My view on potion drinking before battle

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My view on potion drinking before battle

I'm not sure if i like how drinking potions work in TW2. If there isn't a separate skill such as scouting to foresee what enemies are ahead, you wouldn't be able to prepare what potions to drink that will work best and effectively for the next encounter.Anyone with me? Or i apologize if i miss some game information i may not know.
 
archaven said:
I'm not sure if i like how drinking potions work in TW2. If there isn't a separate skill such as scouting to foresee what enemies are ahead, you wouldn't be able to prepare what potions to drink that will work best and effectively for the next encounter.Anyone with me? Or i apologize if i miss some game information i may not know.
I think you can drink potions outside of the meditation but what I understand of the world of the witcher is that you have to be prepare and gather information for the more difficult battles so it makes sense do drink potions during meditation knowing that something big is out there.
 
I've thought about this too, and my initial impression was the op's. I'll have to see how they structure the game first, but I honestly can't think of how they can do this without nerfing alchemy or outright giving the player intel on what he will encounter, and where. I didn't work on the game for three and a half years though. I trust they've come up with something.
 
Mihura said:
Mihura said:
I'm not sure if i like how drinking potions work in TW2. If there isn't a separate skill such as scouting to foresee what enemies are ahead, you wouldn't be able to prepare what potions to drink that will work best and effectively for the next encounter.Anyone with me? Or i apologize if i miss some game information i may not know.
I think you can drink potions outside of the meditation but what I understand of the world of the witcher is that you have to be prepare and gather information for the more difficult battles so it makes sense do drink potions during meditation knowing that something big is out there.
If you watch most of the combat videos, Geralt most probably drink potions during meditation and immediately when the previewers wander out they already knew what to expect.. use what oil(necrophage), what type of swords(with freeze) and to drink what type of potions. I have not seen 1 video that he is able to drink potions during combat.If there's no way to foresee what is to expect without reloading then the potions drinking mechanism are flawed.
 
RyuGuitarFreak said:
I wonder how will we be able to recover health during battle.
I believe there are potions that you need to drink before a battle to increase health regeneration during battle. They have skills that increase health regeneration after combat too but i'm not sure if they have during battle.
 
It is confirmed by now that you can only drink potions while meditating.At first I thought that's a bad thing, but I changed my mind. From a roleplaying point of view, it is much more immersive to have to concentrate on what you are doing, it's not like drinking a soda. It's all part of what a witcher is, he has to be prepared, not run blindly into a fight like a savage. He has to be aware of his surroundings at all times, preferably spotting the enemies before they spot him. Then he can retreat a bit and go into meditation mode.And think of TW1. No one can tell me, you go into the swamp without some serious preparation! At least not if you play on harder difficulties. So you'll always have had your swallow and your tawny owl or whatever your poison, before encountering the first enemies, right?And in the presentations, it's exactly that, presenting what you can do. In real gameplay you might already have drunk your potions and equipped your cool ice sword before you come upon a fight. Plus, the presentation I'm talking about, is played on hard difficulty. I guess that just like in TW1, you can forego potions if you play on the easiest setting. But if you're used to higher difficulties, you. are. prepared. Always.And that is also how you regenerate in battle, you had your pot before and it will last 10 minutes. That kind of time might cover multiple encounters.
 
