Topic: Dragons Dogma 2

@ApostateMage haha these moments are the best. This is the location I had wandered off to while getting side tracked from everything else. I went in a sorcerer (I think) and came back as a Magick Archer, then switched to thief at Bakbhattal after i'd levelled up to about MA lv5.

This is when the adventure got really interesting. I kind of processed what had actually happened earlier, and the fighter, Nessi, is definitely who had the plague, Nyterica must have caught it at camp, but then accidentally brined herself. As since bringing her back to my world nothing has happened to anyone and no one has showed symptoms.

We then, as a new double-thief super team set off for adventure. At this point there was no reason to collect Wymsblood.for the main quest as I already had 50+ in my inventory just from exploring and killing sh** lol, but I wanted to follow the quest properly, so got the location of the lesser dragon and set off to see what we could achieve 😁

I showed Nysterica some of my trused thief moves

And eventually we got to the right area, via a little sky lift and some more trecking. On the way I thought we were heading to a Medusa, and that was the plan when we saw all the statues, but we got turned around in combat and ended up going all the way up to the dragon first.

Fought through everything there, and said hello to the lesser dragon...

Barely a scratch on any of us, damn tutorial dragon lol.

But then right after Nessi decided to jump off the tower and I couldn't be bothered trying to go and revive her at this point, as it was down some dusty mountainside and I didn't want to get us all killed the same way. So whatever.

Then I thought, "who needs a third, Me, Roth and Nysterica can take on any foe" and decided to go and find the Medusa...

Easy work, once again. Circling around and mounting a few times. Off with its head! We three are unstoppable 🫢

I was going to end the session sending Nysterica back to tell you of aught she'd learned before re-hiring her, but then I didn't know how many more levels higher she'd be if I did that as I'm still a bit behind where you were level wise at that point anyway 😅 so I switched TR back to power sorcerer and rested at an Inn for the reset, not fully decided on the next plan of action.

Dual Thief is definitely interesting, and having Roth back as a sorcerer for big damage and hiring a healer is one thought, meaning no front line fighters, other than me making my thief very aggressive. It might be a bit annoying vs swarms, but fun vs large foes.

Such a fun game 😁😁

@Ryu_Niiyama yeah. I just played some of dark arisen a week before this came out just to see if it is a style of game I'd like. And it very much was. Even in that short time with DDDA I'm recognising some of the elements though, so it must be cool on a nostalgic level for people.

In terms of the system. I just mean I'm not going to analyse that they are in fact systems, and just be immersed and hope that things I do have consequences, and that there is a logic always running somewhere keeping track of my actions, rather than plan any based on prior knowledge to how the game works.

This is why I draw comparisons to KCD. They are completely different, but that game uses real world logic more than "game logic", and that catches out people playing a game and expecting guidelines or safety nets for their actions, when no there isn't. And this feels like a fantasy version of a similar mindset to game design. Want to do a quest? You better listen to what the person said, and then think about it, rather than just mindlessly follow stuff mapped out for you, because it won't be 😁

It is also why I don't consider their being "best scenarios" they are just the canonocal scenarios to my game experience and I'm not going to look up how to get a certain outcome as that spoils it. The time I looked up how some quest worked early to get a grasp of how the game functions I regretted it anyway because someone thought that the most gold reward for a quest was the best outcome, when really the best outcome is the one that satisfies your own RP, and doesn't involve being a d*** to the nice person, but being a d*** to the nasty person, even if you get caught for it and don't get as big a reward lol. And it's a game where it is quite on the nose with who is the good and bad person in little side quests based on their voice alone 😆

Later on I got to do something similar but more naturally, as some guy wanted me to do something, but he was clearly the ar****** so I went along with it and just waited for a chance for that to factor in to any decision later on, and it did, so I turned on him and was right to do so lol.

As for the sculpture thing, I know I've got a sketchy outcome as I wanted to do it before getting the thing the NPC's hint at to tackle it, as I wanted to discover that enemy naturally myself rather than scout for it for one small quest. But during the Griffin fight I told my pawns to hang back a bit, as i didnt want to go in and melt the thing instantly, but the Griffin kind of wandered out of the nest and then flew away for no reason before I could even land a good few attacks, and the artist was like "oh, I suppose that will have to do" 😂😂 but I'm actually looking forward to seeing what crap he comes up with "from memory" as that is part of the fun 😁😁

Tip: Never start a fight when halfway across a ravine bride. I thought my pawns had got to safety after a classic Nathan Drake sequence but when I awoke from the Brine, I was alone. It was actually quite a peaceful trek back to Battahl without pawns, until a cyclops blocked my path. He was easy work to solo though as a Magic Archer. Really enjoying this role at the min.

NG+ is so good. I got Portcrystals at all the major locations and Ferrystones seem to be for sale more or I just know where to buy with more money to burn.

Warfarer = I'm now carrying around the Medusa Spellbow, some Daggers, some magic Daggers, and either an archistaff/sword and shield depending on mood. Or I will be when I next play the game, I haven't even tried the Bow out yet as it is made of incredibly HEAVY METAL. But I think I can handle my load-out okay.

