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Just completed the last main quest line in Velen and I'm still nowhere near finished with exploring the rest of that map yet. Even with playing this game in most of my free time at this point I'm hoping I complete the game before Fallout 4 comes out. The game is massive and has tons to explore and they've been adding free downloadable content every week or so.

The whole main quest line with the Baron was one of the best I've seen in any rpg in a long time. Definitely a major consequence there based on my choices. Wondering if letting the blonde sorceress leave with the research notes affects something later.

It was also cool to run into the "Assassin of Kings" witcher from the second game. Just sort of ran into him by accident and helped him out.

Oh god, the Baron line. Did you let that evil horse out of containment?

  Yeah. Lol.

I did it mainly to fuck with the crones though. I figure depriving the crones of an steady food source, a bunch of stupid peasant servants, along with unleashing something that's pissed at them, should at least somewhat mess with their comfort level.

While I didn't mind the Baron and it's too bad what happened what happened with him, Anna was an idiot for dealing with the crones anyway, so I didn't care about her. I guess the lubberkin isn't going to be looking after anyone at the castle now.

How could you keep the Botchling alive? You monster!

Annnnd, this thread looks like a publicized CIA document, what with all the black bars blocking out important information. :P

The Baron seemed to not want me to kill it (at first anyway, and when he finally saw it, it was too late by then) and I was little leery of the Pellar wanting its blood at the time (turned out he was a pretty okay dude though) so I did the ritual instead.

If it helps, I didn't unleash the plague maiden on the world (even Geralt says in his conversation there is an inconsistency in her story) and managed to break that curse with just her kissing her (and killing) her old boyfriend.

REDACTED

I don't recall a Plague Maiden. In what quest did that occur?
 

It was a side quest, but it sort of wrapped up the storyline with the blonde sorceress you get to sleep with.

Ahh, I see. I never bothered to shag Keira Metz.
 

Tan let her go, he hasn't encountered her since, but he hasn't finished yet.

Yeah, apparently if you continue to question her you can direct her to Kaer Morhen, which wold probably allow you to see her when you get there. Curious to see if her notes lead to the medical break-through or genocide, hopefully going to prevent the latter by doing something I shouldn't spoil.

Oh yeah, I also had the dude kiss the wraith. For whatever reason Aman keeps missing that subplot and just has the wraith kill her boyfriend in his house.

Yup. Didn't even know it was a thing, lol. 

Velen/Novigrad is huge, skellige is huger. 

Cool.

I think the toughest battle I've had so far is still that Griffin from the first map. I had to play that one over several times and I had done everything on that map already so I was as ready as I was going to be.

Not that I haven't come across some equally hard battles in Velen, but since it's so big, you've always got the option of going somewhere else to do stuff and come back to a difficult fight later. (Like Jenny O the Woods was giving me problems for awhile)

The werewolf was terrible. Had to get the oil, the fire bomb, and practically cheat in order to beat it. (Killed the wolves first, then ran away and saved, ha ha). It's regeneration is just so hard to bypass in low levels.

Oddly, I somehow killed the werewolf on the first try, I didn't even get a chance to use the oil I had either since it attacked me so quickly. I just never let up on attacks and kept casting Quen.

I was having problems with Jenny (And night wraiths in general) since after awhile she splits in the three entities and each one starts draining your life if you're even remotely close to them and they heal her back up. You either have to keep a large distance until they disappeared or kill them immediately. Then there's the fact you have to keep casting Ygiv sign to get some solid hits on her.

What... How. XD I spent hours on that bastard. XD

oh yeah, my main strategy on that was just roll away and them come back. Didn't have much trouble with noonwraiths, since it's only one, usually. If you have like, 6 wraiths at a time (dragonslayer's grotto is the first place that comes to mind), it's terrible.

My brother figured out that if you use Quen and just wail on him, you can beat him down faster than he can regenerate.
 

Odd, Quen didn't really work for me in that fight, even though I maxed it out. It took me several tries, but I ended up just using like, 6XP I forgot to use and got level two Igni, which destroyed him really quickly.
I remember that first wraith by the well being pretty hard but once you get the wraith-oil she goes down really easy.

Think all the fights are easy enough once you act like an actual witcher and look up the enemy in the bestiary and prepare for it haha.

Speaking of Skellige, have you taken on the dragon contract yet?

