random games

[Random]

Overwatch is still really fun.

[ganonfloyd]

I haven't played it in awhile, was keeping low until the new character hype died down. Might need to get back into it soon.

[Random]

So I've now spent almost as much time playing the Witcher 3 as it took me to beat the Witcher 2. Feel like I've gotten... almost somewhere.

Freed a spirit from a tree and now it might be a demon druid horse? Pretty metal.

Talked to some witches. They're hella gross. Gonna go kill them later on.

Lifted a curse from a village that had been turned into pigs.

Became the champion of fist fighting and horse racing in all of Velen.

Been continuing my conquest of everyone with a "play gwent" prompt, though some people have been pretty tough to beat. Had a few thrillers, I'll tell you. The most memorable one was against someone playing a monster deck. She had mustered basically her entire deck onto the front line, and I had already used my biting frost. Luckily, I had a medic card, which I used to bring back a spy card, and playing that drew me two cards. One of those was a biting frost. The other player had nothing left. I did a fist pump.

Now I'm on an island that is haunted by a plague maiden and her army of rats. After I finish there, I'll go back to the bog and pummel some witches, and theeeen I might actually start to do some cleanup a little bit? Though not a lot a bit because I've seen a ton of stuff that's still over my level, so I know I'll have to come back later to really get into everything. No worries there.

[Random]

Did more sidequest stuff tonight. Foglet in the swamp, dispelled the pellar's dad's ghost, started yet another sidequest for Keira.

True highlights of the night are my gwent wins over the boatwright and Haddy. Took Haddy down in one go. Guess the kid wasn't so good after all.
The boatwright was a real bastard though. He played the Nilfgaardian deck and had the card that lets you take from your opponent's discard pile. Must have taken me 4 tries to beat him, but I finally got a good hand.

I'm getting close to being able to play a Nilfgaard deck myself, which I'm looking forward to. In the meantime, I picked up the Roche card for my Northern Realms deck, which is cool even though I will probably never draw the bastard.

Kinda wondering if/when he'll show up in person.

[Random]

Two things happened in the Witcher last night that made me feel pretty terrible for the first time since I started playing the series.

Spoilers follow, though the first is just a side quest thing.

A few days back, I was heading east when I encountered a wagon beset by ghouls. There was a guy hiding underneath the wagon. His name was Gert, and after I had slain the ghouls, I found out that it was Gert's job to haul plague-ridden corpses away for disposal. He claimed to be immune to the plague, having been exposed many times throughout his life but never falling victim. I convinced him to burn the wagon anyway and get a new one.

Then last night, I was making my way through a field south of Toderas, destroying Nekkar nests when I saw a man wandering around a condemned  house. It was Gert, and when I got close enough, I saw the pox had taken his face. Guess his luck ran out. He begged me to kill him, to end his suffering.

But I refused.

There was no follow up. No option to try and treat his illness. After all, the mage Alexander's notes told me that 93% of people who fall victim to the plague perish. When they receive medical care, that number drops to 89%. Gert staggered away and told me to leave him. So I did.

Later, I joined the Bloody Baron and his men at Downwarren where they were preparing to head into the swamp and rescue his wife, Anna. I arrived to find the Baron talking to the terrified ealdorman. The ealdorman, short an ear, was talking about how a horse demon had been terrorizing the village. Said it was the "dark ghost" of the swamp, seeking revenge.

The horse was my doing. Earlier in my journey, I had gone into the swamp following a lead on Ciri. There I met the witches who had encountered her and also enslaved Anna. Before they would tell me what had become of Ciri, the crones bade me help the people of Downwarren by dealing with an evil beneath the Whispering Hillock.

That evil was trapped within the heart of a cursed tree. It lured villagers with sibilant whispers on the wind and murdered the with werewolves in its thrall. When I confronted the spirit, it claimed to be a druid who had opposed the witches in ages past, and it was sealed beneath the tree. It asked me to free it. When I brought up the dead villagers, it said that nature was indifferent.

I felt no obligation to the witches and figured that releasing the spirit was as good as destroying it if it went on its way. I also made it promise to free the children kept at the witches' hut, which it did.

Hearing that the spirit was still murdering villagers made me uneasy, but that was not why I had returned to Downwarren. I told the Baron I was ready and escorted his men down into the bog.

