The Witcher 3 Alchemy System

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The Witcher 3 Alchemy System

  • Yes

    Votes: 250 24.3%
  • No

    Votes: 270 26.2%
  • I need to see it in action to be sure

    Votes: 294 28.6%
  • I prefer the system of TW1

    Votes: 363 35.3%
  • I prefer the system of TW2

    Votes: 104 10.1%

  • Total voters
    1,029
As mentioned, the potions do seem a bit crazy OP like the swallow basically looking like an outright health potion. I would much rather have less powerful potions and have them last longer. Sounds balanced to me at least.
 
As mentioned, the potions do seem a bit crazy OP like the swallow basically looking like an outright health potion. I would much rather have less powerful potions and have them last longer. Sounds balanced to me at least.

The funny thing about balance is that we can speculate about it a lot, but until we play it we won't know for sure. Even with all the new information, there's still stuff we don't know.
You know the saying, in theory there is no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is. :)

How strong a potion is, how long it lasts, what ingredients it needs and in what quantities for each level, how it actually augments the gameplay in various situations and a thousand other questions will be answered one we play the game.

I believe that they had a pretty good reason to go with the current system, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.
 
Was the lack of drinking animation confirmed in the new info? I might have missed that.

There have been none shown so far. If you look closely during some of the gameplay, you'll see how the screen just does a warp effect which indicates that a potion has been used.
 
There have been none shown so far. If you look closely during some of the gameplay, you'll see how the screen just does a warp effect which indicates that a potion has been used.

What I meant was if the guy who played it for 2 days said something about that.
I've been looking into the new details, but I might have missed something, you never know. :)
 
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The funny thing about balance is that we can speculate about it a lot, but until we play it we won't know for sure. Even with all the new information, there's still stuff we don't know.
You know the saying, in theory there is no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is. :)

How strong a potion is, how long it lasts, what ingredients it needs and in what quantities for each level, how it actually augments the gameplay in various situations and a thousand other questions will be answered one we play the game.

I believe that they had a pretty good reason to go with the current system, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.

Yeah look, like I said in my post maybe they had a good reason for the short lasting potions, and I also can understand the reasoning behind reducing the amount of herbs you have to hoard and reducing the time you need to gather herbs and stuff like that.

But for why the hell completely simplify it? They didn't go "well, to reduce the farming and gathering and the hoarding we make you consume less herbs for one potion, you get multiple uses for one potion and you can "stretch" the potion if you have 1 or 2 uses of it left, etc"

They went "lets make them gather potion ingredients one time for each potion and then it just refills as long as they have alcohol". That completely negates the process of gathering the herbs and brewing them in the first place, if you do that you might as well just leave all herb gathering out and include objects serving as "buffs" you can find in the world and can use infinite times.

That's not the sense of potions.

Especially if all we can choose are 2 potions for each combat situation where the effects only last 1 - 2 minutes.
I might as well just cast a spell like Quen which takes up about the same time.

Also means I probably have to stop every 2 or 3 minutes to refill potions or equip new ones when I am - for example - in a cave and have to fight hoards of monsters over and over. I'm sure that would work FINE with the current system. I call that even more annoying and tedious than gathering herbs.

Remeber the days in TW1 where you had 3 - 4 potions equipped which all had secondary effects and your toxicity was pretty much at the border of what was bearable. This time you will have max. 3 potions (1 mutagenic (as far as I know you can only equip 1 mutagenic potion at a time) and 2 normal) at a time, you will probably most of the time not even have problems with toxicity since the effects of the potions last only that short then toxicity might also last pretty short. And even if it doesn't, then the balance is complete nonesense, like having to wait 10 minutes for toxictiy to get lower just to be able to use a potion again that lasts 1 minute? Why even bother? Especially since you can win without a problem drinking no potions anyway.....
 
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Yeah look, like I said in my post maybe they had a good reason for the short lasting potions, and I also can understand the reasoning behind reducing the amount of herbs you have to hoard and reducing the time you need to gather herbs and stuff like that.

