Combat help

[Kryllic]

Can someone PLEASE explain how the ♥♥♥♥ the combat works in this game?! I get that heavy stance is for stronger/slower enemies, fast stance is for weaker/faster enemies, and group stance is for groups of 3 or more enemies at once. I also know that Steel is effective against humans/animals, and silver is effective against monsters/magic. I also know that I click once, wait for the combo to end, then click again to chain into the second combo, and so on.

What I'm NOT getting, is how the hell do I take on 50+ humans at once? Seriously, this game does this so many times, I have to solo against a few dozen people, and they kill me within SECONDS. My group stance seems to do very little, considering whenever I try to use it, Geralt either just stands there like an idiot, or the enemies EASILY block/parry my attack. I'm a level 15, and have maxed out everything in Group bronze, both steel and silver.

I also realize this game puts a huge emphasis on using potions. Well, I have none. I have no idea where to buy any. And when it comes to making them, I have little to no ingredients to make any potions, and I have no idea where to get them or what I need. The game does a horrible job at providing such information.

So if anyone can please give me some advice on these ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ situations where it's me vs 100, I would be grateful.

[Supermarine]

Ok... 'll try to help you, even when I'm no master myself. This game is somewhat unintuitive, and the combat system and interface are the main culprits.

Here we go: in combat you have 3 styles, 2 main weapons and some items you can craft. There is also a variety of skills and passive abilities that can help you in certain situations. Finally, you have access to signs, which simply put are "magic powers" that drain endurance (which is akin to Mana in other games, and recovers over time).

Before continuing, let me tell you a little secret: under the Hero menu you can find the tab "monsters". Here you will find useful information on how to counter specific creatures. This info does not come free; you must feed the bestiary with books (bought from vendors) and talking to people. It's really helpful and I suggest you get as many books as you can find.

The styles and swords you got it right so I won't waste time here.

You didn't mention the cursor, so in case you don't know this I'll explain. The cursor changes to a little sword when pointing at a potential enemy. This is when you click. Geralt will execute his moves and then the cursor, for a brief time, will appear as flaming. It is when this flaming sword appears that you must click again, not sooner. If you do it correctly, he will chain his attacks and increase the combo hits. You can actually kill an enemy without receiving a single hit if you do this on time. Technically, it appears that you can chain-attack forever.

Another tip: Geralt parries automatically. Try and experiment by getting surrounded by weak enemies and doing nothing. You can then get a feeling of how many attacks he is able to evade, block and dodge. This percentage can increase with skills (passive ones).

The auto-parry feature means you cannot actively block or defend, but you can jump and roll to evade incoming blows. You do this by double-tapping the WASD keys. Use this to get out of tight spots or to flee if necessary.

If you get surrounded and activate the group figthing style, and just stand there, you'll notice Geralt can actually multi-parry attacks coming from different directions. You will also notice that when you attack, the wide sweeps with the sword actually hit more than one foe on the same movement.

Using the group style, the WASD keys and the chain-attacks in coordination will turn you into a killing machine. This is how you can survive group fights. Beware missiles, though.

Also, complement your attacks with the available signs. Aard and Igni are the first ones you can get. One is a "Star Wars force-push" sort of magic, and the other one you can think of as a fanned flamethrower. Use those before you actually get surrounded for best results.

What I do is the following:

1.- When the enemy group is incoming, prepare the Aard. Shoot when the closest one is about 2 meters away.
2.- This will stun, knock down or push away at least some of them. Focus on those who remain standing and running towards you.
3.- Prepare the next sign (Igni) and either scorch them, attack the closest with corresponding sword or dodge. If done correctly, you'll deal damage to everyone (those on the ground and those still up). You can also repeat Aard.
4.- Focus on the closest or the strongest enemy, and chain your attacks while the others burn/stand up/recover.
5.- When the others get close, switch to Group and chain-attack again. Pick one and focus; don't worry about the others unless they're 20, your health is low or you're cornered.
6.- If the enemies are many or too strong, the fight will last for a while. At least enough to use your signs 2 or 3 more times.
7.- Remember to dodge and jump every 2-3 moves if you think you are losing.

Some other tips:

- Prepare in advance: study the bestiary, oil your weapon and drink a potion before the fight.
- Remember you can always run away. Geralt is faster than most enemies.
- Don't drink potions mid-fight. The animation is slow and will get you killed.
- Take advantage of the extras available to you: wheatstones, bombs, oils and potions.
- Learn the keybindings so you can quickly switch stances and signs.
- Remember you can pause and assess the situation at any time.
- You can lure, ambush and split groups of enemies. They are quite dumb.

