Video Game / Dragon's Dogma II

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Dragon's Dogma II (also alternatively written as Dragon's Dogma 2) is the sequel to Capcom's Action RPG Dragon's Dogma. It was originally revealed on May 2022 and has Hideaki Itsuno returning as the director. It was released on March 21, 2024 for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. A demo version containing only the game's character creator was released on March 7, 2024, allowing players to create their Arisen and Pawns ahead of the game's release.

Dragon's Dogma II takes place in a parallel world to the original game, with many familiar and new elements to explore. The story begins in an underground gaol where the Dragon's voice echoes in the fog of lost memories. Betwixt the domains of human and Beastren, a hero must fulfill their forgotten destiny. Rather than Gransys, the game sees the player explore the human kingdom of Vermund and the Beastren nation of Battahl, becoming embroiled in their politics while working to fight the Dragon.

The game sees a number of changes to the original's vocations: Fighter, Mage, Warrior, Sorcerer and Magick Archer return, but Strider has been split into two separate vocations named Thief (wielding daggers) and Archer (wielding bows), and Magick Archer can no longer wield daggers, now being a ranged-only class. Ranger, Assassin and Mystic Knight have been removed, but the game introduces three new vocations in the form of the duospear-wielding Mystic Spearhand, the incense-wielding Trickster and the Warfarer, who can use a combination of all weapons from other vocations at the cost of lower stats, bringing the total number of vocations to 10.

Tropes:

• Absurdly High Level Cap: The level cap for both the Arisen and pawns are 999, a huge step from the original game's level cap of 200. You can curb stomp anything the game throws at you once you reach level 50.
• Advertising by Association: The "Calls from Hideaki Itsuno and Casey Edwards" video which was uploaded a day before the launch of Devil May Cry: Peak of Combat has Itsuno advertising Dragon's Dogma II before the end of his segment, which makes sense because he's a recurring series director for both the Devil May Cry and Dragon's Dogma IPs of Capcom.
  Itsuno: Please also pay more attention to "Dragon's Dogma 2".
• Alternate Universe: Instead of taking place in the same world as the first game, II takes place in a parallel universe. The Unmoored World heavily implies that the events of the first game happened in some manner, as you can find the remains of what appears to be Gran Soren once all the bodies of water dry up.
• Always a Bigger Fish: When the Arisen confronts Lord Phaesus at the top of Moonglint Tower, the latter manages to summon the Royce Dragon from the sky and attempts to take command of it... Until The Dragon falls from above and crushes it with its bigger body.
• Ambiguous Situation: What exactly is the "great will" the Pathfinder speaks of? His dialogue implies it's the "god" of the Dragon's Dogma universe as a whole, surpassing even that of the Seneschal (a god-like being himself), but the details are not made clear. The fact that the "great will" is only alluded to in the True Ending really doesn't help.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • The first game allows you to buy flasks to preserve perishable foods and prevent them from spoiling. This entry allows you to combine foods into dried snacks whenever they ripen or age. With this, dried meats can be kept around for cooking without rotting away.
  • The game introduces hotkeys for turning on your lantern and consuming curatives on the go. No more pulling up the items menu every time your lantern gets drenched or when you need to heal in the middle of combat.
  • Whenever you unlock a new Vocation to use, you are given a full set of equipment for that vocation to wear. So no more starting out naked when unlocking a vocation that uses nothing you were previously wearing.
  • Stat growth is still based on your current vocation when you level up, but when switching to a new vocation, base stats are adjusted to suit the vocation you are changing to. While you will want to level with certain vocations to make your desired future vocation better (e.g. leveling Mage or Sorcerer before changing to Magick Archer), doing otherwise will not render certain vocations nonviable.
  • If found in an Unwinnable by Mistake situation, you can either load from your most recent save, or the last time you rested at an inn.
• Apocalypse How: The Unmoored World. When the Arisen chooses to stab themselves with the Godsbane in an effort to reject the Pathfinder's cycle, the latter responds by unleashing the Brine upon the world. The skies turn red, the seas are drained, many fell creatures roam the land and some parts of the world such as the region around Melve have already fallen to it. Time has also seemingly halted to a standstill, only progressing when the player rests. Once the Arisen awakens in the Unmoored World, their tasks involve defeating powerful monsters and evacuating the various settlements and cities before the end.
• Artificial Stupidity:
  • Though the Pawn system AI has been improved in many ways, often subtle, the AI still tends to make poor decisions. Caster Pawns will stand uncomfortably close to danger and pawns in general have been known to throw themselves off cliffs or into open water, killing themselves instantly. This is generally equal parts amusing and frustrating.
  • Enemies, likewise, will at times wander too deep (or just straight up dive) into water, where they are instantly subject to the same Super Drowning Skills as the player and other NPCs. On the bright side, this also means an easy win and free experience points.
• Ascended Extra: Downplayed. While the Brine does not play a major role in the story, it poses a much more severe threat than simply killing anything unlucky enough to land itself in deep water. In this game, the Brine is akin to a cosmic threat as it ravages the world on the Pathfinder's orders when the Arisen refuses to play ball with his plans. It's even capable of spawning monsters, including dragons, something it was not able to do in the first game.
• Ascended Meme: In Dragon's Dogma, the Arisen could be pulled underwater by the Brine even after becoming the Seneschal (a mere oversight of the dev team and not intentional), which led to the fans joking that the Brine was some sort of Eldritch Abomination that surrounded the entire world. Come Dragon's Dogma II, and that's exactly what the Brine is, a consuming entity controlled by the Pathfinder that is omnipresent, able to manifest in bodies of water deep enough. And it's so huge and powerful that, when you defy the Pathfinder by using the Godsbane on yourself to not fight the Dragon, he orders it to envelop the entire planet, turning it into a post-apocalyptic wasteland infested with monsters and plagued by multiple dragons.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Given the monumental task of killing the Dragon, the Arisen have to be badass if they want to succeed. This plays into why the Arisen is hailed as the one-true Sovran of Vermund; Brant and several other characters make it very clear the Arisen's rule is uncontested, if not integral to the kingdom's future. This is also the reason why Disa tries to take the Arisen out of the picture and install her son Sven as the Sovran, since such a position would give her and her house near-perfect political power.
• Auto-Save: Your progress is automatically saved at certain points, but a related tutorial prompt also warns that the autosave system can be unreliable (just like in the first game). The prompt even recommends you to regularly rest at an inn so that the reliability of your saved data is ensured, since resting at an inn manually forces the game to create a "checkpoint" save that can be loaded via the "Last Inn Rest" option.
• Bandit Mook: Scavengers are a type of human enemies who can be found alongside other bandits, usually staying out of the Arisen's range until they get knocked down by other attacks, at which point they swoop in and pin them down, steal an item from them and then flee. There is an achievement linked to taking back your stolen item from them.
• Behemoth Battle: One quest in the Unmoored World guides you back to the Gigantus^*Provided you managed to defeat it early before it reaches the lava. Upon reaching it, your Main Pawn will suddenly possess it and goes on to fight and kill a massive Purgener single-handedly while you and Lord Phaesus are left to just watch from a safe distance.
• Bilingual Bonus: Items acquired from Elven vendors will usually have Welsh or Irish names that give some indication of their special property. For example: a staff named Tintreach (Irish for 'lightning') which boosts the wielder's electrical spells, or a heavy-duty metal bow named Dinistrydd (Welsh for 'destroyer').
• Bittersweet Ending: The true ending ends with Arisen killing the Pathfinder with the Empowered Godsbane Blade and freeing the world from the Cycle, with the world slowly beginning to heal from the effects of the Unmoored World. However, the Arisen and their pawn both sacrifice themselves to bring this about, with their beloved looking out towards the sea in sadness.
