Witcher III : PT III : Blood and Winos

[Warden of the North]

Gonna play this again soon.

Ive declared it my "Game of the Decade"

 

[ArchAngel55]

Complete Edition is only $15 on PSN right now.

 

[Chaels Arms]

I had a number of false starts when trying to go through a second play through. I just couldn't get myself through White Orchard and Velen. Just started it again and made a beeline to Novigrad so I think I'm going to finish this one out. Crazy seeing my last save was from 2016 and I still remember so much about the story. Picked a new choice in dealing with the witches in the bog and happy I did, really cool and different result.

 

[Turin]

I had a number of false starts when trying to go through a second play through. I just couldn't get myself through White Orchard and Velen. Just started it again and made a beeline to Novigrad so I think I'm going to finish this one out. Crazy seeing my last save was from 2016 and I still remember so much about the story. Picked a new choice in dealing with the witches in the bog and happy I did, really cool and different result.

I’ll probably play this game through every year at this point. Once you get out of White Orchard/get some not horrid looking gear it can snowball quickly. Though it’s already at the point where I remember every detail from even the Witcher contracts.

 

[Bocephus86]

I just restarted a play through after finishing the netflix show. I think I'm going to create a real back up save right around the Bloody Baron quest and write down a reminder for myself so, if I ever wanted a 4th play through, I can just start there. There isn't much outside of Kiera that really matters prior to that, and I seem to make the same choices with her every time so it doesn't even matter.

 

[tacogeoff]

I just restarted a play through after finishing the netflix show. I think I'm going to create a real back up save right around the Bloody Baron quest and write down a reminder for myself so, if I ever wanted a 4th play through, I can just start there. There isn't much outside of Kiera that really matters prior to that, and I seem to make the same choices with her every time so it doesn't even matter.

I agree. The game really takes of after the bloody baron. I remember that I stopped playing around there and then picked it back up a month or so later to be blown away

 

[Bocephus86]

I agree. The game really takes of after the bloody baron. I remember that I stopped playing around there and then picked it back up a month or so later to be blown away

Exactly the same thing happened to me. Honestly I think I bought it because of this forum talking about it, got through White Orchard and into Velen, and thought "this isn't for me". Posted that here and someone said "keep going through the bloody baron". I listened, got hooked, and it's my favorite game (of this type) of all time, pretty easily. So glad I listened haha.

 

[ArchAngel55]

Finally ran into Letho. After about my 10th time playing/beating this game, I didn't even know I kept missing a witcher.

 

[Chaels Arms]

Finally ran into Letho. After about my 10th time playing/beating this game, I didn't even know I kept missing a witcher.

Had no idea Letho was in the game until reading your post. Now I have to backtrack to Velen.

 

[Bocephus86]

I know it's going on like 5 years old, but there's a thing with Letho:

Spoiler: Letho

You had to have spared him in the Witcher 2. If you didn't play/load a play through, you have to tell the Nilfguard Emperor that you spared him during that conversation right after White Orchard. Otherwise he won't show.

Spoiler: Letho Location

If you did spare him, he's in Velen & you run into him during some mission where youre supposed to go check out a creepy/old manor. If you didn't spare him, I'm 99% sure he's 'replaced' with a couple wraiths.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

Only played the game once and ran into Letho, funny

 

[ArchAngel55]

Had no idea Letho was in the game until reading your post. Now I have to backtrack to Velen.

I think he appeared because of the answers I gave when meeting the emperor. It was the Ghosts of the Past mission. I can't believe I missed him every single time.

 

[aleshemsky83]

I think he appeared because of the answers I gave when meeting the emperor. It was the Ghosts of the Past mission. I can't believe I missed him every single time.

Yep, he wont be in the game unless you say you let him live.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Letho and Geralt have a great chemistry in TW3. It's too bad you don't see him again until the Battle for Kaer Morhen (assuming you invite him there after his side quest).

Also I'm almost finished with BaW again, and I am not looking forward to the end mission in the game. The DLC is pretty much fantastic except for that part.

Spoiler

A gigantic vampire attack killing innocent people completely destroyed Dettlaff as a complex character and just reduced him to straight evil.

 

[Warden of the North]

I havent played in a long time. Better part of a year anyways. Last time I played I beat the base game (for the second time) and stopped playing early into Hearts of Stone. The place to pick this game up after months away is not just before fighting that giant frog in the sewers followed by the duel with Olgierd.

I got through the frog only dying a couple times before I got into the groove of this game again. But Olgierd is wrecking me I havent been able to get him lower then 50% health in the like 15 times Ive tried to beat him. I dont remember having near this trouble beating him the first time I beat HoS. Gonna have to play for a few hours doing some less tough stuff before going back to him.