DelightfulMcCoy said:
It is confirmed by now that you can only drink potions while meditating.At first I thought that's a bad thing, but I changed my mind. From a roleplaying point of view, it is much more immersive to have to concentrate on what you are doing, it's not like drinking a soda. It's all part of what a witcher is, he has to be prepared, not run blindly into a fight like a savage. He has to be aware of his surroundings at all times, preferably spotting the enemies before they spot him. Then he can retreat a bit and go into meditation mode.And think of TW1. No one can tell me, you go into the swamp without some serious preparation! At least not if you play on harder difficulties. So you'll always have had your swallow and your tawny owl or whatever your poison, before encountering the first enemies, right?And in the presentations, it's exactly that, presenting what you can do. In real gameplay you might already have drunk your potions and equipped your cool ice sword before you come upon a fight. Plus, the presentation I'm talking about, is played on hard difficulty. I guess that just like in TW1, you can forego potions if you play on the easiest setting. But if you're used to higher difficulties, you. are. prepared. Always.And that is also how you regenerate in battle, you had your pot before and it will last 10 minutes. That kind of time might cover multiple encounters.
I still feel it's a flaw if you do not know what to expect.. you would not know what to prepare. So when you are adventuring the first time and out of a sudden you stumble upon certain enemies/monsters you got yourself killed and to reload only to know what to prepare in this battle.. ALSO what happens if the encounters are random?As you said it yourself, Geralt has to be aware of his surroundings at all times and PREFERABLY spotting the enemies before they spot you. IF the system allows Geralt a scouting skill or a far vision then it'll be fine. BUT i seriously doubt this is the case.
 
RyuGuitarFreak said:
I wonder how will we be able to recover health during battle.
with the potions, if you've seen the cdprojekt conference gameplay, you'll notice that he uses Swallow and Gadwall to deal with the health regeneration;about the drinking prior battle, i think is a great idea, helps the immersion and tactical about the game, you have to be always ready. Probably is gonna have information that helps you prepare, like reading books about the region or talking with people.
 

Aver

Forum veteran
In books Geralt always drink potions several minutes before battle so it's ok for me, but I miss visual effects of overdosing potions from The Witcher 1.
 
Aver said:
In books Geralt always drink potions several minutes before battle so it's ok for me, but I miss visual effects of overdosing potions from The Witcher 1.
There's no problem drinking potions several minutes before battle for me. But what potions should you drink before the battle? Do you know what to be expected a few more meters away? Or there wasn't any battles to be fought for at least 10 mins of exploration and damn! i wasted drinking my potions for nothing :p
 
DelightfulMcCoy said:
It is confirmed by now that you can only drink potions while meditating.
Well guess I was wrong :pI think Geralt now can meditate all over the world not just on a specific place so I do not think this will harm the gameplay or the immersion, I actually think this is more close to what I saw in one of the books.
 
archaven said:
That kind of time might cover multiple encounters.
It also might cover multiple types of enemies, which as I said, would be dumbing down the alchemy system, so that you now need fewer types of potions. I have no evidence of this though; I'll need to see the game to really understand how they plan to implement alchemy. To be honest, it was already close to this way in TW1. There is only one immediate health fix in battle: White Raffords, and that was highly toxic. Hardly a get out of jail free card. Most of the time, you knew what you were going to encounter, and you couldn't rely on chugging health potions as in other RPG's.
 
slimgrin said:
slimgrin said:
That kind of time might cover multiple encounters.
It also might cover multiple types of enemies, which as I said, would be dumbing down the alchemy system, so that you now need fewer types of potions. I have no evidence of this though; I'll need to see the game to really understand how they plan to implement alchemy. To be honest, it was already close to this way in TW1. There is only one immediate health fix in battle: White Raffords, and that was highly toxic. Hardly a get out of jail free card. Most of the time, you knew what you were going to encounter and you couldn't rely on chugging health potions as in other RPG's.
Then sadly we have to rely on reloads then :(. I was hoping that there will be some kind of scouting skill Geralt may have in order to better prepared himself since potions can only be drank during meditation. There's also another flaw i mentioned earlier.. What if there are random encounters? If most of the potions we are drinking are going to counter multiple fights then i believe the Alchemy system is kinda shallow then.Please don't be mistaken i'm trying to criticize the game or whatsoever. I love this game by heart with the beautiful world and wonderful stories. I just happen to ponder on possible gameplay mechanism flaws if drinking potions are only allow during meditation. I'm PERFECTLY fine with it but at least i should be given a scouting skill to know what to expect in order to properly prepare.
 
