Author: Lily Ross

I’m feeling a bit under the weather today so I’, going to make this as brief as possible since really there isn’t much to cover with menus and levels. 

MENUS:

What I mean by “Menus” is the necessity navigational outlets that will help you find things quicker. For instance, BESTIARAY is under the menu called Bestiary. While books that you also collect on The Path of a Witcher is under the Books menu OR one of the categories in your equipment menu. You’d have to see that for yourself if you wish to play the game, the tutorial walks you through equipment nav. 

Now when you first load in, you will see different options depending on which game version you have. For instance, the complete edition of The Witcher 3; The Wild Hunt, includes two side stories 

Heart of Stone

Blood and Wine. 

These two stories are an extension for Geralt’s lore, more so Blood and Wine than Hearts of stone. If you have not played the game or if you have, whichever is the case the game itself offers you a chance to play the stories separately from the main story. Jumping you right into the beginning of the DLC I believe. I have not actually started the DLC stories separately myself. 

I cannot say for sure if they put you in the appropriate approximate level but if you don’t want the complete conclusion of the entire Witcher lore to end, I don’t recommend starting Blood and Wine yet. 

You will also find the game difficulty setting based on easiest to hardest and then of course New Game + where you keep all of your equipment, but the game is automatically harder.

LEVELS:

THIS IS IMPORTANT!

Levels exist for a reason in every game, while some try to beat a boss while severely under level and can win, this game WILL NOT let you do that without stress. Remember what I said about equipment and tools? It’s for this exact reason.

There will be bounties or rather known as Contracts you will find all throughout the cities you travel too. You won’t know the level until you navigate to your bounty drop down menu through your quest’s menu.

IF YOU SEE A GIANT RED SKULL ON THE SIDE OF THAT BOUNTY DO NOT ENGAGE THAT BOUNTY YET.

I kid you not guys, The monsters you will fight in this game are as realistic as they can get with modern tech today, or during their time in when the game released. (2020 or 2022 I can’t remember)

They will kill you in one hit or knock you down to a sliver of one health left. Now if you’re brave and willing to live on the edge, sure go for it. If you’re safe and would rather figure out what the enemy is (it more than likely will be a much bigger or avian monster) gather materials, then fight it later, congrats you’ll live to see another day especially if you save your game.

(You also only get three health potions when first starting out before you begin upgrades.)

For the love of God please save your game before a big fight or story cutscene. It won’t be every time but get accustomed to saving, the game does quick save but if you don’t save manually, it can crash your game and cause a Permanant error. (Especially on ps4-5 if on disc or not) 

Saving a game before you talk to your bounty contractor will help you a lot in future, and I’ll explain more in the future as well.

SKILLS:

I mentioned Upgrades earlier and this ties in with levels since Every time you level up you gain an Attribute/Ability point.

(I apologize if its blurry, you may have to squint)

The image above is the level up/attribute menu. All the boxes on the right-hand side, that’s how many you can have equipped. The small outer boxes are for mutagens but those will come later. 

You have five trees to choose from: 

Combat, Magic, DNA, Alchemy, and Travel. 

Combat: pretty plain and simple. Fighting skills, leveling them up etc.

Magic: also, very forward. You remember when I mentioned Witcher Signs? Thats the only magic you have, and you can upgrade and further improve them in the blue menu.

The green menu is the Mutagen menu; you select your mutagens there to help your attributes. Match the corresponding color of the mutagen with the colored attribute you’ll see if the mutagen enhances that skill and even more if there’s multiple of the same color, but it has to be on the same side as the offside box. 

Alchemy: this is where you can improve your stock of potions, bombs, and oils. 

Travel: The furthest on the right. These skills will help you as time passes using in-game time such as regeneration, meditation attributes and buffs, it’s like a natural honing for Geralt and his Witcher senses. (Which is an actual skill.) 

You see why these are so important?

You have to spend your points wisely and you can also acquire skills that can be maxed out in three uses of attribute points. You don’t get these points back and you don’t get to equip everything; sometime dire situation calls for dire needs so you will have to spend some to gain an upper hand. 

Let me know how you feel about The Witcher 3, The Wild hunt. I’ve received comments on interests as to wanting to play the game and I’ll gladly answer to any questions you may have or will let you know if it’s in an upcoming blog.  

As I said I would, I’m covering some more of the basics when it comes to The Witcher more specifically to the GAME I’m having to write notes on the lore right now to figure out how to summarize it, it’s very similar to the show Arcane for having multiple stories in one big world.)

WARNING: 

I’m very appreciative of some of the comments left about wanting to read The Witcher books but I must warn you, these books are not the typical book. It’s a hard read with very vivid graphic imagery of A LOT OF adult content, so if you’re one to get squeamish when it comes to guts, blood, sex, drinking, death, sometimes sexism, it’s not for you. SOME BOOKS WILL NOT ALWAYS BE GERALT BASED. ITS A BIG WORLD.

