Death March, the hardest difficulty setting in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, is the best way to play the game, especially for hardcore fans of the franchise. While it may seem counterintuitive at first, Death March has a similar appeal to games like Dark Souls. Instead of being able to push through the game by spamming melee attacks or using overwhelming force, Death March encourages players to utilize all the skills and witcher tools at their disposal.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, released in 2015, has four difficulty settings: Just the Story, Sword and Story, Blood and Broken Bones, and Death March. Just the Story is, of course, Witcher terminology for “easy mode,” so players can simply enjoy Witcher 3’s story and lore. Sword and Story acts as the “normal” difficulty that most people will likely choose to play during their first playthrough. Blood and Broken Bones is the first of two hard modes, in which enemies have 20% more health and deal 130% more damage. Even compared to Death March, however, Blood and Broken Bones looks like a leisurely stroll through the park.
In Death March, enemies have 80% more health and deal 230% more damage – a big step up even from the previous already-difficult game setting. Unlike each of the other modes, it’s almost impossible to muscle through Witcher 3’s bestiary of terrifying monsters with just physical prowess in Death March. To come away from the fight victorious, players need to use the full range of witcher powers, making it the best, most realistic (or at least immersive) method of experiencing Witcher 3.
Death March Is The Best Way To Play The Witcher 3
While Witcher 3 is undeniably a modern classic, it’s fairly easy to get through the entire story without using many skills beyond Geralt’s two swords, so long as players are generally skilled at the combat. This isn’t true in the Death March difficulty, however, which requires that players have an intimate knowledge of other Witcher tricks and strategies, like bombs and alchemy, to successfully take on more difficult monsters. It also encourages players to engage with some of the game’s more detective-like mechanics that elucidate monster weaknesses.
Alchemy in particular is a necessity when playing on the Death March difficulty, which is great because alchemy is also integral to the lore of The Witcher. In the Witcher books by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski, the source material for both the games and the Netflix TV show, witchers use a variety of potions to aid in their monster-slaying activities. In Witcher 3, however, Geralt doesn’t often need to use anything other than health potions in most situations on lower difficulties.
Yet to survive the bruality of Witcher 3’s Death March, the player needs to craft and drink the magical concoctions that give Geralt stat buffs and enhanced senses in battle, in addition to using poisons that amplify the damage done to certain enemy types. Not only does this make Witcher 3 more challenging, it also helps to ground players in the worldbuilding and lore of the setting, adding substantially to immersion.
Because of this, Death March is by far the best way to play The Witcher 3. It’s only a difficulty that should be taken on by stalwart players ready to deeply learn the game’s systems (and spend a lot more time loading their game after death), but for those up for the challenge, it’s a fun way to experience what it might actually be like to live in Geralt’s shoes for a few hundred hours.
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