• Black Knight: One of the game's new boss monsters is the dullahan, a creature resembling a ghostly knight in dark armor holding his own head like a lantern and wielding a sickle as a weapon. He can be found as a rare overworld encounter during night time and as part of the "Till Death Do Us Part" quest. They become more commonly found as overworld minibosses once the player enters the Unmoored World.
• Blob Monster: Slimes are one of the game's new enemies, resembling shapeless goop that is impervious to physical damage and can slow you down and eat away at your health quickly if left unchecked. You need elemental attacks to be able to kill them, with ice being most effective as it freezes them solid.
  • The Ooze and Sludge are variants of the slime encountered later in the game. The former is a blob of oil that tars on contact and combusts easily when exposed to fire, while the latter is a Living Lava that burns on touch, turning solid when water or ice are used against it.
• Body Bridge: Knocking the cyclops close to a small-enough gap between ledges will cause it to fall down and form a bridge, allowing the player and their pawns to walk across it and awards an achievement for it.
• Border Patrol: The Brine returns from the first game, keeping players from venturing into deep water, and is even introduced by consuming Rook near the end of the tutorial. Like with the original Dragon's Dogma, any enemy or Pawn who is taken by the Brine is killed instantly.
  • After the Pathfinder orders the Brine to destroy the world, all bodies of water dry up and reveal new areas. However, it transforms into a Fog of Doom that blocks off portions of the map starting with Northern Vermund, and will close in towards the center and engulf other areas including cities if the Arisen does not defeat the Purgeners before resting a certain number of times.
• Boss-Altering Consequence: If the player does not defeat Talos fast enough, it will walk into a pool of lava that it then sinks into before disappearing from the map. However, defeating it early will stop it from moving and nets you an achievement. Not only that, when the player reaches the Unmoored World, it will turn the two Purgeners on the Volcanic Island into Cutscene Bosses when your main pawn gets absorbed into the giant statue where they then singlehandedly defeat the monsters in a Behemoth Battle, while you and Phaesus spectate the fight from a distance. This saves the player the trouble of having to fight two more Purgeners had they not stopped Talos from walking into the lava.
• Broken Bridge: There are multiple Broken Bridges around the map that will be fixed as the player progresses in the main story, though some of them can be bypassed via a longer and dangerous alternate route.
  • A bridge to the east of Borderwatch Outpost will not be repaired until the player progresses down the first few main quests.
  • The destroyed bridge to the east of Vermund where the Nameless Village will only be repaired once the player takes an alternate path down south towards the Palace Overlook Cape.
  • Bridge of Theodracus the Second, another broken bridge between Checkpoint Rest Town and Harve Village will be repaired when the player obtains the Border Entry Permit, though another bridge up north can be taken instead.
  • The Spellseal Door that blocks the route between Bakbattahl and Volcanic Island Camp will only open when the player obtains the Empowered Godsbane Blade and uses it to unlock it. Otherwise to reach the camp, they have to take a longer route through Drabnir's Grotto, which is a large dungeon filled with a myriad of bandits followed by hobgoblins and other monsters.
• Call-Back: The first Pawn to assist the player is Rook, the selfsame introductory Pawn from the first game.
• Canon Immigrant: Two of the new monsters introduced to the game are the Sphinx and the Medusa. Both of these creatures made their first appearance in Dragon's Dogma Online, albeit with different designs. The new Sphinx has carried over its predecessor's peacock motif, prominent breasts, piercing red eyes, and multicoloured blue and yellow feathers, but while the new Sphinx is a unique character in her own right with a lengthy questline associated with her, the Dragon's Dogma Online Sphinx was just another monster to be fought and in gameplay terms was merely an Underground Monkey of the Griffin. The previous Medusa, meanwhile, was a humanoid spellcaster similar to a Wight as opposed to a serpentine monster, although both versions have similar faces.
• Cat Folk: The game introduces a new species of humanoid felines called the Beastren, who make up the majority of the population residing in Battahl. If you so choose, you can play as a Beastren yourself and/or create a Beastren pawn.
• Censor Steam: Your character and your pawns, along with other NPCs, are completely naked while in the hot springs; only a conveniently-placed steam that follows you around covers the sensitive parts.
• Chainmail Bikini: While most of the revealing outfits are mage robes and the like with the actual armor being sensible, there are a few examples. The Gauntleted Petticoat is basically just a crop-top, a miniskirt, and a pair of gauntlets, while Brunhilda's Embrace is pretty much just three small metal plates covering the breasts and belly button held together by leather straps. The latter example is Justified by its description, which notes that it is imbued with a blessing that makes it far more protective than its appearance would imply.
• Character Customization: You can customize the appearance of your Arisen and main Pawn in-depth using a wide variety of options and sliders. This time around, you can even decide to create Beastren characters.
• Checkpoint Starvation: After waking up in the Unmoored World, the player can no longer load from autosaves if they die, and must load either at the last inn/dwelling/campfire they rested at or go back to the day of their awakening.
• Citywide Evacuation: Once the player enters the Unmoored World, they can take up quests to evacuate everyone from all remaining settlements that will eventually be destroyed and consumed by the red fog if the player does not fell the Purgeners in those areas. The people you evacuate will then move to Seafloor Shrine and remain there until the Arisen begins the last fight with the Pathfinder.
• Classical Chimera: The Chimera makes a return from the previous game, largely unchanged save for a few differences: notably, the goat head now casts more powerful spells that strike multiple times rather than just one. Design-wise, it has also lost the extra digits it had in the first game, now sporting normal lion front paws and goat hind hooves.
• Collection Sidequest: The Seeker's Tokens return from the first game. There are two-hundred and forty Seeker's Token's scattered throughout the game world that you can collect and turn in for various rewards. Collecting eighty of them is tied to an achievement.
  • The game also adds the Golden Trove Beetles, consumable items that you can find to increase you and your pawn's max encumbrance by 0.15 kg each time they are consumed.
• Colossus Climb: You can scale just about every large enemy in the game, with most of their weak spots being either the head or chest. The best example is with the Talos, which is a more traditional colossus with weak points all over its body.
  • The Purgener found near the Sacred Arbour and the Excavation Site is a giant serpent-like monsters with weak points that reveal the others closer to their heads as the player destroys them. Climbing up its long body is one of the ways for melee fighters to reach them.
  • The True Ending credits have the Arisen climb up the back of Nex, the Pathfinder-turned-Dragon who is more massive than the Dragon that ate their heart. They have to evade the spikes erupting from its skin, as well as the Brine rising from the tips of its wing while it breathes fire on them before their Main Pawn arrives to help them finish off the dragon.
• Company Cross-References:
  • Apart from nods to the Dragon's Dogma franchise, this game also has several references to other Capcom IPs. From the Character Creation system alone, there's a hairstyle that greatly resembles the iconic hair of Leon S. Kennedy. And just like the first game, the list of pre-set Monikers includes the names of Capcom characters such as Zangief and Vergil.
  • Two nearly identical NPCs at Checkpoint Rest Town, one of whom is required to be brought to the Sphinx to solve one of her last four riddles, are named after Dante and Vergil.
• Continuity Nod: When the oceans recede during the post-game Unmoored World sequence, the Seafloor Shrine is fully revealed as the remains of the first game's Gran Soren; vendors evacuated there even set up shop in the same buildings. Gauging by relative locations, the circular ruins near Vernworth are what's left of Blue Moon Tower, and there's even a permanent Portcrystal revealed around where the one outside Cassardis was in Dark Arisen. In addition, the final pillar of light appears directly above the Everfall, the location core to the never-ending cycle in the first game.
