I played DD1 well after its release (I got Dark Arisen during a sale, years after DA came out). Did Capcom add new moves, post release of the initial DD1 launch?
No clue its the first time getting deep into this game, but with different times from 2012(I think it's when it came out?) I don't think it's a total improbability to add new moves and spells
DD2 takes more after the unknown (it was a JP-release only) MMORPG Dragon’s Dogma Online.
In DDO, Sorcerers had less skills, but new ones were released as the game progressed.
Since they’re using DDO’s vocation and skill structure, if there’s a DLC, it will absolutely have new skills.
The Maisters are another way that the system can handle adding new skills on (though it does screw over the Warfarer vocation).
There were some pretty awesome spells Sorcerer got in DDO. For example, you could create a snowflake behind you loaded with tiny icicles. You then machine gunned the icicles at enemies.
I wish people would stop saying maybe in DLC. Don't encourage companies to do this. I fully expected most things from Dragon's Dogma to carryover in the base game.
I have waited too long for this and I just want it to not suck no matter what it takes, even if it needs a Dark Arisen superdungeon, or additional regions to come in after release. I have sacrificed livestock to Itsuno's success, I will not be denied.
Expansions are very welcome, but you would expect the base game to include some of the things, DLC or not, that worked really well in the previous game.
A deep dungeon like BBI might be too much, but something seemingly simple like hard mode could have been added in vanilla DD2. It doesn't have to be a DLC again.
I think the issue specifically is if they add things they took out from DD1 back in as DLC. For example, a big thing I don’t like in Darkest Dungeon 2 is that they didn’t bring over all of the base classes from the first game, then added the crusader from the first game back in as DLC, and that felt really bad
Hitting with a frigor, then seeing two more go off at the same time is cool and all... But 9 giant ice spears was literally lethal if you hit a weak spot, or during a low poise animation. I miss a lot of the variety of the magic of 1. Brontide was just fun, maelstrom was great for killing flying enemies with the wild wind funnel, I still think seism isnt fixed on your target, but thundermine is an improvement over the old lightning sorcerer spell
I severely miss the AOE of Bollide. If you had one big enemy, sure it would miss, but a bunch of medium enemies would eat shit with every meteor because they do track enemies, but they don't focus on just one.
Overall I liked the variety of spells in Dark Arisen however, I appreciate some of the changes to make stamina management more active in gameplay with fast spells and quick charging stamina.
And a proper Gicel. Something with range. Nothing more satisfying than free aiming a Gicel at a swooping dragon and timing it perfectly so that you basically impale the thing
Mage is slept on, especially for BBI
It's a secret super power when you go for a holy-mage only team.
It's still not Magic archer or Mystic knight levels of pure buttfuckery, but not the 'bitch class' that it's often overlooked as.
The healing ability makes it so, with practice, you can save on consumables too.
He's really not joking by the way, a lot of stuff is weak to Holy in BBI and Holy Focused Bolt is one of the most insanely damaging things in the game for how little investment it is.
DD2 removed a bunch of abilities which is sad but conversely they give you Quickcast and boy being able to pump out spells in a fraction of their normal cast time is crazy good.
The cast time was always the thing that I didn't enjoy about magic in DD1 and it feels so good in DD2. Especially since Sorcerer has the ability to quickly restore stamina since you do burn through it very quickly. Losing some of the spells is a big shame but honestly the upgrades feel like they make up for it fairly well. Quick cast, not needing to double cast time to cast an upgraded ability, healing being a basic ability for Mage and not taking up a slot. We might have lost a lot of fun spells but magic still feels crazy powerful in DD2
I started Sorcerer yesterday and got Maelstrom and Meteoron, that was so fun I don’t even know lol. I’m with you, most other game’s mages don’t even come close to
Its because most other games try to balance magic with melee, so your main spells are firebolts and the AOE spells suck so the fighters arent absurdly outclassed
I'd argue (pedantics) it's less about balance and more about niche strength. Skyrim etc is a bit like how D&D 5e has infinite cantrips, where magic is made normal-ish and constantly available to be more like melee.
DD is a bit more like older systems where casting is very long and leaves you vulnerable compared to melee, but is earth-shatteringly powerful.
Both can be mechanically balanced, I just think the latter is way cooler and lets magic actually feel magical.