Nah, not that far yet. I haven't even explored the Novigrad side of the map or visited Triss yet, let alone gone to Viking country.

Bastard gave me less money for telling the truth >:-/

Doesn't really matter though. Money means very little at that point of the game.

Has anyone found any good heavy armor in the velen? I've looked everywhere and they all suck until bear armor, but that's at level 16 and in skellige

I stumbled upon some diagrams for "Ursine Armor" in a guarded treasure location at the bottom part of the Velen map,  but I can't use it yet even if I built any of it anyway since I'm currently only level 12. I actually found diagrams for superior Ursine gauntlets on the first map somewhere, but again, couldn't use them even if I built them.

Other than that, I've come across some heavy armors here and there that were okay, but even if they had a slightly higher armor value, the medium or light armors tend to have a few more resistances so I tend to keep those on instead.

I'm usually looking for more monster killing oils, potions and especially bomb upgrades. I've sort of gotten to the point where I'm not necessarily looting every peasant house I come across for junk so I can sell for gold now. My inventory is still cluttered with a lot of monster parts, powders, ores and various vegetation though since I'm never sure what exactly I'm going to need for the next recipe.

Witcher Gear is sooooooo much better then anything else. With my Feline Armor set, the final boss barely hurt me, and thats light armor. I think the first available armor set is Griffin School, though viper swords appear in White Orchard. 

... And here's me, stuck with shitty Skyrim like the plebe I am :/

Shhh, it's okay. I forgive you for using PC.

Yeah, my pc would explode if I tried loading up Witcher 3 I think :p or at least lag like an 89 year old with athsma and a broken leg, not that I could afford it anytime soon.

Fallout 4 looks much safer at least...

Annnd, fuck. Turns out that I can't save or get past load screens anymore. Thanks, Xbox. 9_9

Did all your saves get corrupted?

Naw, it just... stopped working. I'm currently waiting for a patch.

Once happened to me. What I did was just pull the plug on the xbox. Should work.

Sweet. WIll do. Thanks.

Np. Hope it works for you

Did  a hard reset. Game now working. :D

I need to get this game as soon I have money. Looks really good.

Has anybody walked in on 2 Drowners doing anal? I forgot which quest it was (it was in some cave though, so probably a treasure hunt), but it just baffles me someone stuffed that into the game hahaha. Might have just been some sort of wacky glitch.

Risky Google search of the day...

XD

Well, at least there wasn't too much R34. I couldn't find it, thought. What happened?

For some reason I think it was either in one of the Griffin-School treasure hunts that lead to a cavern or it was that mission with the Drowner Pheromones. Could be wrong.

Anyway, what happened was that I simply walked into a cave, and suddenly the screen semi-freezes (like it does for a cut-scene) and pans in on the two drowners in front of me, facing away from Geralt, one clutching the others back with it's Drowner claws like it's lower body was glued to it. And it just... Remained there (ignoring me) for a while until I started blasting them with Igni until they finally separated, and they died soon after. Wasn't a huge part or anything, though it was a simply nasty experience haha.

Lol, can't say that I have. Sounds like a weird glitch, but you never can tell in this setting.

I did find the Rock troll who goes "Trollolololo." Guess the developers like Internet Memes. I helped the troll out on that quest.

Really, I've been sort of letting a lot of monsters "go" lately while in Novigrad. A Doppler, a Succubus, a Godling. None of them were doing anything too bad so I didn't kill them. So far I think in the case of the Godling it seems like it worked out for the best anyway.

Currently doing the series of missions looking for Dandelion, working with the underworld and helping Triss. 

Godlings are easily my favorite monsters. So adorable hahaha.

*Sigh* One day, my little Toshiba. One day it will come out on this lovely moddable platform with all the DLC and we'll be able to take on the Witcher, just like we did last time before I lost the fucking disk...

Bah, fuck this Magic the Gathering/Pokemon mini game bullshit, I'm going back to killing monsters. (Fuck horse racing too, I was on the goddamn path!)

Seems like the only quests still available in Velen/Novigrad now are too high for me now, so I guess I'll finally be going to Viking country soon after finishing up what I'm guessing is the last of the main quests here. 

Ha ha, yeah, the card game sucks. Once you get enough hero cards you cant lose though. Horse racing is super inportant, though more so in skellige. You need the weight grants. 