The same can be said about the game. Giving you actual real time scenery of what is going on. (Admittedly for it to still be considered content appropriate, the game does censor some of the more intimate scenes with even a skip button, however violence and killing in the game, beasts and other humans is mandatory for the plot. Sorry, can’t skip that and you will get graphic, small, in game, quick cutscenes. A common one being a quick decapitation if fighting a human or lesser monster.)

I would absolutely love to explain more of the books to you, however even I am in the process of still reading these books. (I’ve read the first one like 3 times because I’m trying to buy them all in the same cover.) I can however tell you LOTS about the games!

Being a very late fan into the Witcher most of the previous game (1 and 2) are unavailable to me so Instead I already have the Witcher Three: The Wild Hunt.

YOU NEED TO KNOW THESE FOR THE GAME: 

I, when I was about 12 years old when I played this game, I was amazed at so much thought and detail went into the game but most importantly I loved the BEASTIARY and CRAFTING/BLACKSMITHING so much because I found them out SO LATE! (I had the same armor through the entire game and was dying VERY easily, lol)

This above is the BEASTIARY! 

If you can’t tell what that is above, that my friend is a Fiend. Kinda looks like a Wendigo, doesn’t it? Well, what if I told you the wendigo and another beast called a Leshen were actually pretty similar? 

Figuring this, can you guess what the BEASTIARY is? 

If you guessed a journal or logbook for certain beasts and magical entities or races (including people) then you’d be correct. 

The BEASTIARY is a perfect dictionary of sorts that helps you identify your creature you are hunting. Its lore, where it comes from, if it has similar brethren in different regions, what its weak to, using oils, silver, steel and what sign you must use. 

Brief Sign disclosure: Its Witcher magic (will be covered in the lore blog sometime soon, not the next.) 

If you look up “Bestiary Witcher 3”, a wide variety of images will show you different entities under their respective races recorded section. 

A lot of these drop-down menus show you what they are 

For example:

Beasts:

wolf,

wild dog,

bear

etc. 

Necromancers: 

Ghouls,

Alghouls

etc.

So on, so forth. 

Now again, you wanna pay attention to the small image of the fiend at the top. Refer to the small three or 4 boxes at the bottom of its figure, that’s where you will find its vulnerabilities! 

CRAFTING/BLACKSMITHING: 

oh boy the one thing YOU DEFINETLY WILL HAVE TO DO PROGRESSILVLY throughout the game. Guys…your swords can dull and break! PAY THEM HEED!’ so will your armor!

It is important that you keep an eye on your screen when you see a small diagram pop up on the left-hand side with red armor or swords. Thats an indicator that your equipment is very weak! (Id show you but there no picture found) 

So instead, you’ll need this: A repair kit(s)

(One will usually do it; that’s just the quantity of how many this person has.)

These can be found or bought in local cities or found out in the open world. 

Its kinda small and I’m sorry but below is the crafting menu: 

This is where you will make your potions, oils, bombs, fabrics and other materials for your travels. Diagrams you collect on your journey (aka The Path) will aid you in discovering new items and essentials to crafting new armor or swords. YOU WILL NEED TO DO THIS!

Do not be like 12-year-old me way back when and though that your weak little swords and armor will last you, IT WON’T! 

Trade, craft, go to a blacksmith (it’s a very similar menu like the one above) This is a very slice of life game, you HAVE to play this game like you’re desperately trying to survive. 

With your (hopefully new or restored) armor and weapons you will need to go out and deliberately slice and dice monsters or harvest plants. The tutorial in the game walks you through this phase.  

What it doesn’t always tell you is that if you have a sort of Alcohol in your inventory, Dwarven spirit, then your health potion once you craft it: Swallow, will regenerate once you meditate. 

Meditating is a key factor in resting and regenerating health, magic, toxicity, stamina, and health items/oils. 

To think these are the basics is quite the stretch since I learned these so late! So, if you decide to play the game (Available on ps4-psf5, Xbox one, Xbox series s-x, PC or Nintendo switch) you now know ahead of time to know what to look out for. Sometime people forget things, so I hope this blog was helpful if you ever forget a key detail on your Path. 

(Preferably, when looking for the game look for the one labeled COMPLETE EDITION you get the full pack of DLC’s and extra equipment to hunt and I wouldn’t recommend PS4 or Nintendo switch cause sometimes issues will occur frequently, meaning you may burn/overheat your console.) 

THANKS SO MUCH FOR READING, Its long yet necessary for game depth. And I only covered two factors, next will be navigations of the map, menus, and level differences and gaging, contracts/treasure hunts and currency. Yeah…

The plan:

Next Wednesday, 9/3/25: Menus and levels.

The Wednesday after, 9/10/25: Map nav and Bounty/treasure/currency.

9/17/25: Meat and potatoes of the Lore (AROUND GERALT!) 

The game itself can tell you lore about what’s going on with the world, hence why it’s an open world adventure for a reason. 