  • The throne underneath the Seafloor Shrine where the player first meets Rothais bears a striking resemblence to the same throne sat upon by the Seneschal in the first game.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Averted with all of the large monsters, including the Sphinx and the main questline bosses, Gigantus and The Dragon, who can be instantly defeated by the One-Hit Kill effects of both the Unmaking Arrow and Medusa's Head.
• Cooking Mechanics: The game introduces the campfire mechanic where before resting, the player is given the option to cook and eat any meat they have in their inventory to gain boosts to their health, stamina, strength and recovery, with the buff becoming stronger depending on the quality of meat. Rotten meat provides little to no buff, while aged beast-steaks give the highest stat boosts.
• Dark Reprise: The soundtrack that plays in the main menu is an upbeat song that instills a sense of adventure to its listeners. Once the player reaches the Unmoored World, the song changes to a more sombre tone, befitting the grim situation that is the The End of the World as We Know It.
• Death Is Cheap:
  • Played straight with Pawns. If or when they die, they are simply returned to the Rift.
  • Downplayed with Wakestones. They can revive any NPC on the field or in the Morgue. However, they are rare to assemble or collect through normal means. Certain NPCs in quests are gone for good should they die.
• Delicious Distraction:
  • Discarding any piece of meat (including a rotten one) will cause all nearby wolves to stop what they are doing to move over and feed on said meat on the floor. This trick also works on Garms and Wargs.
  • One of the side quests has you distract Brokkr with nutriabh, an Elven delicacy revulsed by Elves but secretly loved by Dwarves. After delivering few ingredients to Doireann and delivering the dish to his assistant Sara, she will give it to him. He then briefly leaves the entrance of the cave he works in to eat it, granting the player temporary access to the cave that holds Scalecinder, which must be collected and brought back to the Sacred Arbor to resuscitate the Arborheart.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • One of the Sphinx's riddles involves the player being tasked with returning to the site of the very first Seeker's Token they collected, testing their memory. If the player hasn't collected any Seeker's Tokens, the Sphinx will note that the Arisen seems bewildered by her request. When the player finds their first Seeker's Token, there will be a Finder's Token right next to it.
  • After five riddles, the Sphinx will fly off to a new location, challenging the player to find her. If you're quick, you can clamber onto her back and simply hitch a ride there. As she flies off, the Sphinx will notice you, and congratulate you on your quick thinking.
  • Ogres typically seek out the females in the player's party and will attempt to grab and run off with them, but can be fooled by a male character wearing feminine clothing. When they realise they've been tricked, they will become enraged and slam their captive into the ground. Likewise, if a female character is sufficiently covered up to the point where it isn't obvious they're female, Ogres will not target them.
  • If the player manages to slay the Lesser Dragon before it can flee during the "Readvent of Calamity" questline, Sigurd will show up and reward them with the Mystic Spearhand maister skill earlier than it would have been obtained if the player refights the Lesser Dragon at Dragonsbreath Tower. Despite this, Ulrika will still be accused of treason, this time for sending a "false report" as well.
  • One side quest has the Arisen assist a sculptor in Battahl with making a griffin statue by fighting it at its nest while he observes and sketches the creature. The resulting quality of the statue— and the quest rewards depends on how long you take to fight the monster, with the quality becoming poorer if it dies or flees before the sculptor is finished sketching. If you use a Medusa's Head to petrify it instead, the sculptor will give unique dialogue to the player and then use the petrified monster as reference to finish his sketch. This will always result in a perfect statue as though the player had kept it alive and grounded for long enough.
  • The sidequest "Short-Sighted Ambition" normally ends with the questgiver Isaac reading the tome On Transference of Souls 2 and casting a spell that goes wrong and turns his wife and child into piles of sand, with him being in denial over their deaths before leaving and abandoning his shop. If you give him the forged tome instead, the spell will fail instead of killing his family, and Isaac will decide that he's content with his humble life working at the apothecary. Furthermore, if Isaac leaves the shop, this will unlock an alternate dialogue option for Hugo at the end of another quest "Off The Pilfered Path", where you can suggest he gets a job at that store, and not only will he serve as the replacement shopkeeper for the rest of the playthrough, but he will also sell two unique masks that are otherwise not found anywhere.
• Dialog During Gameplay: The Pawn Chatter system is expanded upon from the first game, so Pawns can now point out and guide the Arisen to places of interests such as treasures and ladders. They can also have amusing conversations with each other, talk about the vocations they changed from, mention the different quest outcomes their masters received in other worlds and make remarks about the party's composition, such as when there are only Beastrens in the party.
• Die, Chair, Die!: There is a lot of objects in the game such as crates and pots that the player can either pick up and throw, or smash with their weapons, often having a chance of dropping an item upon destruction. Even the wooden bridges are destructible, such that there are signposts that tell the player to stop destroying them.
• Difficult, but Awesome: The Warfarer vocation is Weak, but Skilled in that, while it has the advantage of using all the vocation abilities and weapons of other vocations on top of having no armor restrictions, it lowers your base stats on top and, like the Mystic Spearhand, runs on Magikarp Power as it can only use the vocation abilities you've already unlocked with your other vocations. This makes it difficult to use at first, but once you've sufficiently leveled up your vocations, unlocked the right abilities and have the perfect set-up, the Warfarer can show off its full potential. Fancy yourself a cross between a mage and a Magick Archer? Slap a mine on an enemy and let loose.
• Disc-One Nuke: The Marcher's Armor set has the best defense to weight ratio of any other armor set in the game and can be equipped by every single vocation. You can aqcuire 2 sets for free in Vernsworth.
• Doomed Hometown: Subverted, then Downplayed. Melve, a settlement the player visits early on, gets attacked not once but twice by two different dragons, but the Arisen repels them back. However, Ulrika gets accused of treason and leaves Melve, which then falls under occupation by soldiers whose mistreatment of the villagers forces Lennart to lead an escape with his people as they move to Harve where she fled to, leaving the village nearly empty by the end of the "Home Is Where the Hearth Is" side quest. Played straight in the Unmoored World, where Melve and the rest of North Vermund have been consumed by the Brine fog during the Arisen's absence.
• Double Meaning: The "Feast of Deception" main quest has you finally confronting the False Arisens lies during the Sovran Coronation... except you don't even enter the palace. Your main pawn senses something compelling them to turn on you, forcing you both to retreat before things get worse. You later learn that the False Arisen has a powerful "godsway" item that controls pawns, continuing to "feed" lies to the Vermundian populace, so you must investigate and find a way to negate it before settling the score.
• Downer Beginning: The game opens to you returning to Vernworth to claim the throne as Sovran, only to be stricken by a curse, robbed of your memories, and Made a Slave in a neighboring nation.
• Eldritch Abomination: The Brine is a mass of amorphous red...something that lurks in deep bodies of water and devours any living thing that falls in. It is actually an extension of the "great will" that reigns over the world, and when you Screw Destiny by using the Godsbane Blade on yourself, the Brine extends from the seas into the skies and begins to destroy the world.
• End-Game Results Screen: As the credits roll after the True Ending, the game will show three NPCs with whom you have the highest affinity, as well as three most hired Support Pawns. And after the credits finish, the results screen will appear, showing your playtime, number of enemies killed, number of times you died and the number of Wakestones used to revive themselves/others.
• Escort Mission: These return but instead of getting them from a notice board, characters will appear at your home or run into you in the wild to ask you to escort them to a certain place in the world. Successful completion will yield a boost to their affinity towards you.