Yep. Saddlebags are extremely useful, and you can win them at the horse races. One or two are more trouble than they're worth though, that one End was talking about is a killer (can't go off-road in the slightest). I think you can buy the better saddlebags, but it's hard to find merchants with them on such a huge map.

Always thought Gwent was kinda like a simplified Commander, rules wise. Was fun in the beginning and then it just got annoying. Thankfully you don't have to play once you finish the tourney (and you may or may not get laid again).

I've mostly been buying the horse upgrades. The only upgrade I won was against the Nilfgardian General during a quest where you're questioning all of Danelion's acquaintances and I went with the general to the races. He gave me a saddle, but I already had one that was just as good. I somehow got two better ones that added 55 stamina later that I guess I found during my rampant kleptomania because I knew I never bought or won them. 

As far as the saddlebags go, I recently bought one that allowed for 100 extra weight, so I should be good for awhile.

The problem with Gwent is the same problem I have with collectable card games in real life, you basically have to "pay to win." I've been buying up cards where I can, and apparently I still don't have a suitable deck to beat anyone with and so far I can only use the Northern Kingdom deck because I don't have enough cards for the other ones.

I liked the dice poker game in the second game better.

The boxing mini game is okay though.

Boxing is awesome. Just wait for the level 30 Skellige brawls. So much fun. 

Welp, I'm on The Isle of Mists. I feel like I pushed through the game too quickly; let's hope there's a free-roam mode after the campaign is done.

Isle of Mist isnt close to the end, but yeah, there is. 

Holy fuck. How long is this game? XD

The finale took me like, 3 days. XD

Holy damn. That upgrade to Quen where you create the bubble that regenerates your Health is awesome.

That was like one the major abilities I was trying to upgrade to as fast as possible.

Neer actually bothered with that. Focused more on exploding and intensity.

Lol, damn OCD.

I was finishing up the last of the main quest lines in that area and ended up going up a level which opened up a bunch of quests that I previous was too low for, then some other new quests opened up with Zolan and Dandy, so... yeah I'm never leaving Velen/Novigrad at this rate. (Let alone completing the game anytime soon)

Anyway, the serial killer quest was sort of cool, though it was sort of obvious who the killer was going to be. I think I locked myself out of a quest though since I found all these figurines during a quest and Geralt says he wishes Triss was around so he could ask her about them, but she's already fled the city. Oh well.

EDIT: And now there's yet another new free DLC quest available. I'm going to be playing this game forever. Lol.

Yeah, I was super pissed that you can get locked out of quests that way. 

When I finally get this game it shall be glorious (along with borderlands pre-sequel and, when it comes out, Fallout 4).

By the way, anyone other than Aman and Seth read the books?

I've been considering them, but I worry about the translation being up to par.

@Aman @Sethaniel are they any god?

I've read them all, most of them are in English, the fan translations are fairly well-done. The series itself is amazing.

Ive only read the first four so far, but yeah, I'd say so. The author tends to have EPIC scenes, but theres almost always a lull in the  middle of the books which is incredibely boring. Still suggest to read it. The good parts are awesome.

That lull is called character building!

I dunno. I loved the Ciri/Yennefer scenes (or anything with Ciri I guess) but that whole part with the kings and queens in the middle of BoE was just horrible. I get he's trying to make lore and explain what's going on, but at least make the ruling class have personality haha.

Oh yeah, Ciri's awesome, and also the best-written child character that i've ever read - normally when I get to a part with a kid in a movie or book or TV show I just kinda go "SKIP!" and jump ahead, hoping that everything still makes sense and that I don't have to read that part.

Despise Yennefer though. 

Yennefer is awful in both the games and the books. Hell, if they ever make a Witcher film she'll be a bitch.

I dont get all the yennefer hate. She's fantastic in the game. 

She cockblocks you in the beginning.

She's kind of a sarcastic asshole, and keeps Geralt in the dark for most of it.

I honestly never felt that. I mean, she's certainly not as romantic as Triss, but I never thought she was an ass. She left Geralt in the dark a lot, yes, but she also really loves him. (And if you reject her in her sidequest, youre a terrible person and should feel terrible)

Meh, Triss lied to him in the second game, she just has a "gentler" personality.

Scheming and duplicity is just sort of in the nature of women Sorceresses it would seem.

