The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt can be a brutally difficult game if you have Geralt wandering into an area he’s not prepared for. You need to constantly level up to stay ahead of the game and be able to effectively fight future encounters. This guide explains how to level up fast in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, so you never have to worry about battling again.
Related: How to get new moon armor in The Witcher 3
How to level up fast
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is a massive game filled with adventure, interesting characters, insightful quests, and treacherous combat. But the beginning of the game might seem a bit difficult for new players due to the time it takes to level up a low level Geralt. He doesn’t have too many unlocked skills and his gear isn’t the best, which makes it difficult to fight against evil monsters. Below we’ve outlined a few methods you can follow to ensure that you level up with the demands of the game and can get through every battle with just a few scratches.
Focus on side quests and avoid the main story.
Gamepur screenshot
The world of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is absolutely huge. While the main story takes you through each main hub, there’s plenty to see and do between the beats of the main story. We recommend playing a few main quests, but then leaving that quest line for a while so you can explore, take on side quests, and gain experience. There are interesting little hunts, bounties, and quests to take on everywhere.
You will often learn these side activities naturally as you move through each town. Be sure to stop on the boards to collect whatever you can find, and chat with as many NPCs as possible to see if they will trigger a new quest. Usually a small task in a town has much bigger repercussions, and you don’t want to miss those quests by ignoring a few side quests early on. If a quest or side quest requires a higher level than Geralt’s current level, explore and fight local wildlife, or tackle lower level quests until your level is high enough. If you constantly engage in the secondary content of this game, you’ll never find yourself wanting to do things.
Get the Gourmet skill early
Picture via CD Project
When leveling up Geralt and gaining skills, the Gourmet skill is a good option to start early. This will give Geralt the ability to regenerate health for 20 minutes, making it much easier to complete quests and kill enemies. You don’t have to worry so much about dying and losing progress when Geralt can take a break and fully regenerate after eating a cake or two. It doesn’t directly increase your level, but it will make you much faster in everything else. Leveling up faster is just a nice bonus in this case.
catch the signs
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You will find signs everywhere as you explore the world around you in this game. They are useful as they are a crucial part of the fast travel system. Although Roach is a fast horse, you can’t instantly beat from panel to panel, but neither can you if you don’t collect panel locations.
If you’re roaming the map, completing missions everywhere, it’s worth having the fast travel system as comprehensive as possible. This will allow you to take a bunch of quests, move around the map, complete or advance them, then return to the same town to turn them all in and collect your rewards. Most of us play open world games this way, selecting all of the side activities in an area before moving on, so that we finish everything around us as we slowly progress through the map. While it’s not for everyone, it’s a great way to help you level up much faster and see more of what the game has to offer each session.
Visit every city
Picture via CD Projekt Red
Small towns are the best places to find collections of smaller quests to complete. These are mostly standalone and separate from the main story, but some play into the larger story arc. All of them are also mostly low level activities, or require a lower level for the next main quest. These are the perfect tasks you can undertake to level up quickly and efficiently without losing experience fighting enemies or stealing cow hides. A great way to make this even faster is to have as many signals unlocked as possible, because then, as we mentioned before, you can travel fast and complete tasks in a very short time.
Upgrade your gear often
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By visiting cities on your journey in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, you will have a great opportunity to visit all the vendors they house. Blacksmiths and Traders are great because you can sell any gear you no longer need, putting coins in your pocket for even better items. Sometimes it’s actually better to sell the gear you’re using in favor of something a vendor is selling, as it has much greater longevity. Even just upgrading your gear can help it last a bit longer and help you complete a few more missions before you start thinking about looking for the better stuff.
Even if you are looking for the best gear in the game, you should look for Witcher school gear like Serpentine, Griffin, Feline, Wolven, Viper, Manticore, and Ursine outfits. These push you to complete more tasks, kill more enemies, and hunt across the world to depths you would never reach naturally. All of this will add experience and eventually level you up faster, so you’re ready for the big fights.
Complete all of the White Orchard
Screenshot via CD Projekt
Related: How to start the Hearts of Stone DLC mission in The Witcher 3
White Orchard is the first town you’ll enter in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and it serves as a short tutorial for the rest of the game. This area is perfect for learning about the main quests, side quests, and all the different activities in which you can participate. We recommend that you do everything in White Orchard from top to bottom, so that you have a decent level before moving on to the main one. Research. Leave nothing to chance, no unfinished business, and you will be well positioned for the future.
Look for gear with XP boosters
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There are items and equipment in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt that have a green color to differentiate them. If you check out the descriptions of these items, you’ll see that they also have additional stats that make them better or more useful than other gear you might run with. For example, you can pick up a silver sword that gives you an additional 20% experience boost when killing monsters. Check each green item for a description to see which ones will be most useful to you in battle or leveling up. Roach also has trophies you can equip that will increase experience gained under certain circumstances. Combine these items early in the game to level up much faster than you could without them.
Of course, you can swap these items out for ones that give you bonus damage if you really need them for specific bosses or battles. Typically, however, these are the items that will help you raise Geralt to a level far above that required by the next main quest long before you reach it.
farm drowners
Screenshot via increased draw distance
Drowners are a perfect enemy to farm if you want to gain a lot of experience quickly and level up even faster. They spawn around most bodies of water and are relentless. They will spawn pretty much every time you spawn, and each will give you a fair amount of experience when they die. Even more, if they are of a higher level or if you have activated the increase in level of the enemy. If you’re going to farm, do it right and do it with an enemy you don’t have to think too much about fighting.
Enable Enemy Level Upgrade
Picture via CD Projekt Red
Most players don’t mess with this option, but it’s great for leveling up early. You can change the settings in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt to enable the enemy scaling option. This ensures that every enemy you face is equal to or higher than your current level. While this seems to make the game much harder, and it does, it also gives you more experience. So you can take on side quests, kill much more powerful enemies, and be ready to take on the main quest very quickly. You can always deactivate the enemy buff once you are at the level you need.
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