Meh, I am hopeful whatever I do makes Ciri live. I don’t consider it much of a spoiler to know she could die. I tried recruiting everyone I can and got almost everyone. I have done all side-quests except that wolf one.
I’m also not much for romance, but 1) I tend to be a completionist, and 2) I only play through a game once and like to get the (or a) “good” ending, so I dutifully participated. And I also don’t mind mild spoilers, so I had looked up guides beforehand and ascertained that Yennefer is generally considered the canon choice, so I chose her.
(I also found Triss kind of annoying. One interesting thing I learned by looking up the voice cast is that the English-language voice actress behind Triss, Jaimi Barbakoff, is British. She’s doing an American accent in the game, but there are little giveaways, like the way she pronounces “figure” as “FIG-er” and the fact that she inserts the “intrusive r” between words ending/beginning with vowels.)
What determines Ciri’s fate is the sum of 4-5 (one is missable) dialogue choices you make. Judging by where you say you are in the story, you’ve already passed the first one plus the missable one. If you could subsume them all under one general principle, the closest you could probably come would be “treat Ciri like an independent adult, rather than trying to protect her or tell her what to do.” But at the time, they can feel very mundane, something no more important or significant than choosing between “here, have a glass of wine” vs. “here, have a beer” and you could wind up with a disappointing ending, muttering “how was I supposed to know wine was the ‘good’ choice and beer the ‘bad’ one?”
My own further thoughts upon getting partway through Hearts of Stone: one of the annoying things about this game is the haphazard scattering of higher-level monsters across the world. In the last 2 Assassin’s Creed games, if the game told you the suggested level for an area was, say 15, that was a guarantee that there were no enemies higher than level 15 in that entire area, and therefore if you were level 15 you knew you could do everything within that area. Several times in this game, the completionist in me has set out to clear the map of question marks, only to run into a big warning skull on a monster 15 levels above me. It happened when I was partway through the Velen/Novigrad quests, and it happened in Skellige when I thought I’d clear that area before finishing the main story. Then, after beating the final boss, at level 35 or so, I thought to myself, “surely I must be able to handle everything in Skellige now!” So I set off in a boat, cleared a few smuggler’s caches or spoils of war, headed to the next question mark, and what do I encounter? A level 48 Archgriffin! Level 48, what the hell? I’m not going to be that level until I’m most of the way through Blood and Wine? What were the game designers thinking?
Also, this may be easier on PC than on consoles, but I wish there were an easier way to manage all the oils and potions. It’s quite cumbersome as I enter a battle, to have to click through several screens just to get to the panel of oils, then hover over each one until I get the tooltip to find out what each one is, one-by-one, until I find the one I want. Because of course I can’t remember what they all look like. It’s even worse with the potions and decoctions; there’s over an entire screen full of them and there’s no way I’m ever going to memorize them all by their little icon.
I won’t read the (much appreciated) spoiler content, but I am guessing I have ruled out the absolute best ending in general because:
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I did not kill Radovid(?), which I actually think was way too permanent a small decision. I was asked by that one dude to kill him and I didn’t agree and the entire game took that as a forever-decision. Now, mages left and non-humans are being crucified or burned. So, yeah, he should have died.
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Keira is dead, which I guess means she didn’t do the right thing. I got a “Fallout style” epilogue, where Geralt kind of mourned her.
Still, I would rather just play blindly and hope for the best.
If it makes you feel better, the “kill Radovid” ending is not particularly happy either (if I recall).
The effects of killing Radovid are one of those things you’re told about in the epilogue narration, not something that manifests in-game. Non-humans being killed is a function of your helping the mages escape in the mission Now or Never, which it sounds like you did.
I’m entering what feels like the final series of quests in the main story. Child of the Elder Blood and The Sunstone are my quests and both feel like final-ish preparation for the end.
I am at level 35. They were dumping huge amounts of experience on me at the end of various quests and I jumped levels really quickly there for awhile.
After I beat the main game, I definitely plan to do Hearts of Stone, which was apparently the first DLC released, so I figure I should do it first.
Yeah, you’re almost there. I think I was 35 when I finished the game. You still have a couple more determinants of Ciri’s fate left, though I don’t think that’s a spoiler since as I said, it’s not at all apparent that that’s what they are when you’re experiencing them.
I’ve been realizing I find this game extremely bleak, dark, somber, and morose. Maybe it’s all the crap going on in the real world right now, but it feels so depressing to keep playing. I know people say Blood and Wine is more of a romp, but I’ve found even during the lighthearted or humorous moments of the main game it continued to have an overall dark and depressing feeling for me. I’m in the market for a more positive, uplifting activity after I’m done with this game.