But for why the hell completely simplify it? They didn't go "well, to reduce the farming and gathering and the hoarding we make you consume less herbs for one potion, you get multiple uses for one potion and you can "stretch" the potion if you have 1 or 2 uses of it left, etc"

They went "lets make them gather potion ingredients one time for each potion and then it just refills as long as they have alcohol". That completely negates the process of gathering the herbs and brewing them in the first place, if you do that you might as well just leave all herb gathering out and include objects serving as "buffs" you can find in the world and can use infinite times.

That's not the sense of potions.

Especially if all we can choose are 2 potions for each combat situation where the effects only last 1 - 2 minutes.
I might as well just cast a spell like Quen which takes up about the same time.

Also means I probably have to stop every 2 or 3 minutes to refill potions or equip new ones when I am - for example - in a cave and have to fight hoards of monsters over and over. I'm sure that would work FINE with the current system. I call that even more annoying and tedious than gathering herbs.

Remeber the days in TW1 where you had 3 - 4 potions equipped which all had secondary effects and your toxicity was pretty much at the border of what was bearable. This time you will have max. 3 potions (1 mutagenic (as far as I know you can only equip 1 mutagenic potion at a time) and 2 normal) at a time, you will probably most of the time not even have problems with toxicity since the effects of the potions last only that short then toxicity might also last pretty short. And even if it doesn't, then the balance is complete nonesense, like having to wait 10 minutes for toxictiy to get lower just to be able to use a potion again that lasts 1 minute? Why even bother? Especially since you can win without a problem drinking no potions anyway.....

i couldn't have summed it up better myself. the whole alchemy system seems to be dumbed down to no end.
i wish they could give us the option to disactivate the "auto-refill" feature and make the toxicity an important aspect of alchemy as before, not a simple limitation to the number potions you can injest -_-

i used to say that TES V: skyrim was dumbed down as hell despite being a fun game, and yet, even that game managed to keep alchemy fun, interresting, and very addictive.
how the heck can a game which is not "hardcore" in its nature like skyrim have a good alchemy system, while a complex and demanding game in terms of skill like TW3 have auto-refill. :sad:
 
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With such filled open world and this amount of playable hours, Do I really need to repeat endlessly the same potion when there's a lot of differents kind of potions, upgraded potions, mutagens and upgraded mutagen?

I'm a lover of the alchemist of The Witcher games, I enjoy collecting herbs and ingredients, but it seems there will be an uncounted items for collect and craft and distract yourself tracking, fighting, haggle, talking, traveling...etc...etc..etc... instead to waste a precious time for re-creating the same boring basic potions...
 
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With such filled open world and this amount of playable hours, Do I really need to repeat endlessly the same potion when there's a lot of differents kind of potions, upgraded potions, mutagens and upgraded mutagen?

I'm a lover of the alchemist of The Witcher games, I enjoy collecting herbs and ingredients, but it seems there will be an uncounted items for collect and craft and distract yourself tracking, fighting, haggle, talking, traveling...etc...etc..etc... instead to waste a precious time for re-creating the same boring basic potions...
I do get what you’re saying. And you know what you said reminded me of ? Bethesda
They added plenty of features to skyrim like the new crafting system but strip away or stream line other gameplay mechanics such as magic or interactions with NPCs…etc, getting in final a fun experience but that lacks any sort of depth or challenge
In short: just because you added plenty of new things, doesn’t that it’s ok to dumb down other aspects of gameplay.
 
I do get what you’re saying. And you know what you said reminded me of ? Bethesda
They added plenty of features to skyrim like the new crafting system but strip away or stream line other gameplay mechanics such as magic or interactions with NPCs…etc, getting in final a fun experience but that lacks any sort of depth or challenge
In short: just because you added plenty of new things, doesn’t that it’s ok to dumb down other aspects of gameplay.

Exacly. This is the problem.
It's not a matter of challenging, but of complexity, depth...of the system.
If a system is simplistic...then it's barely a system, but a worthless minigame.
 
