The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Witcher 3....was greatly enamoured by this title upon first impressions but soon discovered that endless cinema grade dialogue does not in itself a good game make, if the combat mechanic sucks....and that is the Witcher 3's problem...combat sucks and after Level 10 or so, the balancing system goes out of the window....so I soon lost the motivation to keep playing.

Anyone know if there are any mods out that totally overhaul the sucky combat?

A Mod that lets you edit the playist would be good as well...some of the tunes that get repeated ad-infinitum in this game really bursted my box.
 
strumpusplunket said:
So returning to the build questions, I'm finding my signs build a little disappointing at the moment (at lvl 13 now).

Quen is awesome, both standard and alternate modes. No problems there.

Axii is very useful against single opponents who are vulnerable to it.

Yrden is very helpful against wraiths, but the slow effect is negligible. The alternate case is nice but has a very long build-up which negates it use in battle somewhat.

The biggest issue is that igni seems pretty much pointless. I was hoping that once I got my sign intensity up I'd see some better results, but with intensity now at around 120% I'm very underwhelmed. Firestream can't even take down mobs a few levels lower than me before the stamina bar is empty, and it's very easily interruptable. It doesn't even seem to do much more damage (if any) than base igni, which is also lacking a bit. Standard igni okay for some crowd control with its high burn chance, but the damage is barely significant. If I want cc I could just use aard, surely? Feeling all the points in it are a bit wasted. I can't see a reason to use firestream at all.

After a bit of research I hear igni was heavily nerfed in patch 1.07 (firestream particularly). Has anyone got a good offensive sign build post-1.07? Or did most recommendations for these builds come from prior to that?

At the moment I feel I need to spec points out of igni. And I'm not exactly in love with aard. I've not only specced points into (which I can clear with a potion) but also been hunting and building gear specifically for it (all in griffin now). I still use swords to do almost all of my damage and find myself only ever casting quen in 90% of fights (with some situational use of yrden and axii).

Am I doing something wrong, or did 1.07 put the nail in the coffin of a pure signs build?
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Don't use Firestream anymore is the trick. You want igni not because of it's damage necessarily (which is insane when you get sign intensity up) but because of the burn. The burn basically staggers enemies for it's duration allowing you to sit back without fear of being hit, allowing you to target other enemies/reposition/charge up strong melee etc. Firestream used to be good but it's too weak now and it's range is too short AND it's ramp up is too long for enemies which can jump on you.

If you don't have the Griffon school talent in the fourth tree, get that ASAP too if you have griffon armor already, it makes a humongous difference to your stam regen, it almost doubles it.

I rarely ever use Aard, I only ever take it as theres nothing else to put points into to get to the next tier. It can be handy sometimes though.

1.07 definitely hasn't destroyed sign build as I'm running it now (although the alchemy talent which boosts mutagen power has given me an extra 30% sign intensity which isn't negligible and im at 250%ish right now so maybe it just requires mutagens+more blue abilities for more stam regen and more intensity.

My advice is try using normal igni. Enter combat with Quen, cover as many enemies at once with an Igni as possible and let them burn, when your stam is close to recovered, get some melee hits in, repeat. I'm not sure what your burn chance is though, that might be the problem for you.
 
bazzabear said:
Wait ... you're saying that rolling all over the place isn't the right approach?
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It doesn't work as well in W3 in my experience because it takes you too far away from enemies and I keep missing my next attack. It's not like DS where you can roll around enemies and hit them quickly. Dodge works much better for most enemies (maybe not the big ones) because you can evade and then actually hit them.

Munimentum said:
Don't use Firestream anymore is the trick. You want igni not because of it's damage necessarily (which is insane when you get sign intensity up) but because of the burn. The burn basically staggers enemies for it's duration allowing you to sit back without fear of being hit, allowing you to target other enemies/reposition/charge up strong melee etc. Firestream used to be good but it's too weak now and it's range is too short AND it's ramp up is too long for enemies which can jump on you.

If you don't have the Griffon school talent in the fourth tree, get that ASAP too if you have griffon armor already, it makes a humongous difference to your stam regen, it almost doubles it.

I rarely ever use Aard, I only ever take it as theres nothing else to put points into to get to the next tier. It can be handy sometimes though.

