Story spoiler thread.

[Carrion]

Quite disappointed the game doesn't ask you about the fate of Jacques de Aldersberg. Not giving his soul to the Wild Hunt seemed pretty important way back in TW1.

Yeah, none of the choices from TW1 matter in any way. Thaler is alive even if you let him get killed in TW1, Adda is never mentioned, Siegfried doesn't make any further appearances, and so on.

 

[hivemind]

Finished game, endings are hard to make and the final five or so hours of this one were both kinda meh in some parts and pretty good in others.

Radovid and Djikstra(Broche&Thaler>a fat fuck) are both ded and the gay eagle of Redania can go fuck itself.
Based Emperor conquered the world, purged traitors at home and made hedgehogs a protected species from Tretogor to Vicovaro.
I presume that the eternal fire is extinguished or, at least, it's political power is completely removed in favor of whatever religion there is in Nilfgaard.
White lilies look a lot better on a black background than they would on a blue one or, gods forbid, a red one.

Powerful mages are controlled without innocents being brutally murdered in the process, truly Nilfgaard is a bastion of civilization.

Skellige prospers under its new Queen and Ciri is witchering around after saving literally all worlds from certain extinction while Geralt and Yen are living happily ever after.

I hope that the Emperor will get another heir because whereas I find the idea of the Imperial House of a world unifying empire having the Elder Blood in their veins to be sorta cool it's probably real fucking dangerous without elven sages from another dimension to serve as tutors at the court.
I also hope that Ciri sticks to lesbomancy and doesn't have any kids because with the White Frost gone I think that if anyone was to be born again with Ciri's powers it could only do more harm than good.

And I find the idea of Geralt and Yen living a mundane life happily ever after hilarious because they are both pretty much immortal and incredibly powerful.

Completely agree with the thing being a lackluster on ending slides though.

Also kinda sad that the order of the flaming rose and Siegfried were completely gone, also missed Kalkstein but that was at least explained(RIP you magnificent bastard)

Despite several flaws and bad game design decisions and me getting completely tired of sidequesting once I found Ciri this game is probably the best AAA RPG I have ever played

but I simply could not cope with the consequences of releasing the tree spirit.

Funny thing is I actually reloaded once to release the tree spirit because the crones pissed me off.
I, for some reason, thought that releasing the druid bitch or whatever would mean that she would help me kill the 3 cunts but sadly the black horse never appeared again. I sucked up the destroyed village if it meant that I at least pissed off the crones and saved the kiddos.

In TW2 Ves was just one of his soldiers,

I thought that Roche and Ves had the sort of a Geralt and Ciri relationship.

 

[Carrion]

I thought that Roche and Ves had the sort of a Geralt and Ciri relationship.

He took her in when she was 16, so yeah, he's got a soft spot for her, although it's not really comparable to Geralt and Ciri. She's also the only one of Roche's soldiers that knows Geralt from before, so it does make sense that she plays a bigger role than the others. Still, I dislike the hamfisted way she was included in the story, as she's barely given any lines of dialogue or character development and seems to be just thrown in for old time's sake.

Roche, too, is much less interesting and more one-dimensional than he was in TW2, and the two just feel awfully out of place somehow, like all of their content was done by some random modder, from the dialogue to their looks and Roche's quest which is all about Ves who apparently has completely lost her mind between the two games and regressed into an angsty teenager in the process. The game seems to expect that you care about them, but it's all based on the great times you had with them in the last game, not really on how you get to interact with them now. I wonder if I'm the only one who feels this way.

Another such character is Radovid, who was still a somewhat complex character in TW2, but in TW3 most of his complexity is stripped away. At the end of TW2 there could be the choice who you wanted to hand Anais to, and it was a genuinely difficult one. In my imported save I went with Radovid, as I saw it as the only realistic option in the long run, the best way to secure a strong North and prevent Temeria from falling into a civil war, even if it meant sacrifices elsewhere. At the start of TW3 I was glad to hear how Radovid had indeed managed to display his strategic knowledge and nerves of steel and unite parts of the North to seriously mess up the emperor's plans, but after that we hear pretty much nothing about Radovid the Master Strategist, and instead it's all about Radovid the Madman, an increasingly paranoid and obsessive ruler that no one seems to have anything positive to say about. All of the rulers in TW2 were great, Emhyr is too, so it's weird how they almost completely dropped the ball here.

Philippa and Thaler made much more successful comebacks, the former being her own bitchy self and the latter being as charming as ever and having that awesome wagon. The writing just seems very uneven when it comes to returning characters, even though the new characters are generally excellent.

 

[Lhynn]

So im not the only one that disliked the treatment to most non-ciri characters, including geralt.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

And I find the idea of Geralt and Yen living a mundane life happily ever after hilarious because they are both pretty much immortal and incredibly powerful.

How old can a Witcher become?

 

[hivemind]

Nobody knows given that most witcher are killed by one monster or another somewhere down the line, hence the saying "No witcher has ever died in his bed".

