History VideoGame / DragonsDogma

* MeleeATrois: During "A Fortress Besieged," the soldiers that were supposed to guide you to the Stone of the South run afoul of a pack of goblin raiders... [[spoiler:only for a griffin to swoop down and kill both the soldiers ''and'' the goblins, leaving you to make the trek to the fort on your own.]]
* MeteorSummoningAttack: Bolide summons meteors to rain down on a targets. It also comes in high and grand variants that unleash more stronger meteors as well.

* MultipleHeadCase: The three heads of the Chimera can team up rather efficiently, but when attacked it sometimes goes into a panic, causing the heads to wrest over control of the body.

* MusclesAreMeaningless: A surprising gameplay aversion. Your character's weight matters ''a lot'' as heftier characters (either with more muscles, more fat, or just more height) have a much higher encumbrance rating. Lightweights, on the other hand are very fast, but can't carry nearly as much stuff.

* NoGoodDeedGoesUnpunished: In one side quest you are asked to evict a family from their home. You can TakeAThirdOption and just buy the home from the current owner allowing the family to stay. While this seems like a good and generous idea at the time it comes back to bite you later as everyone but the young boy dies [[spoiler:in the city collapse after the dragon is defeated]]. If you evict them they survive.

** All dragons in the wild have some kind of roar ability that instantly kills your Pawns, regardless of health, requiring you to go each one of them and revive them to half health. It's not frequent enough to constitute TheComputerIsACheatingBastard, but it's still annoying.

* OurHydrasAreDifferent: Hydras are big, four-headed snakes that eat people. Thankfully, they don't grow more heads when one is chopped off, but they ''do'' regrow very quickly if you don't use fire to burn the neck.

* PowerPerversionPotential: Pawns have basically no free will of their own and can be created to look and act however their master likes...

* RainbowPimpGear: Given that you can often find pieces of gear before the full set is available, or that certain classes are only allowed to wear certain items, or just that sometimes the best combination available at the moment ''looks pretty silly'', you can expect to see yourself and some Pawns wearing some pretty outlandish things at one point or another. If you hire a Pawn from another player, when you dismiss them you're given the option of rating the Pawn's appearance as well as helpfulness.
* RandomLootExchanger: The "cursed" items from Bitterblack Isle give you random things; you'll never know what you'll get until after they are purified, though they are sub-categorized into novelties or gear.

* RecurringRiff: There is a small sequence of notes that the player will get used to hearing on several tracks before realizing that it's part of the game's main theme, which plays fully during the credits. ''Dark Arisen'' also features its own theme, and it also plays a specific snippet of it on some of its tracks.

* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: [[spoiler:Daimon wishes to destroy the cycle of arisen, dragons and the seneschal for forcing him to choose between his love and killing the dragon that was his previous master]].
* RomanceSidequest: A very strange and unintuitive example. Simply put, ''every NPC'' in the game is a potential romance option, provided you raise their affinity high enough. You raise an NPC's affinity for you by simply talking to them, and can speed the process up by buying things from them, giving them gifts from your inventory, or finishing quests for them. This can lead to aberrations like your character falling madly in love with a random shopkeeper because you bought a lot of healing items from them for example. There are certain characters the game actively pushes you towards, such as Aelinore, whose affinity can be maxed out by talking to her literally once.
* {{Roofhopping}}: While you're in a city or town, the game's traversal and LeParkour mechanics allow you to climb up ladders or the edges of walls, then jump from roof to roof. Oftentimes, this is encouraged to reach [[InexplicableTreasureChest treasure chests that are somehow placed above houses]].

** The Mage, Sorcerer and Magick Archer classes have this, but only in a rare few situations. Some enemies, such as the Golem, Metal Golem, and Dark Bishop, are resistant to any form of elemental magic to the point of almost total immunity, which is the main form of offense for the first two classes. The Sorcerer mitigates this a bit, as some of their spells can deal physical damage as well as elemental. For Mages, your only option is the [[KillItWithIce Frigor]] spell or whacking a golem's weak points with your staff. That, or [[HeroesFightBarehanded punching it]]. Magick Archers also suffer from this specifically against the floating medals of a Metal Golem, or the Dark Bishop himself, since their bows fire magick arrows, and they could only deal physical damage if they've equipped daggers.