About potions and alchemy:

- Your best supplier is the nature. Collect every and all herbs and ingredients you can find. Think Skyrim or Diablo. Use Ctrl+click to make it faster.
- Buy recipe books and learn which potions are the most useful.
- Ingredients are obscure-named but color-coded. This helps a lot.
- Unlock the "Herbalism" still ASAP.
- You can also buy ingredients from vendors and peddlers, but some of them can be expensive.

I hope this wall of text helps :/

[[101st]Stryker]

in my opinion, it's nice sum up

[Nephrin]

That was a damn good explanation man

[Deadbubble]

What I do when going against large groups is to use a puff of Igni jacked up with silver talents. All you have to do. Igni is OP in general, though.

[Kryllic]

Originally posted by Supermarine:

Ok... 'll try to help you, even when I'm no master myself. This game is somewhat unintuitive, and the combat system and interface are the main culprits.

Here we go: in combat you have 3 styles, 2 main weapons and some items you can craft. There is also a variety of skills and passive abilities that can help you in certain situations. Finally, you have access to signs, which simply put are "magic powers" that drain endurance (which is akin to Mana in other games, and recovers over time).

Before continuing, let me tell you a little secret: under the Hero menu you can find the tab "monsters". Here you will find useful information on how to counter specific creatures. This info does not come free; you must feed the bestiary with books (bought from vendors) and talking to people. It's really helpful and I suggest you get as many books as you can find.

The styles and swords you got it right so I won't waste time here.

You didn't mention the cursor, so in case you don't know this I'll explain. The cursor changes to a little sword when pointing at a potential enemy. This is when you click. Geralt will execute his moves and then the cursor, for a brief time, will appear as flaming. It is when this flaming sword appears that you must click again, not sooner. If you do it correctly, he will chain his attacks and increase the combo hits. You can actually kill an enemy without receiving a single hit if you do this on time. Technically, it appears that you can chain-attack forever.

Another tip: Geralt parries automatically. Try and experiment by getting surrounded by weak enemies and doing nothing. You can then get a feeling of how many attacks he is able to evade, block and dodge. This percentage can increase with skills (passive ones).

The auto-parry feature means you cannot actively block or defend, but you can jump and roll to evade incoming blows. You do this by double-tapping the WASD keys. Use this to get out of tight spots or to flee if necessary.

If you get surrounded and activate the group figthing style, and just stand there, you'll notice Geralt can actually multi-parry attacks coming from different directions. You will also notice that when you attack, the wide sweeps with the sword actually hit more than one foe on the same movement.

Using the group style, the WASD keys and the chain-attacks in coordination will turn you into a killing machine. This is how you can survive group fights. Beware missiles, though.

Also, complement your attacks with the available signs. Aard and Igni are the first ones you can get. One is a "Star Wars force-push" sort of magic, and the other one you can think of as a fanned flamethrower. Use those before you actually get surrounded for best results.

What I do is the following:

1.- When the enemy group is incoming, prepare the Aard. Shoot when the closest one is about 2 meters away.
2.- This will stun, knock down or push away at least some of them. Focus on those who remain standing and running towards you.
3.- Prepare the next sign (Igni) and either scorch them, attack the closest with corresponding sword or dodge. If done correctly, you'll deal damage to everyone (those on the ground and those still up). You can also repeat Aard.
4.- Focus on the closest or the strongest enemy, and chain your attacks while the others burn/stand up/recover.
5.- When the others get close, switch to Group and chain-attack again. Pick one and focus; don't worry about the others unless they're 20, your health is low or you're cornered.
6.- If the enemies are many or too strong, the fight will last for a while. At least enough to use your signs 2 or 3 more times.
7.- Remember to dodge and jump every 2-3 moves if you think you are losing.

Some other tips:

- Prepare in advance: study the bestiary, oil your weapon and drink a potion before the fight.
- Remember you can always run away. Geralt is faster than most enemies.
- Don't drink potions mid-fight. The animation is slow and will get you killed.
- Take advantage of the extras available to you: wheatstones, bombs, oils and potions.
- Learn the keybindings so you can quickly switch stances and signs.
- Remember you can pause and assess the situation at any time.
- You can lure, ambush and split groups of enemies. They are quite dumb.

About potions and alchemy:

- Your best supplier is the nature. Collect every and all herbs and ingredients you can find. Think Skyrim or Diablo. Use Ctrl+click to make it faster.
- Buy recipe books and learn which potions are the most useful.
- Ingredients are obscure-named but color-coded. This helps a lot.
- Unlock the "Herbalism" still ASAP.
- You can also buy ingredients from vendors and peddlers, but some of them can be expensive.

