Oxenfurt

Oxenfurt stands on the northern bank of the Pontar, a short ride southeast of Novigrad. It is a compact river town of steep roofs, timber-framed houses and red-brick walls, wedged between the slow brown water and the golden wheat of the Gustfields. Two gates lead in: the Novigrad Gate in the north and the Western Gate at the southern end, where the Guildenstern bridge crosses the river. Along the waterfront the harbor fills with moored ships, crates and fishing boats, and over everything rise the towers and courtyards of the Academy, the largest university in the Northern Kingdoms.

In better days the town belonged to students, lecturers and artists, who filled its taverns with loud debates, bad poetry and worse wine. By the time Geralt arrives the mood has soured. King Radovid has shut the Academy and sent most of its students and professors to the army, witch hunters and Redanian soldiers guard the university and the gates, and the Western Gate is closed to anyone without the right papers. What is left is a market town at war: busy, a little shabby, and full of people who would rather not say what brought them here.

In The Witcher 3

Geralt’s first visit usually comes during Family Matters, when the Baron’s daughter Tamara turns out to have fled to Oxenfurt. Getting through the Western Gate is a quest of its own, since the guards turn back anyone without a proper pass. Later the town is the backdrop for the hunt for Whoreson Junior, whose guarded mansion here was a gift from King Radovid. Geralt and Vernon Roche meet a Redanian contact at the Oxenfurt Chess Club, and once Junior has been dealt with, soldiers escort the witcher aboard King Radovid’s galley in the harbor. Near the end of the main story Geralt comes back with Yennefer to free Margarita Laux-Antille from Deireadh, the infamous prison of the witch hunters, by way of a blocked-off well and the tunnels beneath it.

Oxenfurt also has its share of witcher work. A katakan named Gael has been killing drunks in the alleys, and the bodies end up in a makeshift morgue by the harbor. An archgriffin nests in the woods outside town, a troll who wants to join the Redanian army sings (badly) at White Eagle Fort west of the harbor, and thugs have started to lean on the locals. Stjepan, the innkeep of The Alchemy, is one of the strongest gwent players around.

Hearts of Stone makes Oxenfurt one of its main stages. Shani runs a clinic in town, Olgierd’s men drink at The Alchemy, the Borsody Auction House hosts the auction and the heist, a tax collector waits in the market for witchers with suspiciously full purses, and the well on the market square leads down into the Oxenfurt Sewers, where the Toad Prince lurks. The closed Academy finally opens its gates (with Shani’s help) in the expansion’s last quest.

Quests in Oxenfurt

• Family Matters
• Thou Shalt Not Pass
• Get Junior
• A Favor for Radovid
• The Great Escape
• Contract: The Oxenfurt Drunk
• Contract: The Creature from Oxenfurt Forest
• Rough Neighborhood
• The Volunteer
• Gwent: Playing Innkeeps
• Evil’s Soft First Touches
• Open Sesame!
• The Taxman Cometh
• Whatsoever a Man Soweth…

Good to know

• Oxenfurt has three fast travel signposts: the Novigrad Gate, the Western Gate and Oxenfurt Harbor.
• The notice board in town hands out several contracts and side quests, including the archgriffin hunt and the troll at White Eagle Fort.
• Beat Stjepan at gwent in The Alchemy for the Yennefer of Vengerberg card. He plays a Nilfgaardian deck.
• The Academy grounds can only be entered once, during the last Hearts of Stone quest, so loot them while you are there.

In the books: Sapkowski’s Oxenfurt is a colorful wooden town of narrow streets and pointed roofs that lives off its Academy, founded by Nicodemus de Boot. Its workshops and stalls sell inventions found nowhere else, and visitors sign a guest book at the Philosophers’ Gate. The game version is smaller and has no sign of the elven aqueduct the Academy turned into an experimental sewage plant, which is probably for the best.