Kiera Metz also totally lies to you, so it holds up haha. Damn womynz, breaking Geralt's trust >:-|

#banganddash

I knew I made the right decision when I didn't bang her.

Dude, not banging in a video game is never the right decision. Geralt needs all the love he can get :(

Dunno if it makes that much of a difference in the end though. Will see.

What actually happens if you dont bang? There's a key plot scene after sexy times.

She invites you to stargaze then knocks you out with a spell.

Oh, so basically you 'missed out' for no reason haha.

Pretty much. :P

Lol.

Sorceresses are sort of Geralt's weakness anyway. They're basically his "type" of women that he tends to go for and not completely think things through at times.

Sorceresses and whores.

Yeah, at one point in the game, everyone aside from like 3 characters near geralt have had sex with him. All sorcereces. 

To be fair, literally everyone lies to you in Witcher. Like, if someone who appears to be a good guy tells you something, they are most definitely lying their asses off.

Now strangely enough, the bad guys embrace honesty whole-heartedly...

In the books Triss is more unlike-able, I thought. Yen's hilarious, and also has great chemistry with Geralt in terms of how they clash with each other.

In the game I really liked both. It's a horrible feeling when I agreed with Aman to go for Triss instead of Yen (to see the differences). There's a scene that makes you feel absolutely horrible about rejecting her haha. Her reaction was kinda hilarious though. I lolled.

I let Triss go since I'm going to focus on Yen. (Finally going to Skelliger) I laughed when that ex-spy guy called me an ass for letting her go. 

Mu favorite part of all that was when Triss jumps into Heralt's arms and he just like, puts her back down, lol. 

Are you fucking kidding me? Yennefer treats him like shit, cheats on him (all the fuckin' time, there was an entire short story devoted to how much she cheated on him), thinks he's worthless (the parts where you see her thoughts on Geralt in the books are universally devoted to how useless she thinks he is, and how she thinks he's basically going to get himself killed with his incompetence and idiocy).

Triss, on the other hand, loves Geralt. Now, admittedly, he doesn't love her back (for some reason, because Yennefer has nicer boobs I guess) but she still actually loves him. She's the one who tells Geralt everything, treats him like a real person, helps him. Yennefer lies to him for the shits and giggles and breaks his heart every other minute. Comparing Yennefer to Triss is like comparing a bag of assholes to a beautifully carved and sculpted greek statue. Geralt's attraction to Yennefer, all of it, it's complete bullshit. I don't get it, frankly I never will. (Note: referring to the books, they made her much more deceitful in the game, though note that she only ever lies to Geralt because she's forced to by the Sorceress' lodge, and has often broken her oath to tell him the truth .Yennefer, in contrast, is just a raging asshole)

I can't see how you would ever think Yennefer is better than Triss. I haven't played Witcher 3 but if choosing Triss over Yennefer makes Yennefer feel like shit, I relish the chance to do exactly that. Because I still remember that scene where Geralt found out she didn't love him and Geralt set his mind on killing himself in that duel with the archmage, only to realize the archmage fully intended to do the same because she rejected him, the person she was cheating on Geralt with, at the same time.

I mean, she and Geralt were spending romantic time together in a city and she literally fucked him the second she left Geralt's sight!

I'm just going off of the books I've read, because obviously I'm missing something haha. Didn't like Triss in the books because she's basically just a lapdog for Geralt's attention, and plus she totally took advantage of him after whatever happened with Yen. I figure the whole deal with Geralt wanting Y over T was because of some destiny BS with the Djinn, so for whatever reason he has to love her somewhat, no matter what hot chick comes and wants it instead. In the first two books it always seemed like Yen kinda had that 'tough girl' demeanor and loved Geralt back even if she didn't show it, because that's her personality. Yeah, she's a bitch, but I never felt like she didn't love Geralt. Triss on the other hand may love Geralt, but her lapdog personality made me like Yen over her as a character, in the books at least. Probably why Geralt likes Yen over her as well (but probably just because he's into that sort of woman, dunno). Probably changes in the upcoming books though, as told by your hilarious analogy haha.

And, uh, to be fair, Geralt's done his fair share of cheating too, right? XD In the Witcher universe sex is just kinda a thing that casually happens I suppose. I blame Europe or something haha.

