The Witcher 3 is a massive, massive game. Spanning two completely different areas and one massive city, it’s possible to play the game for more time than someone might play several other games and still not actually come close to completing every quest, fighting every contract, or meeting every cool NPC. CDPR’s world is carefully crafted, and the amount of care is evident with every piece of treasure and carefully written letter found in the game.
A list that delved into everything a player could possibly miss would consist of literally hundreds of items. But this list examines some trickier ones in The Witcher 3 — those with quests involving dialogue that’s easy to miss, or are connections to later missions.
Updated January 30, 2022 by Ritwik Mitra: The Witcher 3 is one of the greatest open-world games ever made, with an incredible amount of content that can take hours upon hours to completely uncover. In fact, the sheer number of things to do in this game is so immense that players are inevitably going to fail to notice some of the many details present in this massive title. The most notable examples in this regard are mentioned below.
15 Getting A Good Ending For The Baron Even After Releasing The Evil Spirit
Most people who are tasked with killing the evil tree spirit end up doing so without a second thought. However, there are some players who are swayed by its words and release this demonic spirit to torment the land.
While this leads to the Baron's wife dying and him taking his own life, there's a way to release this spirit without sacrificing the Baron's well-being. Players just need to encounter the spirit during their travels and release it before getting the quest to do so.
14 Killing The Bear Before He Gets To The Sheep In A Hilarious Quest
During the main quest, players will encounter a rather hilarious sheep owner whose property has run away. Geralt eventually finds said sheep in the middle of the woods, and needs to defeat a bear before the sheep can rejoin its owner.
However, it's possible for you to go into this forest beforehand and take care of the bear before this quest is triggered. Geralt even passes a comment about this while coming back with the sheep.
13 Encountering An Easter Egg Referencing Game Of Thrones
Game of Thrones was one of the most popular shows around during the release of The Witcher 3, and the game definitely capitalized on its popularity. The Sky Cells are an iconic part of the series, and players can actually find a reference to these cells in the game.
During their exploration of Skellige, players will find a ruined fortress with prison cells that are quite similar to the ones in the show. To add the icing on this pop-culture cake, the corpse of a small man just like Tyrion Lannister can be found within it as well!
12 The Permit A38 Easter Egg
Permit A38 is a document that Geralt needs to be signed during the events of Blood and Wine. However, there's a fair bit of running around that players need to do before this document is finally signed.
The name of this document is a reference to another Permit A38 that Asterix is handed during his adventures as well. He has to go through the same trials and tribulations to get it signed, which frustrates him to no end.
11 The Bovine Defense Force Initiative
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In White Orchard, players can exploit a system in the game that allows them to kill cows, sell their meat, pass time to respawn said cows, and start the process again. CD Projekt Red quickly picked up on this money-making exploit and patched it out in a rather hilarious manner.
After killing a set number of cows, a high-level Chort will spawn to save these bovines. It's an unexpected and hilarious moment that shows exactly why so many people love this game.
10 You Can Save Tomira
For people who are nuts enough to save Radovid, they’ll wind up with an ending where Radovid wins the war. If that happens, he’ll make attempts to kill all the mages and alchemists around.
Afterward, the player can go back and visit White Orchard and he’ll run into Tomira, the herbalist who wants Geralt’s help with another quest early on. Geralt will notice her house on fire by the Witch Hunters, and he can choose to help her by killing all the Witch Hunters. She’ll be released from the stake she was nearly burned at, and then explain that she plans on going as far away from Radovid’s reach as she can.
9 Lying To A Werewolf
In the questline “Wild at Heart”, you’ll meet a hunter named Niellen who’s looking for his missing wife. While searching for her using Geralt’s abilities, the sister of the hunter’s wife, Margrit, will tell Geralt to go back and lie to Niellen about what happened to his wife.
Typically, most players will probe further because things are obviously suspect, but if you take her money and wait a bit, you’ll eventually learn that Margrit and Niellen were later found dead as well. It’s implied that Niellen killed her himself, meaning he eventually discovered that Margrit was responsible for what happened to his wife.