* IgnoredExpert: Your Pawns will almost certainly fill this role a great many times. This is because they ''actually give extremely valuable advice,'' in contrast to what companions tend to do in other games. Often their remarks are the only way of knowing what exactly you're supposed to do next, and missing it can lead to all kinds of nasty situations. Even better is the knowledge system - when they travel with a player they gain knowledge about the geography of new locations, strategies for beating enemies, and hints for completing quests.
* IHaveYourWife: '''PAY ATTENTION TO THE AFFINITY SYSTEM.''' [[spoiler:The dragon captures the one with the highest affinity (or the one to whom you gave the Arisen's bond) and uses them for a SadisticChoice.]]

* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: You may find the occasional skeleton pinned to a tree with its own sword.
* ImplacableMan: In the ''Dark Arisen'' expansion, TheGrimReaper. He randomly appears while traveling through the Bitterblack Isle, seeking you out with his magical lantern, then putting you to sleep and {{One Hit Kill}}ing you with his SinisterScythe. Although it is eventually possible to take Death down, most players will find it a much better idea to just run.

* InfinityPlusOneSword: Dragon weapons in the original game and Bitterblack weapons and armor from Dark Arisen.

** Dragon's weapons in Dark Arisen. While statwise inferior to Bitterblack weapons, they gave you the boost necessary to even farm BBI in the first place.
** DLC or "Black Cat" weapons and armors in Dark Arisen. While surpassed in power by the above, they are DiscOneNuke with powerful gimmicks that keep them useful throughout the game. Special mentions go to the Caged Fury archistaff and Ancient armor set. With full [[ChargedAttack charges]], the former is the strongest archistaff in the game while the later can give complete immunity to status effects in exchange for lower elemental resistance.

* LethalJokeItem: The Rusted weapons. They are the weakest weapons in their class and are sold cheaply, as well as being uncommon loot; a warrior actually starts the game with a Rusted sword and shield. However, once you start upgrading them, they gain the ability to inflict Poison on their targets. At three stars, they gain the ability to inflict Torpor, which is an ''extremely'' useful debilitation that slows its sufferers' movement and attack speed to a crawl, and only a few monster types are immune to it. At Dragonforged levels and above, their attack power increases dramatically, and their chances of inflicting Poison and Torpor are increased as well. For example, Rusted Daggers have an attack power of only 7 with no special properties. At the highest enhancement level, Gold Rarefied, they have a massive 405 attack power, '''and''' can inflict Poison and Torpor. When fully upgraded, Rusted weapons are unquestionably the most valuable support weapons in the game.
* LevelGrinding: The experience points required for the next level grow high enough to the point where you'll be needing approximately 90,000 EXP around Level 60. Level grinding is either done subtly or forced, depending on the quest type, but basically, you'll often be killing respawning thieves, goblins, wolves, etc. For a lot of quests where you'll be required to backtrack, you can kill as much enemies as you want on the way. {{Mass Monster Slaughter Sidequest}}s require you to kill a lot of enemies, letting you slowly level grind on top of the EXP rewards given upon quest completion. You also gain more EXP per enemy kill the fewer Pawns are in your party.
* LevelUpFillUp: If you or your main pawn levels up during a fight, your HP will be automatically refilled.
* LightningLash: The spell Brontide summons a magical whip of pure electricity.
* LimitedLoadout: Your Arisen and Pawns can each only equip gear on provided slots; one primary weapon, one secondary weapon (depending on the vocation), one headgear, one clothing, one armor, one leg gear, one feet gear, one cape or shoulder gear, and two accessories. All of these, and the other items in your carried inventory are being [[AntiHoarding capped by a weight limit]].
* LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards: Averted completely, surprisingly enough. The different classes all have different play styles, but the game puts emphasis on teamwork, unless you choose to become an assassin. In that case, you actually get a huge attack and defense bonus for not having any Pawns with you, including your own.
* LiterallyShatteredLives: Ice magick and weapon infusion can freeze smaller enemies, much more so against those that have a natural weakness against it. Striking a frozen enemy causes it to shatter.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: Just to get into the game, you go through (none of these is skippable)[[note]]Thankfully averted in the [=PS4/Xbone=] versions[[/note]]:

* LyricalDissonance: The original menu song for ''Dragon's Dogma'', "Into Free ~Dangan~," by B'z. On bare surface, the song is upbeat and energetic, which many fans grew to love over time. Not only is the song out of place, it doesn't seem like a very depressing song either...[[spoiler:until you finish the game. A closer look at the lyrics reveals that the whole song is actually singing about the Post-Game disaster and even ''the Arisen's death''. One verse explicitly states: ''[[LiteralMetaphor We kill ourselves in the end]]''; even describing the Arisen's death and corpse falling into the ocean at the end of the game ''Flying into free''.]]

