While there's countless hours of play to be found in The Witcher 3 and its DLC, CD Projekt Red's masterpiece can extend well beyond the PC or console as a springboard for tabletop RPG adventures.
Whether you're a Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition fan or prefer the tried and true Pathfinder, there's a treasure trove of adventure seeds to be found in The Witcher quests.
For those who prefer game rules that more appropriately evoke the feel of Geralt's adventures, there is in fact a licensed pen and paper RPG adaptation of The Witcher out now from R. Taslorian Games.
The writer of that RPG recommends the bedroom exploits of these quests all happen off screen -- but do whatever your group is comfortable with! No matter which system you use (or if you keep in the parts where most groups fade to black), there are some basic ideas to always keep in mind if you want to nail that Witcher feel.
In general, always keep in mind the world doesn't need a hero — it needs a professional. Preferably one who looks great in the bath tub and mostly mutters an expletive whenever something happens.
While most Witcher adventures will revolve around some sort of monstrous menace, directly fighting those creatures shouldn't necessarily be the main focus. Rather, a successful quest should be more about how those monsters have impacted the local people.
Ready to 'Witch' up your weekly RPG session? Let's take a look at the nine best The Witcher quests to recreate for your D&D campaign!
Carnal Sins
Some of the most fun to be had in a fantasy RPG session is when your players discover the cities can be just as dangerous as the dungeons.
If you've got a bard in the party, that player could easily take the role of Dandelion, or any tavern regular the group has interacted with in the past could start the quest instead.
Rather than focusing on a series of combat set pieces, this quest will have the group on the trail of a serial killer — but it isn't lacking in classic locations, like a sewer. The morgue and brothel scenes serve as great ways to get characters with lesser-used skills a chance to shine, and it would be simple to work in NPCs the party already cares about as possible victims to save.
For the quest's resolution you could keep the vampire connection, or change it to any bad guy lurking in the background who is killing for any number of reasons connected to your existing campaign storyline.
Of Dairy & Darkness
Really want to throw your players for a loop while injecting some levity and creating a whole host of table in-jokes? This cheese-focused quest is ripe for conversion into a tabletop D&D session. With a little work, tyromancy (divination based on studying cheese mold) could become a whole new way to use magic in your campaign.
There's a wizard's laboratory to explore, which is a classic RPG trope, but the twist is that its filled with deadly toxic cheese fumes! Protection From Elements and Gust Of Wind might come in handy here, or the party may need to come up with a more creative way to deal with those hazards.
If you want to include the various lizard, bull, and snake figurines in the quest, they could easily become a Figurine Of Wondrous Power that summons a giant gecko, frilled lizard, snake, or other creepies.
A Towerful of Mice
This Witcher 3 side quest is ripe for either an investigative group a combat-heavy group, as the party will need to plan a launch point and then assault an island infested with undead monsters. There's tons of room here to tease the story as each combat encounter is followed by clues as to what happened with the recently-deceased locals.
The means of telling the story could be switched up to be uncovered through various investigative abilities and wizard / cleric spells, or you could keep it as-is with ghosts re-enacting past events if you want to run this as a spooky Halloween one shot.
If you've got any aspects of plague or evil wizards running amok in your campaign, A Towerful of Mice is also simple to plop into the existing storyline.
Recreating the interior of the tower at the center of the island itself as a dungeon to be stomped includes some interesting possibilities for D&D. Rogue abilities for detecting traps and climbing, as well as low level wizard spells like Mage Hand, can be very useful.
If you want to connect this quest to a larger campaign, introduce characters to take the parts of Annabelle, Alexander, Kiera, and Graham ahead of time. If you're already running a campaign, there's no reason those roles couldn't transition to existing characters your party knows well for a bigger impact.
Face Me If You Dare!
Want to spice up the overland travel scenes or throw a little color into the mix when re-supplying in town? This quest is a great springboard for a recurring nuisance to the party.
Imagine if Noober from Baldur's Gate wanted to challenge you to personal combat, but kept coming back time and again after leveling up and hiring more guards to even the odds.
The specific reason for the duel could easily be worked into your main campaign's backstory, as perhaps your group ticked off the wrong tavern owners, town guards, or local guild.
The Tower Outta Nowheres
If you've got a druid or a wizard with a penchant for teleportation magic in the group, it will be incredibly easy to hook the party into The Tower Outta Nowheres.
When the weather goes haywire as a magic tower just poofs into existence, there's no question a group of heroes will need to investigate to calm the frightened locals.
Assaulting a wizard's tower is a pretty common occurrence, but the twist here is that the wizard needs your help to deal with his defenses gone haywire! After completing the quest, said wizard could serve as a mentor to the party, with the conquered tower a new possible mobile base of operations.
The Phantom Of Eldberg Contract
This contract could be simple to plop into any setting or existing campaign. Some locals the party has interacted with before might go missing, and a haunted lighthouse could need investigating to find the root of the problem.
The penitent wraith inhabiting the lighthouse could have any number of connections to your existing story, depending on what it misdeeds it needs to atone for.
An encounter with the penitent wraith might even serve as a warning for players going the murder-hobo route who need to see some possible consequences for their misdeeds.
A Princess In Distress
This one is a fun way to turn expectations on their heads, and can allow the party's ranger to finally see some serious usage. In this case, the "princess" that's gone missing is a goat, and it's needed for a magic ritual.
A diabolical DM could work all kinds of problems into that simple setup, with everything going wrong and the goat getting into all kinds of dangerous situations.
From goblin gangs with fireworks to bear traps to any number of large forest monsters, just simply getting Princess home safe might be a whole adventure on its own.
The Last Wish
This iconic short story of the same name was adapted as a major plot point of the Netflix series, and while it may not work as-is for most gaming groups, the basic story beats are perfect for a D&D translation.
The romance subplot can probably be jettisoned (unless you've got a co-dependent couple of characters who need to be forcibly removed from one another somehow) but the notion of capturing a djinn to work powerful wish magics has everything you need for an adventure.
Be careful how you structure this one though, as party members getting to proclaim wishes is a quick way to unbalance a game world — although that might be half the fun!
A Matter Of Life And Death
While the backing reasons for getting into this quest probably don't connect to your existing campaign, several of the major plot points make for excellent D&D fodder.
Shadowy deals, following contacts through markets, secret passwords, and intrigue during a masquerade ball are all great ways to get your party more into the roleplaying side if you've had too much combat lately.
Of course, the quest doesn't completely lack in that either, as there's bandit ambushes and witch hunter zealots looking to annihilate all spellcasters.
What did you think of our picks, and are there any other quests from The Witcher games or Netflix series you think would make a great RPG adventure?
R. Taslorian previously announced a collection of The Witcher adventures titled the Book Of Tales was in the works, although there doesn't seem to be an actual release date at this point. If you need more ideas for a Witcher campaign, the games and books are probably your best bet for inspiration right now.
If you've already gone through all those stories, keep in min the Netflix show is getting at least two new major characters -- one from the books, and one from The Witcher 3 -- when it lands in 2021, and we also have an animated Witcher film focusing on Vesemir to look forward to soon.
Published: Feb 17, 2020 07:14 pm