Character Builds, Ability Points, & How to Kick Ass Thread

[-Hisoka]

Sounds like a fun build. Just note that console users can't use Yellow abilities in the Mutation skill slots, so they won't be able to use your build.

not true my friend ! ^^
if u put a green skill in the 4 extra slots(if u use euphoria)
and yellow/red skills in the default 6 slots

you can then drag the greens into the red/yellows and it will swap them for you


p.s
let me know if you can test my build,im just excited about it but got a long way until i finish HoS/BnW

 

[Exentryk]

not true my friend ! ^^
if u put a green skill in the 4 extra slots(if u use euphoria)
and yellow/red skills in the default 6 slots

you can then drag the greens into the red/yellows and it will swap them for you


p.s
let me know if you can test my build,im just excited about it but got a long way until i finish HoS/BnW

Console users can't drag and drop with the controller.

I won't be able to test it, as I'll be on holiday for a few weeks. But it sounds like it should work.

 

[-Hisoka]

Console users can't drag and drop with the controller.

I won't be able to test it, as I'll be on holiday for a few weeks. But it sounds like it should work.

ok m8 ill hope ill find the gear and update b4 u come ^^

 

[aozgolo]

I've come to really like using Bombs, and Igni in battle to compliment Fast Strikes, but would like to incorporate more alchemy into it, lean a bit more on using decoctions, oils, and potions. So I'm really looking for a good build that gives me max bombs, whirl, delusion (for RP purposes), Igni power (don't need firestream as I use it more as crowd control), and with a greater focus on alchemy usage.

 

[DeathBK]

You feel bored.

You hate the repeated cycle slash -> dodge/roll -> slash until your enemy dead. Feel like you are playing Dark Souls, not The Witcher

You are Geralt of Rivia, The White Wolf, The Butcher of Blaviken, the greastest swordman the world has ever seen, a monster slayer, an automatic killing machine ... but even a noname city guard can beat you out of misery, And you hate that !!!

I bring you this build, Invincible Geralt, will help you crush everything you meet in your Path. Nothing can stop you, no one can stop you, except some peasant with pitchforks, or a witch with black-haired, I guess !!!

I used my build on Death March difficulty, upscaled, and not die even one in this 2nd playthrough. (My first playthrough is a full Sign run)

I made this vid to present my build, all you have to do is hold fast attack button until you feel bored
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fTOhCRy-tw" target="_blank">[video=youtube;5fTOhCRy-tw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fTOhCRy-tw[/video]

Early games (lv 10-15, I guess)
There is not much to say, because you do not have much skill points in this stage. But no problem, I will give you some tips:
- General: knowledge is power, find as much potions/decotions/oils formulae as possible; wearing best armor, using best weapon you can find, no need to care much about equipment at this moment.
- Fight against monsters: dodge, roll, hit ... etc. Using quen to protect yourself. Do not rush, just gently like a witcher !!! Make sure you know your bestiary, apply appropriate oils, bombs ...
- Fight against human/nonhumans: stay on Roach If you can, just ride toward enemy and slay them. If you can't fight with Road, kill archers first. Axii them, roll behind their back, press heavy attack and hope for a finish move.

You will have at least 21 skill points SP at level 15 (15 from level up, 6 from Place of Power in White Orchard), I suggest you spend SP in this order:
- 5 SP to Muscle Memory: Fast Attack is main dmg dealer of this build, so ...
- 3 SP to Delusion: increases effective of Axii in dialogue, that's what I need.
- 3 SP to Resolve/3SP to Strength Training: so you can access round 2 of sword skills. I suggest you invest to Resolve, so you do not need to buy potion of clearance later.
- 5 SP to Precise Blows
- 3 SP to Acquired Tolerance
- The rest go to Heightened Tolerance or Poisoned Blade, so you can access round 2 of alchemy skills.