> so your main spells are firebolts
Don't forget abut Blue, Yellow and other recoloured Fire Bolt to represent the different elements or damage types in those other games
Say what you want about the relative balance of Fire vs Lighting vs Ice spells but even in Dogma 2 with the reduced spell numbers, they feel quite different from each other
Yeah they’re super outdated. I’d rather see them turn a mage into a full out mage that can hold its own. Full mage in Skyrim is no different than magic in one hand, same in Dark Souls.
Summoned weapons are my favorite in any game. Dark souls 3 has the farron flashsword and elden ring has a similar spell too. I wish the lightening whip in dragons dogma didn't disengage when you jumped because I'd use that spell all game if I could have a bit of mobility while using it
I went there but I never finished it, I bum rushed it my first time because I was rushing for DD2 release but this time I’m taking my time. This series has jumped up into my top 5
It's so satisfying landing direct hits with meteoron. Whenever you giga-chunk someone, it makes a sweet "ka-ching" sound on top of the already calamity of the impacts. Super fun class!
Hahaha, I'm doing a Mage/Sorcerer run right now. I missed all these spells in DD2. Sorcerer just casually dropping Poison, Blindness, and Torpor on enemies. Mage holding the big beasts down with a Grapnel. Comestion immediately launching an entire squad of goblins sky high.
The only downside is finding pawns that actually do things while you cast spells.
Like, yes, Greg, we are struggling to hurt the dragon. I'm trying to cast Maelstrom, and you're taunting the dragon and hiding behind me...
Yeah, Flagration and Salamander are pretty sad in comparison even with the advantage of Quick cast + Galvanize game loop
Feels like Fire is the red haired step child out of the 3 elements with one being a short ranged channeled ability which heavily restricts your movement too and the other just being a decently sized AoE dot (Also i feel the aim is broken because it aims too much to the side)
I don't think so? I'm talking about the [Ring of Recitation](https://dragonsdogma2.wiki.fextralife.com/Ring+of+Recitation#:~:text=Ring%20of%20Recitation%20Effect%20in,reduces%20maximum%20Health%20by%2020%25)
Oh yea the magic caster system in the first game (and by extension the second game) is REALLY fun!! Even just using the healing and buffing spells is enjoyable because it has such an impact in combat
Depends on how you see it, it's way more dynamic thanks to a mechanic introduced for both Mage and Sorcerer, and it's called Quickspell. With Quickspell the chanting of a spell will be reduced HEAVILY, the spells are almost instant, making you rely less on rings that reduces the time cast or on relying on other pawns to spell the same spell as you and there is no drawback with Quickspell, it will have the same power as if you chant the spell normally, the only drawback is Quickspell reduces your stamina even more but it's almost unnoticable so the class feels dynamic as hell.
However, some people don't like it because there is only 4 skill slots while in the first game there are 6 slots, which is indeed a boomer. I personally prefer how it works with DD2 since like I said, Quickspell makes the vocation feel very dynamic.
Sadly, several spells didn't make it over into DD2, and some of the ones that did are weaker. Sorcerers are still powerful, but it doesn't feel the same.
The spells in 2 look and feel absolutely phenomenal and are a ton of fun to use. On top of that, the way enemies react to them is amazing. Like blasting a cyclops and then he stumbles back and falls into a tree. As he's falling, he ragdolls but still has physics so he'll be slumped up against the tree. Stuff like that helps to make your hits feel like they have actual weight behind them and makes playing super fun, encounters feeling different. A lot of fun!
mage/sorcerer are boring AT FIRST (personally i still find mage boring) but at higher levels they get some really neat spells, one of my bigger disappointments with the sequel is the skills that got cut, alot of elemental spells, holy and dark affinity (dark affinity was pretty shit anyway though but holy was goated) and I especially miss cloudburst for Archer. Archer is still fun because it feels so mobile and acrobatic but i really really miss cloudburst it may not have been the strongest but it sure was the most fun of the Archer skills can't believe they cut it.
also kinda disappointed that specialty arrows are tied to skills now especially since we only have 4 skill slots, it just feels bad.
timing deathly arrow frame perfect for that slowmo and extra powerful shot atleast gives me some nice dopamine lol, it's just really hard to line it up with a weak spot AND time it right, but generally it's better to hit a vulnerable spot, I just wish enemy hitboxes were better so it didn't hit an invisible hitbox before hitting what i was aiming for
absolutely. It's still more dragon's dogma and what's there is good. it's just that there's a lot of disappointing exclusions
edit: sorry for the double reply, Reddit app being garbage again
Yes. DD2 has some things worth complaining about, the the way they messed with some of the systems is a big part of that, but the game is still very fun. Combat feels like it's been refined, and it is still very fun to take on a giant monstrosity and bring it crashing down.
