Every fight in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt requires preparation, be it potions, oils, and maybe even decoctions. But, once players really get the hang of the combat, like any other game they'll start to min-max efficiency and find out some "broken" strategies, and Witcher 3 has quite a few of them.
Curious players have already worked out which weapon, Decoction, Oil, and Potion combinations work the absolute best against each enemy, so synergizing those builds with other incredibly strong gear just turns Geralt into an unstoppable killing machine. To give some examples, let's look at some of the best Gear and Skills that turn The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt into an absolute cakewalk.
Updated February 4, 2023 by Jacob Buchalter: With the Witcher franchise seemingly everpresent in people's minds thanks to the drama around the Netflix show, the popularity of Vesemir's animated story in Nightmare of the Wolf, and the relatively recent Next-Gen update for the Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, it seems like a good time to look back at this list again. What items are there for Geralt to use in this game to absolutely destroy the balance CDProjekt Red (who seemingly has a lot planned for 2023) intended? What Oils, Potions, Swords, Abilities, Skills, or other types of gear make the game so much easier than the developers ever intended?
13 Cat School Techniques: Felines Are All About Crit Damage
Even before the DLCs for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt came out, the Cat School Techniques Skill in the General Tree was incredibly useful. Named after the Cat School Branch of Witchers (for reference, Geralt is from the Wolf School), this ability increases base critical hit damage by 25 percent and fast attack damage by 5 percent for every piece of light armor worn.
So, when Geralt wears a full set of light armor, that's 100 percent more critical hit damage and 25 percent more fast attack damage. Not only are fast attacks the most common attacks used in the game (probably used around 20-50 times per average length combat encounter), they now deal more damage on-hit. Plus, once Glyphwords were introduced in the Hearts of Stone DLC, this ability became even better. There's a Glyphword Geralt can equip called Levity that, when used, treats all armor as if it was light armor. This means that Geralt can use this ability alongside even the heaviest armor sets in the game and still get all the active effects from it.
12 Fleet Footed: Make Combat Even Safer Than It Already Was
To be frank, dodging is already quite powerful in The Witcher 3. Geralt can keep a fight going forever and slowly regenerate health (with food or certain skills) just by dodging and rolling at certain times. But, what if the dodging mechanic was even stronger than it already was? Well, thats where the Fleet Footed skill comes in. While active, this Skill gives Geralt an invincibility window during his side-step that nullifies a percentage of the damage that he would normally take when getting hit during this.
And, at max rank, this damage nullification is 100 percent. This ability is a lifesaver on the harder difficulties and in NG+ especially (for those who didn't already get enough from this massive open-world game), as some of the bigger hits from higher-level enemies in this can one-shot Geralt if he's not careful.
11 Euphoria Mutation: Chug Those Decoctions
Mutations weren't originally part of The Witcher 3 and were added as a mechanic in the Blood and Wine DLC expansion. They basically work as skill/ability modifiers and really aren't accessed until relatively late into the game unless players specifically seek them out, and even then it still has some roadblocks. One of the Mutations in the Alchemy tree is called Euphoria, and it's by far the best Mutation to use for players who use Decoctions pretty often.
With this Mutation, the higher Geralt's toxicity level, the more damage his sword swings and Signs will do in combat. Each point of Toxicity translates to 0.75 percent of extra damage, maxing out at a potential 75 percent increase. And, when used in combination with other Alchemy skills like any of the other Tolerance skills, it somehow gets even better.
10 Killing Spree: Crits On Crits
Critical damage in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is pretty absurd in general, given how many hits Geralt usually needs to kill something with regular damage. Thankfully, with the Killing Spree skill in Tier 4 of the Alchemy tree, crits manage to become even more absurd. With every enemy killed while this skill is active and while Geralt is over 0 percent toxicity, he'll get a 10 percent increase to his current crit chance for the remainder of the fight.
And, at max rank, that 10 percent goes up to 50 per kill, which means that 2 kills ramps Geralt right up to 100 percent crit chance. Note that it caps out at 100 percent and every kill afterward does nothing, so leveling the Skill up is only to get to the 100 percent bonus with fewer kills.
9 Whirl: The Best Of All "Spin To Win" Tactics
On the initial release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Whirl was probably the most broken thing in the game. Since then, it's been touched a tad, even more so in the 4.0 Patch, yet it's still one of the best combat abilities by far. Essentially, when Geralt is surrounded by enemies, he can hold the light attack button to start spinning his sword around in a way only a true warrior could, with a technique that seems to effortlessly cut anyone or anything in its path.
And, while it's whirling around, he'll hit any enemy in range for some pretty nasty damage. It's a great way to take out groups of enemies that stick close together like Nekkers or some Bandit groups. Additionally, it's only in Tier 2 of the Combat Tree, so players can start using it pretty early on.
8 Fixative: No More Oily Hands
This next skill is really just a convenience thing, but in a game where every fight requires going through at least a couple of menus, checking what Potions are active, and a whole bunch of other steps, saving any amount of time serves to better the experience in general and reduce the chances of a player forgetting any step of this process, thereby 'buffing' them overall.
To sum it up simply, the Fixative skill in the Alchemy Tree increases the number of charges each Blade Oil application has. At level one, it's a 33 percent bonus, at level two it's 67 percent, and at level three they just don't wear off anymore. Levels 1 and 2 are helpful, but players should really just stock up on ability points and get to level 3 all at once because the level 3 buff is the actually important part. Never having to reapply Oils, especially mid-combat, is so beneficial to each player's enjoyment of the game overall.