Also, had anyone ever heard the word “whoreson” before this game?
I’m wondering how many hours I’ve played to reach the final push. Steam says only 40, but a few times I got the “offline” error where it loaded the game despite not connecting to the server. I suspect that does not count hours on Steam.
I’ve done all hugely important secondary quests(except the wolf one I will never return to). I did not play Gwent(sacrelige?) due to wanting to focus on the RPG stuff. I missed that Lotho guy, but did all the allies quests except for apparently missing him.
I once played Fallout 3 and all its DLC’s in offline mode due to being somewhere with no internet and none of the hours were recorded on Steam.
I didn’t play Gwent at all in my first run-through; I got frustrated by the first couple of matches I played and it wasn’t fascinating enough to keep my attention.
My second time through, I dialed the Gwent difficulty down to easy and I mostly enjoyed the Gwent quests (although the game itself got a little repetitive after a while).
I actually downloaded the Android app in case I want to learn to play. I did not take the opening game I was forced-tutorialed through in the game seriously and did not continue with it.
The last card game in a video game I played was Triple Triad in Final Fantasy VIII. It worked OK, but Tetra Master in Final Fantasy IX was terrible.
So I take it Collect 'em All failed for you? Because there are several missable opportunities to play throughout the game that give you unique cards.
I didn’t think I was going to like Gwent, but once you start building up a decent deck, it’s fun. Actually, it’s difficult before that point, becomes fun as it becomes your goal to acquire all the cards, and it feels like that’s the reason you’re playing, so that once you’ve finally Collected 'em All, it suddenly feels like there’s no reason to play anymore.
Finished Hearts of Stone earlier this evening. That certainly wasn’t what I was expecting. I am once again glad I’m not afraid of minor spoilers and don’t mind looking up guides, as the Viper gear is missable, only obtainable during certain quests. On to Blood and Wine.
Yes, I guess I did. I haven’t gone through my failed quests very much, though they are there in the quest list. I know that some Gwent quests remain in my secondary quest list, though.
There are also a couple horse-races down in there as well.
How long did Hearts of Stone take you (if you know)?
One of the many good things about Blood & Wine is that there’s a fun new Gwent deck that you’re encouraged to play with, and you can collect the cards pretty quickly.
I woke up really early to get out and play the final part of the game. I beat it and my ending was basically:
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Ciri survived and became a Witcher. I am a sucker and genuinely believed she had died and the sword was for Geralt. When he entered the Inn and Ciri was there, I’m a big sap and smiled pretty broadly.
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Radovid lived and the epilogue made it clear this was a negative.
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Geralt and Yenefer lead boring lives like they wanted.
I’m not sure what other details there are, but that is the gist.
On to Hearts of Stone
I made the mistake of trying to romance everyone and payed the price in the end. While I know Yennifer is canon, had I known better I would have chosen Triss. Redheads are my biggest weakness.
Yenefer is the only one that seemed like an adult to me.
Redhead >>>> Adult
Some things just can’t be explained logically.
Not sure. Playing on a console, I don’t have Steam to keep track of time for me. I’d estimate maybe 15 hours, but that’s with some side content, not just the main quests.
Glad to hear you got the ending where Ciri lives. From the little flashbacks you see as Ciri approaches the White Frost, you may have realized what the decision points that determine her fate are.
For my part, I think if I hadn’t looked up a guide in advance, the decisions I probably would have made would have been:
- I’d have told her “you don’t have to be good at everything” instead of “I know something that will lift your spirits” during Blood on the Battlefield;
- I’d have taken her to the Emperor and accepted the reward;
- I’d have gone in with her to the Lodge of Sorceresses;
- I’d have said “calm down” instead of “go for it” when she wanted to trash Avallac’h’s lab;
- I’d have taken her to visit Skjall’s grave.
So I would have made only one “good” decision and she would have died.
Here is what I did:
- Played snowball fight.
- Took her to the emperor, but rejected a reward.
- Left her to visit alone(did they tell her about the white frost in there?)
- Trashed the lab.
- Yes, visited the grave.
She did flash to those moments, but it looked kind of like some were bad choices.
I see her becoming empress was an ending, but I think that is a worse ending than I got. I think of the Ciri-endings, her becoming a Witcher is the best.
If there is a Witcher 4, it could use the Ciri-witcher ending and have it be about her.