When we arrived at the site, we found witch hunters from the Order of the Flaming Rose had beaten us there, but they were beset by necrophages. After fighting them off, I found out that Tamara, the Baron's daughter and a recent convert, had taken up the sword to free her mother. The Baron greeted her and she countered with icy words, ignoring him to focus on the matter at hand.

A brief search uncovered Anna, or what had become of her. She had been transformed into a beast, a curse from the crones as punishment for letting the children escape.

It didn't take long to reverse the effects of the curse, but it was too late, and it was also a trick. The transformation was a ruse, for the real curse was a death sentence. Anna had a moment to see her husband and daughter together. She pleaded with Tamara to remember her not as this hag but as the woman who loved her and who laughed while weaving flowers together.

The Baron was beside himself. His daughter departed, still wanting nothing to do with him. His wife lay cold on the swamp floor. He told me my payment would be waiting back at Crow's Perch.

When I arrived, I found him hanging from a tree in the courtyard.

[Scourge the Hedgehog]

You just experienced my personal favorite quest of the game.

The whole thing was masterfully done.

[Random]

Yeah. The extent to which they make a drunken wifebeater a likeable character that you want to help, and who I'm pretty devastated to have failed, is really impressive.

I haven't looked up the alternative ends to the quest line, and I'm going to try not to. Even if I could go back and find a save from before that branch, this is something I'll have to live with.

Just have to wait for New Game + to see what could have been.

[Random]

Grabbed the last diagrams for the Griffin set only to realize there's not a blacksmith around who can forge the swords for me. Will point out that after decking myself out in medium armor and taking the Griffin School talent, I am kinda of unstoppable one on one. I stunlocked a level 18 wyvern using Aard and a combination of strong and fast attacks. My stamina recharges so fast I can pretty much cast signs immediately after the enemy recovers. Still have to be more careful in groups, which is why I held off on a monster den full of level 18 nekkars.

And now I have crossed the Pontar, my sights set on Novigrad and a new beginning in the big city.

[Random]

that bastion short was so good

[Random]

Ashes of Ariandal is the first DSIII DLC. Apparently the trailer was up briefly but got taken down, presumably to go up officially later in the week.

[ganonfloyd]

They have an announcement set for tomorrow so hopefully its that.

[ganonfloyd]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5JCsO6eblw&feature=youtu.be

the good stuff

[Maniac]

painted world of ariamis: the revengeance

i did say to myself once that we had better see priscilla in some DLC somewhere, so we damn well better

[Random]

Novigrad. I'm wondering if this city has changed me.

Some spoilers to follow.

I must have been there about a week, perhaps longer. Spent enough time trudging about in sewers and tunnels that I may have lost a day here or there. Followed most of the leads I had upon arrival, tracking people down through Farcorners and The Bits and volunteering to help just about anyone who calls for it, just to see if they'll reveal something about the city that I didn't previously know.

I acted as bodyguard for a fisstech dealer, hunted down a fiend who turned out to be a doppler with a case of kleptomania, even investigated a haunted house. I've gotten into fistfights and played card games in places from the harbor all the way up to posh Gildorf. I've learned how to get around in a city where turning the wrong corner at the wrong time of day can mean walking into an ambush.

I met up with Triss Merigold in the Putrid Grove and endured uncomfortable moments where I reminded people in front of her that we were just friends, same as we'd decided after the events at Loc Muinne. It stings her still, I can tell, but I think most of all we're just happy that neither of us turned up dead.

As I should have guessed from the start, Ciri's trail led me to Dandelion. Or his own trail, as it were. Damn fool's been captured, apparently. For some reason he got into a tussle with the Big Four of Novigrad's underworld: Sigi Reuven, The King of Beggars, Cleaver, and Whoreson Junior. Three of those I met at Reuven's bathhouse, where I learned Dandelion's apparent heist had succeeded. A sizeable fortune had disappeared from Reuven's vault, and he wanted me to track it down for him. I already knew who had stolen it, but finding the treasure would hopefully lead me to the bard.

