Dragon’s Dogma - Beginner’s Tips!
Since quite a few people will be trying out Dragon's Dogma for the first time with the recent PC port of Dark Arisen I thought it might be a good idea to share some beginner's tips with everyone as it can be a bit rough starting out, so here's my tips for starting out with Dragon's Dogma!
1 - Pick up everything, deposit most of it in Item Storage for later use
In Dragon's Dogma, there's a lot of items to pick up, a lot of it seems like junk too, but you'd be surprised at some of the uses these items can have, it may not be immediately useful but you might be able to rely on it later.
Item storage is available from any Inn in the game, it works similar to the Item boxes from old school Resident Evil games, the same storage is accessible from many places.
PC users in particular should check the contents of their Item storage, there's lots of free stuff in there that used to be DLC in the console version, however some of it can give you a little too much of an advantage when starting out, if you want the true 'Dragon's Dogma experience' you may wish to ignore some of these free goodies, definitely get the 'Eternal Ferrystone' though!
The next point sort of continues on from this one....
2 - Don't know what an item does? Read it's description!
Every item in the game has a description that tells you something useful about it, though that may not be immediately obvious, you see every item actually has 2 pages of description & you only see the first page by default, to see the second page you must press X (on an Xbox 360 controller) to see the second page of an item description, the second page will directly tell you if it restores health or stamina, if it's combinable, if it cures a Status Ailment (known as 'Debilitations' in Dragon's Dogma) & even if the item decays over time (with the descriptor 'Time Sensitive').
3 - There are hidden treasure chests EVERYWHERE
Seriously, some of the nooks & crannies the devs chose to hide treasure chests in might surprise you, be thorough in your search for loot!
4 - You can explore almost anywhere from the start, but doing so may be dangerous
If you run into enemies who can nearly one shot you & are barely taking any damage from you & your Pawns attacks, you may wish to leave that section of the map until later when you've levelled up a bit & acquired better gear.
5 - Experiment with the different character classes/Vocations! Augments can be used with any class/Vocation!
Upon starting Dragon's Dogma, you'll be asked to pick which class you want to start with, Fighter, Strider & Mage, pay attention to their weapon loadout & pick whatever sounds most fun to play to you, but be warned you'll be stuck with this class until you reach the big city called Gran Soren.
Upon reaching Gran Soren, the man at the Inn called Asalam can change your class (called Vocation in Dragon's Dogma) for you, once you've paid the necessary amount of discipline points to unlock a Vocation, you can switch to that Vocation for free whenever you want, you only spend points the first time.
Every Vocation in the game have these things called Augments. These are basically passive buffs, some of them are extremely useful & the super neat thing about them is that once you've unlocked them, Augments can be used with any Vocation! For this reason it is advised to spend at least some time with all the Vocations in the game, for both you & your pawn.
6 - Caxton, the weaponsmith in Gran Soren, can upgrade existing weapons & armour in addition to selling you new ones
This is the guy with the beard & moustache who goes "They're Masterworks all! You can't go wrong!" when you talk to him, select the 'Enhance' dialgoue option & you'll be taken to the upgrade menu, initial upgrades only cost money, but level 2 & 3 upgrades will require materials in addition to yet more money. In the end it's up to you to check the stats & see whether it's better to buy completely new weapons & armour or upgrade existing ones. The right-most tab in the upgrade menu will let you upgrade weapons & armour sitting in your Item Storage.
Speaking of Item Storage, you do NOT need upgrade materials in your inventory to upgrade anything, you can use upgrade materials straight from Item Storage.
7 - Main Story Quests can automatically fail Side Quests if you progress too far
One annoying problem with Dragon's Dogma is that it does little to organise Quests in your quest log, Notice Board Quests look different, but Main Story Quests & Side Quests look exactly the same in the quest log, if you end up automatically failing a quest like this & the game saves, you may not be able to go back & do that quest without either starting the game over from scratch or waiting until New Game Plus to try again.
If an NPC has a quest for you they will have a green question mark above their head, but this icon has a short draw distance so it's easy to miss.
Here's an early example, there's a side quest you can get early on called 'Lost and Found' This quest will fail out if you speak to Barnaby in the Pawn Guild in Gran Soren.
You can still go to Gran Soren before doing this side quest, just don't speak to Barnaby until it's completed.