Middle game (lv 15-25)
- General: keep find potions/decotions/oils formula. Maxed out Protective Coating as soon as you can. Combine this skill with a high resistance armor, you are nearly impossible to kill. And because you killed a Grffin at the very first of the game, I highly recommend you make Griffin Decotion, can provide you at maximum 25% resistance to all type of dmg except dmg from monster. Follow this build, you will very hard to kill, and although your damage look very low, do not worry, they will increase a lot in combat, when you drink your potions and apply your oils: Thunderbolt, Tawny Owl, Blizzard ...

You can see those difference in these pics.
Here is my stats before combat: http://i.imgur.com/gMUwFJt.jpg
And in combat, after drink potions, decotions, apply oils ... http://i.imgur.com/sxpCHSc.jpg
See ??? 3000 dps before, 17000 dps later, approximately 6 times difference.

You will have 10-15 more SP, I suggest you spend them in this order:
- 5SP to Protective Coating
- 5SP to Heightened Tolerance
- 2SP to Refreshment, so you can access row 3 of Alchemy.
- The rest go to Synergy.

Late game:
- General: not much to say. Keep wearing heavy armor to maintain high resistance, enchantment them with Levify (all equipped armor counts as Light Armor), so you can have benefits from Cat School Techniques. Using whatever sword you want, as long as It provide A LOT OF % critical damage. Maxed out those skills: Fixative, Fleet Flooted/Crushing Blows, Whirl, Razor Focus, Deadly Precision. When go into combat, again, drink decotions/potions, apply oils. You should have the Auto Apply Oils mod, will have you save a lot of time.

TL; DR, here is for you

Why those dude in your vid die so soon ??? As I see, the highest dmg you deal is 5000, those soldiers have aroud 70000 hp, why after even 4-5 hit, a lot of them die already ???

OK, seem like you are truly the best swordman the world've ever seen, you can kick ass everyone you met in the game. But I wonder how your build perform against monsters ???

 

[-Hisoka]

question about some of the skills

hey !
im tying to improve my build each day , thinking which skills to remove/add


i just found out that i must start use Resolve / Razor focus for the andrenaline points
i also found out that instead of focusing on Stamina regen i can focus on AP with the yellow skill that let you cast signs for AP which is amazing better idea

so id like to know what do you think about some of the skills

Poisioned blades - is it worth it ? on monsters that higher level then me or with high HP pool the Poision effect is nice in terms of damage but sometimes its just low like for humans and such...

Tissue Transmutation - im using 4 Decoctions and i get 4k HP which gets me to 11.5k hp so without it i will get to 7.5k

i also use delusion for quests/xp


i use the 6 red skills that u need to get whirl/rend - so im not sure if any of them worth taking back!

also i use Griffin school - and now i think its useless ! and i should swap it with something else



also would like to know what do you think about Sunder Armor - is it worth taking up a slot ?

also for the Runewords - im using Protection which automaticly cast quen for me when i enter the fight - but im thinking maybe i should get the deflect arrows one ? maybe you got better runeword i should try out ?



Thanks!

 

[Draconifors]

I'd say Poisoned Blades is worth having, and so is Delusion. The first three fast attack skills are also good. Griffin school is a nice bonus if you're wearing medium armor, but you'll do just fine without it.

If you don't really use Axii outside of dialogue, you could try only slotting Delusion when you need it, and have something more generally useful in that slot when not in dialogue.

The rest I've never used and so don't know about.

 

[nfi42]

I tailor my build such that its effective against high health. low health enemies, your build doesn't matter

Thus poison blades is good. Immediate one bar adrenalin and raising adrenalin points quickly. maximise critical hit chance.

For protection. high tolerance and obviously quen

 

[-Hisoka]

I tailor my build such that its effective against high health. low health enemies, your build doesn't matter

Thus poison blades is good. Immediate one bar adrenalin and raising adrenalin points quickly. maximise critical hit chance.