I hope this wall of text helps :/

Wow, that's a lot of info o.o most of what you said, though, I already knew of, but actually some of it I didn't know, and hopefully will be useful. For instance, I haven't been using Herbs because I didn't think it would be that helpful, but now I'm ganna spend some time getting into it. And when I would fight with group stance, I would just stand there because I didn't think I could move, and that I would miss.
But thanks for the in depth information, I'm glad you went over stuff just to make sure I knew, I really appreciate it. Hopefully I can beat this game now! :D

[Deadbubble]

Just remember to put some points into Igni. Trust me, its worth it. Make ample use of Alchemy as well. Thunderbolt (+50% damage, -50% dodge & parry) and Swallow (+health regen, brings it to actual reasonable levels) are lifesavers for me.

[Supermarine]

Originally posted by Deadbubble:

Just remember to put some points into Igni. Trust me, its worth it. Make ample use of Alchemy as well. Thunderbolt (+50% damage, -50% dodge & parry) and Swallow (+health regen, brings it to actual reasonable levels) are lifesavers for me.

Swallow I think might be the single most useful potion in the game. A life saver, for sure. Drink one before every important battle.

Also, I forgot to mention: loot all crates, wardrobes, barrels, etc. you can find. There's no police here: you can take everything from houses and containers even under the owner's nose without consecuences whatsoever.

View each fight as a dance of sorts. The point is to be calm but alert, keep moving and control the situation. Button-mashing is bad in this game, but combat can become frustrating very easily.

[Kryllic]

Originally posted by Supermarine:

Originally posted by Deadbubble:

Just remember to put some points into Igni. Trust me, its worth it. Make ample use of Alchemy as well. Thunderbolt (+50% damage, -50% dodge & parry) and Swallow (+health regen, brings it to actual reasonable levels) are lifesavers for me.

Swallow I think might be the single most useful potion in the game. A life saver, for sure. Drink one before every important battle.

Also, I forgot to mention: loot all crates, wardrobes, barrels, etc. you can find. There's no police here: you can take everything from houses and containers even under the owner's nose without consecuences whatsoever.

View each fight as a dance of sorts. The point is to be calm but alert, keep moving and control the situation. Button-mashing is bad in this game, but combat can become frustrating very easily.

Yea, I have had probably only 2 Swallow potions throughout the entire game. Again, I have no idea how to obtain it, or create it. Guess I'll have to do more research for that.

[Deadbubble]

Originally posted by Kryllic:

Originally posted by Supermarine:

Swallow I think might be the single most useful potion in the game. A life saver, for sure. Drink one before every important battle.

Also, I forgot to mention: loot all crates, wardrobes, barrels, etc. you can find. There's no police here: you can take everything from houses and containers even under the owner's nose without consecuences whatsoever.

View each fight as a dance of sorts. The point is to be calm but alert, keep moving and control the situation. Button-mashing is bad in this game, but combat can become frustrating very easily.

Yea, I have had probably only 2 Swallow potions throughout the entire game. Again, I have no idea how to obtain it, or create it. Guess I'll have to do more research for that.

Just collect ingridients. Pick up a few herbalist books (leaf on cover). Get a hard liquor (it'll say so, and say its a potion base). Make white gull if you so desire, then make Swallow.

Edit: Alchemy isn't really that complicated. Its nowhere near as complex as it may seem. All you have to do is read some herbalism books (books with a leaf on the cover), take the appropiate intelligence skill point to get a quick boost, pick up all, or most, ingridients you came across (plants, monster drops). Also, pick up any hard alcohol you come across. The description will say what kind of alcohol it is (weak, medium hard/potion base). Some potions, like Thunderbolt, require a White Gull to be brewed. If you have reserves, you can free up inventory space by converting all of your hard alcohol to White Gulls. Next, meditate and make whatever potion you want. Swallow is absolutely a necessity; anything else is up to you..

[Renato]

Max out your bronze skills for Aard and Igni. Then when you get silver points go for Igni. Aard won't help you much later on. But with Igni you will burn your enemies to death with continiously damage dealing incineration.

There are recipes for potions/oils/bombs. If you buy and read them you can learn them. You can buy them from vendors and when you enter meditation, you have to click Alchemy button. It is 2 clicks above Hero button. Geralt knows how to brew some potions. But as I said you have to learn the others. Some people will give you recipes for completing missions. But it is kinda rare so don't count on it.

You have to unlock Herbalism skill. It is a tier 2 bronze skill under Intelligence talent. Otherwise you can't gather herbs to brew potions.

I will try to explain alchemy.

>Meditate
>Go to Alchemy screen
>Choose potion and brew it

When you see the potion list, near the potions there are some colours. Those are substances. There are 6 basic substances in the game. Each of them have specific colours.
Bottom slots of your inventory is for alchemical ingredients. There you can hover over and see what substance an ingredient has. Also here there are 7 vials, if you click blue one it will highlight the ingredients which have blue substance. Ingredients are herbs and monster organs.

