After my first trip through the Witcher there were several occasions where I felt I could have done things better, or saved money. This stuff does not really fit comfortably into the excellent walkthrough.
I'll give a couple of examples, so you see what I mean.
WARNING, SPOILERS AHEAD, hold mouse button down and move over blank area, to bring spoilers up.
Spoiler
First four general tips.
General tips 1) You run faster than most (not all) monsters. When you are in an area with many monsters (like the swamp at night, from chapter II onward). Then you can often run until they give up following you. In the swamp, I tended to run in straight lines rather than follow paths. This triggers many creatures to try and attack you. Plants don't move, though they can fire missiles at you for a while. Bloedzigers (sp), the giant leech-like things, are slow, and soon give up chasing. Drowners are faster but can still be outrun fairly easily. Wyverns are pretty quick and tenacious followers, while the smaller kikkimores you come across later, can really shift, sometimes being just a shade quicker than your speed. Drawing your silver sword and running with it in-hand, allows you to run a little faster. Sometimes when two different enemies meet, they fight each other. Drowners versus the big Kikkimore warriors are a good example.
General tip 2) storing things. Innkeepers store stuff for you. Move to another place, and talk to another innkeeper, and they will have your stuff. So you can get your stuff from any innkeeper, even if you left it with a different innkeeper. To keep control of your own inventory, this is what I did. There are Six basic ingredients (Aether, Hydragenum, Quebrith, Rebis, Vermillion, Vitriol). Each of them can also have a secondary effect; Albedo, Nigredo and Rubedo. Once I had gathered a number of ingredients, I sorted them in my inventory into three rows of six.
First row was each of the six ingredients that had Albedo as its secondary effect, second was the same , but with Nigredo as the secondary effect and third was the same again, but with Rubedo as secondary effect. Anything that had no secondary effect was discarded as soon as I had alternatives with a secondary effect. Any time I found more than one thing with the same two effects, I dumped or sold the less commonly found one. This makes a maximum of 3x6=18 slots taken up by ingredients for making potions, blade coatings and bombs. This adds up to a lot of spaces, and when you add the 'base' (within which the ingredients are mixed) for bombs, potions and blade-coatings, it is even more.
If you don't exercise a logical approach in what you keep, you will keep finding you do not have what you want in your inventory, when you want it, as in practice you will spend plenty of time running around with no more than a half-dozen spaces, to store things.
General tip 3) Consider which of the signs to develop. You do not have to spend tokens in all of them. You do not earn enough silver tokens to develop everything well. There are good reasons to choose just two or three signs to develop, so you can spend those valuable tokens elsewhere.
General tip 4) The dice and fighting 'side games'. If you do not compete in the earlier chapters, then you cannot play the games later on. It is worth playing both dice and fighting. Fighting generates a good deal of money, and dice can generate even more. Remember that in the dice game, you should not always give up too soon, the computer can make some strange choices for your opponents tactics (especially in earlier chapters), so even when it looks like you will lose a round, you may still come out a winner.
Specific tips.
In chapter I in the 'No Early Bird' quest, there is a woman (Vesna Hood, near the stockade at night) surrounded by thugs. When you despatch the thugs threatening her, she asks you to escort her home. This is quite a tough quest to complete, without Vesna dying along the way. At the same time as you accept this quest, you are very likely to also be trying to light all the candles for 'The Reverend' at shrines along the road to her home. I recommend you do not come close enough to her, to trigger the 'No Early Bird' scenario, until you have already run the guantlet of phantom hounds once, placing lighted candles at each shrine. Then if you go back and escort the lady home, you can give the shrines as wide a berth as possible (the shrines are a 'hotspot' for hounds appearing). If you still have trouble keeping the girl alive, then try simply running rather than fighting, waiting for her to catch up, at quieter places along the way. Of course, if you are playing in a maximum-realism manner, then ignore this advice.
In Chapter II if you have not offended Siegfried (the 'Flaming Rose' guy who you met in the sewers while after the cockatrice) to this point, then during the day there is an armourer just where you go down steps to the Poor Quarter. He is an especially handy fellow to visit, as he accepts books, rings, Fisstech, and many other things, while you are still in the good graces of the Flaming Rose. He is also one of the few people to whom you can sell your old armour, before buying new improved stuff. Sadly, being in the Flaming Rose's good graces does not last forever, and after a while you will have to do something to get in their good graces again, before you can once again trade with this armourer. If you have supported the Scoiatel instead of the Flaming Rose, then the Dwarven blacksmith (in the non-humans enclave) is an alternative source for selling the weapons you pick up, but he will not accept many of the things the other armourer will.
Also in this chapter, when you first emerge from the sewers, you have been directed to a detective (Raymond) who may help you. He lives pretty much right next to where you emerge. I suggest you do NOT go to see him immediately. Doing so triggers an event that certainly prevents one quest from being done (for someone called Coleman)
In chapter IV, you begin to find more Sun, Earth, Moon Runes. That means you are likely to have shelled out good money for an upgraded silver sword, (mine was upgraded to a blade with two 'Moon' runes and one 'Earth' rune, imo the best overall option).
After defeating Dagon, bypass the Lady of the Lake, go back to the Inn, give your silver sword to the Innkeeper, go back to Black Tern island and THEN speak with the Lady of the Lake, who gives you the silver sword Aerondight. Now you haven't lost your expensive upgraded sword and can use it or sell it as required. Again, ignore this if maximum-realism is the way you play.