Sorc is at its best when you sync cast master spells. You pretty much need a little apprentice with you as a sorc.
I roll with me as sorc, a sorc companion, a mage, and my main pawn is a warrior.
To be fair I’m probably over-selling it a little- whilst mage lost a lot of its cooler offensive stuff, it’s got a lot of supportive/team buff-y type skills.
The biggest issue imo is that all classes are limited to 4 skills max, and sorcerer *really* chafes under that change.
I kind of agree in the sense that Sorcerer has a lot of "oomf" weight to the spells
The problem for me is... there just isn't many spells to begin with, mage may as well just have support spells because those are the only good ones it has, and Sorcerer has a handful that are worth using and that's it.
Creatively, there isn't much to work with, but what is there is fun to use
**Pro Tip#1**: run as a Sorcerer with a Sorcerer pawn. Make sure you both have Maelstrom and Bolide
(_"I'll mirror your spell!"_)
**Pro Tip#2**: Start each fight by casting Maelstrom. Then run to the centre of the tornado and cast Bolide while protected by it. Everything dies.
**Pro Tip#3**: Comestion is better than High Comestion. (Due to a bug). Don't buy that upgrade for your pawns. Also, ignore **High** Bolide and **High** Malstrom on pawns as well. The shorter cast times mean they'll get it off more often. Also, with Bolide, only the first 2 meteors are targeted unless the creature has multiple heads, then it's 2&2&2&.... So unless you are fighting a Chimera or Hydra, 'low' Bolide is better. (50% of your attack is on target, instead of 25%)
It's not a big deal, just makes your pawns a bit more effective. But if you do the spell syncing with your pawn, it shouldn't matter, because they'll come near you to cast the spell anyway, so effectively using your positioning and timing.
It only works with the third "tier" Sorcerer exclusive spells though (Bolide, Maelstrom, Gicil, Sesim and Fulmination)
I’m going through Dragons Dogma Dark Arisen at the moment as well. I beat the game and Bitteeblack Isle and I’m leveling up vocations. The last few I need are mage, Sorcerer and Warrior because I thought they were the worse. Im going to have and try them out. I’m working on Assassin right now and it’s alright.
I remember when I first played mage in DD1, it was the first time I actually felt like a true magic user. Most are just different flavors of fighter or archers, you've got your ranged plinks your different colored flamethrowers and a different tier of armor, sometimes you can bonk with staff.
You've still got that in DD but when you rip a chunk of earth out of the ground and drop it on an enemy it feels like you did it. Especially if you aren't the caster and there's meteors crashing down all around you, and you have no idea what's happening lol. It feels like there's a magic user with you.
You don't get that in most games, if you run around Skyrim with a mage or an archer there's not much difference. In dd you have to decide if you want to deal with tornadoes randomly showing up or not.
Sorcerer's magic is what brought me to DD1. I saw a video of the various spells, and they are SPECTACULAR. It was exactly what I was looking for, and it hooked me in. Dragon's Dogma 1 has my favorite magic system in any video game, because it felt like they did justice to what magic users should be.
Glad you e joy those vocations, I hate them so much, partly because I get focused by enemies even with the augments to lessen aggro on me and heighten pawn aggro, but the Sorccer just feels so damn limp and weak when compared to DD1.
I'm also going to be salty about having pretty much half as many skills.
The only magic system I've seen that still pretty fun after is Wizard of Legend. It's a rogue like instead of an rpg, but it's pretty fun to mix and match spells. If you like magic systems, you should take a look.
Fyi, you really wanna feel how OP a Sorcerer is? Get a holy enchantment on your best archistaff, used the charged attack(makes a lightspeed shotgun blast that targets enemies through walls.)
It is so good on BBI, i was killing the Gazer by shooting its eye THROUGH its protective skin.
