The Witcher 3 Best Early-Game Gear & Swords

The early hours of The Witcher 3 feel lean on gear, but there are a handful of swords and armor pieces you can grab quickly that punch well above the shops' random loot. Knowing where they are saves you from swinging rusty starter blades far longer than you need to.

Locations and item details below were confirmed against the Fextralife wiki, PowerPyx collectible guides and IGN walkthroughs in October 2026, and apply to the Next-Gen version of the game.

The Viper School swords

The Viper steel and silver swords are among the strongest blades you can obtain very early. The steel sword can be picked up during the prologue area, and the silver sword is found shortly after you reach Velen as part of a short scavenger quest. They carry a bleeding chance and solid damage for their level, and they will comfortably outclass anything you buy from early merchants.

Grab both as soon as you can. They bridge the gap until you start finding higher-level relic swords and your first witcher set pieces.

It is worth understanding how the sword-quality tiers read, because the color of an item name tells you a lot at a glance. White and green items are common and rarely worth keeping; blue items are magic-tier with a bonus or two; and the orange relic swords are the rare, powerful blades you build around. Early on you will see mostly white and green drops, so a named blue or relic weapon like the Viper swords is a clear upgrade that you should hold onto rather than sell.

Do not overlook the fact that a sword's listed damage is a range, and your actual output depends heavily on oils, sign and alchemy bonuses on top of it. That means a modestly higher base-damage sword is not automatically better if your current one has a useful bonus like bleeding or a critical-hit chance. Early on, a Viper sword's bleed effect often out-damages a plain blade with a slightly higher number, because the damage-over-time keeps ticking while you reposition.

Early armor worth wearing

Random armor from merchants is forgettable early on, so look for named and set pieces instead:

• Temerian Armor set — available very cheaply from a merchant near the start; it is not powerful, but it looks the part and beats starter rags.
• Nilfgaardian and bandit drops — occasionally roll useful stats; dismantle the rest for crafting materials.
• Early witcher set pieces — the moment you can start a school's scavenger hunt, that gear will outscale generic armor.

Do not over-invest crowns in generic armor early. Save your money for crafting witcher gear and the oils and potions that actually win fights, a philosophy that pairs well with the economy tips in our crowns guide.

Armor weight is a mechanic new players often miss, and it matters from the first hour. Light armor lets you dodge more nimbly and regenerate stamina fastest, which favors fast attacks and signs; heavy armor soaks far more damage but slows your stamina recovery; medium sits between the two. There is no universally correct choice, but picking armor whose weight matches how you want to fight is more important than chasing a slightly higher armor rating in the wrong category. Decide early whether you are a quick duelist or a tank, and let that guide what you pick up.

Start a witcher school scavenger hunt early

The witcher sets — Cat (Feline), Griffin, Bear (Ursine), Wolf (Wolven) — are the real goal. Each is found through a scavenger hunt that scatters diagrams across the map, and the lowest-tier versions are accessible surprisingly early. The Cat School set is a great first target for an aggressive build because it favors fast attacks and critical hits in light armor, while Griffin suits a sign-focused player.

The Bear and Wolf sets are also reachable before long, and each pushes you toward a distinct feel. Bear is heavy and defensive, rewarding strong attacks and trading blows, which suits a player who would rather tank hits than dance around them. Wolf is a balanced medium set that touches melee, signs and adrenaline, making it a forgiving first school if you have not settled on a direction. There is no wrong answer here, but picking one and committing to it beats owning a piece from each, because the set bonuses only reward you for wearing several matching parts at once.

You craft the gear from diagrams at a blacksmith and armorer, so you will need materials and crowns, but a basic Cat or Griffin set early makes a dramatic difference. Deciding which set to chase is really a decision about your whole playstyle, and our best swords and gear sets guide compares them in detail.

One practical note on crafting: the diagram tells you which smith you need, because some pieces require a blacksmith of a certain skill level found only in the larger towns. If a craftsman says he cannot make an item, you usually need to find a more skilled smith rather than better materials. Novigrad has the craftsmen capable of the higher-tier work, so plan a trip there once your diagrams and materials pile up. Gathering the materials also overlaps neatly with ordinary play, since dismantling junk gear and looting monster parts feeds straight into the components these sets demand.

Don't forget oils, potions and the crossbow

Gear is only half of your early power. Applying the correct oil to your sword for the enemy type adds a large damage bonus for free, and keeping Swallow and Thunderbolt potions brewed turns tough early fights around. Your crossbow, often overlooked, knocks flying creatures out of the air and interrupts divers, which solves some of the most frustrating early encounters.

Make a habit early of checking the bestiary before a contract so you know which oil and which sign to use. That preparation matters more than a slightly better sword.

The crossbow deserves a little extra respect in the early game specifically. Beyond knocking fliers out of the sky, a crossbow bolt interrupts the lunge of a drowner or the dive of a harpy, and it can pop the explosive sacs on certain creatures from a safe distance. Early on, when you cannot simply out-damage everything, that free interrupt turns otherwise frustrating encounters with flying or leaping enemies into controlled fights. Keep it bound to a comfortable button and use it as a tool rather than an afterthought.

A short early shopping list makes the opening hours far smoother. Learn and keep brewing Swallow for out-of-combat healing, pick up the basic oils for the enemy families you keep meeting such as Necrophage and Relict oil, and craft a few Grapeshot or Northern Wind bombs for crowd and freeze utility. None of these cost much, and together they matter more to your early survival than any single piece of armor. Meditating to refill potions and bombs is free and only needs the alcohol you can buy cheaply from innkeepers, so there is no reason to head into a contract under-prepared.

Inventory weight is one more early concern worth a mention. Geralt can become over-encumbered and lose the ability to sprint if you hoard too much junk, so sell or dismantle regularly rather than carrying everything you find. Books and letters, once read, can usually be sold, and crafting materials do not count toward your carry weight, so there is no penalty for stockpiling ingredients you will later craft with. Keeping your pack lean means you are always mobile and always have space for the loot that actually matters.

Finally, give Roach, your horse, a little attention early. Saddlebags increase your carry weight, saddles improve stamina for galloping, and blinders reduce how easily Roach panics near monsters, which otherwise throws you off mid-ride. None of these are expensive, and together they make exploring and fleeing bad fights far smoother. Small quality-of-life upgrades like these do more for your early hours than an extra point of armor, and they are easy to overlook while you are focused on swords and signs. Taken together, the Viper swords, a weight-matched starter armor, an early witcher-set scavenger hunt, a well-stocked potion and oil belt, and a few Roach upgrades give you an opening loadout that carries comfortably into the mid-game, long after the generic merchant gear you passed over would have fallen behind.

Skipping ahead with an unlocked save

The satisfying way to gear up is to hunt the diagrams, gather the materials and craft your first witcher set yourself. It teaches you the map and the crafting loop, and it is genuinely enjoyable.

If you would rather begin with everything already available to equip, the all-in-game-unlocked NG+ starter save gives you a character with the game's gear and resources unlocked so you can kit out Geralt immediately. It is a save file delivered to your account on PC, PS4, PS5 or Xbox, not a cheat you run, and you must own the game. See more on the The Witcher 3 page.

Frequently Asked Questions