* HPToOne:
** The Evil Eye's Chew attack can't kill you and will actually leave your HP at one. It can kill Pawns though.
** A positive but inverted example can happen to the Arisen and Pawns equipped with the secret augment Tenacity. This augment gives a chance that a normally fatal attack would leave the user with 1 HP instead of 0.

* EscortMission: A good chunk of the notice board quests. If the escortee dies before reaching their destination, the quest will not only count as a failure as usual, but you'll also be (unfortunately) unable to re-take that quest again on the same playthrough.

* FanService: The vast majority of the game's armor and clothing can be equipped by either gender, but there are several pieces that can be worn only by female players/Pawns. They're abnormally skimpy, and sport JigglePhysics.
** Sent up with a trophy; buy a male character the female armor, and you unlock it.

* FighterMageThief: Shows up here. In this case, there are two variations of each class - a "basic" vocation with a [[JackOfAllStats generalized stat spread]] and a skillset oriented toward a balance of damage and support, and an "advanced" one found later in the game that's more specialized and damage-oriented. You have Fighter/Warrior (sword-and-shield combat with defensive and taunting abilities vs high-damage two-handed play), Mage/Sorcerer (basic elemental skills with an emphasis on healing and support vs [[GameBreaker very overpowered]] wide-area spells with no healing options at all), and Strider/Ranger (short-range, melee-heavy play with a focus on confounding and stealing from enemies vs primarily long-range and damage-heavy attacks). Then there are the three "hybrid" vocations which share characteristics of two classes - [[MageMarksman Magick Archer]], [[MagicKnight Mystic Knight]], and [[BowAndSwordInAccord Assassin]].
* FinalBossPreview: Sort of. You fight the Dragon in the very beginning at Level 1, but [[HopelessBossFight obviously he's very powerful and your attacks barely leave a dent on him.]] Once you become a true Arisen, you will become stronger over the course of your journey to take him down. Of course, [[VillainForgotToLevelGrind he has the same exact stats as when you first fought him.]] [[spoiler:The game even [[DiscOneFinalBoss continues]] after you beat him too.]]

*** The original out of place Jpop song for ''Dragon's Dogma'', "Into Free ~Dangan~" by B'z, is actually [[spoiler:singing about what happens in the Post-Game, from waking up to finding the world different to explicitly stating: ''We kill ourselves in the end'']].

** Death and the corpse eating beasts have a habit of showing up during or right after some of the tougher fights on Bitterblack Isle.

* GenerationXerox: Your NewGamePlus begins with "Countless generations passed..." and yet there's an ''entire country'' full of [[IdenticalGrandson identical great-great-great-grandkids]].
** Possibly Justified, considering [[spoiler:The Seneschal explains that everyone who has lived or died returns to life eventually, as a part of a never-ending cycle without beginning or end. As such, it's entirely possible these are just reincarnations of their past selves.]]

** The griffin that is fought as part of the main questline is an especially obnoxious example: it originally appears on a hill outside Gran Soren, but if the player can't finish it off in a short enough amount of time it flies away to a ruin way off to the north and must be followed there by the player.

* GlassCannon: Assassins are one of the best vocations at single target damage as well as one of the most versatile. They're the only ones can use arrows, shields, sword ''and'' daggers and they have the best strength growth in the game, making them DPS monsters. However, their below average defense growth is only partially mitigated by their ability to use shields.

* TheGrimReaper: Randomly appears on Bitterblack Isle in ''Dark Arisen'' and his scythe instantly one-shots anything it hits. If it happens to kill a Pawn, they are instantly sent back to the Rift without a chance for revival. However, his scythe swing is his only actual attack, and the sleep spell he casts with his lantern can be nullified with proper equipment, making him less threatening.

** Certain quests in the From a Different Sky line only become available during very specific story quests and can only be completed while completing those quests.

** Getting [[spoiler: the Duke's secret escort quest]] in NewGamePlus requires that you attain a high affinity with him in your first playthrough. Fair enough, but the fact that you have no way of knowing about the quest means you have no initiative to gain his favor at all. Oh, and if you complete A Warm Welcome - a major post-game story quest - all affinity drops to zero and you're permanently locked out from getting the quest. The only way to get the quest is to gain his affinity ''then'' [[spoiler: drop into the Everfall]] immediately upon reaching Gran Soren.
** Monsters can have very hard resistances to certain builds. A golem, for example, is highly magic resistant but very vulnerable to climbing and physical attacks. If you stumble upon a story golem fight and you happen to be a mage, you will have almost no impact on the fight, needing to rely on your uncontrollable Pawns to figure it out (assuming they're physical attackers), which can take quite a while. This means you need to either run away to the nearest rest stop to change classes or endure through a very long and tedious battle. Since there's little way to know about many boss fights beforehand, your first run through becomes a trial and error ordeal depending on how much time it will cost you to cope.