You'll enjoy the game a lot then, just for that one scene XD

I think it was in Sword of Destiny or The Last Wish that she went uber-bitch on him, not sure.

"Triss on the other hand may love Geralt, but her lapdog personality made me like Yen over her as a character, in the books at least."

Triss is a lapdog because she feels helpless. She feels helpless because she knows Geralt loves Yen more than he loves her. She feels desperate. This makes sense.

Yen is a bitch because why she was an ugly hunchback when she was a little girl, and now that she's a grown woman with a nice pair of tits and a magically crafted body men want to fuck her, and she resents them for it. That same emotional damage is why she treats Geralt like shit.

Here's the thing though: Literally all sorceresses go through the same thing. All of them were born ugly (their magical talent warped their bodies, or so they say - and marriageable girls wouldn't be sent off to be made into sorceresses anyway). 

Yennefer has no reason to be so much more of a bitch than everyone else, including Triss.

Now maybe it's just me, but I feel so much more inclined to like Triss (and make Geralt choose Triss) since Triss clearly actually loves Geralit, is willing to help him and thinks highly of him, instead of liking the girl who's treats every single person around her like absolute trash (except for Ciri, because Ciri is the daugher she wanted but could never have). The only time Yennefer ever did anything, and I mean anything for Geralt, was when she killed herself trying to save him. And she failed.

Frankly, how you die does not make up for all the pain you caused when you were alive. Yennefer ruined Geralt, that she just barely tried to fix him doesn't make up for it.

Geralt was actually insanely loyal to Yennefer in the books. He cheats on her in the games (mostly because he doesn't know she exists, at least in the first two), but the games are non-canon.

In the books, he outright thinks about how he feels no attraction or love for anyone but Yennefer. It's why it destroyed him when he found out that she loved the mage guy.

He also thinks about how he wouldn't care, as long as she didn't love him. But she did, she admitted that she loved mage guy (even though she clearly fucking didn't, since she abandoned mage guy and Geralt to kill/commit suicide together).

I'm not contesting that Yennefer loves Geralt. She absolutely does. I'm saying she's a horrific piece of shit who acts as an acidic poison to Geralt and everyone who has ever loved her, and that her very touch rapidly siphons happiness and converts it into an even greater amount of assholishness that she will use to fuel her magical powers.

Edit: And Yennefer's tough girl thing is not an act. She actually thinks Geralt is useless, right up until he (spoiler) kills Vilgefortz. You see the scene through her perspective. Bitch right to the end.

Edit2: Nothing to do with anything else, but Regis was really awesome.

Probably in Sword of Destiny, cuz I haven't read that one. I dunno, dying for someone is kinda a redemption, I'd think. 

Wasn't it a point that Yennefer was like, especially ugly (even for a sorceress)? Like, Trisa wasn't a hunchback, and anything is hotter than a hunchback. Doesn't really excuse what you said, but... Yeah. I'm gonna need to read the other books XD

All sorceresses made themselves super attractive because they used to be ugly, the thing with Geralt is that he knows this and purposely looks for traces of the ugliness in their bodies (maybe so that he isn't so disarmed by their looks) and see a little of the real them (to match their cold eyes).

Yennefer isn't actually currently unattractive - she's gorgeous enough that people are constantly falling for her out of nowhere, Geralt just looks for traces of her old condition, he thus deduced she was a hunchback, he saw the ugliness in her eyes and matched what he could of it with her body.

Triss magically rapes geralt!

I can see why someone would prefer Triss over Yennefer, especially in the games since you have more contact with her in them, but so far Yennefer doesn't really seem all that bitchy to me. Geralt already sexed her up on the unicorn and she seemed pretty happy to see him in general.

About the only thing she's done so far is taunt him a little about chopping up a bunch of stuffed animals while being under the influence of hallucinating gas, which was pretty minor.

I dunno, I also preferred Morrigan over Lilianna even though everyone was saying she was a complete bitch too.

It's likely because of what happens in the books. For reference, if you think the sorceresses are bad in the game, they are so, so much worse in the books. Truly horrible people, all of them. Only nice one was Triss, and even then it's probably only because she was in love with Geralt.

Err, wut?

In the second book(?), Triss thinks about how when Geralt and Yen had a fight, and she wa super jealous of their terrible relationship, so she magically compelled Geralt to fuck her. It's in the beginning of it.

