The Exp curve for this game is broken, just like Witcher 2 before rebalance mode..

[Gh0st787]

Build - http://i.imgur.com/yH1MoHn.png + full cat armor (lvl 1) set and swords. Humans are probably the easiest yes, regardless I shouldn't be able to beat a dude 14 lvls above me without oils, pots and what not. Grey'd out the inventory count cause I am using the mod for it, incase its not allowed.

Yeah pretty much the build I had figured you'd be using. It is in my opinion the best (and also my current as well). The cat school skill and fast attack skills giving you 175% critical damage is pretty insane. Pair this with a decent set of Assassins Gauntlets (+10% Critical Chance) and your literally doing probably the highest damage in the game outside of a full charged Rend or using a full sign built Igni against a monster weak to it. Also whirlwind can proc multiple criticals I believe and seeing how many swings and arcs you get with it its easy to understand why you can put out so much damage. Using three red mutagens (how you ever go this many I'll never know!) plus full Feline gear (Im guessing this is what you have?) also gives a ton of damage.

But in any case this still shouldn't make the game trivial (and it indeed does in some cases). In the sake of fairness though your using in my opinion one of the strongest builds available. Everything is viable this is just superior to most in terms of damage potential. Also Fleet-Footed is to damn good as well. With proper timing you can literally dodge INTO large enemies and still take no damage.

They can't balance all builds and gear setups without obviously limiting choices. I'm not saying you should play a different way its just that you have conceived a very powerful build/setup which doesn't help when wanting a challenge out of the game.

 

[Sardukhar]

I need to introduce these threads to each other:

http://forums.cdprojektred.com/threads/39951-The-lack-of-level-scaling-is-ruining-my-immersion/page2

 

[eshrai]

Take out these mutagens and the defense talent. With out that you need to use oils, potions, etc to survive.

I will probably do that, but if I should purposely cripple myself, there is something fundamentally wrong with the difficulty curve, no?

 

[Kamei]

I will probably do that, but if I should purposely cripple myself, there is something fundamentally wrong with the difficulty curve, no?

No every game is perfect, for me Dark Soul was easy with the Spell Warrior Build (i just die a lot because i fall form cliffs lol). But indeed, the EXP curve is wrong. In death march difficulty they need to reduce the Main Quest EXP. If you need a Challenge, use mine, the game is quite difficult (im using ursine armor btw, with fast strike more nerf )

 

[Gh0st787]

I will probably do that, but if I should purposely cripple myself, there is something fundamentally wrong with the difficulty curve, no?

I don't see this as intentionally crippling yourself. There are strong builds and weaker ones. You by evidence of the image provided are in fact using a strong build. This as a result is hampering your ability to enjoy the game. I personally enjoy finding the most powerful builds for in RPGs and strive to obtain these. However changing up your skills to maybe a more hybrid play style shoudnt be seen as such a bad compromise if it allows you to get more enjoyment out of the game. The game is only a week old so who knows what kind of plans CDPR has. A lot was changed from vanilla Witcher 2 to EE.

 

[MooseOnFire]

This is what I'm talking about http://i.imgur.com/5pQVlwr.png
It might not be the greatest example, but yea. I'm lvl 19 while the dude is lvl 33. Playing on death march, no potions, no oils, barely breaking a sweat. I should have gotten completely destroyed, and I remember getting completely destroyed by a lvl 20 water hag when I was lvl 5. I don't know man..

This is a bit deflating for me. I had the exact same experience with the second game at release, which is why I chose Death March here. Hopefully CDPR can tune the game to maintain the challenge right through to the end.

 

[mindw0rk2]

The biggest problem of this game is Quen. Stop using. At all. And you'll get your difficulty back.
Playing Dead is Dead (any death = game over) with no Quen and no living house lootings gonna be ultimate challenge

 

[Gh0st787]

The biggest problem of this game is Quen. Stop using. At all. And you'll get your difficulty back.
Playing Dead is Dead (any death = game over) with no Quen and no living house lootings gonna be ultimate challenge

Yeah while Quen is awesome and definitely a safety net in Death March etc after extended play time similar results are had with the dodging mechanic alone. Pair with Fleet Footed it may even be better. (Aside from not healing you).

 

[Sharpy47]

It's amusing we have this thread saying the game is too easy to out level, yet I have seen plenty from people complaining that you don't get enough experience from the game.

Exactly my same thoughts.

 

[GreyReaver]

I have the opposite problem. Yeah, you get a stupid amount of xp from the main story missions, but it seems broken the other way for side missions. If you try to take your time and do everything in addition to the main storyline, leveling turns into this arduous drawn out affair that only moves quickly when you hop back into the main quests.

 

[kaltorakh]

It's amusing we have this thread saying the game is too easy to out level, yet I have seen plenty from people complaining that you don't get enough experience from the game.

That is why he is talking about a curve. XP gains/costs should follow a curve, and in this game it's almost linear.

At lower levels, leveling takes quite alot of time. That's why players are complaining about slow levels. But at higher levels, it takes too few, thus this post.

 

[dasega]

I think solution is very simple here if someone from CD Projekt Red is checking on this thread, please can you add one more difficulty level where there is less experience gain for main/side/witcher contracts quests.