(I won’t be stuck on the Witcher for too much longer.)

I’m a really, really, REALLY! Big fan of The Witcher book series written by Andrzej Sapkowski and game produced by CD Projekt Red who helped create the Witcher Three, The Wild Hunt. However, something I’m not too happy about is the disregard to timeline, character development, and story in Netflix’s adaptation. 

Who is casting?  Who or what is the problem? 

A really big fan of the books was stared as the main protagonist, Geralt of Rivia. A Witcher on The Path. Some may know him from his previous role as Superman in Zack Snyders DC Superman films, Henry Cavill. 

Henry, like many with favorites to the games, was in big favor of the books. At first, everyone waited on the edge of their seats for the upcoming Witcher series that would release on December 20th, 2019, because of the highly anticipated casting of Henry being Geralt himself. However, the excitement did not last long. The sudden cause for future drastic disinterest and modestly, shame, for the series wasn’t because of Henry, it was really the opposite, it’s the producers. 

If you are unaware, Henry had a lot of back and forth with Zack Snyders superman for not entirely being true and accurate to Superman’s character in the comics, the same can be said for Geralt when the producers began changing and mixing things up that weren’t not only true to Geralt, but the entire story and sequences of events as well. 

I understand some movies and shows have budgets, and The Witcher series defiantly would have to have been a show. For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ll give you some story depth.

Who IS Geralt?

Geralt of Rivia is a man from the kingdom of Rivia but was taken as a child from his home by these monster and human hunters called Witcher’s, a male version of witch, sort of. Only boys at a young age were taken, and very few survived the mutation or training to become a Witcher, the mutation being the “rite of passage” sort of deal where if they survive, they are now destined to walk The Path, a brutal and dangerous journey for just any normal man. Going to town after town, contract after contract with no such thing as a retirement. (Geralt would also be the one to change this in the video game and maybe the books but not until the very end) 

Another really big difference that I’ve noticed is that they really switch up his love interests and their storylines. Theres so much I want to rant about, but I can’t incase anyone’s interested in reading the books and then playing the games. 

(The games and the books are heavily tied together, and the games stay very true to the books, making them more accurate and canonical. If you saw how many side quests and in-depth world exploration is, Netflix would have a very hard time keeping up with it all, so I understand not including EVERYTHING) 

Here are some pictures of the Geralt’s used in both the game and Henry Cavills adaptation to him! 

Book Geralt (1st book):

Game Geralt (The Witcher 3):

Henry Cavills Geralt:

I’ll get more into The Witcher in my next blog, hope you enjoyed the basics though.

Theres many things in this world that people can enjoy like, Coffee, Boba, and Tea. 

You may or may not be a morning person, so coffee may or may not be for you. You might enjoy a bitter but prominent flavorful taste; Tea is the way to go. Now if you enjoy both, Boba adds to the fun. Giving you a silky-smooth milk tea or coffee experience with fun popping or brown sugar boba balls at the bottom. Each one of these drinks can add just the right amount of dopamine to your day. It doesn’t have to be every day but whenever you want. 

In better understanding what each of these beverages bring to you, you have to be willing to TRY them, otherwise you miss out on, potentially, a newfound experience.  Or maybe you have, and it just wasn’t for you, that’s fine, you don’t HAVE to like them. 

Coffee:

Coffee is a well-used essential beverage in everyday life, specifically mornings to help those wake up for a very long day with a boost of caffeine. However not always is it used for this purpose. From what I’ve seen, coffee is a very comforting beverage to some and even helps keep the brain focused without a dump load of caffeine like energy drinks do normally. You can drink it on the go, hot or cold, you can even try many different types of coffee like a Frappuccino, Macchiato, Cold brew, so on and so forth. You can even mix and match flavors and styles to find and personalize your own. [If you couldn’t tell already, I really like coffee.]

Tea:

Most people who like coffee, don’t really like tea and those who really like tea don’t really like coffee. Tea in itself is unique. It’s herbal and fresh and brewed fresh just for you. It can be bitter, but that can change with anything you want to add into it. Tea is a very soothing beverage, it helps ease the mind and if you’re not a caffeine fan, this helps keep you energized and awake in a good healthy way. You can drink it hot or cold, anywhere you want. 

Boba:

Boba is a nice, sweet surprise in a cup. The tea, coffee or even milk itself is not what makes this drink so overly fascinating, it’s the surprise at the bottom. Can you guess what their called? These fun little surprises can make any tea or coffee ten times more enjoyable and fun. Certain flavors with the right beverage mix will be an explosion of flavor in your mouth if you have the popping pearls. The regular pearls at the bottom are usually just the standard brown-sugar pack in a three-pack box from Walmart. These Boba’s are a lot squishier and purely just for flavor. You can of course get different flavor of the standard pearls and the popping pearls, its fun to mix and match sometimes! 

So, what do you think? Willing to give these three drinks a try?