The Cow-Guarding Demon from The Witcher 3 Continues to Surprise Players After 11 Years

Long ago, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt featured an early-game exploit that allowed players to rake in a ton of coin in no time. The trick was simple: hunt down some cows, sell their hides, meditate to respawn them, and repeat the cycle.

The developers behind The Witcher 3 implemented a clever fix for this money-making loophole in patch 1.05 back in June 2015. Now, when players killed six cows, a level 27 chort would appear, posing a significant challenge far beyond what players would typically face at that stage.

These specific cows, located in White Orchard—the game’s starting zone—were guarded by this formidable foe. Even after all these years, players still find themselves caught off guard by this hidden threat.

Ironically, the fix inadvertently created an even more lucrative exploit. If players managed to defeat the chort, another would spawn in its place. You can see where this is leading: repeatedly taking down chorts yielded far greater rewards than the original cow-hunting strategy.

While this was mainly advantageous for higher-level players who returned to the area later, it was eventually patched again so that only one chort would spawn at a time. To get another, Geralt would need to leave White Orchard and come back.

The Witcher 3 is my all-time favorite game. I rarely replay titles, but I’ve completed Wild Hunt multiple times and even have a Geralt of Rivia tattoo. Until now, I had never heard of the cleverly named “Bovine Defense Force,” which might explain why many players are in the same boat. I also have a bit of trauma from taking down the chicken in Skyrim early on, which has made me wary of attacking non-hostile creatures in RPGs, so I wasn’t exactly the target for the chort’s wrath in the first place.