I finished off Chapter 3 in The Witcher, but now I’m left with a bit of a dilemma…

I left off needing to go back to the swamp, but first played some more poker dice in order to buy the improved leather armour. Back in the swamps, I was surprised to find Carmen there and she wanted me to cure her lover’s lycanthropy, and I got some advice on doing so at the druid’s grove.

First though, I cleared out the Salamandra camps in the cave (where I also found the lost kid), at the old lumberjack camp, and at the collapsed tower, and then found a big camp of them back where the ‘squirrels’ used to be. They had archers and a mage this time, and it was a much closer fight, but the group style still took them down quickly.

Then it was back to town again to turn in various quests and talk to Carmen, and I was sidetracked by Yaevinn, who requested that I check out the sewers for a lost expedition. I took the teleporter there, and wound up doing the quest backwards, killing the target and then going outside to talk to the expedition members who were going to send me in to kill the target…

After exiting the sewers, a messenger told me that the bank was being robbed, so I ran there and it turned out to be Yaevinn again and a band of ‘squirrels’, and I had to choose whether to help them or not. I had nothing against him and he claimed it would help get the bank back into the hands of the rightful owner, so I helped him out by clearing the path out to the sewers of monsters. Siegfried was pissed off at this, but oh well.

I did various minor quests and monster hunting in the swamps for a bit to kill some time until I had to meet some guards in the sewers. They got me into a new area of the Trade Quarter, where I found another Salamandra base. The members there were communicating with some unhappy third party, and they noticed and attacked me. After dealing with them, I could still talk to the person they were communicating with, and some minor political intrigue was discussed and he implied there was some connection to Princess Adda.

Upon leaving the base, there was an encounter with a werewolf who turned out to be Captain Vincent. I could choose to either fight him or let him be, and since Carmen’s quest implies that his lycanthropy can be cured, I let him go for now.

I took a stone I found at the base back to Triss, who pointed out the house that the transmission came from. I also talked to Leuvaarden, who wanted me to help raise an army from groups that I’m close to, which would be the ‘squirrels’ at this point. I went to the source of the transmission and there found the king of Redania, a neighbouring country. Some more political intrigue was discussed, the finer points of which I can’t recall, but Geralt doesn’t really want to get involved.

I couldn’t find Yaevinn in the swamp like usual, so I did the rest of the werewolf quest instead, which just involved a lot of running around and talking to people, and Vincent is now cure. Then I remembered that Yaevinn said he’d be hiding at Vivaldi’s after the bank heist, and managed to recruit his troops.

Triss warned me that I was now at a point of no return and to finish up any other business, but there wasn’t much at this point besides a couple monster contracts. I seduced a couple more women for their cards (a noblewoman and a town clerk, easily impressed by gifts), and then it was off to meet up with everyone at the inn. I encountered some Salamandra at the inn, but Vincent showed up to help out and they were easily beaten, and Triss then teleported us away to the main Salamandra base in a big cave.

At the end of the cave I once again encountered Azar Javed and the Professor, but this time Triss had placed a shield on me that protected me from Javed’s magic, and he fled again. That left the Professor, who had a fairly large pool of health, but I eventually wore him down and finished him off for good. The cave then collapsed though, putting me near the Kikimore Queen. To beat her I had to run through a corridor filled with workers, knock down some supporting pillars, and then flee, but it took me a few tries since I kept getting myself caught in the rockslide.

Upon leaving the cave, I was immediately surrounded by troops led by Princess Adda. She admitted to a plot to usurp the throne while the king was away, but I was teleported away by Triss before Adda could have her troops execute me. And so ends Chapter 3.

Chapter 4 starts in an entirely new location, Lakeside, and it looks like I won’t be going back to the city for a while. I soon met a young girl who told me about the area, a nearby naiad (nekkid, of course) who wanted me to fetch her necklace stolen by some drowners, and a Vodyanoi (fishman) priest who told me about another witcher in a nearby crypt.

I cleared out the drowners close by and at a nearby island, where I also met the Lady of the Lake (also nekkid, but more strategically covered, oddly enough), and we talked about the Holy Grail. I then went to the crypt and found the thought-to-be-dead Berengar, and we fought some vampires together. He didn’t seem particularly friendly towards me though, and the only real information I got out of him was about a legendary set of witcher armour (a piece of which I think I found in that crypt).

I headed south from there and finished off the last group of drowners to get the naiad’s necklace, running into Dandelion again along the way.

And that’s where I’ve left off for now, and I might not play again for a while. They’ve announced that there will be an enhanced version of The Witcher coming out in May, with better dialogue, shorter loading times, some other improvements, and some new quests, and it’ll also be available as a patch for those of us who already bought the original. So, I’ll probably pause here and wait for that to come out before continuing further.