Oh, she never magically compelled him. She just took advantage of his weakness, I think, which might as well be the same thing. But, I dunno, I just feel like if I were in that situation, I wouldn't mind the super-hot sorceress offering herself to me right after my girlfriend and I broke up, so it just doesn't really have the same impact. You know?

Though yeah, she did take advantage of him.

I remember it saying magically, but I could be wrong.

Oh yeah, totally not on the same scale as "cheat on two people who super love you", but still super creepy. XD

XD 

Nah, Im talking about the world building parts, like the northern realms bullshit. XD

Aman got me to read the first two. Solid series, though I'm annoyed at Blood of Elves for not actually ending haha.

I skipped the first Witcher, because I figured the "Read the books first" rule that had been beaten into my head by desperate librarians over the course of my childhood should apply to video games too. Then I heard that the Witcher 2 was unskippably good from my friend, and by that point I realized that sometimes books weren't the be-all end-all of media, so I got it and never really thought about the books up until you mentioned it here.

Basically the games are an "alternate reality" of where the last book leaves off. The author said he was completely cool with whatever story the games tell, but he said his continuity will be different in whatever future books he writes.

Amusingly, he sort of wrote his own "fan fiction" where Geralt and Yennefer get married and live happily ever after. (Definitely not canon obviously)

I'm thinking I should probably get into the books now to get to know Geralt better, because, as Yahtzee says, the games definitely portray him as one secret makeout session with Harry Potter away from being a Gary Stu, which probably isn't the case. Also, it'll probably add a bit of depth to whatever the fuck I'm doing because I barely got through 5 out of the 20 hours of the last game, although it certainly looks like it's fun in addition to being complex this time, as opposed to just being complex.

The first game sucks horribly, but the story is quite nice, especially the end fight.

Okay, Now I know I've been playing this too long. Heard some kid screaming in the neighborhood and I started looking up because I thought it was a siren attack.

XD How many hours have you played?

I dunno, I haven't checked my overall hours played. 

I'm still at Skellige where I'm sort of just clearing up a few question marks on the bigger islands before moving on to meet up with Yennefer after we did that mask quest. I already finished up the clan subplot there and I've only got a few really high level contracts/treasure hunts that I haven't done, along with Gwent/horse racing stuff.

I think by the end of the game, I played over 150 hours or something ridiculous like that. XD

Who'd you support?

Never really felt the need to do the treasure hunts aside from the witcher gear. Thought they were mostly wastes of time, ha ha. And I only did the gwent tourney thing. After that I stopped looking at those evil cards. XD

I helped Cerys.

Yeah, I'm probably going to go back and do a lot of the question marks later and just move on with the main quest in Skellige now, since there are so many of them in the water, and I'm not a fan of the underwater treasure hunts. Gives me something to do for after the main game is finished I suppose.

Gwent I've mostly ignored. Last time I played it was with Dandy's girlfriend to pass the time before the ambush and I surprisingly beat her. (Then it cuts to a scene where she says, "This was a stupid idea.")

You sicken me.

Ha ha, I got crushed, lol. XD

Cerys was obviously less psycho than her brother.

Hjallmar was fucking awesome man. Psycho, yes, but awesome. Didn't have him kinged, but he was one of my favorite characters. He freaking rammed Wild Hunt monsters to save Ciri. Epic doesn't even describe him properly.

Lol. I hope it wasn't anything serious XD

I just finished the game today! Once you get out of Skellige the game moves really quickly, keeps getting better and better. 

Really an excellent game. Bit annoyed that there were several loose ends they never really dealt with, but the game is so huge in that respect that I can't really blame them. Won't say much more just yet.

What ending did you get?

Ciri lives on to be a famous Witcher, Redania is #rekt and Temeria and Novigrad become sorta at peace. Hjallmar, despite the peace, attacks Novigrad's shores just for the lulz every summer, and Geralt lives happily ever after with Triss in a luxurious house in Kovir, occasionally doing contracts recreationally.

Loose ends: What happens to Eskel and Lambert? Or with the Baron's wife? Very little is mentioned about Priscilla after the attack, what happens to Phillipa and the rest of the Sorceresses beyond just the Lodge's recreation? The last Crone? I dunno, I just feel like these things were barely touched on. Though I guess I sorta get it, since either Geralt doesn't care by the end or it just leaves it to the player's imagination, which is fine I suppose.