But Vesemir was at least 200 years old and still more than lively.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

But hey, CDPR pissing all over the canon, that is unheard of!

Speaking of this, it's been a while since I read The Eternal Fire, but didn't dopplers in the books have to be within eyesight of those they wanted to transform into? In the game they can basically take any form they want to at any time, even those of dead people whose bodies have burned unrecognizable, which should make them ridiculously powerful and potentially extremely dangerous if one of them wanted to become, say, an assassin. They also absorb some of the characteristics and thoughts of the people they turn into, which makes Dudu feel very uncomfortable when he briefly takes Menge's form, yet he might eventually become a fake Whoreson Junior even though Whoreson's probably the most irredeemable piece of shit in Novigrad. I guess he just isn't that bothered by the urge to murder a couple of whores or gouge people's eyes out every now and then.

Generally I don't mind CDPR taking creative freedom with the lore, as Sapkowski occasionally contradicts himself as well and quite frankly goes full retard at times, but it does lead to some issues in places. The questions about teleportation (like the stuff about Kaer Morhen or the mages needing a ship to get out of Novigrad instead of just casting a spell) could probably be explained away with some magic mumbo jumbo as we really don't know the technical aspects of how that stuff works, but the game could at least acknowledge those questions in some way.

I've literally finished reading Eternal Fire right now, and this is not completely right. Dopplers might take form of anyone provided they had enough time to observe them. Dudu transforms into Dandalion while talking to Geralt despite Dandelion not being anywhere near them. Other unnamed Doppler was pretending to be a head of secret police of Novigrad for a long time. He also won't become as bad as Whoreson because as stated in the story Dopplers are good by nature so they can only copy good things about people. Geralt uses that fact to talk Dudu out of a fight. Dudu transforms into Geralt and tries to intimidate him into letting him go because they are now equally matched. Geralt then says that Dudu as a doppler couldn't copy the ugly parts of his psyche, so he still wouldn't be able to beat him.

 

[Carrion]

He also won't become as bad as Whoreson because as stated in the story Dopplers are good by nature so they can only copy good things about people.

But as stated in the game, Dudu does gain an insight into some of Menge's bad traits (a paranoia about a doppler conspiracy and so on), making him hate it being in Menge's form, so it's not consistent either way.

Good corrections anyway. Like I said, been a while since I read it.

 

[hivemind]

Just watched the "bad" ending where Ciri died on youtube and it honestly made me feel kinda happy that I managed to "win" myself a happy ending through my choices whereas some other retards out there managed to fuck up their magical girl parenting hard enough for her to die.

 

[hivemind]

I just realized

if Geralt picks Triss and doesn't complete the Yen sidequest with the Djinn the fate of Geralt and Yen is still linked by magic and thus they are going to get together again.

Trissfags BTFO

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

I just realized

if Geralt picks Triss and doesn't complete the Yen sidequest with the Djinn the fate of Geralt and Yen is still linked by magic and thus they are going to get together again.

Trissfags BTFO

Not really since there is no reason to not finish the quest and just tell Yen to GTFO afterwards.

 

[hivemind]

Well yeah but there is plenty of Trissfags that surely didn't bother looking for a djinn with someone they don't intend to waifu and thus doomed their deluded relationship with Triss.

 

[Gerrard]

Trissfags are forever BTFO because none of this is canon.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

Well yeah but there is plenty of Trissfags that surely didn't bother looking for a djinn with someone they don't intend to waifu and thus doomed their deluded relationship with Triss.

I'm sure they are shattered because of some post credits implications nobody cares about because there won't be any new Witcher games with Geralt. And even if there will be CDP will just ignore all the choices.

 

[hivemind]

It's not even implied in the ending, it's just something that I realized.

 

[Killzig]

I just realized

if Geralt picks Triss and doesn't complete the Yen sidequest with the Djinn the fate of Geralt and Yen is still linked by magic and thus they are going to get together again.

Trissfags BTFO

I am pretty sure Yen tells Geralt not to keep her waiting or she'll start without him, not ironclad but it seems like that undjinning happens with or without Geralt's intervention.

 

[AetherVagrant]

djinn?
One of the things that keeps letting me know this game is even better than i think it is, is that many others' experiences dont mirror my own at all.
I got with triss, she didnt get tortured, never saw a djinn, many of others complaints about how part of the story turned out are night and day from mine, so maybe they just dont like the results of their choices. only thing i regret is not getting rid of radovid.

 

[ghostdog]

Breaking Djikstra's foot --again -- was very funny, but killing Radovid felt good. The choice afterwards was kinda shitty though.

 

[Storyfag]

but killing Radovid felt good

Dunno about that. CDPR sort of failed to comunicate how psychotic he turned in TW3 after presenting him as a magnificent bastard in TW2.

