The Witcher 2 Walkthrough - Conspiracy Theory

The Witcher 2 Walkthrough - Conspiracy Theory
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You’ll start this one up by asking Dethmold about the “square coins” part of the prophesy. He also has a notice about the square coins outside the canteen tent, if you needed another hint. Ask about the notice or the square coins to learn about the conspiracy that’s currently against King Henselt.

You’ll ultimately have to agree to look into it to help stop the curse, as some vital gear is currently being held by the head of the group. We’re going to need some friends in camp to do that though. There’s two good options for that though. You can either fight a big duel, find a drunk man and sweet talk his friends, or you can always do both.

The Butcher of Cidaris

You can start this one out by walking toward the camp canteen to the left of the camp. You’ll have your attention drawn toward an argument between a father and son. Walk up to the father inside the canteen and offer to help him with his problem. It seems that his son has decided to enter in a duel against the Butcher of Cidaris, which is pretty much a death sentence. It’s only right for us to agree to help him out.

Walk outside and talk to Sven. After a little pushing, you can talk him into a two-on-two duel. All that you have to do is convince the Butcher to agree to it. Walk over to big officers’ tent next to the front gate, and head inside to find him. You should be able to easily convince him to settle for the two-person duel. When you’re ready, just walk up to the arena and start things up.

The duel isn’t going to be too hard, if you have some skills in either signs or swordsmanship.

If you have riposte, you can just hold a parry and counterattack for decent damage. Hit-and-run works as well as you expect. Just roll away, then move back in and stun him with Aard or a quick attack to his back. Don’t get caught in his attack combos though. If he manages to chain the whole thing up against you, then you will take a ton of damage. He can easily take half of your health bar.

If you have the spare vigor for it, then keeping Quen up isn’t a bad idea. But if you just have two blocks then I would focus on parrying and dodging. It’s more useful in a one-on-one fight. If you get some space between you and the Butcher, it may be a good idea to swing to the left and smack the Petal around a bit to help Sven. If he manages to finish his opponent off, then it will be a two-on-one scenario in your favor.

Either way, just keep your guard up against the Butcher, take him down and then help out Sven to finish up the fight. Once it’s over, Geralt should automatically call in his favor to learn more about the conspiracy. You will receive one of the square coins, and the instructions to enter their secret base.

In Cervisia Veritas

Finding Odrin

You’ll be able to get this one by talking to any of the three drunk men in the base that are calling out for Odrin. Their friend passed out on the beach just outside of camp. To get there, just walk out the smaller gate to the west of the main camp. This is a right, if you’re walking toward the main gate.

Go out to the beach and wake him up to find Odrin and realize that he is fairly drunk. Help him walk toward the gate and then talk to the guard. They don’t particularly want to let Odrin into the camp. The easiest way to get them to turn a blind eye is a simple 20-30 coin bribe. You can try to convince them that you got Odrin drunk for an interrogation, but if you don’t make an effort to keep Odrin out of trouble, he won’t help you.

Once you’re inside, you’ll need to keep carrying him and walk past the three marked friends of his in the center. Once you pick all three up, pick Odrin up again and then move toward the canteen tent.

Once you’re inside, you’ll need to take the chance to buddy up with them. Make sure that you save before you start the conversation, just in case you mess it up. As a rule, they seem to not like it if you look too eager to join the conspiracy. You should be okay if you ask if Henselt has any work, and then say that you think that the king knows what he’s doing. This should trigger a correction by Odrin, which will end with you getting a square coin and the instructions you need.

Killing Vinson Traut

Killing Vinson Traut

Before you attack, consider getting a better steel sword. There may be an affordable one available at the armorer. If you can hack it without an upgrade though, you’ll wind up with a good sword after the fight from the loot.

When you get the information and your own square coin, go over to the red tent that is currently serving as the brothel for the army camp. Talk to the Madame standing at the entrance to the camp, hand her your square coin and then ask for Whistling Wendy. When she asks you what you want to do, just ask her to open the gates of paradise with her smile. She’ll take you over to the bed and open the trap door in the floor. This will drop you down to the tunnel that leads into the basement of the old tower next to the camp.

Take a moment now to meditate and drink a Swallow potion, if you wish. Make sure that you have a good sword equipped for the steel slot, and then open up the door. Regardless of the conversation’s path, Traut will attack you, along with five other plotters.

Make sure that you draw the steel sword. The game had a nasty habit of drawing my silver sword for this fight. Start by rolling away and moving down the line to the other end. If you stay in one spot at the start, you’ll get surrounded and killed. Cast Quen, put some poison on your blade and then pick out a plotter and try to quickly kill him with fast strokes. After that, see if you can settle in and parry at the end of the table. The men should need a little time to surround you, so just wait and see if you can land a riposte to do a lot of damage. Aard and a follow-up hit will take them out too.

Once you pick off a few plotters, it gets a lot easier. You’ll have more room to breathe, and you’ll be able to run around and regenerate vigor easier. If you keep Quen up, you’ll be able to take out the last two without too much trouble.

In a one-on-one fight, Traut isn’t terribly dangerous. You can probably just use Quen and a parry to handle him. A riposte works quite well against him, although again, Aard and a following attack will work well too. You probably have a standard one-on-one strategy by this point.

Loose Ends

Once he’s dead, loot the nice sword off of his body and make sure that you get the armor too. You’ll need it as a sign of courage for the “Courage Symbolized” quest. Loot the rest of the bodies, pick up one of the propaganda posters, and then use the key that you looted to open the middle door on the wall to find a way out of the plotters’ tunnel.

Talk to Dandelion on your way out of the camp. If he’s not at the brothel, he’ll be resting by some tents by the western gate. Just follow the quest marker. The only one in the region who would do work like this is Dandelion, so confront him about it to learn what you can. Then report your success back to Dethmold. You can ask about a reward at the end. Tell Dethmold that you killed six of them to secure a 300 oren reward, if you want to take it (you can always insist that you don’t kill humans for money).

That wraps it up for now. The leads are dead (some literally), so all we can do is wait and see how they recover.

References

All information and screenshots from a “normal” difficulty playthrough of Witcher 2

Due to the branching nature of the game your experience may differ. Please feel free to comment on any noticed differences in the segment below,

This post is part of the series: The Witcher 2 Walkthrough - Chapter 2 - Henselt’s Side - Main Quests

Chapter 2 will offer different main quests for players, depending on their plot choices. This walkthrough will focus on the quests available in Henselt’s camp, and cover how you can break the curses and seek out the kingslayers hiding in the region.

  1. Witcher 2 - Prelude to War: Kaedwen
  2. Witcher 2 - Conspiracy Theory
  3. Witcher 2 - The Blood Curse
  4. Witcher 2 - Gathering the Symbols (Roche)