To brew potion, first you should have some strong alcohol. Not wines(medium) nor beers(weak). Or White Gull potion. There are 3 levels of potions bases. Standard-High-Top. White Gull potion is the top quality base but there are other alcohols which have top quality. When you hover over strong alcohols it says which quality base it has.
Standard quality potion bases have 3 slots for substances.
High quality potion bases have 4 slots for substances.
Top quality potion substances have 5 slots for substances.

Let's use Swallow as an example.

Swallow requires 4 substances so you will need a high quality potion base (or top, it doesn't matter if one slot remains empty). I don't call substances by their names, I call them by their colours. It is easier. In the potion list you will see 1 blue, 2 green and 1 purple colours. If you just click Swallow the game automatically select the ingredients and when you hit Mix it will brew it easily.
But if you don't wanna use some of the ingredients, like White vinegar (because it is expensive and you can sell it for money), you have to drag it back to the inventory and select an ingredient which has blue substance. (Because white vinegar had blue substance so you have to replace it).

And there are special ingredients. They are colored like a rainbow. They are gathered by boss monsters. Like in the tutorial, when you brew a potion for Triss you had to use the Frightener's special ingredient.

Also there are 3 secondary substances but those are not important to brew potions. Just if you have 3 of some red colored secondary substance, you will get some bonuses. You can learn it by yourself as you brew potions.

Here I copy-pasted from wiki.

Albedo dominance — Reduces toxicity of consumed potions, it lasts 1 hour.
Nigredo dominance — Increases damage inflicted by 20%, it lasts 4 hours.
Rubedo dominance — Accelerates regeneration of vitality, it lasts 4 hours.

I think there aren't any other things to say. I hope I explained clearly.

[metal_hamster]

It must be quite embarrassing to be too stupid to understand and read the tutorial/manual.

[Kryllic]

Originally posted by metal_hamster:

It must be quite embarrassing to be too stupid to understand and read the tutorial/manual.

not embarrassing enough to go on the forums and ask for help... Honestly, not exactly sure what your intentions are for such insults, they help no one and only make you look like an ass/troll. Also, can I mention that I did understand and read the tutorial/manual? And if I missed the part in the tutorial/manual where they tell you how to take on 20+ guys solo without dying, by all means, please guide to such information, I would really appreciate it!

[Sauce]

If you're fighting a bunch of guys, make sure you stay on the outside by double tapping the movement keys in the direction you want to go. He will do a flip or spin of some kind and get you out of that situation. It helps be directly next to the enemy, and IMO the easiest way to just have him jump over the guy in front of him. When you're out, immediately turn around and unleash some group strikes. As they close in on you, they will be felled. Rinse and repeat if they don't die quickly. It'll help if you swap enemies as you combo since they get pushed back a bit when you attack, if you spin and continue the combo on the guy that's riding your ass, it should keep most of them at a decent distance. It is also easier if you utilize the pause for both this dodge and the combos and really battle in general in case you're not reacting fast enough. Sorry if it's been said!

[IceDogg]

If you max igni, later it will be super strong aoe, its easier way to beat game
You should buy books to learn about flowers and be able to pick up them after it, also you need alcohol for potions, which can be looted or bought
make potions during meditation: its nice to have Swallow most of the time (it shouldnt be hard), have some cat potions to be able to see in caves etc (or you can DL mod to see in dark, which is more booklike), the strongest potion in my opinion is blizzard, it doesnt last long, but with increasing parry by 50% and dodge by 50% its very useful (not only) against multiple enemies, you should have some in backup for toughest fights
//For example in fight, which occur when you are supposed to enter the town and you end in jail

potions are learnt by recipes, which you can buy like books, or can be discovered by trying new combinations, new potions will be unknown, untill you try them - then Geralt will know them
if you dont mind cheating, you can find recipes on internet and then learn it Geralt


I think that not active parry/dodge is RPG element, like in DD when you throw dice and hope in proc, with stats you can increase your chances
You can find this in plenty RPGs (I mean the ones from above)

Also there is quite big mod called Full Combat Rebalance, which rebalance combat
You would need to start new game, but I find it more entertaining challenging and smarter

[dunbaratu]

The most frustrating thing I had getting started was the fact that the game does not tell you that when you click on an enemy to attack you don't click. You press and HOLD the mouse button to attack, and then release once you see your character finish the move, and THAT is when the cooldown time begins where you take your finger off the button. If you just click, it will continue to do absolutely nothing over and over each time you click. That was really infuriating because nothing in the game tells you this. I only found it by trial and error, after failing again and again in the simple tutorial opening mission because silly me I actually followed the in-game instructions and CLICKED rather than held the button.