1.07 definitely hasn't destroyed sign build as I'm running it now (although the alchemy talent which boosts mutagen power has given me an extra 30% sign intensity which isn't negligible and im at 250%ish right now so maybe it just requires mutagens+more blue abilities for more stam regen and more intensity.

My advice is try using normal igni. Enter combat with Quen, cover as many enemies at once with an Igni as possible and let them burn, when your stam is close to recovered, get some melee hits in, repeat. I'm not sure what your burn chance is though, that might be the problem for you.
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It's disappointing that firestream is now basically a pointless skill. I was looking forward to being a witcher flamethrower, but the animation isn't even that impressive for it. More like a weak roman candle than a flamethrower :(

I have burn chance at 100% and I can see igni being useful for crowd control. Part of my problem is that my stamina regen is too slow that I need to use it whenever it's available to recast quen. I'll use my next ability slot for griffin technique I think and try that as you say.

Also, it seems though that only 3rd tier signs skill I'd want is igni intensity and I'm wondering if it's worth piling points into junk abilities just to unlock it. Does the regular igni damage really become worth it? With my build at level 13 I just noticed one cast took maybe 1/4 of a level 9 ghoul's health bar (which I could double with one sword swing), so it's got a long way to ramp up to become useful as a damage source.
 
Firestream is great for certain situations, especially for fire susceptible enemies, but yeah the first igni is more versatile. I love yrden II and quen II.
 
For normal Igni, the initial damage is almost irrelevant, it's the burn that does the damage. My Igni right now does about 300-400 upfront but ticks for significantly more than that.

If you dislike the 1.07 Firestream there is a mod that reverts the changes, found here. I'm tempted to get that myself as, while I'm not exactly struggling now, Firestream was a LOT of fun, even if it was super broken.

As for stamina regen, definitely get the Griffon Technique as that will do the most to improve it. It's then a case of equipping as many sign abilities as possible as each slotted ability increases your stam regen. You could also start using the regen potion if you have it.

Igni definitely becomes worth it when you have enough sign intensity. I one shot similar level enemies with it and as a level 44 I was able to clear level 58+ enemies when I came across them.
 
Munimentum said:
For normal Igni, the initial damage is almost irrelevant, it's the burn that does the damage. My Igni right now does about 300-400 upfront but ticks for significantly more than that.

If you dislike the 1.07 Firestream there is a mod that reverts the changes, found here. I'm tempted to get that myself as, while I'm not exactly struggling now, Firestream was a LOT of fun, even if it was super broken.

As for stamina regen, definitely get the Griffon Technique as that will do the most to improve it. It's then a case of equipping as many sign abilities as possible as each slotted ability increases your stam regen. You could also start using the regen potion if you have it.

Igni definitely becomes worth it when you have enough sign intensity. I one shot similar level enemies with it and as a level 44 I was able to clear level 58+ enemies when I came across them.
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Day off today so been playing around with it a bit and yes the griffin technique makes all the difference! The tooltip makes it sound like stamina should regen about 20% faster, which didn't sound that impressive. However, it's more like double and I've actually been able to use signs in combat instead of using my stamina to roll and recast quen. Thanks for the tip!

Been fighting mostly human enemies today but igni burning them makes a big difference to the fights. The burning seems to last a variable time though - sometimes six or seven seconds, but sometimes only one or two seconds. I guess they must have a set chance to resist?

Does the melt armour effect do much though? I can't say I've noticed any real difference to enemies' armour.
 
strumpusplunket said:
Day off today so been playing around with it a bit and yes the griffin technique makes all the difference! The tooltip makes it sound like stamina should regen about 20% faster, which didn't sound that impressive. However, it's more like double and I've actually been able to use signs in combat instead of using my stamina to roll and recast quen. Thanks for the tip!

Been fighting mostly human enemies today but igni burning them makes a big difference to the fights. The burning seems to last a variable time though - sometimes six or seven seconds, but sometimes only one or two seconds. I guess they must have a set chance to resist?

Does the melt armour effect do much though? I can't say I've noticed any real difference to enemies' armour.
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It depends on their resistance and also their level I think. It's almost impossible to burn enemies much higher level than you for example. Likewise some of the enemies later on are immune to fire and burning altogether so it depends what you're fighting too. Not sure if it's affected by your burn chance too (go into character screen and press the right trigger it shows you your combat stats and you can see what burn chance you have)

I haven't noticed the melt armor difference honestly but I don't really pay attention either.
 
Question, about the main story (where am I?).

