Dragon's Dogma 2: The Best Mechanics You Didn't Know About

This article is part of a directory: Dragon's Dogma 2 Guide Hub - Quests, Vocations, Pawns, Equipment, & More

Table of contents

Highlights

Make the most of hidden mechanics in Dragon's Dogma 2, like climbing up fallen bridges or playing 'Pigball' with your Pawns.
Some Vocations have platforming tools like Concussive Leap, Thief Vocation being a prime example, making traversal easier and more fun.
EXP trick: Less Pawns in your party means more EXP gained for your Arisen and Main Pawn, allowing for faster leveling up.

While Dragon's Dogma 2 might, at first, seem like a game that's only about the combat, there's a lot more to it than it might seem. This game has a lot of hidden mechanics in it, or at the very least mechanics that players don't figure out on their own (though many are explained in the Tutorials menu).

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Some of these mechanics were in both Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen and Dragon's Dogma 2, and some of them are entirely brand new. So, to make sure everyone knows as much about the game as possible, let's go over some of those hidden mechanics now.

Climbing, Destroying, & Creating Your Own Bridges

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Making A Bridge Collapse

There's actually a lot of tech in Dragon's Dogma 2 centered around bridges, oddly enough, examples include:

The Arisen and their Pawns can actually climb up bridges that have been broken and have fallen to one side as if it were a ladder.
Certain Spells (and arrows especially) can knock down bridges from a far distance to create an easy way up via climbing said bridge.
Certain large enemies, Cyclops especially, will become their own 'bridges' when they're knocked off a ledge with another ledge within reach on the other side. Players can use this to cross gaps that would otherwise be inaccessible.
Certain smaller bridges absolutely have a weight limit that larger enemies (AKA any enemy the Arisen can climb) cause the bridge to immediately snap.

Of course, the extremely large bridges or the ones made out of stone aren't applicable for this tech, but just about every other bridge is fair game.

7 You Can Play Catch With Your Pawns

It's Called Pigball or Toss the Pig Depending on Who You Ask

This next mechanic is one that was originally discovered in the first release of Dragon's Dogma and has now returned in Dragon's Dogma 2. It involves a little self-titled game called 'Pigball' in which the Arisen picks up a nearby pig (alive) and tosses them to any of their Pawns.

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Instead of the Pawn getting hit by the pig or simply catching it and putting it down, players can actually get the Pawns to catch the pig and throw it back. They even have unique voice lines about how much fun throwing the pig around is. It can be pretty finicky to get this to work, but it's an incredibly neat little system nonetheless.

6 Some Vocations Have A Ton Of Platforming Tools

In Particular, Concussive Leap is Amazing

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Crossing A Gap Using Mystic Spearhand

Now for the next mechanic on here, it's not entirely confirmed if this was intentional or not, but certain Vocations in DD2 can use their Skills to make traversal a lot easier, the Thief Vocation being the primary example. With Concussive Leap (or even Concussive Step) Thief players can get across gaps that would normally only be accessible to either Mages, Sorcerers, or a dedicated player holding on to a Harpy.

Combine that with Helm Splitter, another Thief skill that adds a bit more height to the Thief's jump, and platforming with this Vocation is not only a ton of fun but a test of skill as well. Some other great platforming examples include Levitate from both the Mage and Sorcerer or the Dragoun's Stabbe from Mystic Spearhand.

5 The Dreaded Dragonsplague Mechanic

You Probably Know About It But Not About The Intricacies of It

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Dragonsplague Tutorial

At this point, anyone playing Dragon's Dogma 2 who browses social media at all probably knows about Dragonsplague, so it's not the most 'hidden' mechanic anymore. However, as far as the details of Dragonsplague go, those are a bit less well-known. For one, players can easily tell if their Pawn or a hired Pawn has contracted Dragonsplague in a couple of ways:

If the Pawn has bright red eyes at any point (even if they flash red)
The Pawn shows an attitude towards the Arisen or straight up doesn't listen to commands.
The Pawn holds its head every now and then like it has a bad headache

On top of this, players are also being overly paranoid about this mechanic because it can potentially wipe out a whole town of NPCs if left alone. However, if players wait a week in-game after a town is wiped out by this 'disease' then most of the NPCs actually come back to life. Granted, it doesn't seem to be all of the NPCs, mostly just the merchants, so make sure to use Waking Stones on the remaining dead NPCs that still have Quests to give.

4 Vocation Statistical Advantages

Stats Can Be Influenced By Vocations Before You Ever Level Up

As for the next mechanic, just know ahead of time that this one has a very small impact on the game overall. However, it is worth knowing that the player's choice of starting Vocation has a small effect on their starting stats such as with carrying capacity (the Fighter gives the biggest bonus to this).

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Additionally, it's worth knowing that, when switching Vocations, certain stats get a percentage buff to them and others get a debuff based on the Vocation in question. This change is not permanent but seems to be a way to sort of 'orient' the player's build towards an optimal setup for that Vocation without actually permanently changing any stats.

3 Using Forgeries In General

For Meister Questlines Or For A Free Permenant 'Get Out of Jail' Tool

Dragon's Dogma 2 - Checkpoint Town Scrap Store

The Meister Questline for both the Mage and Sorcerer requires getting certain Grimoires and handing them over to two different NPCs. And, unfortunately, there is some overlap between the books these two NPCs want.

Of course, players can get multiple copies of each book by searching diligently, but it's much easier to just create copies of all of the books that overlap using the Scrap Shop in the Checkpoint Town (though they do notice the forgeries, it still counts towards the quest). These forgeries are also helpful for a couple of other questlines in the game with the primary example being the Jade Orb, but the lesser-known ones that make a huge difference are the forgery of the Gaol Key that Brant gives the player or making forgeries of the Newt Liqueur to give to Lamond for the Warfarer Vocation.

2 EXP Differences In A Full Party

Less Pawns = More EXP

This is another trick that is a holdover from the first game, so the people who played the original Dragon's Dogma likely started using this trick from the beginning. Essentially, the more Pawns a player has in the party, the less EXP their Arisen and Main Pawn are getting.

The EXP is spread across everyone in this game, meaning that if players just keep their party to the Arisen and Main Pawn (or even just the Arisen) they'll notice that they're gaining levels at a faster rate. And, as a bit of an extra tip for those who have unlocked Warfarer, this Vocation also levels up all the other Vocations alongside it, meaning having less Pawns in the party is even more of a benefit.

1 Knocking A Griffin To The Ground While Riding On Top Of It

You Don't Always Have To Get Taken Back To Its Nest

At this point, it's very likely that most people who are playing Dragon's Dogma 2 know about the fact that they can ride on a Griffin's back when it flies away and use the Griffin as a temporary flying machine.

However, most of the time the Griffin takes the player back to their nest or settles down in a really dangerous area. To avoid this and also get some free damage on the Griffin, go to town on it while it's flying back to its nest. Use the strongest Skills, stab it in the head, or use any other trick to completely knock the Griffin out of the sky and back onto the ground, and as long as the player was holding on while it fell then they'll survive the fall easily as well. This can also apply to Drakes as well, it's just a bit more difficult and a bit less common.