For protection. high tolerance and obviously quen

right now i changed my build to
6 red skills for whirl/rend
razor focus and resolve
2 yellow skills which are signs with stamina and 30 more toxicity
delusion lvl 3 for dialogs
synregy/aquired tolerence/fixative/protective coating

i have 1 free slot and it could be eaither poisioned blades/sunder armor/tissue transmutation or something else entirely

i think poisioned blades will be the better choice here


also what do you think about the runes?auto cast quen seems useless now but on the other hand still nice to have insta quen so im not sure about it...

 

[nfi42]

right now i changed my build to
6 red skills for whirl/rend
razor focus and resolve
2 yellow skills which are signs with stamina and 30 more toxicity
delusion lvl 3 for dialogs
synregy/aquired tolerence/fixative/protective coating

i have 1 free slot and it could be eaither poisioned blades/sunder armor/tissue transmutation or something else entirely

i think poisioned blades will be the better choice here


also what do you think about the runes?auto cast quen seems useless now but on the other hand still nice to have insta quen so im not sure about it...

To be honest, I don't pay that much attention to The Best Build, but having said that, here's what I think.

I don't use whirl/rend, just seems too OP to me. That means I use poisoned blades and sunder arms. with one slot, I'd go poisoned blades, works with both strong and fast attack. Just beat the toad prince and poisoned blades still worked. I was surprised. I don't use Tissue transmutation at all, I find it better to have abilities to heal yourself are better than max health.

The normal runestones are much of a muchness and don't add much to your build. I just using chernobog runestones as it always adds attack power. That is if it isn't still bugged, I haven't even bothered checking. I just use the quen runestones for my play style.

I don't use runewords, looked at them, and didn't feel any of them was worth removing the 3 runestone slots.

Don't forget to use your bombs and potions these all tie into your build and play style.

Again, it doesn't really matter, Combat in the witcher is not that difficult to really make "best" builds matter. If you like replaying, try different builds, I've tried most of them.

 

[-Hisoka]

To be honest, I don't pay that much attention to The Best Build, but having said that, here's what I think.

I don't use whirl/rend, just seems too OP to me. That means I use poisoned blades and sunder arms. with one slot, I'd go poisoned blades, works with both strong and fast attack. Just beat the toad prince and poisoned blades still worked. I was surprised. I don't use Tissue transmutation at all, I find it better to have abilities to heal yourself are better than max health.

The normal runestones are much of a muchness and don't add much to your build. I just using chernobog runestones as it always adds attack power. That is if it isn't still bugged, I haven't even bothered checking. I just use the quen runestones for my play style.

I don't use runewords, looked at them, and didn't feel any of them was worth removing the 3 runestone slots.

Don't forget to use your bombs and potions these all tie into your build and play style.

Again, it doesn't really matter, Combat in the witcher is not that difficult to really make "best" builds matter. If you like replaying, try different builds, I've tried most of them.

ok m8 thanks
ill go with poisioned blades on my last free slot! ^^
thing is...i need find some god damm mutegens aleeady to unlock that slot((

 

[matmatej]

Hi guys. I wanted to share with you my build.
At the start i have to point out that this is not the 'most OP' build to one-shoot enemies.
I got bored by that after few hours of using Euphoria mutation. So i decided to make a new build for my ng+, and make it a fun one.

So to the point. Here are skills that I'm using:
View attachment 59351
And here is my EQ and stas:
View attachment 59361

This build revolves around quiclky getting adrenaline points (with the help of crossbow, Maribor Forest potion and Ursine set) to spend them using "Flood of Anger" skill.


The most fun thing about "Flood of Anger" is that you can adapt to any situation, :
You are low on health? - use alternative "Queen"
A lot of archers? - use alternative "Yrden"
A lot of meele enemies? - Just burn them with the "Igni"
And my favourite, when you are fighting a lot of human enemies - Just take two of them to help you with "Axii".


Crossbow in this build is mainly for supporting your other skills like heavy attacks or signs with "Flood of Anger". But with "Cat Eyes" mutation and some "Split bolts" it deals nice amount of damage too.