8 - Your Pawn learns from your actions, sometimes to it's detriment
You can issue basic commands to your Pawns using the D-Pad, however this can influence the Pawn's AI & lead to it learning undesirable traits.
For example, if you stop fighting to pick up items in the middle of an ongoing battle for any reason, your pawn will pick up on this & start picking up items when they should be engaging the enemy, also abusing the 'Come!' (Down D-Pad) & 'Help!' (Left/Right D-Pad) commands can give your pawn the 'Guardian' inclination over time.
The 'Guardian' inclination sounds good on paper, your Pawn prioritizes protecting you above all else, in practice though, the Pawn will stick to you like glue & only attack the enemy when they get very close or attack you outright, it's unfortunate that it's very easy to accidentally give your pawn this inclination.
"But wait" I hear you ask, "What are these 'inclinations' you're talking about? I'm glad you asked!
9 - A primer on Pawn Inclinations
On the Status page, switch to your pawn & scroll down to the 'Profile' page, at the bottom you'll see a section labelled 'Primary' & 'Secondary'
These are your Pawn's inclinations, they somewhat dictate how a Pawn's AI will act in combat, here's a breakdown of what they all mean.
Scather - Rushes into battle & immediately engages the strongest enemy in a group
Challenger - Prioritizes the elimination of ranged & magic enemies first
Mitigator - Focuses on killing the weakest enemies in groups first
Guardian - The Pawn prioritizes the Arisen's safety above all else, sticking to them like glue & barely attacking (some suggest that if both you & the pawn are melee classes then this inclination can work well)
Nexus - Same as Guardian, but for other Pawns instead of the Arisen
Medicant - Pawn focuses on restoring health & curing debilitations (status ailments) for itself & the party, good if you want a dedicated healer
Utilitarian - Encourages a pawn to use it's support abilities more often
Acquisitor - Pawns will focus on gathering loot, even breaking off mid-battle to do so
Pioneer - Pawns will walk further ahead of you, potentially engaging in fights earlier than you may want to
There are lots of guides online about pawn inclination should you wish to know more, but for now I'll just say this, more experienced Dragon's Dogma players will tend to avoid hiring pawns with Guardian & Nexus inclinations.
Following on from this, more pawn advice.....
10 - Pawns higher than your level cost 'Rift Crystals' to hire, but Pawns from people on your friends list are always free regardless of level!
If they don't mind, you could add someone you know has a good pawn to your friend's list ^_^
However be wary when hiring higher level pawns..........
11 - If you hire pawns of a higher level than your Arisen, you will earn less experience from kills
This XP penalty can be as much as 25%, hiring higher level pawns can also make game easier than it's supposed to be, choose wisely before hiring higher level pawns.
An advanced tactic is to hire lower level pawns or just not hire pawns at all, this gives you bonus experience but obviously is not recommended for a first time playthrough.
Besides, hiring pawns is part of the fun! ^_^
12 - Carrying too much? Use your pawns as pack mules!
Pawns have inventory space too, make use of it! Giving them healing items if you have any to spare can also keep them alive, they will use them automatically when their health gets too low.
Also don't worry about giving items to pawns hired from other players, any items they were carrying will automatically be desposited into your Item Storage when you dismiss them.
However DO worry about equipping weapons & armour on hired pawns, you can do this but the game treats it as a gift to that pawn's creator so you'll lose that equipment when you dismiss them. For this reason people tend to seek out pawns that already have decent equipment.
13 - Nighttime is dangerous & very dark, always bring a Lantern!
Enemy compositions can change at nighttime & be a bit tougher but in general the biggest enemy at night is the realistically low visibility, make sure to always bring a Lantern & some flasks of oil to refill it should you be exploring at night or in dark areas.
14 - Don't go to Bitterblack Isle too early
You might see a blue marker on your minimap, if you go to the marked destination at nighttime (the pier in the starting town of Cassardis) you'll meet a lady called Olra, talking to her gives you the option to go to Bitterblack Isle, this an endgame dungeon with incredibly difficult enemies & the best gear waiting within, if you go there right at the start there is a 400% chance you will get rekt. Further on in Bitterblack Isle the story developments assume you've beaten the main game already so there's potential spoilers in that sense as well.
If you end up going there by accident, talk to Olra again & she should give you the option to return to the main game.
Right! I think that's everything I wanted to cover, I hope you enjoy your time in the world of Gransys, stay tuned for more streams from the Babble Gang & until next time folks, ta-ta for now!