 

[Carrion]

Radovid's a guy that hears the heartbeat of inanimate chess pieces and fantasizes about torturing and killing them, gives himself an honorary position at a university and then throws everyone who objects into jail, orders Geralt to be killed because his presence annoys him, and organizes mass murders of sorcerers, alchemists, herbalists, healers and a ton of other people mainly because of a childhood trauma. In short, a pretty cool guy, but I'm not sure how much more they could've done to demonize him, as they even gave him an asymmetric face that makes him look like a degenerate. Throughout the whole game they tried to hammer across the point that Radovid was an evil fuck that had completely lost it, which was pretty sad considering how much more interesting he was still in TW2.

Even though you got to conspire with the broest of bros, I felt the whole assassination plot was a bit of a copout, an easy way to insert some politics and choice into the game without much depth or complexity.

 

[Wulfstand]

What felt especially dumb was how they handled the ending of the quest, as in having you decide between either Djikstra or Roche, Thaler and Ves. One of the supposedly most intelligent characters within the setting, and the best way he could think to dispose of a tight group of elite warriors that just finished mowing down the king alongside his best units is to face them full on with a handful of warriors? Even more so, after recognizing the futility behind his stupidly-written attempt, he doesn't even once want to surrender, and prefers to die in battle like some Skellige booze-fueled grunt? He instantly loses his senses after quoting from fucking Macbeth?

The whole part with choosing between Dijkstra and Roche felt like an attempt at reestablishing the 'grimdark' nature of the setting, and a pretty clumsy attempt at that.

Can you tell how upset I am at that part?

 

[Carrion]

Yeah, it's a pretty badly handed scene that cheapens Dijkstra's character and also all but removes the political aspect from the game's most interesting political choice. Even if you agree with Dijkstra and think that going with him is the best option for the Northern Kingdoms (which it is, really), there's just no way you could turn a blind eye to his stupid betrayal. It really should've been handled differently and more subtly, but if a betrayal and an inevitable fight was to be included, it should've been the Temerians working behind Dijkstra's back instead, as that at least would've been a harder choice. Now it's just one pretty neutral guy deciding to backstab and kill three of your friends, a couple of whom might've risked their lives for you just a couple of hours earlier.

One thing that annoyed me about the whole questline is that its written in a way that your relationships with different characters pretty override the major political decisions you get to make. The political stuff is there if you pay attention, but the questline barely touches on that and instead only uses Yennefer, Triss and Radovid's insanity as Geralt's motivation. That's not necessarily a bad thing, as a purely political motivation wouldn't fit Geralt's character, but that doesn't mean they couldn't have inserted other factors into it. There's no chance to discuss the potential consequences of Radovid's assassination, for instance, which I thought was weird considering that Radovid was the only thing holding Nilfgaard back — assassinating him during the war rather than after it (he does end up winning him if you let him live) seemed like a pretty dumb move, yet there's no way to bring this point up when first talking with Dijkstra, who's supposed to be a pretty smart guy.

 

[Perkel]

Radovid's a guy that hears the heartbeat of inanimate chess pieces and fantasizes about torturing and killing them, gives himself an honorary position at a university and then throws everyone who objects into jail, orders Geralt to be killed because his presence annoys him, and organizes mass murders of sorcerers, alchemists, herbalists, healers and a ton of other people mainly because of a childhood trauma. In short, a pretty cool guy, but I'm not sure how much more they could've done to demonize him, as they even gave him an asymmetric face that makes him look like a degenerate. Throughout the whole game they tried to hammer across the point that Radovid was an evil fuck that had completely lost it, which was pretty sad considering how much more interesting he was still in TW2.

Heh if you are SJW maybe.

Dude is amazing commander. Dude fucked up rest of the kingdoms and united them. Even main Emhyr commander tells you that dude is amazing.

He rilled up people to hunt non humans, fucked up completely mages so they will no longer meddle in his kingdom (which after Thanned and especially after lodge was almost certain it will happen Radovid or not). Gave power order of flaming rose to rile up fanatics against nilfgard.

And if you don't kill him he wins the war.
Mad ? Evil ? Seems like dude is awesome ruler.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

The guy burned and impaled people. He wasn't an awesome ruler.

I'm not saying despots and tyrants can't be awesome rulers - I'm no big fan of democracy, especially in medieval settings - but cruelty? Nah, that isn't very enlightened.

 

[Perkel]

The guy burned and impaled people. He wasn't an awesome ruler.

I'm not saying despots and tyrants can't be awesome rulers - I'm no big fan of democracy, especially in medieval settings - but cruelty? Nah, that isn't very enlightened.

technically it wasn't him.
secondly impaling and burning people at stake considering times it took place isn't anything special or extra evil

Like i said he managed to hide problems, riled extra troops and win the war. His actions aren't clean but he achieved what he wanted. After beating nilfgard probably things would went back to pre war.

Also like i said burning mages and later non human had some justification.

mages played their own game which backfired on them (vilgefortz aka head of mages, lodge)
non humans joined scoiatel commandos that worked for nilfgard in previous war.

Like they said you reap what you sow.