In the fight you should go with this combination:
Maribor Forest (and some other potions if you like) --> 2 shots with your crossbow (one shot should generate around 0.5 points of adrenaline) --> one or two heavy attacks --> sign empowered by the "Flood of Anger" --> attack --> Repeat.


Runewords I'm using: 2x Severance & Protection
Decotions: Ekhidna, Ekkimara and Water Hag.
I'm playing this on Death March without any mods.


Give it a try, and I hope you will like my build, its preety fun to play with.
If you have some sugestions, like what skills should i swap to improve this, please share

Btw. Sorry about Polish version of the game on screenshoots.

 

[-Hisoka]

Hi guys. I wanted to share with you my build.
At the start i have to point out that this is not the 'most OP' build to one-shoot enemies.
I got bored by that after few hours of using Euphoria mutation. So i decided to make a new build for my ng+, and make it a fun one.

So to the point. Here are skills that I'm using:
View attachment 59351
And here is my EQ and stas:
View attachment 59361

This build revolves around quiclky getting adrenaline points (with the help of crossbow, Maribor Forest potion and Ursine set) to spend them using "Flood of Anger" skill.


The most fun thing about "Flood of Anger" is that you can adapt to any situation, :
You are low on health? - use alternative "Queen"
A lot of archers? - use alternative "Yrden"
A lot of meele enemies? - Just burn them with the "Igni"
And my favourite, when you are fighting a lot of human enemies - Just take two of them to help you with "Axii".


Crossbow in this build is mainly for supporting your other skills like heavy attacks or signs with "Flood of Anger". But with "Cat Eyes" mutation and some "Split bolts" it deals nice amount of damage too.


In the fight you should go with this combination:
Maribor Forest (and some other potions if you like) --> 2 shots with your crossbow (one shot should generate around 0.5 points of adrenaline) --> one or two heavy attacks --> sign empowered by the "Flood of Anger" --> attack --> Repeat.


Runewords I'm using: 2x Severance & Protection
Decotions: Ekhidna, Ekkimara and Water Hag.
I'm playing this on Death March without any mods.


Give it a try, and I hope you will like my build, its preety fun to play with.
If you have some sugestions, like what skills should i swap to improve this, please share

Btw. Sorry about Polish version of the game on screenshoots.

cool build!
i like the way you think about not being too OP
thats why in my build i do use Eupohria but i work on a way to make my self hybrid as much as i can so i can do everything the game has to offer but also have some challange on the way

 

[matmatej]

cool build!
i like the way you think about not being too OP
thats why in my build i do use Eupohria but i work on a way to make my self hybrid as much as i can so i can do everything the game has to offer but also have some challange on the way

Thanks, that was exacly my way of thinking.

 

[Rawls]

I don't really try and build my character to look for maximum damage or anything, but just like to create something that let's me play how I want to. I started almost pure combat, then went with a combat/alchemy blend. But now with the greater number of skill points for NG+ I am planning on doing a full hybrid build with combat focus. I think I will quite like this build for B&BB.

My Current game is in White Orchard in NG+ (I played through Uncharted 4 after first run through of B&W and now an starting again for final play-through). I am level 51. I don’t have the skill points to have fully upgraded Alchemy (don’t have synergy yet) and Mutations (don’t have final two skill slots open) trees to where I want them by the end of NG+. So this is my current build plus what I will eventually add to it. Here is what I am eventually aiming for:

Muscle Memory x5
Precise Blows x2
Whirl x3
Greater Red Mutegen

Strength Training x5
Rend x5
Arrow Deflection x3
Greater Red Mutagen

Fleet Footed x5
Deadly Precision x2
Cat School Techniques x1
Greater Red Mutagen

Delusion x3
Melt Armor x5
Active Shield x3
Greater Blue Mutagen

Acquired Tolerance x3
Poisoned Blades x5
Euphoria
Protective Coating x5 (eventually) – Not currently available
Synergy x5 (eventually) – Not currently available