• Evolving Title Screen: Throughout most of the game, the title screen just says "Dragon's Dogma" for some reason, with the II nowhere to be seen. Then, after you defy the Pathfinder's plans by using the Godsbane on yourself, thus breaking the cycle of the Arisen fighting the Dragon, the post-game is unlocked, and finally the II is added to the title screen.
  • The background first shows the city of Vernsworth, then changes to Bakbattahl after the Arisen goes to the coronation. Upon enterring the Unmoored World, the background shows the ruins of the Seafloor Shrine, while the menu music changes to a darker tone.
• Excalibur in the Rust: The Regalia Sword, wielded by the Sovran in Vermundian History, is given by Ser Roman to the Arisen in its dull form as a result of Disa's disdain towards tradition leaving it unmaintained. The Arisen is tasked with bringing it to the Ultimate Blacksmith residing in Bakbattahl who can restore the blade to its former glory. Being a ceremonial weapon however, the sword itself cannot be wielded for combat even after being repaired.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: In an attempt to gain more political power, the Queen Regent Disa has a man play the role of the "Arisen", if only so he will keep the Drakken Throne warm until her son is ready to claim it. To help sell the ruse, she even gives the fake Arisen a special amulet that lets him control Pawns. As a result, few believe the real Arisen is who they claim to be, barring those who are aware of Disa's manipulations such as Brant.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • The Beastren of Battahl are not welcoming towards Pawns, seeing them as a source of great misfortune. Given what happens to pawns afflicted by dragonsplague, they've every right to be concerned.
  • Downplayed with Vermund, which has an anti-Beastren sentiment under the surface, though it's rare to find any NPC who shows any hostile prejudice toward them there. However, you can find hate-filled letters in the Slums directed towards them, and those in power are willing to use Beastren as scapegoats. There are also statues of Vermund's beastren founder scattered around the region which have their heads lopped off, whereas the ones found in Battahl have the heads intact.
  • There are elves in the game, and while not easily seen, dwarves do exist within the game's world. And with few exceptions, the relationship between both races is roughly what you'd expect.
• Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Hideaki Itsuno stated the game's world is based on Medieval Mediterranean culture, with Vermund, the human kingdom, being based on the island of Sicily during the Classic/Medieval period, while Battahl is based on Arab Tunisia.
• Fast-Forward Mechanic:
  • Like the first game, staying in an inn will fast forward to later that night or the next morning. The new campfire feature works the same way, with cooking and no need to spend gold.
  • Dozing off on seats with draped red cloths, or passing the time in a bar or tavern, will allow you to fast forward by a few hours instead of a half or full day. Similarly, dozing off during oxcart rides will cause time to pass and have you reach your destination in no time, unless you are ambushed by monsters or bandits.
• Food Porn: Resting at a campsite now gives you the option of cooking meat to give stat bonuses to your party. Choosing to do this results in a live-action close-up of the food being grilled.
• Foreshadowing: Sometimes when you recruit a pawn to your party early on, they'll talk about rumors they've heard of some sort of illness that affects pawns crossing the rift. The illness will initially just make them belligerent but eventually will make them ignore their master altogether. After a certain point in the story, this illness will become a gameplay mechanic where pawns you hire can come infected with The Dragonsplague that makes them ignore your orders. Though that is far from the worst part of The Dragonsplague...
• Gameplay and Story Integration: While many players complain that a significant part of the game, including the battle with the Dragon, seem too easy, the reality is that the player was always meant to win it, as the Pathfinder intends to continue the cycle forever so they can rule the world for all eternity. Once the player has refused to perpetuate the cycle, the gloves come off and enemies that would normally be considered rare minibosses like Gorechimeras and Dullahans become extremely common. In the first half, you lived in a world that was locked into easy mode by default for the sake of the one in charge. In the Unmoored World, the world is fresh out of mercy and will absolutely decimate an unprepared player.
• Guide Dang It!: The riddles of the Sphinx range in difficulty, but some are particularly annoying.
  • One of the Sphinx's first requests is to meet her parent. The solution is you have to recruit an official Capcom pawn named either SphinxFather, SphinxMother or SphinxParent . They can only be recruited from the Riftstone of Fellowship which is relatively nearby. Player pawns named SphinxFather or SphinxMother or SphinxParent do count, but you must be certain the name is written absolutely the same way as official Capcom pawns, and with matching Monikers, too.
  • The most infuriating riddle involves you returning to the location where you found your first Seeker Medal. And the game gives you absolutely zero hints as to where that was, and only gives 7 in-game days to find it.
    • However, it is, by its nature, a relatively easy thing to narrow down, given that unless a player intentionally avoided Seeker Tokens, they'll most likely have found their first one either in Vermund or in the starting areas of the game, which can easily be covered within the seven day timeframe. The only other restriction is travel time, and by this point the player will have been given both a Portcrystal and Ferrystone as rewards for riddles, making it extremely easy to return once the needed item is found.
  • The final trick that the Sphinx plays on you happens after you've completed every riddle. Trying to fight the Sphinx will usually cause her to grow bored of the fight and leave, because the fight itself is also a riddle. The mural found right before the player finds her for the first time has the Riddle of the Sphinx in it, with the added detail that she would offer a reward to one who would leave it "unmarked by sword"; the answer is a man, unharmed by weapons, telling the player they must fight her by only dealing damage to the parts of her that are not a man (i.e. everywhere but her human head and breasts), which can be easier said than done, especially with Pawns. Alternatively, the player can also use an Unmaking Arrow (one which is a reward from one of her riddles, potentially the very last since the second batch is randomized) to kill her instantly, but the issue with this is that you have to wait until her health bar appears to kill her; too early and the arrow will have no effect and too late, and you miss your window. Also, only Archers can actually use the Unmaking Arrow. Your reward for killing the Sphinx is an Eternal Wakestone, which revives multiple NPCs instead of just one (and isn't unlimited as the name might imply). This Wakestone can be very useful if you happen to have a city deal with a rogue pawn suffering from Dragonsplague.
  • The game is very vague about the potentially deadly ramifications of Dragonsplague infection. When you encounter the disease for the first time, you'll get a tutorial about Dragonsplague, warning that it will result in a calamity if left unattended to. Dragonsplague is not listed on the status screens as a debilitation, and the only way to know if a Pawn is infected is to watch for the symptoms, which range from red glowing eyes to refusing to follow orders. There are also only two known ways to cure Dragonsplague: pass it to another Pawn, or forfeit the Pawn. If you rest in an inn while one of your Pawns is infected, you run the risk of said Pawn mutating into a dragon and killing everyone in the surrounding area, potentially including plot-critical NPCs and leaving the game potentially Unwinnable. It is possible to revive dead NPCs with Wakestones, but it takes a lot of time and/or resources to accrue enough to revive a city. You could also get the Eternal Wakestone and use that to revive a city's worth of people in one swoop, but that requires slaying the Sphinx, and It Only Works Once while Dragonsplague can strike again.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: The player can grab any enemy that has been stunned or slain and throw them at another enemy. With a stunned Rattler or Magma Scale, throwing makes it curl up into a wheel and roll towards anyone who you designate as a bowling pin.
• Harping on About Harpies: Harpies make their return in II as one of the Mooks that regularly assail the Arisen's party throughout the adventure. Besides the regular variant, there's also Venin Harpies which are poisonous, Gore Harpies that use brute force to stun you, and Succubi who can freeze with their breaths.
• Helpful Mook: The consumable item Harpysnare Smoke Beacon can be placed outdoors to disperse a scent that attracts and summons a harpy, which the player can hang onto and fly across gaps.
