One thing is certain. Phillipa died a "martyr". So my guess is that she died somewhere between 1272-1276, during the Witch Hunts. It is not stated in the books, exactly when she died, but since she was later referred to as a "martyr", I think she died then. She will definitely have a role to play in TW3 though. A person like Phillipa, would never settle for less.
One thing is certain. Phillipa died a "martyr". So my guess is that she died somewhere between 1272-1276, during the Witch Hunts. It is not stated in the books, exactly when she died, but since she was later referred to as a "martyr", I think she died then. She will definitely have a role to play in TW3 though. A person like Phillipa, would never settle for less.
To be honest, Lodge of Sorceresses was not public knowledge in TW1. People who knew about it (mentioned it), were Radovid, Azar Javed and Leuvaarden. The first one was a king, and he knew just about it's existence, and not it's plans. Javed had connections in many organisations and was very influential, so his knowledge is justified. The last one worked with the Lodge and was a part of another secret organisation.
Also, Geralt (before memory loss) knew about the Lodge or at least suspected it's existance.
Mild book spoilers below.
Also, Geralt (before memory loss) knew about the Lodge or at least suspected it's existance.
Mild book spoilers below.
In the books, the Lodge was not so very secret either, as Dijkstra managed to get some information on it, or at least he suspected it's existance (in his final discussion with Philippa, he refered to "Ladies of Montecalvo" - Montecalvo was headquarters of the Lodge). It was one of the reasons why he had to go into hiding. It is reasonable to assume, that the existance of the Lodge became more widlely known after 5 years.
Although I'd watched the vid before, there's something I missed or at least didn't pay attention to up until now. Borys (the senior writer) seems to imply that early in TW3 players will not only be able to meet Triss, but the option to maintain their relationship may be a prospect. With Geralt's memory being restored, I'd imagine players will be given a choice to either resume close bonds with Triss (which hasn't been broken apparently) or to break them & pursue Yennefer. This is common knowledge I seemed to have missed.
I hope you are right. I unfortunately got the completely opposite vibe from the video, which seemed to suggest to me zero choice in the matter of their relationship & that regarding Yen.
A lot of interesting and well written Sorceresses can die. So Phillipa might be still of use, but I fear Síle is lost due to the choice you can make with the megascope. If we meet her again she might make up for it though. I'd rather have had Sabrina not dying...
Actually, no. If Triss testifies, there are no witch-hunts (it is a non-canonical choice given that the books). THE LODGE is hunted on every outcome, but not all the Northern mages. To have witch-hunts when ALL mages are hunted, Shilard has to come to the summit and present Letho. This is the difference in his and Triss' testimony - Nilfgaardians present the entire affair as the Lodge being a sort of an executive arm of the entire magic community (they sought to kill the monarchs who acted against the will of mages). It is actually a pretty awesome piece of writing because so much is said in so few words. That's why people started to hunt down all mages indiscriminately.
While Triss tries to lessen the impact, and accuses only Sile (and not even Philipa). To hunt the rest of the Lodge was Radovid's idea who got a list from Shilard beforehand, as he told Geralt and Roch during their audience. So the Lodge is presented as a renegade organization that has nothing to do with the rest of the magical community. The rest gets their Council and the Conclave. Again, it is a non-canonical outcome, but in TW3 it should be taken into consideration.
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@new&improved_vivaxardas
Yeah that is indeed what happened in the games.If Triss testifies no Witch Hunts ensue, as far as we know. I would guess that the Hunt for Sorceresses of the Lodge would simply get out of hand though. You know how these things are. We will have to wait to find out. I would like for the Witch Hunts to start though either way. It is an interesting turn of events. Further adding to the chaos.
Yeah that is indeed what happened in the games.If Triss testifies no Witch Hunts ensue, as far as we know. I would guess that the Hunt for Sorceresses of the Lodge would simply get out of hand though. You know how these things are. We will have to wait to find out. I would like for the Witch Hunts to start though either way. It is an interesting turn of events. Further adding to the chaos.
Hm, I kind of wonder if maybe the other sorceresses of the lodge won't be (as) mad at Triss if she isn't the one who reveals its existence?
The last few choices at the end of TW2 are so ploughing difficult! I really want to be super best pals with Iorveth and save Saskia from Phillipa's spell, but I feel so bad for just abandoning Triss, I also think that saving Triss makes the most sense for Geralt's character regardless of romantic involvement with her.