 

[Warden of the North]

Apparently its having its best numbers ever on Steam right now, due to the show. It also just dawned on me that it launched on Microsoft Games Pass at the same time as the premiere on Netflix.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

I havent played in a long time. Better part of a year anyways. Last time I played I beat the base game (for the second time) and stopped playing early into Hearts of Stone. The place to pick this game up after months away is not just before fighting that giant frog in the sewers followed by the duel with Olgierd.

I got through the frog only dying a couple times before I got into the groove of this game again. But Olgierd is wrecking me I havent been able to get him lower then 50% health in the like 15 times Ive tried to beat him. I dont remember having near this trouble beating him the first time I beat HoS. Gonna have to play for a few hours doing some less tough stuff before going back to him.

What is your build like?

A decoction/quen build is absolutely OP in the game, and if you can get the manticore armor you can use four decoctions at once.

 

[Warden of the North]

What is your build like?

A decoction/quen build is absolutely OP in the game, and if you can get the manticore armor you can use four decoctions at once.

I think its just the rust of not playing for so long. Ive played a bunch of AC Odyssey over the past year and im having trouble getting back into Witchers controller configuation. AC uses the shoulders for attack commands while the Witcher uses face buttons.

Honestly, my first playthrough of game I used very few (none?) decoctions and only a couple potions regularly. I shouldnt have this many issues with Olgeird, its just a very unforgiving duel.

 

[RandV]

Finally got around to finish it the other day. Started playing for the first time around summer and made it all the way to the final camp, but then looking at decisions walkthrough so I made the 'negative' choice in the lab so decided to back track to correct it and just never got around to it. It's funny because for the most part of a game I hate any sort of hand holding and prefer the challenge of figuring it out on my own, when it comes to these 'big impact story decisions' in games like the Witcher series I'm a total munchkin. Part of it is I'm only going to play through the game once and I tend to get so engrossed in the story I become paralyzed with indecision if I don't know how this is going to turn out, so in this regard I'm always hitting the 'story' guides.

For my general opinion on The Witcher 3 though, as amazing as it is there's still some flaws I have issues with around design and pacing - haven't gotten through the expansions yet though so some things may adjust there:

- The open world in Velen/Novigrad is great, but as it encourages you to explore if you do so you quickly over level so that when you get back to the main story it's all a cake walk. This is just poor game balance.
- At the start it's almost a Diablo-like looting system always finding new swords and equipment, but then at around level 15 you get witcher equipment diagrams and once you put those together they're far superior so from that point the rest of the loot is just junk you collect.
- some balancing issues with upgrading potions/oils, where some specific ones fall behind because you just can't one or two damn regents. Like I scoured the map pretty thoroughly yet never had any damn Bryona, I think it was
- just a general overall unnecessary system bloat. The idea is your a Witcher and you're supposed to prepare for battles, but you have so many skills/equipment/runes/oils/potions/decoctions that just becomes an unused overload because you can just settle into a basic build that tends to work with everything. All I do is slap on the appropriate oil for the enemies in front of me and whether small groups or large single encounters it all just starts feeling the same.

Still an amazing game overall, but while it obviously had the worst 'gameplay' it's my opinion that the first Witcher game had the best overall 'Witcher' system balance and design.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

What lab decision are you talking about?

 

[Do Make Say Think]

What lab decision are you talking about?

Probably when you can allow (or not) to let a certain someone to let some steam off in a lab. It is one of a few key decisions that influence what ending you get.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Probably when you can allow (or not) to let a certain someone to let some steam off in a lab. It is one of a few key decisions that influence what ending you get.

I thought that was the case, and I was going to say you only need 3/5 "positive" encounters to get the good endings.

 

[RandV]

I thought that was the case, and I was going to say you only need 3/5 "positive" encounters to get the good endings.

Yes I missed that part as I was only looking at these spoiler guides sporadically case-by-case, and didn't actually need to backtrack here.

 

[Bocephus86]

Honestly I focused on quick attack (and then other stuff around). That mutagen I always did red ones. I went cat school gear. Never touched any of the alchemy and had no trouble with the game on the second to hardest setting. I'm going to try more potions this time around (I'm early into Velan) just because I feel like I should, but it never felt necessary once I got the jump-quick attack-perry-jump thing down.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Going into my fifth full playthrough (NG). Intend to play it another time around and that will probably be my last time playing this game.

Going back to White Orchard the music reminds me of when I first started fumbling around with this game.