May I propose to just wait after we all get the chance to play the game, before talking of flaws and dumbing down and "OMG, this doesn't work for me!!"?Until proven otherwise, I believe that the guys have thought all that stuff through and came up with a system that works. It's pretty moot to complain before you even played it. Or is everyone here so shell shocked that they expect another DA2? ;)[OT: Yes, I know, I said that I enjoyed DA2 - but only once and with a bit of a bad aftertaste in my mouth]
 
DelightfulMcCoy said:
May I propose to just wait after we all get the chance to play the game, before talking of flaws and dumbing down and "OMG, this doesn't work for me!!"?Until proven otherwise, I believe that the guys have thought all that stuff through and came up with a system that works. It's pretty moot to complain before you even played it. Or is everyone here so shell shocked that they expect another DA2? ;)[OT: Yes, I know, I said that I enjoyed DA2 - but only once and with a bit of a bad aftertaste in my mouth]
I did not in any way mention it has been dumb down kind sir. You must have misunderstood me :). The reason i'm asking is I may not know of some game information that others may know and what my concerns are not really a problem.It's not a complain. I'm bringing up this topic as discussion. Believe it or not, you may actually have to rely onto reloading to better prepare(which is drinking the correct potion and meditate) before a battle in the hard difficulty. Also if there's random encounters, there will be no way to tell what to expect if you have no scouting ability.
 
That is what Geralt`s amulet is for ...to alert him when danger is nearby...will it alert him to what kind of enemy is luring around the corner...probably not but it should alert him to danger .
 
There were a few instances in TW1 where I drank the wrong thing and had to use White Honey to start over. But for the most part, if you read the journal, bought the right books, you were well prepared. A crypt? That means Necrophages, ghouls, and spirits. The swamps meant Echinops, Drowners, Wyverns, etc. The lakeside was a bit different because there you could see the monsters far off, before they would even attack, and then drink the right potion.Don't get me wrong, I prefer they try and do it this way, as I hate spamming potions in the heat of battle. But I've wondered about the time consuming aspect of having to shift to the meditation screen each time we want to drink up, and mostly likely we'll be drinking potions often. Also, in certain regions like the forest, visibility is limited and it looks like we'll get ambushed by creatures, which is cool. But how many different types live in the forest? 5? 10? So how can we properly prepare for all of them, especially if they'll be sneaking up on us? It just seems to be a tricky game design problem.I'm not complaining really, just mulling this over in my head.
 
You will probably know when the big fights are so you can prepare with potions and everything beforehand. I think you should be able to survive the groups and other small fights with your signs/bombs/weapons and like slimgrin says you will know what oils and potions to prepare beforehand depending on what area you are going into. Since you can meditate anywhere, you can regain your health without having to search for a firepit if they take you down a lot.
 
slimgrin said:
There were a few instances in TW1 where I drank the wrong thing and had to use White Honey to start over. But for the most part, if you read the journal, bought the right books, you were well prepared. A crypt? That means Necrophages, ghouls, and spirits. The swamps meant Echinops, Drowners, Wyverns, etc. The lakeside was a bit different because there you could see the monsters far off, before they would even attack, and then drink the right potion.Don't get me wrong, I prefer they try and do it this way, as I hate spamming potions in the heat of battle. But I've wondered about the time consuming aspect of having to shift to the meditation screen each time we want to drink up, and mostly likely we'll be drinking potions often. Also, in certain regions like the forest, visibility is limited and it looks like we'll get ambushed by creatures, which is cool. But how many different types live in the forest? 5? 10? So how can we properly prepare for all of them, especially if they'll be sneaking up on us? It just seems to be a tricky game design problem.I'm not complaining really, just mulling this over in my head.
Exactly that is what hovering my head too!. I dislike potions spamming too but that can be fixed with potions cooldown and DA2 apparently fixed that. Anyhow, I wish we can have more information from developers to clarify this.
 
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