7 Mastercrafted & Grandmaster Ursine Armor: Top-Tier Tanky-ness & Quen Buffs
This could apply to either the Mastercrafted or Grandmaster variants of the Ursine armor since not all players are going to go the Grandmaster route (considering the effort and time it takes). Now, the Ursine armor is the School of the Bear Witcher set, and it's one of the best sets of heavy armor in the entire game, like most of the Witcher sets tend to be for their respective armor types.
More than its actual defense numbers, however, the armor's secondary effects are the real stars of the show. 45 percent less damage from all monsters in general? A ridiculously good buff. Also, the set bonus for all 6 pieces of Grandmaster gear being equipped at once is that all Quen-related abilities will do double damage, which may not sound like much considering Quen is just a shield ability, but anyone confused by this has assuredly not messed around enough with either the Exploding Shield or Quen Discharge skills.
6 Aerondight Silver Sword: A Sword That Levels Up
Anyone who has played through Witcher 3 before or knows a lot about the game probably knew this sword would be somewhere on here. The Aerondight Silver Sword is just about the best sword in the base game or at least the best silver sword. There's one key reason for this, and it's because the Aerondight is the only sword that levels up with Geralt. Every other sword has a locked level it can be crafted at or has upon Geralt discovering it, but the Aerondight is different.
As a player has Geralt kill enemies, the sword will gather charges. and at max charges the next enemy killed will increase the damage of the sword by +2, and this keeps happening until it reaches a maximum damage amount for Geralt's current level. As Geralt levels up, so does this damage maximum, which is where the 'growing alongside its user' aspect comes in. And, at this max damage amount, Aerondight will almost always deal more damage than any other silver sword equipable by Geralt at his current level.
5 Iris: Olgierd's Steel Sword
At the end of Witcher 3's Hearts of Stone DLC expansion, players are faced with the choice of saving Olgierd von Everec's soul or not. If they do, they'll be gifted with this sword named after his late wife, Iris. The sword itself has a great visual design, as it is one of the only curved blades in the game. But, its inherent ability is what really matters.
Essentially, every heavy attack hits twice, and if a player uses light attacks a couple of times, the sword will glow red. If the player uses a heavy attack when it's glowing red, they'll do an extra heavy attack that bypasses blocks and knocks opponents down, at the cost of 15 percent of their Max Vitality. But, the double heavy attacks are always there and aren't part of the 'glowing red' mechanic, so players afraid of accidentally taking themselves out with these Vitality-draining hits just need to only use heavy attacks while it's not glowing red.
4 Archgriffin Decoction: Percentage-Based Damage Is Always Better Than Flat Damage
It was hard choosing which Decoctions to feature in this piece, but the Archgriffin Decoction has to be the average player's favorite in terms of broken combinations. Basically, if Geralt has any Stamina at all and uses a heavy attack with this Decoction active, it'll consume all of it, do normal heavy damage to the opponent, and then an extra 5 percent of the enemy's maximum health on top of it. Now, why is this so good?
Well, it allows Geralt to cheese his way through many higher-level opponents quite early. Flat damage always loses to percentage-based damage when facing more durable enemies, especially if Geralt is under-leveled compared to them as his regular attacks would only be light cuts to these enemies otherwise.
3 Ekhidna Decoction: Every Slice Heals Geralt
By default, the Ekhinda Decoction, which is named after an enemy that players will be seeing a lot of in Skellige during quests like 'The Possession' and 'King's Gambit' is pretty good. But, it's truly only overpowered when combined with another item on this list, the Archgriffin Decoction. While the Ekhidna Decoction is in effect, Geralt regains Vitality whenever he does anything that uses Stamina such as attacking, rolling, or even jumping outside of combat.
But, while both this and the Archgriffin Decoction are in effect, it allows Geralt to chip away at high-health enemies with max health percentage-based heavy attacks, and these same heavy attacks will heal him for a sizeable amount each time they connect. Outside of this combination, the Ekhidna Decoction is still an incredible tool for Geralt to use to keep him alive during a chaotic encounter.
2 Tawny Owl Potion: A Witcher's Best Friend
This is one of the first Potions players will use in the game (Geralt has a few by default in White Orchard), and also surprisingly one of the best. Swallow, White Raffard's Decoction (which is actually a Potion), and Thunderbolt are also all amazing Potions too, but Tawny Owl is the best. Why? Because Tawny Owl increases Stamina regen by a large amount for about 30 seconds with base Potion Duration.
It allows Geralt to cast Quen more often to keep himself alive, dodge more often to avoid damage, attack more often in sequence to take enemies out, and it enables players to work towards some of the uniquely broken builds that require a lot of Stamina usage. And, all of this isn't even taking into consideration the upgraded forms of Enhanced Tawny Owl and Superior Tawny Owl Potion, both of which just do everything this one does, but better.
1 Firestream: Igni's Glow-Up Ability
The Alchemy ability tree does have a lot of powerful abilities, such as the Firestream ability, but the reason this tree is mentioned so often here is simply that Alchemy is such a unique and core part of The Witcher games.
Because of this, a lot of players tend to lean towards an Alchemy-heavy build in their first playthrough, but a Sign-dependent build is equally overpowered, just in a different way. Firestream, for example, is a great example of this power, as it turns Igni from a single-cast fire blast into a channeled flamethrower ability. To use a more simplistic comparison, if Geralt was a Pokemon, Igni would be Ember and Firestream is Flamethrower. When built properly, this can absolutely melt groups of smaller enemies, which does look a bit brutal while Geralt is trying to be a goody-two-shoes, but it's a brutal world.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is available on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.