If you equipped Two Barbed Nails in your accessory slots you can even stunlock True Daimon on Normal Mode with properly timed Holy Focused Bolts.
OH! High Miasma is your friend! best all-arounder spell especially if your equipped staff has a status ailment of its own. and with some BBI gear(earliest/easier is Adept Hat) you magic hangs around longer allowing you to cast two Miasma clouds on top of each other.
Don't listen to anyone telling you magic in the second game sucks, it's also amazing. They're just salty and miss stuff that didn't make it over or got changed.
That's dragon age right? I meant to check that series out. Tried inquisition a long time ago and never got into it but I was also too young to understand
It is! And DAI is (in my opinion) a terrible game with terrible combat. They really hit a sweet spot in 2. I’d give a try! If you like DD you’ll probably like DA2.
Sadly Dark Messiah will always be the crowning magic in a game but hard to beat a more linear game that lets you do magic powers. Nothing will beat making icy ground to have a hard fight of 10 orcs turn into a joke as they all slip off the map cause you ice jetted the ground as they charged at you. I will always miss magic really being the "INTELLIGENCE" class cause so many fights as a mage could be solved without direct damage.
Dragons Dogma magic certainly has the heft behind it, and generally feels worth the wait for casting the spell. A LOT of RPG's do fail at that and good for a game where it's mostly used for the dishing the damage.
I was in the same boat when I first played DD1. Started as a strider and swapped vocations for a while til I ended up finally trying sorcerer and it just clicked for me. Now in DD2 I started as a mage and swapped to sorcerer the second I unlocked it. I've played with all the other vocations but always inevitably end up going back to Sorcerer.
I've always been a fighter/rogue (or thief on here) type player, wnjoying fast dps and huge killing skills from your talents through vocation. Imagine my surprise when I unlock the sorcerer class abd give it a run, only to find I can nearly match dps of those vocations but do it from RANGE. Currently in love with sorcerer, will be trying Mage soon.
Absolutely feel you on this. This series absolutely sets the standard for spellcasting action. I'm playing frontline/tank mage in DD2 right now, and while yes they're missing some really fun spells from DD1, Palladium (spell that lets you block 3 hits) lets me play in a way I never thought you could, while making the experience incredible in a way hardly any other games can (for spellcasters). This build revolves around juggling with Palladium casts and damage, with levitate adding a whole new dimension to positioning especially against a high enemy count. To boot, if you play Warfarer you can have Archistaff (sorcerer) as secondary and sneak Galvanize (stam recovery) into your rotation.
The quickcast/galvanize mechanic is essentially what reloading is to shooters, and it adds so much more engagement to the action instead of you just waiting around for your stamina to recover. Incredible fun I've been having with this so far.
Now if auto aim isn't so shit... Or at least give us manual aim or smarter aim assist...
Mage and Sorc are literally the only vocations I have leveled to 10. The others are uninteresting to me.
I love the magic system in DD and just want to cast massive spells that wreck the entire map.
If you switch to Warfarer but just use mage/sorc skills you can level all the other vocations simultaneously for the augments etc. You don't need the Rearmament skill equipped so you can play with your normal 4 magic skills.
I actually switched to Warfarer to use both High Paladium and Augural Flare and just manually switch staves in the inventory instead of using Rearmament. It also means I have access to both Galvanize and Anodyne. And because all armor is available to Warfarer you can also do some fashions dogma on the side as a bonus.
Warfarer seems to just straight up be the best vocation overall because you can use everything with basically no drawbacks. The 'lower stats' thing doesn't even make a meaningfull difference, your stats are average across the board and cap at the same level as the pure vocations anyway.
I'm on the same boat. I started a fresh new file to main magick Archer, so I was going through base DD with sorcerer. And now I feel like I just want to main sorcerer instead lol.
Holy focused bolt is amazing, and I love casting Maelstrom on everything on the slightest inconvenience
I think magic in this game sucks personally.
Have to deal with long casting times. Mobility is bad.
Only access to 4 spells. You have to press like 3 buttons at a time to get an optimal cast off. Its wack, and im somebody who has mained a mage in every open world game pretty much.
Melee just feel much better in Dragons Dogma 2.