General tips 1) You run faster than most (not all) monsters. When you are in an area with many monsters (like the swamp at night, from chapter II onward). Then you can often run until they give up following you. In the swamp, I tended to run in straight lines rather than follow paths. This triggers many creatures to try and attack you. Plants don't move, though they can fire missiles at you for a while. Bloedzigers (sp), the giant leech-like things, are slow, and soon give up chasing. Drowners are faster but can still be outrun fairly easily. Wyverns are pretty quick and tenacious followers, while the smaller kikkimores you come across later, can really shift, sometimes being just a shade quicker than your speed. Drawing your silver sword and running with it in-hand, allows you to run a little faster. Sometimes when two different enemies meet, they fight each other. Drowners versus the big Kikkimore warriors are a good example.
General tip 2) storing things. Innkeepers store stuff for you. Move to another place, and talk to another innkeeper, and they will have your stuff. So you can get your stuff from any innkeeper, even if you left it with a different innkeeper. To keep control of your own inventory, this is what I did. There are Six basic ingredients (Aether, Hydragenum, Quebrith, Rebis, Vermillion, Vitriol). Each of them can also have a secondary effect; Albedo, Nigredo and Rubedo. Once I had gathered a number of ingredients, I sorted them in my inventory into three rows of six.
First row was each of the six ingredients that had Albedo as its secondary effect, second was the same , but with Nigredo as the secondary effect and third was the same again, but with Rubedo as secondary effect. Anything that had no secondary effect was discarded as soon as I had alternatives with a secondary effect. Any time I found more than one thing with the same two effects, I dumped or sold the less commonly found one. This makes a maximum of 3x6=18 slots taken up by ingredients for making potions, blade coatings and bombs. This adds up to a lot of spaces, and when you add the 'base' (within which the ingredients are mixed) for bombs, potions and blade-coatings, it is even more.
If you don't exercise a logical approach in what you keep, you will keep finding you do not have what you want in your inventory, when you want it, as in practice you will spend plenty of time running around with no more than a half-dozen spaces, to store things.
General tip 3) Consider which of the signs to develop. You do not have to spend tokens in all of them. You do not earn enough silver tokens to develop everything well. There are good reasons to choose just two or three signs to develop, so you can spend those valuable tokens elsewhere.
General tip 4) The dice and fighting 'side games'. If you do not compete in the earlier chapters, then you cannot play the games later on. It is worth playing both dice and fighting. Fighting generates a good deal of money, and dice can generate even more. Remember that in the dice game, you should not always give up too soon, the computer can make some strange choices for your opponents tactics (especially in earlier chapters), so even when it looks like you will lose a round, you may still come out a winner.
Specific tips.
In chapter I in the 'No Early Bird' quest, there is a woman (Vesna Hood, near the stockade at night) surrounded by thugs. When you despatch the thugs threatening her, she asks you to escort her home. This is quite a tough quest to complete, without Vesna dying along the way. At the same time as you accept this quest, you are very likely to also be trying to light all the candles for 'The Reverend' at shrines along the road to her home. I recommend you do not come close enough to her, to trigger the 'No Early Bird' scenario, until you have already run the guantlet of phantom hounds once, placing lighted candles at each shrine. Then if you go back and escort the lady home, you can give the shrines as wide a berth as possible (the shrines are a 'hotspot' for hounds appearing). If you still have trouble keeping the girl alive, then try simply running rather than fighting, waiting for her to catch up, at quieter places along the way. Of course, if you are playing in a maximum-realism manner, then ignore this advice.
In Chapter II if you have not offended Siegfried (the 'Flaming Rose' guy who you met in the sewers while after the cockatrice) to this point, then during the day there is an armourer just where you go down steps to the Poor Quarter. He is an especially handy fellow to visit, as he accepts books, rings, Fisstech, and many other things, while you are still in the good graces of the Flaming Rose. He is also one of the few people to whom you can sell your old armour, before buying new improved stuff. Sadly, being in the Flaming Rose's good graces does not last forever, and after a while you will have to do something to get in their good graces again, before you can once again trade with this armourer. If you have supported the Scoiatel instead of the Flaming Rose, then the Dwarven blacksmith (in the non-humans enclave) is an alternative source for selling the weapons you pick up, but he will not accept many of the things the other armourer will.
Also in this chapter, when you first emerge from the sewers, you have been directed to a detective (Raymond) who may help you. He lives pretty much right next to where you emerge. I suggest you do NOT go to see him immediately. Doing so triggers an event that certainly prevents one quest from being done (for someone called Coleman)
In chapter IV, you begin to find more Sun, Earth, Moon Runes. That means you are likely to have shelled out good money for an upgraded silver sword, (mine was upgraded to a blade with two 'Moon' runes and one 'Earth' rune, imo the best overall option).
After defeating Dagon, bypass the Lady of the Lake, go back to the Inn, give your silver sword to the Innkeeper, go back to Black Tern island and THEN speak with the Lady of the Lake, who gives you the silver sword Aerondight. Now you haven't lost your expensive upgraded sword and can use it or sell it as required. Again, ignore this if maximum-realism is the way you play.