Then we have Letho, I want to just let him go, but I made a promise to Roche and I feel like I owe it to him to fight Letho. I wonder if Letho will be in TW3 regardless of what we choose and he'll just be like "I survived a direct hit from a Slyzard's tail once, a slash across the chest won't kill me, even if it was you who dealt the blow"
The last few choices at the end of TW2 are so ploughing difficult! I really want to be super best pals with Iorveth and save Saskia from Phillipa's spell, but I feel so bad for just abandoning Triss, I also think that saving Triss makes the most sense for Geralt's character regardless of romantic involvement with her.
Then we have Letho, I want to just let him go, but I made a promise to Roche and I feel like I owe it to him to fight Letho. I wonder if Letho will be in TW3 regardless of what we choose and he'll just be like "I survived a direct hit from a Slyzard's tail once, a slash across the chest won't kill me, even if it was you who dealt the blow"
This. It could be me, but I know what you mean. To me it felt like the Lodge was more public knowledge than it is in Witcher 2. Maybe it is the difference of the journals or simply the writing? I don't remember any quotes, and can't quite put my finger on it, but there were some differences in how the Lodge was mentioned between the two games.
I'm curious, but why call it non-canonical outcome? Is there a canonical playthrough of Witcher 2 that is more correct than any other? If there is I had no idea, nor would I like to hear that my choices aren't as good as anyone elses. Why have choices at all if that is the case?
I can understand if the devs have a preselected story for new players that haven't made the choices of previous games, but I do indeed hope that the devs take each and every possible game ending of Witcher 2 into consideration. In fact I am counting on it to be honest.
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No, it is not about the choice itself, it is about the official timeline from Maxima Mundi (cited in the books). According to Maxima Mundi, the new council and conclave were never created, and the witch hunt started around this time. CDPR very heavily use the timeline in order to situate their story in a canonical setting, but timeline does not have any choices. So given that the witch hunts were a part of the world history, the choice to save Anais/Saskia leads to a canonical development of the events. Saving Triss and re-establishing the Council is an alternative history, and thus non-canonical.
Well, we don't know if the Council was created - the Triss choice gives us a game that ended with an agreement to create the Council, but the invasion immediately afterwards may have easily put the plans on hold. If the Northern Kings did still want an excuse for a witch-hunt, which Radovid clearly did, they could still have found one.
Yea one thing you will notice is that the writers wrote Witcher 2's story in a very clever way.
They've written it in a way that can pretty much result in the story coming to the same conclusions for the Witcher 3 no matter what choices you've made on your W2 when you transfer your save over.
Let's take the two new quests that were added in The Witcher 2 Enchanced Edition as an example.
You can either do the quest where you catch the traitor Maravel and Kimbolt or you can do the quest where you prevent the Nilfgaardian sorcerers getting the Vran virus, but you can never do both.
This way they can have the same result for certain battles in the Witcher 3 but using two different ways of getting to that point.
Either Maravel got Nilfgaard very important info and the Northern force gets slaughtered since you did the virus quest on Iorveth's path.
Or the Northern force gets slaughtered due to the virus Nilfgaard managed to acquire because you were on Roche's path.
And they could also have the opposite happen, where a Northern force was saved due to either of those two choices you made in those quests.
Two different ways to reflect your choices satisfyingly without putting way too much strain on the developers part in making vastly different game moments for various W2 choices.
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Actually, we do. 1:30 seconds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl3xY6-1NfM
"Years before Geralt of Rivia had witnessed the fall of the Conclave and Council of Mages. The summit of Loc Muinne has reestablished both bodies."
But CDPR left a way out - things did not go so well between Radovid and the mages anyway.
Agree completely, wouldn't like to see possible Witcher 2 choices being sidelined.
Why assume that Maxima Mundi is in any way a reliable source of information? As I recall, the excerpts of it often contain misinterpreted or downright incorrect "facts". It was made long after the events of the books, possibly for propaganda purposes, to boot. A lot of information could have been omitted or forgotten. And in any case, the games are more like an alternate universe than official continuation to the books; the history doesn't necessarily have to fit the mould set up by the books perfectly.
Because it is written by Sapkowski, and in the books it is the only thing that may be considered a canonical version of events. Sure you wouldn't call a canon something that contradicts a written Sapkowski's word?