Thank you

 

[Roceh]

Having just completed the game (in around 80hours playtime) and doing as many side quests as i could i was massively over-leveled for most of the game (from around level 10+). Its a shame as i wanted to savor the game more as the side quests were so much fun. I think having an option in the expansions to reduce XP from quests or increase the amount of XP required per level would be nice as an option (separate from the difficulty level option). I still have quite a few contracts and side quests left - mostly all grey to me now - there's probably a few hours of gameplay I've missed out on.

 

[ThePoopflinger]

Having just completed the game (in around 80hours playtime) and doing as many side quests as i could i was massively over-leveled for most of the game (from around level 10+). Its a shame as i wanted to savor the game more as the side quests were so much fun. I think having an option in the expansions to reduce XP from quests or increase the amount of XP required per level would be nice as an option (separate from the difficulty level option). I still have quite a few contracts and side quests left - mostly all grey to me now - there's probably a few hours of gameplay I've missed out on.

What level were you when you finished it and at what difficulty?

 

[ivanfabric]

Exactly my same thoughts.

Man! Thank you for sharing I am 63 hrs in and only Level 10 and i am getting my ass handed over to me all the time! Struggling so much against tougher monsters, as I am constantly under-levelled, why? I am only exploring/doing side quests in Velen, I haven't been to Novigrad yet. Now i am gonna do some main quest missions and take my sweet, sweet revenge

 

[Sharpy47]

Man! Thank you for sharing I am 63 hrs in and only Level 10 and i am getting my ass handed over to me all the time! Struggling so much against tougher monsters, as I am constantly under-levelled, why? I am only exploring/doing side quests in Velen, I haven't been to Novigrad yet. Now i am gonna do some main quest missions and take my sweet, sweet revenge

Hehe my time record spent in Witcher 3 is about 30hrs on GOG account and Im ONLY LEVEL 4 yet! Heh, but Im happy because I just finished White Orchand prologue / region, explored the sh*t out of it by doing all the possible side quests etc and Im absolutely amazed how RICH the world is. Im not even going to do main quest untill all side quests are finished too! Btw Im playing on Death March difficulty now aswell

 

[Eldanon]

I have to agree with OP somewhat... if you have to intentionally gimp yourself by wasting skill points on skills you don't use or intentionally use low level gear at the HARDEST difficultly level - there's a balancing problem here. The hardest difficultly should be where I HAVE to use the right skills/signs/alchemy/gear to win. Not intentionally gimp myself. I LOVE the game, the quests are awesome. I enjoyed vanilla TW2 before they made it far too easy.

I don't mind game being easy on lower difficulty levels, that's great, not everyone wants a challenge and I get that. I just wish the hardest mode was actually HARD. I'd love to see Death March exp rewards to be about 60-70% exp of what they are now. I don't want to intentionally skip side quests just to make combat harder =(

 

[Elbarto145]

I have to agree with OP somewhat... if you have to intentionally gimp yourself by wasting skill points on skills you don't use or intentionally use low level gear at the HARDEST difficultly level - there's a balancing problem here. The hardest difficultly should be where I HAVE to use the right skills/signs/alchemy/gear to win. Not intentionally gimp myself. I LOVE the game, the quests are awesome. I enjoyed vanilla TW2 before they made it far too easy.

I don't mind game being easy on lower difficulty levels, that's great, not everyone wants a challenge and I get that. I just wish the hardest mode was actually HARD. I'd love to see Death March exp rewards to be about 60-70% exp of what they are now. I don't want to intentionally skip side quests just to make combat harder =(

Exactly my opinion. They have to balance the game better but i dont think that less Exp is the right way, because at some point you will be overpower again. I think they should enable level scaling and buff the Armor, Resistance and HP values of everything + nerfing most of the Signs and some Meele Combos.

 

[eshrai]

Thanks for the responses guys. You need to be a certain lvl to start seeing this issue, (gameplay 50hr+) as the game came out last week on some platforms, we will see an influx of these kinda posts. So far I've gathered a bunch of do's and donts

Things I can do or are under my influence :
- removes mutagens, as they have been deemed op especially red ones
- stop using Quen altogether
- stop trying to be a completionist, even side quests
- change my build, as that has been deemed op too. I have always been a Rogue class, and this suggestion triggers something in me
- in severe cases, use weaker sets of weapons and armor.

If I need to weaken myself intentionally to get a challenge out of the hardest difficulty in the game, there is something SEVERELY wrong with the fundamentals of the game.

Things I cannot do or are out of my control:
- stupid as fk experience curve. Its a bunch of lines, instead of an exponential curve, makes no sense to spend the same amount of time to get to lvl 11 from 10, and to lvl 20 from 19. The latter one should be harder and take more time, always.
- Main quests gives wayyy too much xp, side quests gives way less in comparison
- I cannot go back to that sidequest I skipped a week back, as I am 20 lvls above it and will 1 shot literally any of the low lvl bosses. Scaling would have helped a single player rpg like this immensely, as it doesn't force you to abandon side quests all together

Off topic but another thing thats bugging me is the reused character models, the bowlcut guy, the children, that one woman, all have the same exact character model, and some even appear in quests. They might have a different accents, but they look exactly the same. Just feels a bit cheap

 

[Elbarto145]

- stupid as fk experience curve. Its a bunch of lines, instead of an exponential curve, makes no sense to spend the same amount of time to get to lvl 11 from 10, and to lvl 20 from 19. The latter one should be harder and take more time, always.
- Main quests gives wayyy too much xp, side quests gives way less in comparison

You can edit these values in the xml files, so i hope that there will be mods for it.