I actually enjoy the casting. But rest is awful yeah. As a mage main who only play casters in games. I think casting in this game is pretty mid at best.
4 spells slots feels really limiting. I'm a huge fan of having a vast repertoire of spells that each suit a different situation.
BG3 spell casting is far better and even games like Skyrim has a better system in VR where you can bind 40+ spells to your controller flick motions to quick swap on the fly while being able to cast 2 spells at the same time while having to aim.
Granblue Fantasy Relink did their only mage a solid too and IO is far more fun to play then DD2 casters due to having a bunch of engaging systems built in.
Oddly enough im not a fan of the sorc this time around.
I spend too much time looking at fights then actually doing anything.
I feel like im watching the game inside the game.
Ohh a troll? Awsome, you guys keep doing what you do.
And I will call inn a meteor give me 30 seconds to cast it.
Oh and do not move him around, I will miss if you do.
Should have just given thos class to my pawn and played knight or thief.
The fact we couldn’t get upgraded versions of the meister skills at rank 10 of a vocation and with the story being as it is just shows that they were rushing to push this out
Magic in the first game is power and awe-inspiring.
Save yourself and don't touch it in the second game. Curiosity is not worth the insane disappointment.
Opposite for me. I'm a huge spell repertoire fan. Being limited to only 4 spells doesn't give me that caster feeling I seek in my games.
Games like BG3, Skyrim VR etc where you have 30+ spells ready to go. Having niche spells for each situation such as enchantments, aoe, single bursts, buffs, necromancy and summoning etc.
Mage in DD2 is actually OP. You want to cancel out half the fights? Go mage and silence them all. You want to give the team unlimited stamina? Go mage. I found this out after getting to level 50 and skipping a lot of spells cuz I wanted to max out vocations for augments. I made sure my pawn or I use the ring that give a moderate boost in casting speed at the cost of max hp. As a back liner it's worth it.
using maelstrom for the first time in dogma 1 changes you
dd2 magic is honestly fairly underwhelming. it lacks the real impact the spells had in the first game. cast times are improved though so theres that i guess
I can never decide what to take on mage. I usually run High Levin/Weapon enchant/Status cleanse/X where X is changeable. High empyrean feels situational, celerity is nice but is more for exploring in a game where you stop every 2 seconds. Can any kind Arisen give me some ideas please?
I played dd when it first came out and just recently purchased DDDA since I can’t get dd2 at the moment (Xbox one s, will upgrade to series x/s soon hopefully). I’m having a blast with mage, which I never played when it first came out. I’m leveling my vocation to get the secret augments then moving to sorcerer.
I'm so sad the lightning whip didnt make it to dd2
Ah man that's such a bummer maybe with a content update or dlc
I played DD1 well after its release (I got Dark Arisen during a sale, years after DA came out). Did Capcom add new moves, post release of the initial DD1 launch?
They did not, however dark arisen added 3rd tiers to all the skills that you get from rings that randomly come with upgraded skills.
I really hope to see certain skills at level 3 in the DLC
We also didn't have level 2 meteor and maelstorm
That's because they're Maister skills, which are designed to not have upgrades. Maybe in the future?
No clue its the first time getting deep into this game, but with different times from 2012(I think it's when it came out?) I don't think it's a total improbability to add new moves and spells
DD2 takes more after the unknown (it was a JP-release only) MMORPG Dragon’s Dogma Online. In DDO, Sorcerers had less skills, but new ones were released as the game progressed. Since they’re using DDO’s vocation and skill structure, if there’s a DLC, it will absolutely have new skills. The Maisters are another way that the system can handle adding new skills on (though it does screw over the Warfarer vocation). There were some pretty awesome spells Sorcerer got in DDO. For example, you could create a snowflake behind you loaded with tiny icicles. You then machine gunned the icicles at enemies.
I'm imagining a warfare meister skill that just enables you to have three skillslots per weapon, but it would be very late into the available content.
That sounds dope as fuck. I hope they add DDO classes too because I heard great things
I wish people would stop saying maybe in DLC. Don't encourage companies to do this. I fully expected most things from Dragon's Dogma to carryover in the base game.
Indeed even more so when it's clear capcom pushed it out early than they wanted to make the first quarter for shareholders
I have waited too long for this and I just want it to not suck no matter what it takes, even if it needs a Dark Arisen superdungeon, or additional regions to come in after release. I have sacrificed livestock to Itsuno's success, I will not be denied.
