

Oxenfurt is a real disappointment, though, very small and only has a small number of quests connected to it.

 

[Jick Magger]

Have a feeling the writers had a real hard-on for the Wolf Witcher gear you wear, seeing as its plastered all over the promo material. Shame that it's your starter armor that you'll probably quickly abandon the moment you get anything with slightly higher stats. Also shame that most of the other witcher gears look like shit compared to it, in my opinion.

Yeah, you can upgrade it once but you'll probably still end up replacing it before level 10. They released a Wolf Armour DLC a few days ago but that's a separate set of armour and doesn't look as good.

I'd say the Ursine armor is probably the best of those gears, if it weren't for its constant fucking clipping. Usually it's ok but any time Geralt has to turn his head 90 degrees his chin'll clip right through the collar and it's distracting as fuck.

 

[RK47]

 

[DeepOcean]

Holy shit who was the sadistic potato who thought it was a good idea to make the whole portion of the main quest on Novigrad a wild goose chase?

 

[abnaxus]

Holy shit who was the sadistic potato who thought it was a good idea to make the whole fucking game a wild goose chase?

fixed

 

[DeepOcean]

Holy shit who was the sadistic potato who thought it was a good idea to make the whole fucking game a wild goose chase?

fixed

Yeah, things would be far easier if Ciri showed up on Kaer Morhen and said "Hey Lambert, is dad at home? Can't stay for long, there is places to see, things to do but tell him I wanna meet him on the Cinematic Tits tavern on that swamp on Velen, alright?"