* HaveAGayOldTime: Because the game uses older English language dialogue, expect people to describe unusual things using the term 'Queer'.

* HealingSpring: There are a couple spread out across the map, and are one of the few ways to heal everyone in the party.

** The Fighter basic vocation fights with Sword and Shield and of the three basic vocations are best suited for Heavy armor.

* HeroicSuicide: [[spoiler: The only way to get the GoldenEnding is to become Seneschal and then impale yourself upon the Godsbane, finally breaking the infinite cycle of Dragons and Arisen]].

** The Mage and Sorcerer classes have this, but only in a rare few situations. Some enemies, such as the Golem and Metal Golem, are resistant to any form of elemental magic to the point of almost total immunity, which is the main form of offense for both classes. The Sorcerer mitigates this a bit, as some of their spells are able to cause physical damage as well as elemental. For mages, your only option is the [[KillItWithIce Frigor]] spell or whacking its weak points with your staff. That, or [[HeroesFightBarehanded punching it]].

** The Assassin vocation gets some perks that grant you greater abilities at night, actively encouraging you to venture out in the dark rather than during the day.

** Post nerf, the Assassin class is this. Their best attacks are all close quarters and require precise timing, but they're one of the squishiest classes. A single screw up in some of the tougher areas will result in death. Yet the damage Assassins can put out is absolutely staggering and unless the player actually messes up they are essentially untouchable.

** And if you lose the battle with [[spoiler: the Seneschal, you become a Dragon yourself, seemingly destined to bring the next wave of destruction to the world of Gransys]].
** Earlier on, if you [[spoiler: sacrifice your beloved to the Dragon, you become the new Duke - living a seemingly eternal life of loneliness without even your main Pawn to keep you company, with the Dragon's impending return a few generations away]].

* EldritchAbomination: The [[BorderPatrol Brine]] is seen only as a mass of see-through tentacles surrounded by blood-red fog, and any being can fall prey to it when they touch deep water. [[spoiler:Even the freaking ''Seneschal'' [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu isn't immune to its grasp]]]]. The Brine supposedly only appeared when the Dragon did, but even he doesn't know what it is.
** Evil Eyes and their ilk, especially the nearly kaiju-sized Gazer from Bitterblack Isle.
* ElementalPowers: Magic-users have control over fire, ice, lightning, holy, and dark magic. Skills with fire, ice, and lightning damage are available to these classes, whilst Sorcerers also get Maelstrom (dealing dark damage) and Seism (holy). Depending on their currently active weapon element, their normal and charged magic shots change properties (fire and darkness target single enemies for large amounts of damage and knockback, ice pauses momentarily before flying off to a target, thunder bounces off walls and holy first flies forward slowly and then quickly homes in on an enemy).

** The creepiness factor is taken up to eleven when the player can overhear what the undead have to say: they usually mutter something about their past lives or are confused by their condition.

* EscortMission: A good chunk of the notice board quests.
* EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: You get to name your character, but everyone will just address you as Arisen (or Master, in the case of your Pawns). Lampshaded in at least one instance. Upon your first meeting with the Duke's wife, she asks your name. Her next line implies that you told her your name is "Arisen."

** Magick Archer, like Sorcerer has access to multiple impressive looking spell, yet their most important spell is Magick Rebalancer, a simple buff that gave you basically infinite Demon's Periapt and Mage's Periapt.
* BossInMookClothing: Before postgame, Drakes are about the hardest thing you can encounter in the wild, with one of the highest health bars.

* BowAndSwordInAccord: The Strider, Ranger, Assassin, and Magick Archer classes do this. Ranger focuses most on the bow while the Assassin favors sword and Strider is the middle ground. Technically, the Assassin is the only one of the three which actually wields a sword. The rest of the aforementioned classes use daggers. Magick Archers can also choose to subvert this trope, rejecting the use of daggers in favour of [[MagicStaff staves]].

* BrutalBonusLevel: Bitterblack Isle contains many powerful enemies as well as three bonus bosses... the last of which reawakens and makes the dungeon more difficult if you beat him. Another thing that makes this area nasty is that very strong enemies can suddenly spawn during battles, making everything much more difficult and unpredictable. The in-universe reason is that these strong monsters are attracted to the smell of corpses of other enemies you have slain.