Manticore Armor

• Chest – Levity Runewright
• Trousers – Gr. Quen, Gr. Mending
• Gloves – Gr. Quen, Gr. Igni
• Boots – Gr. Quen, Gr. Igni

Weapons

• Aerondight – Gr. Bleeding Rune, Gr. Fire Rune x2
• Iris – Gr. Bleeding Rune, Gr. Fire Rune, Gr. Armor Piercing Rune

Normal Active Decoctions – Ekimmara, Ekhidna

I think it's a well rounded character that is also lore friendly-ish since it still focuses mostly on combat, but allows for some more in depth play with the alchemy and sign systems. I may still tinker some.

 

[thekdawg21]

Looking for a tactically oriented build that maintains challenge

What I am looking for is either general advice or even better an absolute step by step guide towards making a build that has the most tactical options in combat. My guess after looking at a few builds on the Youtube is that a sign based build would have the most options in combat. I do enjoy the melee combat but at times it's basically hack n dodge, or spin 2 win.

Maybe in the Witcher 3 it's just not possible to have very tactical gameplay, but I'm trying to simulate it as much as possible.

PS: If there are any mods out there that make combat tactically interesing, please enlighten me? I would do the reasearch myself but I don't have a whole lot of spare time and I would be EVER so grateful for your advice! :hug:

 

[Rawls]

@thekdawg21 merging your post into the builds thread. Feel free to check out all the various builds here.

 

[PolyaSchoenfeld]

I don't see much choice early game, around level 11 the best equipment I have is Griffin set, and abundant Sign mutagens, So I had to go full Sign build, which is basically God mode on Death March. (Alternate Yrden, Alternate Quen Jesussss ) I wanted to try swordmanship too but I have like, 2 lesser attack power mutagens. Definitely weaker.

 

[Draconifors]

I'm going to do a defensive hybrid build this time:

Delusion 3/3
Pyromaniac 5/5
Aard Intensity 5/5
Greater blue mutagen

Arrow Deflection 3/3
Fleet Footed 5/5
Counterattack 3/3
Greater red mutagen

Deadly Precision 2/2
Anatomical Knowledge 5/5
Resolve 5/5
Greater red mutagen

Poisoned Blades 5/5
Protective Coating 5/5
Synergy 5/5
Greater green mutagen

I'm only level 6 at the moment, and haven't even got the last two ranks of my third Sign ability. The greater blue mutagen I got as a monster drop, which saved me quite a lot of time. Only had one normal blue at that point.
I've literally never not invested in fast attack before, so this is going to be a first.

 

[GeneralJarate]

TL/DR: I'm doing 8,000 to 11,000 damage with every hit on the original New Game.

How?

For a long time, I went pure signs with the fifth level of the mutagen boosting skill, Griffin Techniques, and Rage Management (I think that's the one that allows casting with adrenaline. I had my sign intensity at some mind boggling number, but I ultimately dropped that build after I couldn't hurt anything in Hearts of Stone. Throughout my NG+ play through, I gradually picked up Whirl and other sword abilities and then started using the Cat School armor and Cat Techiques. When I noticed I was doing a lot of critical hits, I wondered how to capitalise on it and then found out that the Manticore armor is made for critical hits. I returned to NG to play B&W, and I'm using the first three fast attack skills, the first two strong attack skills, Aquired Tolerance, the mutagen boosting skill, and the critical hit boosting skill at the end of the alchemy tree, Delusion, and the Quen and Yrden boosters. I use three greater red mutagens and one greater blue. I've currently got the Euphoria mutation, which practically doubles/triples my sword damage. Finally, the runewright redeemed himself in my eyes, as I needed to convert the Manticore armor to light armor, and boost the Whirl range on my swords with Severance. I use the Ekhidna and Katakan decoctions which heal with stamina usage and boost critical hit chance along with Blizzard, Tawny Owl, and Maribor Forest.

It's still not quite where I want it to be, any suggestions are welcome!