Super spoiler: Aman, the bastard that he is, decided to tell me, right at the end, that Ciri didn't die in his game, and started interrogating me as if I did something wrong. Was super relieved when  turned out she didn't :P

You must have not had everyone for "The Battle of Kaer Morhen", because in my game, Lambert ran off with Keira Metz.

Endmaster don't read this: Oh, then yeah. For me Keira was publically impaled on Radovid's orders. Was suitably dark that we had to recover the body.

Damn. How the Hell does that even happen?

It happens if you let her leave with the notes. She tries to give them over to Radovid in return for amnesty and it just... Doesn't go according to plan :-/

I wish there had been more quests with the different rogue factions in Velen and then Novigrad. Still, this game sucked the last 5 weeks of my life away. Got the wolf armor. Wish I could have waited for the 1.07 patch.

That would have been interesting, but wasn't the last game more about the politics about the kingdom? I felt like this installment worked better as a story about Ciri and Geralt.

Finally beat the main storyline. That definitely was an excellent combination of story writing and gameplay in a RPG that I've played in a long time.

The stand out final story missions I really liked were the Battle of Kaer Morrhen, Through Time and Space (Liked the weird worlds thing) and the last battle with the Wild Hunt. (The whole thing, even after you kill Eredin and go through that run/chase scenario)

Speaking of the Wild Hunt, I found the Wild Hunt general the hardest one to fight out of all of them. Took me a lot of tries to beat him with his bullshit "teleport behind you whirlwind attack" tactic he does towards the end of the fight. Found it a lot easier to kill the mage and the king.

Anyway the Empire beat the chicken soup out of the rest of the north (Temeria got a little freedom back), Ciri became Empress and Geralt ended up with Yennefer, so I guess I got the best ending.

Nice. The worst fight for me was the Mage dude, though the general was annoying. The battle for Kaer Morhen was awesome, though my favorite quest was assasinating Radovid.

Yeah Radovid had to go. I didn't like him anyway and Keira didn't deserve the impailing.

I might have let Dijkstra take over Redania, but given that Roche and Ves helped me fight Wild Hunt, I really wasn't going to just let them get killed. Wasn't like Dijkstra helped when I asked.

Yeah, I felt bad for Roche, Ves, and thaler, so I killed Djikstra. Probably gonna let him kill them this time around.

Nice.  Ciri became a Witcher in mine, and Radovid orchestrated a magical holocaust, so I'm doing another playthrough.

XD

You didn't assasinate radovid? XD

Couldn't be arsed.

XD

Battle of Kaer Morhen was epic. Unfortunate the game glitched and I wasn't able to get Letho (game stopped halfway through the quest and couldn't continue it). The very last bosses took a long time (in terms of the battle) for me, but were pretty easy once you figured their attack patterns.
I actually really-really liked the last Kiera quest, even though it was really short. Just really set a dark mood, and the Geralt-voice-over montages are very cool. Was expecting something to do with the notes, though. No lead up on that.
The funniest scenes were the drinking-scene with the Witchers (love Lambert and Eskel) and the theater scene (Dandelion's also awesome).

One things I'd like to note is how I liked how the game went on with Geralt not being the main character. Ciri's words at the end, 'Let me finish my story the way I want to' really kinda set in how Geralt is just a monster-hunter, not a protagonist or hero. I think more RPGs should do that, having you as a moving force in the story but really just a guy affected by what;s going on. Too many games and stories are about the hero and how he's saving the day, not the people who assist him.

Dunno what's the best ending, Ciri becoming a Witcher or her becoming Empress. Discussion within itself.

Also @Malkalack why the hell did you not kill Radovid >_<

Yeah, the Witcher's "drunk mission" was pretty amusing. They both give Geralt a bunch of crap after he comes back from sexing up Yennefer hours before they start drinking.

I had everyone except Kiera at the battle. Roche and Ves were pissed about Letho being there. Lol.

Really I never saw Letho as that bad a guy considering he has helped Geralt and Yen out in the past so I let him live in the second game and he was useful in the battle as well. (And I avoided being a hypocrite by not killing him for being a king slayer since I went and assassinated Radovid in this one!)