The fact I can stay as an all out thief, but supplement it with some other situational stuff is really cool as I enjoyed being an archer for a while, but it wasn't action packed enough to stick with for long, and swapping vocations does get a bit tedious by hour whatever 😁😁😁

@ApostateMage the touch of your hand says you'll catch me whenever I fall 😅

Honestly, misjudging how far I can float or jump/drop has ended my journey more than actual fighting has haha 😵 so this type of teamwork could come in handy. Maybe that's why my hired pawns sometimes end themselves via cliff or ravine after a fight too, learned behaviour :0

I love that. If ever I'm about to try a jump from a height, I always tell my pawns to wait at the bottom so they'll catch me if I don't make it. Loyal buggers.

@ApostateMage when Nysterica gets back to you next time you might have a few new bits of knowledge, I feel like last night I fought endless waves of massive monsters and found a bunch of seekers tokens too.

Did you do the full sphinx quest btw? When I finished it I just felt like I'm so OP now that I'm going to have to hobble my own team. I might legitimately have to cut one pawn and only have parties of 3, or I'm tempted to hire people's under level 10 pawns and send them back shook from the experience 😅

Anyone here who has lower level pawns, feel free to share, we might have aught to show them.

@Ravix Yeah, I'm the same mate. I remember whenever I saw a drake I'd swerve it and find a different route but now I'm like, 'let's get this over with then.'

I've only done the first set of Sphinx riddles. I'm still looking for where she roosted to next.

I have had Nysterica back from you before and she was saying stuff about battling foes she hadn't encountered before and that she was most impressed by the power of the Sorcerer in their midst. 😄

@ApostateMage ah, yes! His legend grows haha. I wonder if Pawns can develop deeper friendships through combined experiences 🤔

I have been hearing more unique dialogue with Pawns starting to talk amongst themselves lately where Mr. Roth explains how as a mage he might have disappointed but now as a Sorcerer he hopes to not let anyone down 🥺

Ooh, so when I send her back she might be able to lead you to the sphinx. Interesting. Weirdly, I found the place even before I knew she would move. I just randomly came upon a shrine after seeing something in the distance during some exploration one time so I slapped down a marker for reference as it had the same sphinx-like layout when I got there, but was just completely devoid of life. An initial wasted journey, but handy to know where to go last night to rattle off some riddles 😁

Dragon's Dogma Lucky Dip : I'm hiring a random level 25 fighter. 35 levels below me, just summoned a bunch and picked one.

I'll probably give them some of my upgraded fighter gear if they perform admirably enough, as I'm way past needing it and have a bunch of stuff I've yet to sell.

Update: we beat a purple super golem and a garm in the volcanic area 😁 I shall send them back proud at some point

I think the whole Pawn plague thing is pretty overblown. I have came across it twice in 130 hours.

If you let it go long enough for one of them to snap I think it's on you.

You have to be really not be paying attention to let it get that far.

Beat my first play through (Peace ending). I think I have gotten the gist of the lore enough to be ready for play through number two. Not sure if I will do the same quests over or rush to Post Dragon. I do have a few quests I wanna fix this time around though. I figure if I pull the finder’s token this time I will dup it to give out as pawn quests rewards. My only gripe is the actual battle with the Dragon is worse than the original game. I only died from fall damage. I wonder if people complained about the original dragon and Ur Dragon fights?

I like the way it feels like it is both a reboot and a direct sequel. After all, roads lead to Gran Soren.

Love the title screen piano music in the post game unmoored world. Beautiful.

PSA: NG+ unlocks post dragon shop for the WLC vendor. Even if you don’t get to the post game. Also apparently the game changes what berries are available in NG+.

That run through Drabnir's Grotto is nuts but very cool. I lost a pawn along the way and unfortunately didn't bring a portcrystal with me so won't be going back that way for a while. In hindsight legging it through there as a level 31 archer was probably a bad idea haha

@xeofate those are the truly great moments though, right? 😁 losing pawns, scrambling to survive with no end in sight, and all because you decided you wanted to go a certain direction and do a thing, not because the game told you to.

It's good to read when people are playing the game properly, and making their own adventure story within it haha 👏👏

@Ravix Absolutely. And in this game if you do blindly follow the quest directions you're likely to get a bad outcome, you really need to make up your own mind about what to do in certain scenarios. Games like this and Elden Ring where there is absolutely no hand holding are definitely my sort of game.

Seriously Whimsical Daydream is a cash machine. It’s random but you get either 10G, 100G, 1000G or 50000G per hit. I just hang on the back of stuff and whack away while my pawns do the actual work. This game really improved the money grind over the last one. I just wish there were suitable things to buy. The expensive houses aren’t worth the cost. There are other ways to make money but if you wanna just play the game rather than farm the economy, then this is a great way to do it.

I hadn't played this for a few days but finally triggered the end fights tonight to get that sorted. The way it ends you can tell as you walk in to the big hall it just isn't the actual end. It's almost like in TV where there's a fake-out dream scene 😅 but I decided to plop down on the throne just to see what happens even though the twilight zone vibes were strong with that overly happy music and narritively it was clearly the wrong thing to do at that point. So now I'm gonna head back on and see what happens when I load my save and get some other stuff to go down 😁😁

Tim Roth thanks you for the wyrm forged staff, @ApostateMage (it saved me upgrading it too, as I ended up upgrading a bunch of stuff I'm probably not even going to use that much as I went on a spending spree with crystals earlier 😵)

Who was everyone's beloved at the dragon fight BTW? Mine was the kitty cat empress, and I don't really know why 😹