* CardboardPrison: The dungeon in the Duke's Demesne, which has a massive hole in one of the cell walls that leads out into the slums, as well as a guard who is exceptionally easy to bribe. Taken up to the next level in the quest "Arousing Suspicion", where the guards don't even bother to take your weapons or armor away even though you've been accused of ''trying to rape the Duke's wife''.

** Steffen implies that magick does this, claiming that it is as taxing to the body as swinging an axe and that the [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity heart and mind]] suffer most. However, it doesn't appear in actual gameplay, except that both spellcasting and special attacks run off the same regenerating stamina bar.
** Played with in the form of the Arcane Archer's Immolate ability. It has a low stamina cost, fast casting time, and will absolutely destroy any enemy who isn't highly resistant to fire. The only drawback is that it involves setting yourself on fire, which logically costs some HP.
* CastOfSnowflakes: Since there's already a large repository of eyes, noses, etc. for use in creating your own Arisen, the townies who populate Gran Soren simply make use of randomized faces pulled from those parts. This can result in the facial equivalent of RainbowPimpGear, as many of the less important characters are rather unattractive (those who have a bit of personality fleshed out on them via quests are usually a bit prettier).
* CatapultToGlory: Fighters and Warriors get two different flavors of this. The former uses their shield to provide a stepping stone, while the latter uses their BFS to launch you towards a flying enemy. Warriors also have an offensive version which hooks an enemy with their weapon in order to launch them several dozen feet into the air.

** The weapons Force Hatchet and Caged Fury increase power everytime you hit something with it. At max charges they double your magick or strength, turning every attacks into charged attacks.

* ChestMonster: ''Dark Arisen'' introduces mimic-type creatures called Maneaters. The second you open a chest, the monster springs out and attempts to swallow your Arisen or Pawn whole. If your Arisen gets caught, you have to wiggle the analog stick hoping to get out or hope one of your Pawns breaks you out of it while taking massive damage before it swallows you whole.

** The Dragonforged, who's a previous Arisen who was unable to beat the Dragon, and now dedicates himself to [[MentorArchetype guiding new Arisen]].

** Daimon, the [[SatanicArchetype Dark Arisen]], who was an Arisen who refused to participate in his Dragon's SadisticChoice, and who rebelled against the Great Cycle.
** Duke Edmun, who was the Arisen prior to the protagonist, and who earned his duchy by defeating the Dragon. [[spoiler:The fact that he hasn't aged since then is a [[{{Foreshadowing}} pretty big hint]] that [[FakeUltimateHero he DIDN'T defeat the dragon]]]].

** Defeating the Hydra will generally require at least one member of the party to climb its necks and sever its heads.

* NonCombatEXP: Completing quests gives you bonus EXP on top of other materials, even if the quest does not involve fighting monsters, but instead require you to pick up items or speak to certain [=NPCs=].

* FireIceLightning: Magicks are primarily categorized within these three elements. The vocations that utilize magicks can even have access to these three elements at once.

* AntiGrinding: If you kill enemies within a given area or dungeon, you'll have to wait for some [[InUniverseGameClock in-game time or day-night cycle(s)]] before they would respawn. This prevents you from easily LevelGrinding too much in one specific place. The only notable [[AvertedTrope exception]] is the [[spoiler:Noble Quarters during post-game, as the guards respawn indefinitely]].

** The game {{Autosave}}s frequently, especially if you move from one area to another. However, one beneficial exception to this feature is when you get arrested by the guards and put to jail in Gran Soren (i.e. by doing random transgressions such as sneaking into the castle at night). You are stripped off your equipment when you're in jail, but you can just easily reload a previous save point from the pause menu, bringing you back to the point prior to your arrest.

* NoticeThis: Spots to be gathered from, chests to be opened, and items sitting on the ground to be picked up will all activate your ShinySense.

* LevelGrinding: Done subtly; for a lot of quests you'll be required to backtrack, meaning you'll often be killing respawning thieves, goblins, wolves, etc.

** You can use a Wakestone to bring [[spoiler:Julien]] back to life [[spoiler:if you killed him during his duel with Mercedes. If you do so, he admits defeat and turns himself in for his crimes]] and you get an otherwise-unobtainable shield. It's also the only way to romance the character.

* AntiDebuff: Several curatives cleanse you from certain debuffs, others do so by ridding you of debilitations from a given type (i.e. they may specifically work for "physical debilitations" or "magical debilitations" if they can't cure all).

* LevelScaling: As you level up, new enemies will begin spawning in place of old ones. You thought fighting zombies all night was annoying? Wait until you get the skeletons coming out. You'll love zombies then.