Sure, the games are not official, but whatever does not contradict the books is still canonical, and something that does - non-canonical. That's why we have all these discussions about Triss' outfit and Geralt's use of a cross-bow. CDPR is trying very hard to fit their story into the official story-line, and one alternative does exactly this, while another - does not. It has nothing to do with a choice being good or bad, right or somehow wrong, only how it fits with the lore from the books.
Yes, but Sapkowsi wrote it as being Nilfgaardian propaganda, didn't he? So even though this particular part doesn't seem like something they would have a reason to lie about, something in a document that's presented as not strictly true can't be taken as canon. Just as dialogue spoken by someone lying isn't canon. Or that Geralt was born in Rivia.
Remember Sapkowski also wrote this:
Remember Sapkowski also wrote this:
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The way I see it, there are three different timelines ( at least ), the book canon, the game canon and the game non-canon. The book canon are the books by themselves, without any alterations to the story. The game canon are the games played separately, without importing saves and such, following the predefined choices CDPR has made, which we don't know what they'll be in W3. The game non canon is the player's perspective with imported saves and all the differences they might make in the plot.
Having said that, I am not sure of how many things our earlier choices can influence. Keep in mind that in order to take every decision into account, CDPR would need to make 2-3 W3 games
We might be able to influence the existence ( or not ) of some NPCs, such as Letho, Henselt or Sile, or even better influence minor or major events which is kind of difficult but doable. Still, there is an easy work around all the choices, by letting a certain portion of time pass between W2 and W3. In that time, many things can have happened, altering or even nullifying our previous decisions, keeping some events canon, as CDPR planned and some others left to our own devices. That way, even if a player's choice contradicts certain plot elements the devs have in mind, said player won't feel "cheated" out of it, because it can all be explained.
Having said that, I am not sure of how many things our earlier choices can influence. Keep in mind that in order to take every decision into account, CDPR would need to make 2-3 W3 games
We might be able to influence the existence ( or not ) of some NPCs, such as Letho, Henselt or Sile, or even better influence minor or major events which is kind of difficult but doable. Still, there is an easy work around all the choices, by letting a certain portion of time pass between W2 and W3. In that time, many things can have happened, altering or even nullifying our previous decisions, keeping some events canon, as CDPR planned and some others left to our own devices. That way, even if a player's choice contradicts certain plot elements the devs have in mind, said player won't feel "cheated" out of it, because it can all be explained. Guys, we are not talking about real events in the real world. In fiction, every fact is created. You can't treat some fictional fact as false if there is no textual evidence to this (no other, already existing fictional fact, that directly contradicts and pretenses as true. It is sort of how fiction works, and how we do all this make-believe. We know that someone is lying in fiction ONLY IF it is revealed in some way. If there is no reveal, no evidence to them lying, we accept it as true. Otherwise, it would be the same as to claim that Yen's eyes were really grey, but people got confused over the years re-telling this story. Or to claim that some character who evidently died in the book, is actually alive.Are you ready to claim that EVERYTHING in Maxima Mundi is a lie? Well, that would be pretty weird. Do you want to claim that witch hunts never happened, but the Council was created, and so this part about witch hunts, and no council, is a lie? Why, just because it suits you better? Well, it is called ad hoc (see ad hoc hypothesis).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hoc
Personally, I don't like any ad hoc, but if you feel like picking and choosing what to believe, sure. It is nothing to argue about, really.
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Nope. Some of it will be true, some false, some sort-of true but twisted. But when a source is known to contain even one falsehood, it cannot be used as an authoritative source. A single example where the hypothesis is false makes the hypothesis as a whole false. It doesn't make Maxima Mundi 100% lies, but it does make it an unreliable source. The hypothesis "All swans are white" is proven wrong by the existence of black swans, but that doesn't mean that all swans are black.
And ad-hoc hypothesis only works if you premise "Maxima Mundi is true except for those parts that are false". But which are the false parts? Unless you can identify all of them, the hypothesis is still, at best, unproven.
Personally, I've no reason to doubt that Maxima Mundi was correct about this particular point, and that the Council/Conclave wasn't created. I also think that we haven't seen evidence yet that CDPR has changed that - a group of people agreed that it WOULD be created, but then we get the dragon attack and the invasion. We won't know until TW3 comes out whether they still went ahead and created it, or if it never happened.
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