I bashed through some chunk of the main story last week and it was bloody awesome. But I've now got 4x Lv22 quests.

I basically stopped playing after my task was to leave the Witcher castle place and go get Ciri from the foggy islands or something or other. Sorry, long day, names and stuff has escaped me.

How much longer do I have in terms of %? I assume I'm about 75% of the way through the story?
 
agnes said:
Question, about the main story (where am I?).

I bashed through some chunk of the main story last week and it was bloody awesome. But I've now got 4x Lv22 quests.

I basically stopped playing after my task was to leave the Witcher castle place and go get Ciri from the foggy islands or something or other. Sorry, long day, names and stuff has escaped me.

How much longer do I have in terms of %? I assume I'm about 75% of the way through the story?
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Probably like 70-75% yeah, there's a massive chunk of story ahead so you'll level up super fast. Also make sure you finish all the characters side quests because I don't think you can go back to them after, just make a save before you enter incase it fails any quests you can reload if you want to do them.
 
I've just completed the main quest after about 130 hours!!!

As for the ending... I had a major tantrum. :eek:
I was absolutely raging when Ciri didn't reappear from the Frost portal. Actually, I quit the game after telling Emhyr she was dead and had to cool down for a few hours.

Loaded back up again to continue and thought oh well, may as well see it through. Got to the Tavern and thought Triss was the shady looking character in the corner... Ah well, at least my Geralt romanced her and won't be foreveralone.jpg.

SURPRISE!
ciri-alive.png


THANK GOD FOR THAT!!!!!

CD Projekt Red are absolute sods for doing that to me!!! :mad:

I was quite happy with the ending and thought it was fitting. I wish it cleared up what happened to Dandelion, Yen and co. though.

Also actually feel quite bad for romancing Triss instead of Yennefer now. Why did they have to make her come across as such a female dog early on? :(

Wish I'd read the books first to be honest, would have probably changed a few major choices for me.
 
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digitalx said:
Level 11 hit, got some nice graphical mods and texture replacements. Just entered Skellige and loving it! I am quite slow..
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Considering you are in Skellige at level 11 means you are going fairly fast. I am at level 21 and haven't been yet.

Currently doing the Cabaret quest for Dandelion.
 
Narj said:
I've just completed the main quest after about 130 hours!!!

As for the ending... I had a major tantrum. :eek:
I was absolutely raging when Ciri didn't reappear from the Frost portal. Actually, I quit the game after telling Emhyr she was dead and had to cool down for a few hours.

Loaded back up again to continue and thought oh well, may as well see it through. Got to the Tavern and thought Triss was the shady looking character in the corner... Ah well, at least my Geralt romanced her and won't be foreveralone.jpg.

SURPRISE!
ciri-alive.png


THANK GOD FOR THAT!!!!!

CD Projekt Red are absolute sods for doing that to me!!! :mad:

I was quite happy with the ending and thought it was fitting. I wish it cleared up what happened to Dandelion, Yen and co. though.

Also actually feel quite bad for romancing Triss instead of Yennefer now. Why did they have to make her come across as such a female dog early on? :(

Wish I'd read the books first to be honest, would have probably changed a few major choices for me.
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Hah, I had the same for the ending. Got really annoyed and started looking at some spoilers to see where I'd gone wrong :p Got confused when what I read indicated I should've got the good ending!
 
Disco_P said:
Considering you are in Skellige at level 11 means you are going fairly fast. I am at level 21 and haven't been yet.

Currently doing the Cabaret quest for Dandelion.
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I went around level 15. It's scary how quick you can progress through the story without realising. I'm not touching the main story again until I literally have nothing else to do.
 
Yes, I've found one of the major challenges of the game has been juggling all the main quests, side quests, contracts and hunts so that I can do as many as possible before they go grey. Not easy once you get into the Skellige quest line and I now have a whole batch of grey non-main quests that I wonder if it's even worth doing now. Many of them do have good stories attached and some affect the ending I understand, but I am getting a bit tired of following trails using witcher senses for miles for a quest that's not even going to give me a worthwhile reward...
 
llamadal said:
27 and not been.... So at 11, I'd say your rushing and going to miss out on some awesome side quests
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And you've left it way too late man.

Really, the mod I want to see more than anything else is a progress balancing mod. A complete overhaul of the XP system and tweaks to the crafting requirements and skill trees.
 
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