• Hidden Elf Village: The Sacred Arbour is home to the elves, who in comparison to Vermund and Bettahl do not involve themselves with the rest of the world and have no particular views toward Pawns or the Arisen. Unlike most examples, they also aren't hostile to outsiders provided they don't intentionally provoke them.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Invoked by the "An Eye for an Eye" achievement, which asks the player to petrify a Medusa. One of the ways to do this is by beheading a Medusa to obtain her head, storing it to avoid letting it rot, rest for a week and then use the head against the respawned Medusa to petrify her. Another way is to retrieve the Daughter of the Evening shield from the Vermund Castle Vault, and then block Medusa's gaze with it to reflect back at her.
• A Homeowner Is You: Completing specific quests will grant players the opportunity to buy homes in the game's world, granting them the perks of resting at an Inn for free thereafter.
• Horse of a Different Color: Grabbing the griffin before it flies away allows you to hitch a ride on it as it soars across the map and awards you with an achievement for doing so. Later on in the game, The Dragon will let the Arisen ride on its back and fly to their arena should they choose to fight it.
• If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten!: The side quest "A Candle in the Storm" puts you in this position, where the mastermind who hired the Coral Snakes to assassinate Empress Nadinia will order you to kill her yourself to correct the Snakes' mistake and prove that you are with them. Provided that you go with Nadinia's plan instead of putting a decoy in her place beforehand, choosing to attack the mastermind instead will have Ser Menella come to arrest her, but she will off herself before they can get any information about her motives. The correct option (with the best quest reward) is to unsheathe your weapon and attempt to attack Nadinia. The mastermind will stop you right before you could kill her, to explain her Evil Plan to have Nadinia die in front of her people so as to fan the flames of revolution, which prompts Nadinia to call her out on her violent ways and Menella to apprehend her now that they know her intentions.
• Indestructible Edible: Averted with most of the food items— any fruit, harspud or meat you have in your inventory will age over time and become rotten if left unconsumed for too long. The player can invoke this trope like in the first game, except instead of using airtight flasks, they can combine aged food items into dried food and roborent, which stay edible for an indefinite amount of time.
  • While keeping fresh food in the item storage prevents them from aging, they end up rotting away by the time the player wakes up in the Unmoored World due to the Time Skip.
• Interface Screw: Without a pawn that possesses a "Woodland Wordsmith" specialization, all dialogue by the residents in Sacred Arbor will be in unrecognizable Elvish script. Even the usual text for shops and inns in this village will have this format.
• Internal Homage: The Dragon swallows the newly-minted Arisen's heart using his finger, recreating the scene from the beginning of the first game where the Dragon also swallowed the Arisen's heart.
• In-Universe Game Clock: The game once again has a day and night cycle, where various NPCs are only available during certain times of day. Unlike the first game, the player can easily tell what time of day it is in the main menu, and can more quickly pass time at taverns or dozing off on benches without needing to rest at an inn.
• Jack of All Trades: The Warfarer is a new vocation that can use every weapon and can learn different skills from each vocation, at the cost of lower base stats. While using this vocation, all of your other unlocked vocations gain experience as well, regardless if you have their weapon. Although this leads to the pool of discipline points being spread thin, resulting in slower leveling, it also means that the vocations you have yet to start using can level up equally, and allow you to unlock their skills, augments, and abilities without switching.
• Language Barrier: By default, the Arisen cannot understand Elven language and will require a Pawn with the associated skill or other NPCs to translate for them.
• Lighter and Softer: While the violence, high stakes and darker aspects of the original game's story remain, the world is overall prettier and cleaner, the citizens of both Vermund and Battahl are relatively more pleasant, and questlines tend to have more positive outcomes and options. In the game's final act, rather than despairing or casting blame on the Arisen for the world's end, past allies rally to take charge and make things better, and the ending is a clear victory over the powers-that-be.
• Living Statue: Late in the story, the player must face the Gigantus, also called Talos, a massive walking statue who emerges from the sea and attacks Agamen Volcanic Island.
• Lizard Folk: Saurians are a returning enemy in this game, acting as they did in the original; tough and wielding fishing spears as weapons, but becoming weaker if you cut off their tails. The game introduces new relatives to them in the form of Asps, Rattlers, Magma Scales and Serpents.
• Losing Your Head:
  • Hitting the Golem's head hard enough will knock it off its body, rendering its Beam Spam attack near useless for the remainder of the fight. Its now-headless body will still try to smack you around, though.
  • Invoked for the Medusa. During her optional boss fight, attacking its head enough will behead her, killing her instantly and rewarding the player with a Medusa Head item, which allows you to equip it like a lantern. Beheading her while she has near-full health will instead award a "Preserved" Head which lasts significantly longer. You can use these Medusa Heads to instantly turn any target to stone (though you won't receive any item drops). However, the longer it stays in your inventory, the more it loses power until it becomes "decayed", rendering it useless. Using her head will make it decay faster, making it important to use it sparingly.
• Lovecraft Lite: In the True Ending, the true nature of the Dragon's Dogma multiverse is revealed to be a Cosmic Horror Story of sorts. The Pathfinder exposits that the greater will grew tired of seeing worlds consumed by oblivion, and thus gave oblivion the identity and role of the Dragon as part of a cosmic cycle called the Dragon's Dogma. The Dragon chooses an Arisen to oppose it and determine the fate of the world, with the pawns also being manifested from the essence of oblivion to ensure the chosen Arisen sticks to the script. If any of the players deviate from the Cycle, however, the Pathfinder condemns the the world to be destroyed by oblivion in the form of the Brine and multiple Dragons, with any pawns being corrupted by Dragonsplague and transformed into lesser dragons themselves. However, with the help of their main pawn—able to resist the Dragonsplague's corruption by sheer loyalty and strength of will—the Arisen is able to use the Empowered Godsbane Blade to slay the Pathfinder's Dragon form and put an end to the cycle once and for all.
• Luminescent Blush: Similar to the first game, characters with high affinity for you with will have a pink blush on their cheeks when you're near them or talk to them. This includes your Main Pawn.
• Mage Marksman: Magick Archer returns from the previous game, focusing only on their magick bow this time.
• Magic Knight: Replacing the Mystic Knight Prestige Class is the Mystic Spearhand, which uses a Duospear in combination with magic and uses their magic to either stun enemies or close in on them.
• Magikarp Power: Mystic Spearhand at first is a bit clunky. It is a melee focused class with no baked in defensive ability. It can't block like Fighter, dodge like Thief, and doesn't have the parry or stagger resistance of Warrior. At first, you need to pay attention to your surroundings as if you find yourself in an awkward position, there will be little you can do to protect yourself. Your only measure of protecting yourself is the charged version of your magic bolts which will stun a small enemy and slow a larger one. However, as the class unlocks multiple options, it gains a ton of flexibility. The stun bolt can be upgraded to spread to nearby enemies, you quickly unlock a spell which creates little bolts to do damage at range, a jump attack that serves as sort of a parry (the upgraded version doing extra damage when used to avoid an attack), a spell that lets you telekinetically throw small objects and enemies at other enemies, and ultimately a shield spell that freely protects you for a short period of time. With all of this, the class gains a great amount of flexibility to fit most situations.
• Masquerade Ball: One of the optional main quests has you sneak into a masquerade ball, wearing a Courtly outfit and a Masquerade Mask to investigate and find out the identity of the False Arisen, as well as Queen Regent Disa's intentions with him.
• Maximum HP Reduction: Dragon's Dogma II introduces the loss gauge mechanic, which lowers the Arisen's and the Pawns' maximum health by a portion of damage they receive from enemy attacks and Fall Damage. The gauge will only reset if the player rests at an inn, their house or a campfire.
  • It can also be reset through use of Wakestones and Allheal Elixirs, which become crucial to hold onto in the post-game where resting becomes limited due to the Brine destroying portions of the world.