Reuven, like plenty of others in the city, was not who he seemed to be. One of Novigrad's newest crime lords was none other than Sigismund Dijkstra, the former head of Redanian intelligence (and a useful gwent card, to boot). He was of the opinion that Junior was behind the disappearance of Dandelion, and when a band of Junior's men broke into the bathhouse during our meeting, that seemed to confirm the suspicion. The fourth member of their uneasy alliance had apparently gone rogue and tried to kill Cleaver earlier that week. Aside from tracking down the treasure, I also decided to go find him.

The treasure, as it turns out, was confiscated by Caleb Menge, the commander of the Temple Guard. He's been using it fund his witch hunts over the past weeks. He also has Dandelion locked in a cell, so Triss and I are going to meet up and bust him out.

The darker path eventually led me to Junior. I had to investigate his operations within the city to lure him out. Tried his hideout first, but Cleaver's men got there first and ransacked the place. Went to his fighting pits next and managed to draw him out briefly by putting on a good show, but the dwarf's thugs showed up again and scared him away. Finally at his casino, I padded my wallet with an extra 400 crowns off wannabe gwent aficionados, which drew the attention of the enforcers from upstairs. Once I had dealt with them, I liberated one of the King of Bedlam's informers, who told me that Junior was working for the Redanians.

It made sense that Radovid would want to root out the crime syndicates within Novigrad. The so-called free city had red and black hands alike pulling at it from all sides, the belligerents trying to gain control of precious ships and coin that could turn the tide of the war. I heard from Dijkstra that an old acquaintance with Redanian connections was holed up outside Oxenfurt, and while it was little surprise, I was glad to see Vernon Roche alive and well. He hadn't hung up his blue stripes for a moment, instead waging guerilla warfare against Nilfgaard with anyone still loyal to Temeria.

Roche agreed to lead me to his contact, but asked if I would be willing to return to him later for a favor. I didn't expect to walk into a meeting with King Radovid himself, though. The man had dark circles under his eyes, and he babbled on about chess before telling me what I needed to know. Whoreson Junior was tucked away in a safehouse within Oxenfurt, though that information also came with a favor attached.

To get into the mansion, I told the guards I was "There about the new girls." It was foreboding enough to hear he required fresh girls every night, but not much could have prepared me for what I found. Blood was pooled on the landing, running down the stairs. I found a body out there. In the room, another hung from the rafters, one was crumpled on the bed, and three more were arranged in the bath tub. And there was junior.

I beat him bloody until he was sniveling and ready to talk, to tell me all I wanted to hear. By the end of his little tale, I was ready to be done with him.

But I didn't kill him. Not sure exactly what stayed my hand. Maybe just knowing he was as good as dead anyway. He surely wouldn't be welcome back in Novigrad.

After that I rode back out to see what Roche wanted. He needed my help recalling Ves from the field. There was a village that had helped their dissident group, and she wanted to make sure they weren't hit by Nilfgaardian reprisal, even disobeying direct orders to stay at camp.

Roche and I arrived just in time. We cut down the black ones and then I stood by while Roche lectured his headstrong lieutenant. One Nilfgaardian survived the fight, and here was another point of impasse. Ves wanted to finish him off. Roche actually motioned for mercy, to try and send a different kind of message.

My vote condemned the soldier to death. Truthfully, I was concerned for Roche and his men. I didn't want a survivor to lead the rest of the black ones to the partisan camp. But my reasoning came out as self-serving. I did work with Nilfgaard from time to time. Could be inconvenient if they found out I helped slaughter a unit.

It wasn't long after that Radovid called on me to fulfill my favor to him. He's called the Stern, not the Patient, after all. His witch hunters had located Philippa Eilhart's hideout, but they were having trouble breaking in. I managed to get past her defenses, but the former head of the Lodge of Sorceresses had flown the coop already. I emerged with a piece of her megascope, but declined to tell the head of the witch hunters I'd found anything. He said he didn't believe me. I told him that was his problem. They drew their swords, and I defended myself.

So now I have a choice. I can take the crystal to Radovid and tell him what I found, or I can take it to Triss. It's not clear to me if these paths are mutually exclusive, but there's a chance one or the other could decide Eilhart's fate. It's a minor dilemma, but I think I know already what I'll do.

[Random]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5JCsO6eblw&feature=youtu.be

the good stuff

the boss who fights with a bowl of lava looks pretty cool

hopefully we can make the lava bowl from his soul and fight with it too
Logarius Wheel 2.0 baby