I am following Philipa (the owl) and whatever health I have when I get about 3/4 through the "shielded walk", I die. I have had as much as half health Aard the big dude straight away before he gets a hit in, and then I die! I know there are Wraiths doing what they always do, and although they may be tougher, it seems the same thing as happens before in the "walk"!

I also don;t like that the Elf ignores the odd soldier spectre that gets through the shield, which is why the best I have managed is having half my life left when the above "bug" happens.

Roll on the patches!

As this "walk takes about 10-12 minutes, you'd think they'd be an auto-save at some point too!

As I play this game I find the niggles are getting more and more and my enjoyment is getting less and less! I have no problem with a challenge, but this game hasn't been thought through, and more often than not you feel cheated rather than beaten.

During the Prologue I would have given this game a 9.5, now I am starting Chapter 2 I am down to 9.0 in my estimation of the game, at this rate, by the end, i'll be giving it 8.1! Which is really annoying as I was hoping for another game as brilliant as the first Witcher!

No bang in the middle of the zone. But as I say, I Aard him and he freezes and then I do the finishing move on him so he doesn't get a hit in. As I die, I see I am still in the middle of the zone.

If you go after the Wraiths, then you might go outside the zone, as they are near the edge, and also that big Dude chases you, potentially getting hits in. To avoid going outside the zone I use my mouse to look "downwards" then Geralt doesn't do all that fancy jumping, which can take him out of the zone! So as far as I am concerned I am doing all the right stuff, which is why I think it's a bug!

It's possible that where you see Geralt and where the game thinks he is are two entirely different places. If you can get through without using finishing moves, I'd recommend trying that. The problem with finishing moves is a pretty common bug, though your problem may be a bit more unique than that.

Going outside the safety zone shouldn't be an instant death, so I would definitely go for the wraiths first since the bigger things are slow and the wraiths tend to die quickly if you use strong attacks. If you end up outside the safety zone, just roll back ASAP :)

Other than that, I don't know what to tell you. If it becomes a huge problem, you could always upload your savegame and have someone get through that part for you.

First off, I have to say a big thanks for offering help the way you are. Sometimes the finishing move cutscene goes dark, so maybe it does think I am outside the "zone", but that doesn't automatically kill you as far as I know. Something has to hit you. When I am back after the cutscene I am in the same place visually, but god knows where the game thinks I am!

And the Aard kill is so it doesn't hit me, then I concentrate on the Wraith's - and it all works okay the first time you do it, so I have no idea. I know that it takes 6 minutes to get to the point where I die, and after 6 tries that is a lot of time doing pretty much nothing, then dying - so frustrating to say the least!

I know when I have done the "mist walk" that finishing moves usually did take place outside the bubble. I always had quen up so I wasn't killed but quen did drop and I took some damage before the move scene ended and I was back in the bubble. There are archers/crossbowmen that shoot at you when you are outside the bubble. One hit can drop a fresh quen. I would guess that if you don't have quen then a bolt/arrow would probably kill you.

Has this stopped me from using finishing moves in the bubble? Nope, but I like to live dangerously. So far my record low for completing the walk is 1 HP left.

Finishing moves quite often take you to a different, predesigned location within a nearby scenery. This is quite apparent in an area with distinguishable landmarks (like a bridge in Vergen or a cave with chasms). So it is possible that if you do use a finishing move (either one fuelled by adrenaline or by use of signs) the engine moves you to a predesigned location for best possible scenery rendering, which may be outside of a safe zone…

Thanks for all the help guys. After an hour of trying to complete the walk that seemed to get slower every time you played it(!) I decided to temporarily go down to the Easy level, and completed the walk with no problem. If anything my complaint would be more about Easy being too easy, whereas Normal can have these little annoying spikes that are frustrating rather than challenging. It sort of needed a level between Easy and Normal! :)

So I am past the problem, and will hope there are no more! :) Thanks guys!