• Mechanically Unusual Class:
  • The Trickster has little to no direct offensive capabilities and instead makes use of their magical censer to create illusions to trick enemies, such as a decoy to draw aggro or fake surfaces and walls. The default attack by itself does negligible damage and is instead used to Draw Aggro. They can combine these to bait enemies into plummeting off of cliffs in an attempt to attack a decoy. They can also cast powerful buffs on their pawns, letting them dole out heavy damage while enemies are distracted by their illusions, as well as use an astral projection to get the lay of the land and remotely cast some illusions.
  • The Warfarer is capable of using every weapon in the game, as well as swapping between weapons on the fly for otherwise impossible combination abilities, such as using a Mage's ice spell to both strike an opponent and create footing from which to launch an aerial attack after switching to a Warrior's greatsword. However, the Warfarer's base stats are significantly reduced in comparison to other classes, meaning care is needed for which weapon is paired with what for the occasion. In addition, Warfarers run on Magikarp Power in that they only have access to abilities learned from other vocations, so a vocation that is seldom-used and low-rank will offer little to the Warfarer; but taking the time and effort to rank up your other vocations will give you a great deal of versatility.
• Medusa: One of the many new enemies introduced in this game. It has scaly skin and hair made out of black snakes with glowing red eyes. You get a front-row seat of what it can do in the gaol when it turns a group of Pawns and guards into stone, before you take it on as part of the tutorial. Much later in the game, she can be fought again as an Optional Boss. Beheading a Medusa will award you with her severed head, which can be equipped like a lantern to unleash its petrification power on a target until it runs out of power.
• Mind Over Matter: The Mystic Spearhand's weapon skill, Humble/Devout Offringe allows them to telekinetically lift and hurl objects at enemies, including enemies who have been stunned or slain. Another skill Unto Skie/Heven can also levitate enemies, except it is followed up by a powerful swing that sends them flying towards the sky, at the cost of not receiving experience for defeating them this way.
• Multiple Endings: There are 4 endings in total: the Bad Endings, the False Good Ending and the True Ending.
  • The first Bad Ending is triggered when you choose to flee from the Dragon and sacrifice your beloved to the dragon in exchange for the throne of Vernworth.
  • The False Good Ending is triggered when you elect to fight the Dragon and do not stab yourself with the Godsbane Blade. After slaying the Dragon, you are taken to the throne room of Vernworth where you can sit on the throne or talk to the Pathfinder to send you back in time to when you are on the back of the Dragon. Electing to sit on the throne and letting the credits roll will end the game and reloading your save will take you back to this point.
  • Dying at any point and choosing not to revive in the Unmoored World results in another Bad Ending where the Arisen wakes up in the same shack where they met the Rivage Elder, and walks out to see a ruined world before them.
  • The path for the True Ending is set when you choose to stab yourself with the Godsbane Blade while on the back of the Dragon in an effort to reject the cycle, sending you both plummeting into the Brine and sending you into the Unmoored World. Persevering through the myriad trials of the Unmoored World and evacuating all the cities and settlements will cause the Pathfinder to take matters into his own hands, transforming into a new, bigger Dragon to destroy the world. The Arisen scales his back before reaching the heart, where they plunge the Godsbane Blade into them and free the world from the cycle at the cost of their life.
• Mysterious Stranger: Every now and again, the Arisen encounters a strange hooded figure called the Pathfinder. Nothing is known about them at first, save that they cannot be seen by other individuals and can influence pawns. As it happens, they are actually the game's Big Bad.
• New Game Plus: Once the player completes the main questline, an option appears in the main menu to let start a new playthrough with their levels, equipment and items (barring quest items) carried over, as well as new weapons and armor becoming available at shops and the Dragonforged, along with special buffs offered by the latter for the cost of Wyrmslife Crystals. Trying to start a new game+ right after slaying the Dragon but before breaking the cycle will have the game ask the player four times if they really want to do it, to incentivize the player to explore the Unmoored World and achieve the Golden Ending.
• Non-Indicative Name: Despite what its name may indicate (especially for veterans of the first game who may be used to the Eternal Ferrystone), the Eternal Wakestone is a single-use item and not eternal in the slightest.
• Non-Standard Game Over:
  • Choosing to flee and sacrifice your beloved to the Dragon instead of fighting it results in the Arisen being crowned as the new Sovran of Vernsworth, though not without showing sorrow as the camera zooms out before the doors close, as a reference to the first game's Downer Ending.
  • Die in the Unmoored World, and instead of showing the game over screen right away, a cutscene will play where the Arisen wakes up in the same hut where they met the Rivage Elder, who is heavily implied by this point to have already gone mad from learning the truth behind the world. Presumably, the Arisen in this cutscene has ended up taking his place as a madman, judging from them wearing the same clothes as him.
• Our Dragons Are Different:
  • The titular Dragon is much akin to Grigori from the first Dragon's Dogma, being an enormous, six-limbed red-scaled wyrm who brings calamity to the world and is responsible for creating the Arisen. Unlike Grigori, this game's Dragon goes unnamed.
  • Drakes return as some of the tougher boss monsters in the overworld, though Wyrms and Wyverns are absent. They are more of a Composite Character of the three rather than being solely based on the original Drake, as while they breathe fire, they are also keen to going into the air and have gained very potent spellcasting, especially when at low health. They are also the origin of the dragonsplague, and may infect Pawns with it if they are caught by their possession attack. Like in the first game, there is a connection between them and the Arisen, where they refer to the player as their "silent-hearted kin", though the exact nature of it is left ambiguous.
  • This game introduces a new type of draconic boss called the Lesser Dragon, who resembles a sickened Drake covered in pustules and buboes who, on top of breathing fire, also vomits out out a poisonous liquid from its mouth. Rather than a heart, the player must instead attack said pustules until they burst in order to weaken the monster. It is first seen attacking Melve, and Sigurd's mission is to hunt it down and slay it. While the Lesser Dragon can only be fought and slain once before the Disc-One Final Boss, more of them can be found as overworld bosses in the Unmoored World. And on New Game Plus onwards, the Lesser Dragon will regularly respawn at Dragonsbreath Tower.
  • Once the player reaches the Unmoored World, they must fight dragons created out of the Brine to stop the end of the world from progressing. These dragons, called Purgeners, come in two forms; a conventional six-limbed dragon with an enormous nasal horn, and a massive serpent, one of which is so large that it can only be killed in a Behemoth Battle with the Gigantus.
• Our Elves Are Different: Elves as a separate species from humans make their appearance in this game. They live in a secluded grove called the Sacred Arbor, where they congregate around a giant tree called the Arborheart. They speak in an unique language which cannot be understood (and even affects store menus for their vendors) unless the player is accompanied by a Pawn with the Woodland Wordsmith specialization.
• Our Goblins Are Different: Goblins and Hobgoblins return as common enemies in this game, generally behaving as they did in the original Dragon's Dogma. They are now accompanied by new relatives; Choppers are Goblins who camouflage in heavy green foliage to ambush the player, while Knackers are a stronger form of Hobgoblin who are prolific in Battahl.
• Our Gryphons Are Different: Griffins return as boss monsters in this game. Like in the original, their wings generate lightning and they can be knocked out of the air by setting them on fire. They are much more prolific in this game than they were in the original Dragon's Dogma and will regularly ambush the player from the skies. They particularly like attacking areas populated by oxen, and if left alone, they sometimes can be seen catching an ox and flying off with them. However, their Underground Monkey counterpart, the Cockatrice, is noticeably missing from this game.
