Only bombs and traps are able to set/thrown if in combat? Why not potions. Witcher 1 had the ability to drink a potion while in combat. I wonder why the change.

Just a bad design desicion. Can't blame them. It happens.

I think you meant to say the opposite of what you did. Of all the people to blame for a bad design decision, I think it would be the designers.

Because preparing and drinking a potion while 3 guys are swinging their swords at you is less realistic :D

On the contrary, it's actually more in line with Geralt's character from the book. Since Witcher 2 introduces Yennefer and goes into the Wild Hunt in more detail, the whole game is really like a bridge to the books, and in the books Geralt drinks potions beforehand. There's simply no time when he's face-to-face with something murdertastic.

Yup, when I was fighting the "Old Man", I forgot to drink the anti-poison potion, and let's say the first boss battle didn't end well for me.

I think that drinking potions out of combat is better in a lore and realistic sense.

But the problem with the gameplat is the very short durations which means your constantly meditating to drink them.

I'd like to see the potions gets a minimum 30min duration.

the only thing I mind is having to meditate to drink potions now. It's time consuming.

There are a lot of things I don't blame CDP for. Like the raccoons living in my walls who steal my milk at night. I put a padlock on the fridge and they STILL steal my milk at night! How do they get past a pad lock? Who gave them the key? ... and they lock the fridge up again afterwards just to make me look crazy! I sit in front of my fridge all night but as soon as I look away... they steal my milk! I can hear them laughing at me behind the walls. Thieving raccoons...

... but I blame CDP for their decisions.

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Just use the mods, My potions last a half hour, it's far nicer than having to jump into the potion making screen after five minutes.

Can't blame them?? OF COURSE you can!! its their bad design decision. The problem is the potions don't stick even if you saved after taking them; when you die, your potion count goes down and have to go through another ~5min cutscene to REDO a major battle. that's what I thought sucks!!
I tried that BUT since 1.2 the oil/pot mods didn't work for me!!

My problem is not so much that you have to drink the potions before combat, but that you have to meditate to do so, and you can't do that everywhere. There were lots of places in the prologue where I wanted to drink a potion outside combat but couldn't. I hope the rest of the game is more lenient about where you can meditate.

Why do so many people have such a huge problem with this change? Is it really THAT hard to drink some potions before you head out/leave town or well, plan to do anything at all?

In the heat of the moment you still have your oils.

Potions are meant for before the task so to speak which is truer to the novels.

What the should do is pause the potion timer during cutscenes and when you're not controlling Geralt. I noticed that all my potions expired when I went to face Draug despite the events from me taking them up to then being 10 minutes max (still had 4 minutes). Being totally alchemy focused this led to just about all my progress beyond level 6 being ignored (had no bombs).

The potion effect times need a bit of readjusting too. 10 should be the minimum with a few that last 20 like swallow or rook. Having to meditate during the middle of a specific expedition to drink another potion is a bit of a drag. The effect times were way too long in the first game so I'm not suggesting that as a measuring stick.

Just download the mod again, and re-insert them into CookedPC, you need to do it again for it to work after having applied the patch. :)