Ciri being a Witcher is more of a "feel good" ending, but I think her becoming Empress fits more in tone of the Witcher setting of not everything being a completely happy ending.

In the scheme of things its good for her and Geralt since with her in charge, at least Geralt knows he doesn't have to worry about the Nilfgardian Empire putting bounties on his head because the Emperor is in a bad mood that day, plus he's at least got extra help in a powerful place if he ever needs it.

As for Ciri, along with her natural powers, she'll also have better protection with all those resources at her disposal, plus she can be a less oppressive ruler than her dad.

Yeah, but one has to worry about Ciri being mauled by a horde of peasants like what happened to Emyr in my game.

EDIT: She can teleport. SMH at myself.

Teleportation, sonic screams and the like, and she's got Witcher battle training on top of that. They'd need to send some seriously skilled assassins and mages after her, not just a peasant mob or disgruntled nobles.

In that last bit where you play as her she's just zipping around killing those massively armored Wild Hunt guys wth one chop. The game would have been a hell of a lot easier playing as her than Geralt. Lol.

To be fair, that's not because she's actually a more skilled witcher than Geralt, it's because she was born with epic magical powers on a scope that make every other sorceress in the series look like a light-weight.

Spoiler:

Ciri Disappeared in mine. And don't try to bang Yennefer and Triss in a menage a trois.

I've been waiting for someone to make the threesome  mistake. on this thread. Did you get some sort of different epilogue, or as it just the standard "Geralt lives as a Witcher for the rest of his days" that the people who didn't romance get?

EDIT: That was horribly worded. Sorry.

I got what I said above in the spoiler plus he's pissed and going on some vengeance spree. I had to basically track down and murder asshole malone, and basically emotionally abuse him and assault him beforehand. I was quite pleased.

I assume "asshole malone" is Whoreson Junior?

Nope, killed that guy. Had to avenge the guy who ordered Ciri's you know what.

What are your opinions on not only the 1.07 patch, but the DLC that's coming? It's reportedly like 20+ hours of new quests and storyline. If you finished already, would you still buy it? Maybe it branches from the end path. I hope so.

Already bought the season pass for the next 2 DLC. I'm basically playing everything connected to the game at this point, that's how much I enjoyed it. Last game I liked this much was Fallout: New Vegas and I even liked this one better. (Fallout 4 is going to have its work cut out ahead of it) This is the first "modern game" for me I'd say ranks up there with Planescape: Torment.

Hopefully the 2 major DLCs they got planned take place after the main game's events and reference what happened based on your ending, but even if it doesn't I imagine you can still play them after you beat the game, just like you can still roam around the world now. 

I'm wondering if they avoid the possible issue altogether by having the DLC take place in another part of the world like Zirakania or something so it's completely separate from the main story.

I completely agree with you. Fallout: New Vegas ruled and I have even replayed it recently with mods. F4 is looking really good, and I dislike Bethesda in general for destroying isometric RPGs with FPS buggy crap. Witcher 3 is one of the best games I've played since KOTOR, possibly. Can't remember the timeline of Gothic II - KOTOR. 

I think that may be how it is, and we may not even be playing Geralt. Have read rumors about playing a different character, although how it could be Ciri, considering the various results I've read in this thread, would be befuddling. I wanna play the rock troll and start smashing.

P.S. Playing Pillars of Eternity, currently. Beautiful art and reasonably decent voice acting. Fairly good writing, bordering on really good. But the combat leaves something to be desired. It feels needlessly complex and is irritating me. Think they're coming out with a patch and expansion to address the problems.

Liked Pillars, but I couldn't finish it since the saves kept on taking longer and longer to complete. After saves starting taking one minute about halfway through the game I just gave up.

Weird, what specs you running? GoG or Steam?

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/72764-quick-saving-and-loading-times-increased-greatly-after-20-hours/

It's a problem with infinity engine games, no doubt you'll suffer through it as well - though if you have a PC you'll probably be able to more easily mod the game so that you can remove the autosaves, which should greatly lower transition times.

Apparently Divinity has the same problem, which is why i've held off on playing it.

One's taking place in Toussaint, where all that fine red wine comes from, happy-go-lucky place that doesn't suffer from the war because the ruler is the emperor's cousin. Geralt once almost gave up on his revenge because he loved it there so much. I hope they bring back the succubus that Regis had an affair with. The other I don't remember.