Exacly. This is the problem.
It's not a matter of challenging, but of complexity, depth...of the system.
If a system is simplistic...then it's barely a system, but a worthless minigame.

but that's not all, it BREAKS immersion. and having a coherant, realistic and immersive gameplay is important for games such as this one.
is having auto-refill makes sense ? absolutely NOT.
 
I will never say that is bullshit or it reminds me another dev companies because it's not my way of reinforce my reviews. I've not plat yet the game, I don't know how it works. But I guess that it seems easy to confuse a whole system of alchemist with some little variation that I assume will not affect any immersion.

As far as I could understand, alchemy and the system to work with it, will remain very important. Far as I know CDPR has not eliminated the process of creating potions but has facilitated the process of reducing the time in a few potions and overcome to devote to more complicated formulas for their ingredients and their power.

If the basic swallow Level 1 is very easy to create why repeat the entire process of creation, when that same time can be used to create another higher with the same process but different ingredients?
 
but that's not all, it BREAKS immersion. and having a coherant, realistic and immersive gameplay is important for games such as this one.
is having auto-refill makes sense ? absolutely NOT.

So, basically what you are saying is that, because you can't press a button to brew a potion, suddenly the system is broken? I call bulshit!

Now let me present you with the following situation, let's take the wyvern battle from the latest video, but Geralt is weaker than the wyvern, by a lot.

If you can brew a lot of potions, say 20 swallows, you can just prolongue the battle and only depend on the potions to keep you alive if you lack skill. Now that would make the game easy for "casuals" and break immersion if you want to go there. In the books Geralt prepares for battles before them, he doesn't drink potions during the battle.

Now with the auto refill you have limited potion uses, so you can't just spam swallow to stay alive, you must have skill if you are out leveled and not use cheap tactics to cheese monsters. If you lack skill, you level up and get better gear and then return. This adds more depth to battles, makes you choose potions wisely and if you face tough enemies you'd better have some skill as well. I don't want the game cheapened to accommodate people not interested in the combat system, for that there is easy mode.

This was discussed multiple times in this thread, I don't want to repeat it, but there are pros and cons to both approaches and we still don't know how this alchemy systems fits into the whole picture.
 
So, basically what you are saying is that, because you can't press a button to brew a potion, suddenly the system is broken? I call bulshit!

If a potion is made with x alchool and y herbs, for every potions (z) you need, you have to use the same amount of x and y.
z=x+y so 3z=3x+3y

Forgive my comparison, but if you want to make a joint, and you have finish the weed, you can't roll it using only filters and papers.
 
I will never say that is bullshit or it reminds me another dev companies because it's not my way of reinforce my reviews. I've not plat yet the game, I don't know how it works. But I guess that it seems easy to confuse a whole system of alchemist with some little variation that I assume will not affect any immersion.

As far as I could understand, alchemy and the system to work with it, will remain very important. Far as I know CDPR has not eliminated the process of creating potions but has facilitated the process of reducing the time in a few potions and overcome to devote to more complicated formulas for their ingredients and their power.

If the basic swallow Level 1 is very easy to create why repeat the entire process of creation, when that same time can be used to create another higher with the same process but different ingredients?

But that is NOT the POINT.

The point is ALL potions, no matter if upgraded or normal are refilled automatically when you meditate as long as you have alcohol in your inventory.
But that has a few effects:

1. Unless they have 300 types of different potions with different effects you will be done with having to brew potions an collect herbs very quickly, you will spend almost no time using alchemy at all since you only have to make the whole thing 1 time and then you can just buy alcohol regularly and let it auto-refill
2. It breaks immersion. If I make a potion out of specific herbs, I can not just go ahead and after the first time making it start making the potion out of thin air. If I do not have the necessary herb I should not be able to make the damn POTION
3. There are better ways to reduce the hoarding and the fact that the process or collecting ingredients and brewing potions is tedious, as for example maing potions have multiple uses, enabling Geralt to "auto-refill" potions in meditation with LESS herbs than he would normally need, enabling "thinning out" a potion, meaning creating more uses for a potion by "auto-refilling" the potion if you have 1 or 2 uses left which means you will get more uses of said potion buit the potions will loose a part of their effectivity (like a tea gets weaker if you fill it up with water again a few times), or by making herb plants give you more herbs for each plant you loot, which means you have to go gathering herbs less in general so you have enough supplies

Not to speak of the fact that whenever you kill a monster you get ingredients for possible alchemy uses. And we KNOW monster-looting is a part of TW3. Hell, I would even be okay if you could enable/disable the auto-refill or if only LOW-LEVEL potions would auto-refill and upgraded potions would need ingredients EVERY TIME.

