What happens if you don't complete Novigrad's main quests?

[ivashanko]

What happens if you don't complete Novigrad's main quests?

It seems unnecessary to complete the Novigrad's main quest; the event with the most significance to the overall story line in Velen is seeing Uma, while the most significant event in the islands is finding out that Uma is important (which is a little sad that those are the most plot-relevant points, now that I think about it). So I was wondering, what happens if you just do Velen's quests up until you see Uma, and then complete the islands story line to the point where you see that Uma is important?

 

[Linkenski]

You must beat the "locate Ciri" part in Novigrad in order to begin the main quest on Skellige, so...

 

[ivashanko]

You must beat the "locate Ciri" part in Novigrad in order to begin the main quest on Skellige, so...

You mean the one where you go to Skellige and see Bran's burning corpse? This is incorrect. You can go to Skellige any time you have 1000 gold coins after you reach Velen.

 

[Azerate2015]

This is an interesting question. I'm guessing you are obliged to complete them at some point in the game but similarly to you I got the impression that they are skippable. The main quests that order you to go to skellige, novigrad and velen are given to you at the same time

 

[lwp]

I believe you are obligated to complete the Novigrad story before you can do the Brothers in Arms: Novigrad. But considering you can begin the

Spoiler

Battle of Kaer Morhen

without doing it....
I'm gonna need to test this on my next playthrough

 

[Matroska]

I thought the same thing. Before I even got to Novigrad I had a quest to take a boat to Skellige, and not at a particularly higher level than I was at the time. I also got a level 11 quest to help Lambert and that involves going to Skellige. It does seem kind of odd that there's all this stuff in Novigrad that's all based on you getting to Dandelion to ask him where Ciri is, yet there's also this whole other area which implies (I haven't completed it yet) that Dandelion will simply point you to Skellige anyway, or to a series of events that lead you there.

 

[moonknightgog]

I thought the same thing. Before I even got to Novigrad I had a quest to take a boat to Skellige, and not at a particularly higher level than I was at the time. I also got a level 11 quest to help Lambert and that involves going to Skellige. It does seem kind of odd that there's all this stuff in Novigrad that's all based on you getting to Dandelion to ask him where Ciri is, yet there's also this whole other area which implies (I haven't completed it yet) that Dandelion will simply point you to Skellige anyway, or to a series of events that lead you there.

Dandelion doesn't point you to skellige.

 

[dragonbird]

There's a level gate and a financial gate for visiting Skellige. The level gate is around 15 or thereabouts, but if you feel strong you shouldn't let that stop you. The financial gate is a fare of 1000 crowns.

There's nothing to stop you going when you want, and nothing gets locked out until you get a very specific warning in the game that proceeding will impact on some side quests. That's MUCH later.

But the game is designed for you to be at least level 14 when you get Skellige, so even though there are some low-level quests there, expect to be running away muttering "Oh shit, oh shit" quite a lot if you go too early.

 

[Matroska]

Dandelion doesn't point you to skellige.

So Dandelion points you somewhere other than Skellige, yet Geralt goes to Skellige anyway for an act of the game? Maybe it'll make more sense when I see it, but as it stands Dandelion either points you to Skellige, to someone else who points you to Skellige, or is completely useless and Geralt just goes to see Yen in Skellige anyway.

Well, as for the level and money gate that Dragonbird mentions, by the time I'd done the Bloody Baron stuff and wound up going to Novigrad as part of the main quest, I was about level 14 and had about 7,000 crowns. The only thing holding me back from going to Skellige was the sense that I'd be bypassing story stuff in Novigrad, not anything in-universe. After going through the questline to the point of completing Whoreson Junior's stuff and now being right after Triss gets tortured, I'm level 17 and have over 10,000 crowns. I'm actually overlevelled for Skellige and certainly over-moneyed, yet I'm still doing all this stuff to find Dandelion even though that Skellige path has been open for a long, long time.

The flow certainly feels very weird. I'm still not sure what the point, in terms of finding Ciri, of all that Whoreson Junior stuff was. It didn't seem to accomplish anything in particular. All the actual leads and plot progression seem to come from the questline with Triss and Menge.

 

[ivashanko]

There's a level gate and a financial gate for visiting Skellige. The level gate is around 15 or thereabouts, but if you feel strong you shouldn't let that stop you. The financial gate is a fare of 1000 crowns.

There's nothing to stop you going when you want, and nothing gets locked out until you get a very specific warning in the game that proceeding will impact on some side quests. That's MUCH later.