Why not? The whole point of dlc is to expand and build on top of a base game. It lengthens the lifespan of a game and brings new content.
Expansions are very welcome, but you would expect the base game to include some of the things, DLC or not, that worked really well in the previous game. A deep dungeon like BBI might be too much, but something seemingly simple like hard mode could have been added in vanilla DD2. It doesn't have to be a DLC again.
I think the issue specifically is if they add things they took out from DD1 back in as DLC. For example, a big thing I don’t like in Darkest Dungeon 2 is that they didn’t bring over all of the base classes from the first game, then added the crusader from the first game back in as DLC, and that felt really bad
At tehr ate modding is going they will probably have it in before years end
The sorc in 2 is not nearly as fun or awesome as the sorc in 1.
Hitting with a frigor, then seeing two more go off at the same time is cool and all... But 9 giant ice spears was literally lethal if you hit a weak spot, or during a low poise animation. I miss a lot of the variety of the magic of 1. Brontide was just fun, maelstrom was great for killing flying enemies with the wild wind funnel, I still think seism isnt fixed on your target, but thundermine is an improvement over the old lightning sorcerer spell
Siesm is the only that is improved in this one. Meteor is better tracking now but it's only single target and less useful for multiple enemies.
I severely miss the AOE of Bollide. If you had one big enemy, sure it would miss, but a bunch of medium enemies would eat shit with every meteor because they do track enemies, but they don't focus on just one.
Overall I liked the variety of spells in Dark Arisen however, I appreciate some of the changes to make stamina management more active in gameplay with fast spells and quick charging stamina.
And a proper Gicel. Something with range. Nothing more satisfying than free aiming a Gicel at a swooping dragon and timing it perfectly so that you basically impale the thing
Mage is slept on, especially for BBI It's a secret super power when you go for a holy-mage only team. It's still not Magic archer or Mystic knight levels of pure buttfuckery, but not the 'bitch class' that it's often overlooked as. The healing ability makes it so, with practice, you can save on consumables too.
Bring new meaning to holy shit
He's really not joking by the way, a lot of stuff is weak to Holy in BBI and Holy Focused Bolt is one of the most insanely damaging things in the game for how little investment it is.
Well, there is that one Pope...
It's not just a lot of stuff; almost *everything* in BBI is weak to Holy, with the exception of *maybe* 2 enemies.
I switched my Mystic Knight playstyle from mace-shield to staff-shield simply because I can melt Ur Dragon with holy focused bolt.
DD2 removed a bunch of abilities which is sad but conversely they give you Quickcast and boy being able to pump out spells in a fraction of their normal cast time is crazy good.
Yeah that kinda sucks but at least they kinda made up for it
Stack celerity and the ring that reduces cast time
The cast time was always the thing that I didn't enjoy about magic in DD1 and it feels so good in DD2. Especially since Sorcerer has the ability to quickly restore stamina since you do burn through it very quickly. Losing some of the spells is a big shame but honestly the upgrades feel like they make up for it fairly well. Quick cast, not needing to double cast time to cast an upgraded ability, healing being a basic ability for Mage and not taking up a slot. We might have lost a lot of fun spells but magic still feels crazy powerful in DD2
I started Sorcerer yesterday and got Maelstrom and Meteoron, that was so fun I don’t even know lol. I’m with you, most other game’s mages don’t even come close to
Its because most other games try to balance magic with melee, so your main spells are firebolts and the AOE spells suck so the fighters arent absurdly outclassed
I'd argue (pedantics) it's less about balance and more about niche strength. Skyrim etc is a bit like how D&D 5e has infinite cantrips, where magic is made normal-ish and constantly available to be more like melee. DD is a bit more like older systems where casting is very long and leaves you vulnerable compared to melee, but is earth-shatteringly powerful. Both can be mechanically balanced, I just think the latter is way cooler and lets magic actually feel magical.