Auto-refill - however you put it - is just LAZY, not for gamers but by the developers. Giving an OPTION for auto-refill, sure why not, I'm game. But making it auto-refill no matter what does not only break immersion but does also completely negate the existence of an alchemy system in the first place. Might as well just find the potions as loot or use them like buffs. We do not need an alchemy and potion-brewing system if we only have to go in there 30 times in the whole game because we only have to brew potions if we make a new potion we never made before. It also negates the existence of plants and herbs existing in the world. For WHAT? They are only needed 1 time anyway, why are they around then???

And for those who argument that it is tedious work, that "clicking a button" means nothing and is not "deeper". Not true. This time I CALL Bullsh*t.
Because to be honest, you might as well see "why is clicking a button in combat deeper than having the character attack automatically?" "Why do I buy things, can't Geralt just restock automatically?" "Interacting with objects in the environment? Why doesn't my character do that automatically?"

I mean sure, let's just make it an MMO. Potions turn to buffs, combat system is going to be an MMO style one, etc, etc

I know, completely exaggerated example here, but what I try to say is, if we start letting things be done automatically and see the game as significantly better and don't see a difference in meaning, immersion and depth of systems here, where do we stop?

Alchemy was never about being particularly skilled or clever, or about having to go around and search for herbs for hours, no one ever did that neither in TW1 nor in TW2. It was about preparing for battle, being tactical with your decisions, managing resources (because some potions SHARED ingredients meaning you might have had to decide "Do I make potion A or B in this case? A is more powerful, on the other hand, if I make B then I have enough ingredients to make potion C as well, that might be the better choice". It was tactical. What is my playstyle? What helps best? How can I get the most out of the resources I have here. The gathering was there for immersions sake and to create the "problem" of having to manage your resources. Hell in TW1 it was even more tactical, encouraging you to also look at the secondary substances the potions had in order to get the most out of it. You could combine potions in a way that a secondary substance helped you reduce toxicity in a way that you could take more potions than normally, or that not only your endurance but ALSO your vitality had a boost (for the price of more toxicity). It was a TACTICAL TOOL which you used to make fights easier, but at the same time you had to pick your fights wisely and take the potions when needed, because you might not have been able to create more or toxicity might prevent you from taking more potions when you actually NEEDED them more. Things like that.

It was not a button press, it was tactical resource and asset management.
And it was great.
With the auto-refill not only the gathering (which created the necessity for the tactical aspect of brewing potions and having to decide to brew one potion over the other sometimes, resource management) but also the brewing itself (primary substances, secondary substances, toxicity management, asset management, tactical playstyle-related decisions, etc.) are eliminated. You do not have to worry about the resources you need to brew a potion, you do not need to choose one potion over the other because you'll just have them all, you will not have to worry about toxicity since you will be limited to take a max of 2 uses of a potion in a combat situation anyway. Also you'll probably either need to meditate a lot to get rid of toxicity just to be able to take another potion that only lasts for 1 minute or (the other scenario) you will have toxicity effects last only for 1 or 2 minutes which will make the whole thing very redundant.

Tell me it is NOT that way, because it IS. You might not care, you might find gathering herbs tedious or be annoyed by the fact you have the brew a potion (simply click a button) every time, but in the end the fact remains that having all potions on autp-refill and only last 1 - 2 minutes will eliminate almost every tactical element that was in the system before and there would have been LOTS of different way to make the potion/alchemy system in a way that would reduce the amount of time spend on gathering herbs, reduce the amount of times you'd need to manually refill potions, hell even eliminate manually refilling potions altogether (as an option) by giving the player the option to enable auto-refill for potions he knows he needs every time, which would auto-refill as long as all ingredients are there in an order set by the player (A list where you go like "Auto-Refilling:" then you have a list of all your potions and you "activate" the auto-refill and give the potion a priority).