• Our Minotaurs Are Different: Minotaurs are one of the new types of boss enemies. Unlike the Eliminators from the previous game, who were undead dressed to invoke the imagery of minotaurs, these are the real deal. They use axes and can be found as overworld encounters. Particularly, these Minotaurs resemble humanoid oxen as opposed to simply bulls, making them closer to the various oxen who inhabit the world. Once the player reaches Battahl, they can also encounter stronger counterparts called Goreminotaurs.
• Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Ogres are a returning enemy from the original game, retaining the mechanic of focusing on female enemies. They are much more prolific in the overworld than in the first Dragon's Dogma, and can notably be found even during daytime, where in the original game they were only found at night or in caves. A stronger counterpart called the Grim Ogre can be found in Battahl, having huge shaggy hair and essentially serving as an equivalent to the Elder Ogres from Dark Arisen.
• Our Sphinxes Are Different: One of the new bosses is the Sphinx, completely redesigned in comparison to her appearance in Dragon's Dogma Online. She is an Optional Boss hidden in the game's open world that requires the player to actively search around to find her. She gives out riddles to be solved, rewarding the player with items on success but will leave forever if they fail. Her attacks include shooting magical projectiles from her wings. Unlike the majority of the game's monsters, she is an Unique Enemy and will not respawn if slain.
• Out-of-Character Alert: Pawns are known for their Undying Loyalty to the Arisen. If they become arrogant, disobedient, or just rude, especially after fighting a dragon or drake, it's a sign that they are infected with Dragonsplague.
• Panacea: The curative item Panacea can clear all negative status effects on the player or their pawn in addition to restoring a large amount of health and stamina. Its stronger counterpart, the Allheal Elixir, completely restores its user's health and stamina, and removes their loss gauge.
• Permanently Missable Content: There are unique side quests in the game that the player will be locked out of alongside their rewards if they progress far enough into the main story or if they fail certain quests and any incomplete quests in the journal will automatically be failed upon entering the post-game. Thankfully the game at least encourages the player to finish the side quests before continuing the main questline.
  • You will have only one chance for each riddle the Sphinx gives you during her quest. Successfully solving it will grant a reward but she will leave the game if you fail even one of them, locking out any remaining rewards until the player either reloads an earlier save or start a new game all over. After solving all riddles, the player must then attack the Sphinx before she leaves in order to initiate a boss fight against her, and must slay her without hitting her front half too much, lest she gets upset and leaves, locking them out of the once-per-playthrough Eternal Wakestone which is needed for an achievement.
• Premium Currency: Wyrmlife Crystals, which are crystalized blood obtained only from draconic creatures, are used as currency at the Dragonforged to upgrade fully enhanced gear, purchase special items and, later on, exceptionally powerful weapons and armor that cannot be bought elsewhere. On New Game Plus, the Dragonforged will also offer special buffs such as halving the stamina cost of one equipped skill and increasing experience/discipline gain for a day.
• Point of No Return: Once the Arisen activates the elevator at Moonglint Tower, they cannot go back to the Excavation Site where they entered from.
• Random Encounters: Monster attacks can occur at any time in select cities. For instance, you could find a group of wolves, a cyclops, or even a drake wreaking havoc in Vermund. They can also happen by chance if the player rides an ox cart and chooses to doze off, interrupting them mid-journey.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning:
  • Pawns afflicted with dragonsplague gain glowing red eyes. On the one hand, they're stronger than your average pawn, but on the other hand, they are a walking time bomb waiting to go off.
  • Some enemy variants, such as Grim Ogres and Goreminotaurs, have red eyes to denote their strength from their weaker brethren.
• Red Sky, Take Warning: In the path of the true ending, choosing to use the Godsbane Blade on yourself rather than the Dragon and defying the Pathfinder's will leads to the latter deciding to wipe the slate clean and use the Brine to destroy the world, infesting it with monsters and dragons. As a consequence of this, the skies turn red for the remainder of the game.
• Relationship Values: The affinity system returns with changes made to it such that NPCs with whom you have high affinity will occasionally leave behind gifts at your homes. And as with the first game, it also determines who the Dragon kidnaps at the end of the main questline. However, your main Pawn now has an affinity value that you can increase through different actions such as talking with them, giving them a high-five after a fight or giving them a new haircut. High affinity changes the Pawn's gestures, has them give heartfelt comments to the Arisen and even say a special dialogue to the Arisen during the True Final Boss fight.
• Savage Wolves:
  • Wolves return as common enemies, hunting in packs as usual, though Pawns don't really note on that part anymore. Battahl has stronger relatives called Redwolves, who are a tad bigger than regular wolves.
  • Both Garms and Wargs return from Dark Arisen, albeit with significant adjustments. Garms have lost their petrifying breath but can now chomp down and maul the player on the spot, and Wargs are changed from being a poisonous version of wolves to an alternate to the Garm.
• Shop Fodder: The Onyx, Jasper and Tiger's Eye are uncommon valuable drops that serve no other purpose (save as ingredients for upgrading certain equipment) than to be sold to merchants for gold. Selling them in Vermund, Battahl and Sacred Arbor respectively increases the selling price for that item, hence encouraging the player to hoard them for a while until they reach those settlements.
• Shout-Out:
  • There's an achievement/trophy named "Off with Its Head!" in reference to the Queen of Hearts' catchphrase from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
  • A character you can talk to in Bak'battahl will complain about Pawns, describing them as "nomads, vagabonds, call them what you will." A reference to the Metallica song Wherever I May Roam.
• Solo Sequence: A handful of areas require the Arisen to go it alone without their pawns. The castle and royal grounds of Vernworth, for instance, forbids entry to pawns. Later on, your pawns will decline to follow you there because the fake Sovran has a means by which to usurp control over pawns.
• Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: While Pawns are a Servant Race to begin with, they are treated more as a Slave Race in Battahl where most people there look down upon them and some, such as Fiska at the beginning of the game, use them for manual labour. On the contrary, the nation of Vermund considers trafficking Pawns a crime, and the Arisen is given a side quest to investigate a ghostly oxcart that is seen smuggling them between the two nations at night.
• The Stinger: The cutscene after the True Ending credits shows the Rivage Elder sailing out into the sea on a boat, looking optimistic now that the Brine is gone along with the Cycle...
• Suicidal "Gotcha!": As the Arisen and Rook escape from the gaol guards near the beginning of the game, they end up jumping off a cliff towards the ocean, only to reappear latched onto a Griffin that then carries them all the way to north Vermund where it gets shot by a ballista.
• Super Drowning Skills: Like in the previous game, the Brine menaces the waters of the game's world: anyone that wanders too far into any body of water is instantly claimed by the Brine and dragged down to a watery grave. The player character, at least, will respawn on dry land with only a modest loss of HP. Conversely, Pawns that are drowned by the Brine are forfeit, and monsters and NPCs are similarly killed instantly.
• Super Smoke: The Trickster Vocation makes use of smoke from a magical Censer to debilitate enemies (such as tricking them into attacking each other) or to buff their Pawns.
• Sword of Plot Advancement: The Godsbane Blade, given to the Arisen by Rothais at the Seafloor Shrine, is used to stab themselves while climbing near the Dragon's heart during the flight in order to defy the Pathfinder's script and gives access to the Unmoored World. It is then used again during the True Ending, when the Arisen stabs the transformed Pathfinder with it as a finishing blow to break the cycle once and for all.
• There Can Be Only One: The main story has you chosen as the next Arisen by the Dragon after it takes your heart, and that Arisen is the only one who can slay the Dragon. The problem is that there is a pretender due to the machinations of Queen Regent Disa. Before your arrival, there have been reports of other "pretenders" executed. That said, it may also refer that only one active exists in a given world. Throughout your journey, you will find other people with scars on their chests. Some claim to have more or less failed in defeating the Dragon, causing another person to be chosen.
