Which mods are your must-haves?

[SimranZenov]

Just curious, what mods can you not play without?

For me it's the increased carry weight. I hate hauling things to storage or constantly selling things... Also, I have 3 sisters who are red heads, so changing Triss's hair color is a must for me...


(no need to respond if you're a hardcore vanilla player that thinks the game is perfection as-is)

[V I D A L]

Yeah.. I don't think there is any must-haves mods.. much less a cheating one.
I only use reshade to tweak some visuals to my liking.. small things.

[Dusty Leon]

Auto Apply Oils, Friendly HUD, and All Quest Objectives on Map are the ones I wouldn't want to do without.

[V I D A L]

I just remember a mod I have installed... not a must have, but an improvement.
So you may or may not have noticed that every NPC has 2 faces.. one that you see in the gameplay whicih is simplified because you only see from a distance, and a higher detailed face that appears only during conversation and cutsces. There is a mod to apply the high detailed face models during gameplay.

[[Kobe Squad] Kulshius]

Only mod that I personally see as "required" is stacking mutagens for NG+.
TL;DR is that for some reason they made a mistake and mutagens stack only in New Game, but not in NG+. So not only you end up with 300 individual wraith mutagens, you also lose any stacks of mutagens on starting NG+.
Sure, only fixes a small bug, but I think it's way better than most of those mods that defeat half of game's points by making you do half of gameplay automatically for you.

[SilentStorm]

For me not an absolute must but HD reworked, real weather, there’s a lightning mod also that adds some immersion during storms, basically any off the graphical upgrade mods.

[Rudi-v]

For me, 'Friendly Wolves' is a must, as it gets very tiresome to constantly having to kill those noble beasts as they are virtually everywhere. They do still show up as enemies whenever the script demands it, and you will still be able to get more than enough wolf parts for crafting and potion making. I, personally, would never use a 'cheat' mod that increases carry weight, as it is just too unrealistic. There are enough ways in the game to improve it----eg;----upgraded saddlebags, an extra weight-carrying ability 'skill' in the general skills tree, and a potion that lets you carry an extra 20lbs., not to mention a 'trophy' you get early in the game that lets you carry anotther 40 lbs.

[Yumeko]

the most important mods is either witcher 3 enhanced edition or Ghostmode, they fix hundreds of issues in the vanilla game, literally, not a figure of speech. And then a good lighting mod to severely improve your visuals without even affecting performance.

other recommendations:
- HDRP
- E3 improved combat animations
- Friendly meditation
- Friendly HUD
- Preperations
The gameplay mods are not needed if going for w3ee.

[[Kobe Squad] Kulshius]

Honestly, mod for "friendly wildlife" sounds like something I'd like at this point... Kind of tired of having to murder bears and wolves (not wild/rabid dogs tho) just because they were chilling around after killing 7 elks. even would make sense, as wolves are not aggressive wildlife by default. Only when hunting. And even then prefer weak prey (injured/old animals). As for bears... well... you scare one in the game as part of gameplay. Doesn't make sense for every single other bear to charge at you for no reason. Same for boars tbh...

[[Kobe Squad] Kulshius]

Messaggio originale di Hi im Royeen:

the most important mods is either witcher 3 enhanced edition or Ghostmode, they fix hundreds of issues in the vanilla game, literally, not a figure of speech. And then a good lighting mod to severely improve your visuals without even affecting performance.

other recommendations:
- HDRP
- E3 improved combat animations
- Friendly meditation
- Friendly HUD
- Preperations
The gameplay mods are not needed if going for w3ee.

What's wrong with default combat, meditation and lightning tho? For HUD... I can see how some things could be adjusted (alchemy material crafting in batches for example, that stuff is painful when you have 115 lesser red mutagens), but HUD isn't that bad in general... (apart from terrible lag in stash/merchants)

[Ijustfragyou]

HD texture and ultra gore thats it.

[Rudi-v]

Messaggio originale di Kobe Squad Kulshius:

Honestly, mod for "friendly wildlife" sounds like something I'd like at this point... Kind of tired of having to murder bears and wolves (not wild/rabid dogs tho) just because they were chilling around after killing 7 elks. even would make sense, as wolves are not aggressive wildlife by default. Only when hunting. And even then prefer weak prey (injured/old animals). As for bears... well... you scare one in the game as part of gameplay. Doesn't make sense for every single other bear to charge at you for no reason. Same for boars tbh...

Unfortunately, only the wolves become friendly, 'guess that's why it's called 'Friendly Wolves'. But, believe me, you'll appreciate having it. As for those bears, I don't like killing them unless it's absolutely necessary, so I generally just zap them with an Axii sign, and while they are dazed, I leave the area, and continue onward.