I'm sorry, no matter how it will "feel" in the end or if the "upgraded potion" system is good in the end, it doesn't change the nature of the new auto-refilling feature and the consequences it will have on the alchemy/potion system and IMO there is just no excuse why they couldn't have chosen an alternative or at least made a compromise somewhere in the middle.

My opinion obviously.
 
Alchemy was never about being particularly skilled or clever, or about having to go around and search for herbs for hours, no one ever did that neither in TW1 nor in TW2. It was about preparing for battle, being tactical with your decisions, managing resources (because some potions SHARED ingredients meaning you might have had to decide "Do I make potion A or B in this case? A is more powerful, on the other hand, if I make B then I have enough ingredients to make potion C as well, that might be the better choice". It was tactical. What is my playstyle? What helps best? How can I get the most out of the resources I have here. The gathering was there for immersions sake and to create the "problem" of having to manage your resources. Hell in TW1 it was even more tactical, encouraging you to also look at the secondary substances the potions had in order to get the most out of it. You could combine potions in a way that a secondary substance helped you reduce toxicity in a way that you could take more potions than normally, or that not only your endurance but ALSO your vitality had a boost (for the price of more toxicity). It was a TACTICAL TOOL which you used to make fights easier, but at the same time you had to pick your fights wisely and take the potions when needed, because you might not have been able to create more or toxicity might prevent you from taking more potions when you actually NEEDED them more. Things like that.

We actually have not seen the alchemy screen yet, so we don't know how exactly the ingredients work, is it more like W2 or like W1. This could have significant effect on the system and add depth to it.

From what we've seen so far, drinking a potion increases toxicity that slowly goes down as the potion expires, but I'm not sure if mutagens also add to the toxicity. You could turn out to have used several mutagens that could increase your base toxicity to a level that allows you to use only some potions, thus making you decide which is more important, a mutagen or a potion that could save your life..

Also creating the mutagens will also require resources, every time you change the mutagen I believe, but I might be wrong on this one. So there will go some of your resources, you might find yourself in a situation when you have found some rare ingredient, but both a mutagen and a potion need it, so which way do you go, especially when you don't know when or if you will find more from it.

Also you'll be able to experiment with the potions recipes, which to me is way more interesting way to engage the player. You can play around experimenting/wasting resources hoping for a better version of a known potion, I hope that there might be some secret recipes that you can't just buy the recipe from, but only achievable through experiments or just being lucky, you know, a pinch of this, a pinch of that, voila.

Having a limited potion uses also adds to the tactical aspect in my opinion, during battle you have a limited resource set that you need to use in the best way possible. I don't see auto refill taking away from that, what it does is removing the manual task of brewing again the potions you use.

At first I was against the refill, because I didn't know how the potions would be, but after seeing them in action, significant effect with a short duration, I changed my mind a bit. If there is no refill, you'll need to constantly gather resources to have sufficient potions. This could turn of players from using potions, they won't bother to gather resources or just hesitate to use them, especially if it is one that needs something rare, which would be bad.
You find this very rare ingredient and make a potion, that you can use once, so when do you use it? DO you wait for a boss? But which boss? You start to wait for the best moment to use it and end up not using it all, not fun, right?

Another unknown are the potions themselves. What they are, what they do, what they need, how useful they are or are they just there for the count.
I hope the potions to provide variety and choice, so that you are not stuck with only 2-3 potions for the whole game.

I think you are being way too pessimistic. What you say is true for the most part, but while some things may sound good in theory, but balancing the game and the fun factor can be very hard and in practice could turn out to be boring/tedious.
You have your mind set and it seems the only thing that could change that is just playing the game and experiencing the new system for yourself.
 
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