8 Some Harmless Flirting
Final Preparations, the initial quest, is known as “Payback”. Payback sees Geralt and Ciri deal with getting revenge on Whoreson Jr., but later also meets up with Bea, a young woman working at The Golden Sturgeon.
While she’s being bullied by some random jerks, Geralt can choose to threaten them and make them leave. Afterward, the player can repeatedly flirt with Bea, who seems very interested, but Ciri is very much disturbed at the idea of her "father" flirting with one of her friends directly in front of her.
7 Romance In Novigrad
There’s a spot on the other side of Novigrad near a cavern that has a bench near it. If found, the entire theme music changes to something considerably more relaxing, and the bench itself seems to be a location where couples are known to go on dates there.
This is an example of CD Projekt RED’s efforts, as many times the player visits there are different couples available, with a man going out of his way to impress the woman he’s brought up there while they look at the city of Novigrad from afar.
6 Moritz Vs. The Witch Hunters
One of the big plotlines for Novigrad involves Triss Merigold and her work to aid the sorcerers and sorceresses in escaping from Novigrad. As she convinces all the spellcasters their time in Novigrad is done, there’s one mage—Moritz—who believes he’s capable of outsmarting the Witch Hunters. Spoiler alert: he isn’t.
Go by Glory Lane later on and the Witch Hunters will be gathered around a pyre. Killing them will result in Moritz being saved, and he’ll agree to leave the city alongside the other mages during “Now or Never”.
5 Odrin
In such a huge game, it’s easy to overlook something so minor yet so awesome. There’s a pretty awesome NPC that goes around making trouble all over the game. In literally every place where the player sees a notice board, there will be mention of someone named Odrin.
He spent three weeks in one inn, and not only snuck away but managed to steal a cask of wine and a silver dining set. Elsewhere, he’s put up a notice offering his “services” to any older woman of means. When the player finds him, it’s on a dock in Novigrad, with him slumped over next to a guy selling empty bottles….lots and lots of empty bottles.
4 An Elusive Thief
It felt like Witcher 3 took ages to come out, and little twists like this show us what was “taking so long”. During the quest Elusive Thief, Geralt winds up tracking down one of the dangerous shapeshifting dopplers who tries to imitate him.
If the player takes on this quest while trying to free Dandelion and find Dudu, beating this doppler will offer a hidden third option: asking them to imitate Caleb Menge. The doppler is of course terrified at the thought, but just having it in was a nice touch, as Geralt would have been desperate enough to ask.
3 Snitches Get Stitches
While on the way to Novigrad, you’re given a new quest called “The Wooden Beast”. The soldier implies there’s a monster that needs killing. Geralt instead meets some Scoia’tael elves who’ve been killing soldiers, raiding them for their supplies.
Geralt finds them and gets offered multiple options. He can choose to fight them, leave them alone, or leave and then tell the soldier who gave him the quest about them. This will get the entire group killed except for a young woman named Vernossiel, who will attack Geralt near Glory Gate in an ambush to get revenge. That’s what you get for snitching.
2 Orphans Of Novigrad
Here’s a neat trick. The most memorable quest of Witcher 3 is the Bloody Baron storyline, which we won’t spoil for those who haven’t played. However, there’s a moment where you wind up with the option to free an ancient spirit, and not doing so results in some poor orphans being eaten.
If you free the spirit without being sent there by her children though, the spirit will instead choose to not only save the children but wind up taking them to Novigrad, where they wind up in the hands of Marabella, a woman running a shelter.
1 The Strung-Up Corpse Of Birna Bran
In Skellige, the main storyline involves helping to decide who will be the new ruler of the people. Birna Bran, the wife of King Bran, wants her son to be the next ruler, as is fitting considering his father was the last ruler of Skellige. Frustrated with the idea of an election, she convinces her son to leave the main hall, making him absent when she spikes the drinks and has several of the people there turn into berserkers, who massacre all but Cerys and Hjalmar.
Helping Cerys will allow you to discover who was truly responsible, which leads to Birna being sentenced to die. Later on, you can travel to a small location north of Sund to find her body there. The place is surrounded by Harpies, so this goes about as well as one might expect.