But the game is designed for you to be at least level 14 when you get Skellige, so even though there are some low-level quests there, expect to be running away muttering "Oh shit, oh shit" quite a lot if you go too early.

I understand that there is a financial gate and a level gate. I'm wondering what are the effects on te story if you skip the Novigrad main missions entirely, since (from a plot perspective) it seems like it will be doable.

 

[dragonbird]

I understand that there is a financial gate and a level gate. I'm wondering what are the effects on te story if you skip the Novigrad main missions entirely, since (from a plot perspective) it seems like it will be doable.

None. Although you will need to go back and do them sometime.

 

[Matroska]

Dandelion doesn't point you to skellige.

Er, actually he does seem to.

I mean, it was obvious that you were going to end up there anyway and it going in this direction isn't a bad thing, other than the predictability that Novigrad would just be a stepping stone. I think the only thing the whole of Novigrad actually yielded was the introduction of the phylactery, and I still don't know what that's to do with since I haven't progressed to that point yet. Seems a LOT of legwork for just a bit of foreshadowing. Not complaining, despite how it may sound, it's still fun.

 

[vasiliM]

Actually it is neccesary to free dandolion, he knows the words of Umas curse, since ciri told him, and Yen needs this to remove the curse, seems minor but i actually found it interesting so you get 1 piece of the puzzle at every location. At skellige you find out uma is important, at novigrad the cursewords and that thing ciri wanted whorson to repair, and at the end of velen you met uma.

 

[ivashanko]

Actually it is neccesary to free dandolion, he knows the words of Umas curse, since ciri told him, and Yen needs this to remove the curse, seems minor but i actually found it interesting so you get 1 piece of the puzzle at every location. At skellige you find out uma is important, at novigrad the cursewords and that thing ciri wanted whorson to repair, and at the end of velen you met uma.

Ah, of course! The words to break Uma's curse is the reason the Novigrad missions must be complete, I had completely forgotten about them.

 

[BTorville]

So Dandelion points you somewhere other than Skellige, yet Geralt goes to Skellige anyway for an act of the game? Maybe it'll make more sense when I see it, but as it stands Dandelion either points you to Skellige, to someone else who points you to Skellige, or is completely useless and Geralt just goes to see Yen in Skellige anyway.

Well, as for the level and money gate that Dragonbird mentions, by the time I'd done the Bloody Baron stuff and wound up going to Novigrad as part of the main quest, I was about level 14 and had about 7,000 crowns. The only thing holding me back from going to Skellige was the sense that I'd be bypassing story stuff in Novigrad, not anything in-universe. After going through the questline to the point of completing Whoreson Junior's stuff and now being right after Triss gets tortured, I'm level 17 and have over 10,000 crowns. I'm actually overlevelled for Skellige and certainly over-moneyed, yet I'm still doing all this stuff to find Dandelion even though that Skellige path has been open for a long, long time.

The flow certainly feels very weird. I'm still not sure what the point, in terms of finding Ciri, of all that Whoreson Junior stuff was. It didn't seem to accomplish anything in particular. All the actual leads and plot progression seem to come from the questline with Triss and Menge.

Yen is what leads you to go to Skellige. After your meeting with Emhyr and learning that Ciri is back and in danger, Yen catches you up with what she's done to try and locate her. She tells you of leads to follow in Velen and Novigrad and then she goes off to Skellige to investigate that explosion that burned down half a forest, believing that it may have had something to do with Ciri.

So, you have leads to follow (main quests) in Velen and Novigrad but can voyage off to Skellige at any time you like, providing you have the coin for the travel, in order to join Yen. And the only way to join her and speak with her is at the launch of Bran's body when it is about to be set on fire. There's never a need to worry about missing out on anything in Novigrad or Velen as long as sign posts have been unlocked. Just fast travel back and forth as you see fit.

Even going to Skellige very early in the game does not harm anything. You still don't know anything about the Bloody Baron, Uma, Whoreson, Jr., Dandelion or the Witch Hunters at that point. But once you return to Velen and Novigrad and begin doing some of the side quests linked to the main quests, you learn all you need to and can then head back to Skellige to continue things there.

 

[xxRENEGADExx]

Hm...if Geralt decided to visit Skellige before Bloody Baron and completed quest in the grove - he didn't know about UMA - so what they (Yen and Geralt) will do next? Will Yen wait for Geralt on Skellige, before he'll complete other quests? Or she'll, whatever, go to Vizima ?