[[Kobe Squad] Kulshius]

Well, for wildlife, sure, mod name makes sense it only affects wolves. Tho, would be nice to see it expanded a bit. Might as well do it by myself if I care enough, which I don't know yet if I do as wolves became trivial to me even if I get cornered by them at this point.
For wolves, I usually just bolt through them with Roach and leave them on their own devices. Not feeling like stopping to murder wildlife when it stands just as roadblock in open field that I can just avoid if I'm not too lazy to go around them in the first place. Especially when there is no benefit for me at all other than getting few raw meats that I use as "almost passive" health regen (with 20min food skill; just a nice thing in-between encounters).
What really caught me off-guard were boars. First of all, didn't expect them being aggressive. Second, I didn't expect them being in game at all (and was questioning how come I've never seen one despite Ciri killing one with sword was mentioned at least 5 times). Getting rammed by one tho is kind of unfair. They are much faster than they really should, each dash hits like 5 times and if there is more than 2 boars at once you are just stunlocked and can only pray you get a chance to dodge away...

Speaking of mods, with my time invested in game so far I would say look up something like "merchant inventory nuke" or whatever it's called. If you haul a lot of stuff for selling, some merchants can get pretty laggy over time. Hatori takes almost 10s for me to open his shop inventory and it's not even fun at this point... Still didn't get that mod myself tho, but really considering it. (also considering mod to make option so that merchant dissassembles all it has into crafting materials while getting gold for doing so for himself. Would make merchants like Hatori a bit more rich while keeping their inventory cleaner)

Also, not sure if there are mods for it, but something for crossbows would be nice. Especially something that adds legendary variety of them. Or something that makes their damage actually care. Sure, they are not meant as primary weapons and probably intended just for utility, but I kind of wish they did more than just 50 dmg when my weapon does over 1k in single hit... (blood and wine kind of fix that, but at pretty high tradeoff cost)

[Bandy]

There is a mod that changes the sharpening wheel and armor bench so the improvements aren't on a timer, because you know, that just makes no sense. The improvements wear down with hits and damage instead, so a must for me.

Also meditation mods (Friendly Meditation and Preparations) to make that game mechanic more lore friendly, especially if you have read the short stories/books.

Could also include a survivorship mod in here so you have to eat, sleep, drink, but nothing too demanding...

But carry weight mods? Really??? That's pretty gamey, steel, iron, silver ingots, etc etc etc already weight nothing, so there is no excuse for increasing carry weight, just buy some saddle bags...

That said, the beauty of mods is that you get to pick and choose to make the game the way you want it to be, so don't let anyone tell you to just play it vanilla, b/c they are a vanilla nazi...

[Rudi-v]

Speaking of mods, with my time invested in game so far I would say look up something like "merchant inventory nuke" or whatever it's called. If you haul a lot of stuff for selling, some merchants can get pretty laggy over time. Hatori takes almost 10s for me to open his shop inventory and it's not even fun at this point... Still didn't get that mod myself tho, but really considering it. (also considering mod to make option so that merchant dissassembles all it has into crafting materials while getting gold for doing so for himself. Would make merchants like Hatori a bit more rich while keeping their inventory cleaner)

There's a mod for that called 'Faster Stash Menu', and it does seem to help a lot.

[[Kobe Squad] Kulshius]

Man, I wish I knew about stash menu mod ~400h of gameplay ago...

As for mods... What does exactly Meditation and Preparation mod do? Sorry to ask, I'm not too familiar with lore (just went through all 3 games, third one twice because NG+ and rushed through 2nd game as i really didn't enjoy it at all gameplay wise). Sure, would have liked if alchemy and rest could have been done only next to campfires, like in first game, but I didn't really need mod for that kind of limitation that I could just "roleplay" by myself. (not that i forced myself on that tho).

Carry weight mods tho... ehh... to each their own I guess. Games are meant to be enjoyed in a way person wants to enjoy. And as long as it's not competitive or multiplayer game I don't see why not. Not like they force me to do same.
I guess I'm sometimes one of those "vanilla nazis" tho, as I usually prefer to have my game with as few mods as manageable, playing game as they were made to be played. Unless mods implement something that fixes gaping issues or add something new to a game that I know inside out already (new maps, quests, locations).


Speaking of mods in general... Have anyone thought of doing some sort of overhaul mod where Witcher1 rules are implemented in W3 gameplay? Namely resting at fireplaces, non-replenishable oils/potions/bombs (so you have to actually make 20 Cat potions if you plan to explore), no toxicity decay, weight on every kind of material (so you can't carry 600 drowner brains on you like it's nothing)... Probably would be annoying to play, but also I would try that for sure :D