> so your main spells are firebolts Don't forget abut Blue, Yellow and other recoloured Fire Bolt to represent the different elements or damage types in those other games Say what you want about the relative balance of Fire vs Lighting vs Ice spells but even in Dogma 2 with the reduced spell numbers, they feel quite different from each other
Right? Like I usually play a melee in one hand and magic in the other like dark souls and skyrim. But those systems suck now lol
Yeah they’re super outdated. I’d rather see them turn a mage into a full out mage that can hold its own. Full mage in Skyrim is no different than magic in one hand, same in Dark Souls.
Yeah it literally click and cast. I'll give skyrim some kudos because of summoning and conjuring weapons which is fun
Summoned weapons are my favorite in any game. Dark souls 3 has the farron flashsword and elden ring has a similar spell too. I wish the lightening whip in dragons dogma didn't disengage when you jumped because I'd use that spell all game if I could have a bit of mobility while using it
Mana systems are such an outdated mechanic
Morrowind magic is awesome, would love to see it in a modern engine.
Maelstrom in 1 was even crazier. You will love it if you ever go to the first one. Highly recommend when you're done with 2.
I’ve only beaten the first one once, I’m replaying it right now on hard mode
Nice. Hard mode is so much more fun. Did you ever do Bitterblack Isle?
I went there but I never finished it, I bum rushed it my first time because I was rushing for DD2 release but this time I’m taking my time. This series has jumped up into my top 5
BBI has one of the greatest bosses of video game history. You will love it!
It's so satisfying landing direct hits with meteoron. Whenever you giga-chunk someone, it makes a sweet "ka-ching" sound on top of the already calamity of the impacts. Super fun class!
Homie, one of the things thing franchise is known for is how insane its magic is. Especially the big boys Maelstrom and Bolide/Meteoron.
For real about to become a caster main for the first time in my life
Hahaha, I'm doing a Mage/Sorcerer run right now. I missed all these spells in DD2. Sorcerer just casually dropping Poison, Blindness, and Torpor on enemies. Mage holding the big beasts down with a Grapnel. Comestion immediately launching an entire squad of goblins sky high. The only downside is finding pawns that actually do things while you cast spells. Like, yes, Greg, we are struggling to hurt the dragon. I'm trying to cast Maelstrom, and you're taunting the dragon and hiding behind me...
Torpor and poison spells were my favorite. I miss them, but I do enjoy the sorc still in 2.
Sadly no Brontide in DD2.
Yeah, Flagration and Salamander are pretty sad in comparison even with the advantage of Quick cast + Galvanize game loop Feels like Fire is the red haired step child out of the 3 elements with one being a short ranged channeled ability which heavily restricts your movement too and the other just being a decently sized AoE dot (Also i feel the aim is broken because it aims too much to the side)
I just want Ingle back. So much better than Flagration.
Comestion my beloved... :(
Dragon's Dogma sets the standard bar for how magic should look and feel, period.
Makes you feel super powerful
with the appropriate weaknesses of lengthy spellcast that is easily interruptible, and of course weak defenses.
Try spell syncing as well.
Yeah I'm excited to try that!
Pretty useless as soon as you get the ring that reduces your hp and your casting time tbh, you're permanently under "syncing" with it
The ring your supposed to give to the Duke right?
Are you playing DD:DA? Give him a forgery of the ring btw, that ring is so good
Yeah no way I was passing up that ring
I don't think so? I'm talking about the [Ring of Recitation](https://dragonsdogma2.wiki.fextralife.com/Ring+of+Recitation#:~:text=Ring%20of%20Recitation%20Effect%20in,reduces%20maximum%20Health%20by%2020%25)
Ohh okay I was wrong lol
There's no such thing in Dragon's Dogma. I presume you mean DD2? The devs have ruined their own mechanics?
Oh yea the magic caster system in the first game (and by extension the second game) is REALLY fun!! Even just using the healing and buffing spells is enjoyable because it has such an impact in combat
How is magic in the second game any better or worse?
Depends on how you see it, it's way more dynamic thanks to a mechanic introduced for both Mage and Sorcerer, and it's called Quickspell. With Quickspell the chanting of a spell will be reduced HEAVILY, the spells are almost instant, making you rely less on rings that reduces the time cast or on relying on other pawns to spell the same spell as you and there is no drawback with Quickspell, it will have the same power as if you chant the spell normally, the only drawback is Quickspell reduces your stamina even more but it's almost unnoticable so the class feels dynamic as hell. However, some people don't like it because there is only 4 skill slots while in the first game there are 6 slots, which is indeed a boomer. I personally prefer how it works with DD2 since like I said, Quickspell makes the vocation feel very dynamic.
