Summary
- Ciri is a very powerful figure, and some would argue too powerful to be a protagonist.
- Ciri has completed the Trial of the Grasses, granting her witcher powers.
- CDPR has already considered and addressed Ciri’s power level.
A week after the airing of The Witcher 4‘s cinematic reveal trailer at this year’s Game Awards, the discourse rages on. Although the majority of the fan base is delighted to have Ciri helming The Witcher 4 and perhaps the entirety of the series’ next trilogy, there are also her detractors. While most of these individuals are arguing in bad faith about culture war nonsense, there are also people making the salient point that Ciri is too powerful to be a protagonist.
Ciri is a descendant of Lara Dorren, designating her as a child of the elder blood. This means that Ciri can harness the power of elder magic, the control over space and time that she exhibits in The Witcher 3. Ciri, like her mother Pavetta, is also a Source. These are people with a natural ability for magic.
Ciri Nerfs
As we observed in the trailer, Ciri’s eyes are noticeably more cat-like. CDPR has confirmed that Ciri has undergone and completed the Trial of the Grasses. This is the most excruciating of the witcher trials—apprentices are immobilised and continuously injected with virus cultures and other mutagens. Subjects often suffer temporary bouts of madness during the two-week ordeal, and few ultimately survive.
The surviving apprentices are mutated, possessing enhanced reflexes, senses and physical strength, as well as slower ageing. This means that Ciri in The Witcher 4 potentially has her elder magic and now, her witcher powers. However, we also know that Ciri is only at the beginning of her journey as a witcher, meaning she doesn’t have the same mastery over her abilities as Geralt does.
CDPR addressed this concern in a recent interview with GamesRadar+, with executive producer Malgorzata Mitręga saying “The gap between her being totally overpowered at the end of the previous game and now, with the skill set we showed off in the trailer… something totally happened in-between. We had to delve deep to consider how we would address this – we have huge respect for the lore, for both the books and for what made it into our previous games. But this was one of the first questions we found the answer for, and it’s how we were able to create this original story which starts with The Witcher 4.”
In the trailer, Ciri defeats the Bauk with traditional witcher methods. This, in combination with Mitręga’s comments, could suggest that Ciri can’t access her elder magic in The Witcher 4. Perhaps the effect of the Trials has forever changed Ciri. Either way, it would appear that CDPR already has the potential power creep handled.
The Witcher IV is a single-player, open-world RPG from CD PROJEKT RED. At the start of a new saga, players take on the role of Ciri, a professional monster slayer, and embark on a journey through a brutal dark-fantasy world. Powered by Unreal Engine 5, it aims to be the most immersive and ambitious open-world Witcher game to date.