• Timed Mission:
  • Some quests are time-sensitive, marked by an hourglass in the list. If you take too long, there is a good chance you will see a potentially grim outcome, if not fail a quest.
  • The endgame freezes the day/night cycle, but it has a soft time limit of approximately 7 rests at an inn or campfire, which can be extended by defeating specific bosses at regions indicated by columns of light. Afterwards, it will become impossible to rest or pass time, so your ability to restore vitality and respawn monsters for more experience will be similarly stymied.
• Title Drop:
  • The late-game Fighter sword, Dragon's Dogma, returns as one of the powerful weapons you can get from the Dragonforged in the post game. There's even an achievement tied to obtaining it for the first time.
  • Both the Dragon and the Pathfinder drop the title during their respective confrontations at the end of the game.
• Too Awesome to Use: The Unmaking Arrow is this game's equivalent of the first game's Maker's Finger; having the similar function of killing the target in one hit, including dragons. It has a similar drawback as well; the moment you fire it, the game will immediately create a save so that it will be gone the next time you attempt to reload (regardless of whether the arrow hit or missed). The game nudges you into using one of these on the Sphinx. You are rewarded with an Unmaking Arrow from one of her riddles, but there will be one chest left behind that you cannot open when you clear all of them, as the Sphinx will shortly fly away, leaving the game forever. The player is encouraged to either fire the Unmaking Arrow at her or attack her before she leaves, the latter which instigates a boss battle with her. Upon death, she will drop the key to the last chest, which contains the Eternal Wakestone, that can only be obtained once per playthrough.
• Under the Sea: A rare downplayed example where the player can explore the bottom parts of the rivers and ocean where there is no water, as a side effect of the Pathfinder commanding the Brine to rise up from the water and destroy the world in the post-game.
• Underwater Ruins: The Seafloor Shrine is a submerged ruin that can only be accessed once by going through a dungeon beyond Stormwind Cave near Harve Village and taking a one-way elevator leading to it after the "Flickering Shadows" quest. It doesn't hold enemies or anything of interest aside from a little bit of loot, but it becomes an important location after the player enters the Unmoored World, where the absence of water makes the rest of the Shrine accessible and turns it into a final Hub Level where the remaining NPCs can take shelter at if the player chooses to evacuate the cities first.
• Uneven Hybrid: Human-Beastren relationships are frowned upon by the people of Vermund because any child of such a union is invariably born a Beastren themselves, and they fear this will eventually lead to a demographic crisis or a takeover by the predominantly Beastren nation of Battahl. One character mentions that it's theoretically possible for it to result in a human child as well, but that it must be impossibly rare and he's personally never seen it happen. In Wilhelmina's side quests, it's eventually revealed that her mother was a Beastren, and she looks like an ordinary human aside from her left eye having a slit pupil, which she keeps hidden beneath her hair.
• Unique Enemy:
  • Downplayed with the Medusa, as while there is only a single one in the entire world map, she respawns like other boss monsters after several days.
  • Played straight with the Sphinx, if you pick a fight with her. She is a completely unique boss fight that can only be done once per playthrough.
  • The Purgeners in Unmoored World, when the Arisen interacts with the red beams of light near Vernsworth and Sacred Arbor. They are Brine-like draconic and serpentine monsters respectively, spawned from holes in the red sky that the Arisen must defeat to prevent the destruction of said cities, and each can only be fought at least once.
• Useless Useful Spell: The Trickster has Scented Alarum and its upgraded version, Fragrant Alarum. This skill allows the player to sense enemies through walls at the cost of stamina. This is very rarely useful, as while a few enemies do ambush the player, most are only encountered in the early game and the Trickster vocation is unlocked in a midgame area, so by the time you have this skill none of the enemies that this might be useful against will be much of a threat anyway. On top of that the Trickster already has the Suffocating Shroud skill, an area-of-effect aggro-drawing ability that causes health bars to show up over the heads of any enemies hit with it while also being useful in combat for keeping the enemies' attention on you instead of your allies.
• Vicious Cycle: While this is present in the first game, II ups it significantly by virtue of the Pathfinder being a massive Control Freak obsessed with the idea of a "never-ending story". The Dragon, a participant and integral factor in the cycle's upkeep, is disgusted with the Pathfinder and believes he's prolonging the cycle far longer than needed and subtly hints at the Arisen as to how they might break free from the cycle. Unfortunately, choosing to try and subvert this trope leads to the Pathfinder kickstarting The End of the World as We Know It.
• Video Game Caring Potential: The game not only lets you raise your affinities with NPCs, but also your own Main Pawn. While you cannot give them gifts normally, you can raise your Relationship Values with them by talking to them every now and then, high-fiving them after every successful battle, taking them to the barbershop or bathing together in the hot springs. Inversely, letting them die and return to the Rift every time reduces their affinity, so the player is encouraged to keep them from falling in combat, or at least reviving them when they do. When the player reaches a high enough affinity with the Pawn, they will blush and comment on the bonds they share with them. And the cutscene at the end of the boss fight against the Pathfinder will play out differently.
  • One of the Sphinx's riddles requires you to present to her "your most beloved" person. While this hints you towards bringing to her an NPC with whom you have high affinity, choosing your Main Pawn as an answer is also a valid choice, and this will complete the riddle and raise your Pawn's affinity.
• Video Game Stealing: The Thief vocation has Pilfer, and its upgrade Plunder, that allows them to steal items from enemies and other characters.
• The Virus: The Dragonsplague, a contagious disease-like condition that infects pawns as they travel between worlds. Afflicted pawns are noted to gain greater performance but become bossy and assertive, and according to folklore, when the symptoms reach a terminal stage, it will result in devastating calamity. Said calamity causes the afflicted pawn to kill everyone in the nearby vicinity before being forcibly returned to beyond the Rift; that is, if left unchecked.
• Warp Whistle:
  • Ferrystones make a return from the first game, requiring each to instantly travel to an active Portcrystal (either one fixed in a city/town or one you can set yourself as a quest reward).
  • Oxcarts are the newest form of fast travel, but the process is very downplayed. They are no faster than your own two feet; in fact, they are even slower than that. However, you can simply doze off and you'll soon wake up to your destination with time passed. There are only three caveats to keep in mind. First, each cart has a fixed route to and from major cities or towns (mainly Melve, Vernworth, the Checkpoint Rest Town, and Bakbattahl). Second, you can only either ride from the starting point early in the morning (they'll refuse late into the night), or meet a traveling cart along your route. The third and most important one is that enemies are likely to ambush you at any time and, should they destroy the cart, you'll be forced to traverse the rest of the way on foot.
• Weak, but Skilled: The Warfarer vocation's MO. It allows you to swap between 2-3 weapons. Naturally, this gives you a LOT of flexibility in terms of skill loadout. The tradeoff is that your base stats are lower than any other dedicated vocation, so your raw damage will be reduced. Also, if you add the Rearmament master skill, you'll be limited to 3 other skills, those only usable when you have the corresponding weapon equipped.
• Wham Episode: The endgame in spades. The Unmoored World occurs as a result of the Arisen defying the Pathfinder, who is none too happy that his "chosen" is going against "the script" and decides to wipe the slate clean, ordering the Brine to spawn monsters and destroy the world. As a result, all bodies of water dry up, creating new areas to explore...including the ruins of what looks to be Gran Soren, implying that the events of the first game transpired in this world as well, only it did not fare nearly as well...
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The True Ending credits shows various characters going about their day in the post-Unmoored World, if the player has completed their side quests. Otherwise, a landscape of one of the game's locations will be shown instead by default.