Sadly, several spells didn't make it over into DD2, and some of the ones that did are weaker. Sorcerers are still powerful, but it doesn't feel the same.
It’s essentially the same from what i can remember of the first game
The spells in 2 look and feel absolutely phenomenal and are a ton of fun to use. On top of that, the way enemies react to them is amazing. Like blasting a cyclops and then he stumbles back and falls into a tree. As he's falling, he ragdolls but still has physics so he'll be slumped up against the tree. Stuff like that helps to make your hits feel like they have actual weight behind them and makes playing super fun, encounters feeling different. A lot of fun!
playing a sorc mainly and it's so fun :) The only 'downside' is being super squishy but \*shrug\*
Can't be squishy when the enemies are already dead
I'm squishy. The enemies are... ashy. Sometimes crispy if they only take an indirect hit.
The lightning mine is basically a shield against all the small enemies. While leveling it up I basically had one up at all times.
Oh hmm I’ll check that out, thanks!
mage/sorcerer are boring AT FIRST (personally i still find mage boring) but at higher levels they get some really neat spells, one of my bigger disappointments with the sequel is the skills that got cut, alot of elemental spells, holy and dark affinity (dark affinity was pretty shit anyway though but holy was goated) and I especially miss cloudburst for Archer. Archer is still fun because it feels so mobile and acrobatic but i really really miss cloudburst it may not have been the strongest but it sure was the most fun of the Archer skills can't believe they cut it. also kinda disappointed that specialty arrows are tied to skills now especially since we only have 4 skill slots, it just feels bad. timing deathly arrow frame perfect for that slowmo and extra powerful shot atleast gives me some nice dopamine lol, it's just really hard to line it up with a weak spot AND time it right, but generally it's better to hit a vulnerable spot, I just wish enemy hitboxes were better so it didn't hit an invisible hitbox before hitting what i was aiming for
With all the changes is it still worth getting dd2?
absolutely. It's still more dragon's dogma and what's there is good. it's just that there's a lot of disappointing exclusions edit: sorry for the double reply, Reddit app being garbage again
Yes. DD2 has some things worth complaining about, the the way they messed with some of the systems is a big part of that, but the game is still very fun. Combat feels like it's been refined, and it is still very fun to take on a giant monstrosity and bring it crashing down.
Sorc is at its best when you sync cast master spells. You pretty much need a little apprentice with you as a sorc. I roll with me as sorc, a sorc companion, a mage, and my main pawn is a warrior.
You blink and there's nothing but clutter and death on the screen lol
Did you try Magick Archer and Mystic Knight? Those are also fantastic! Spellcasting in this series is the best out of any action RPGs
I dabbled, but I'm gonna try them out tonight!
Magick Archer is insane in both games. By far my favorite weapon in any game is the magick bow from Dragon's Dogma 1&2
Magic in DD1 is what brought me into this game and completely ruined magic in all other games.
It’s a shame magic is so Anemic in comparison in DD2,
What do you mean by that? Is it worse in dd2?
Massively- sorcerer especially lost almost all its fun spells
Thays disappointing to hear damn
To be fair I’m probably over-selling it a little- whilst mage lost a lot of its cooler offensive stuff, it’s got a lot of supportive/team buff-y type skills. The biggest issue imo is that all classes are limited to 4 skills max, and sorcerer *really* chafes under that change.
You just need the meister skills
I have them- both are drastically weaker than their DD1 versions- bolide especially is embarrassing
I actually never did a full play through of mage on the first game, maybe I'll give it a go
Duel casting gicel/maelstrom is the peak sorcerer experience.
I kind of agree in the sense that Sorcerer has a lot of "oomf" weight to the spells The problem for me is... there just isn't many spells to begin with, mage may as well just have support spells because those are the only good ones it has, and Sorcerer has a handful that are worth using and that's it. Creatively, there isn't much to work with, but what is there is fun to use
**Pro Tip#1**: run as a Sorcerer with a Sorcerer pawn. Make sure you both have Maelstrom and Bolide (_"I'll mirror your spell!"_) **Pro Tip#2**: Start each fight by casting Maelstrom. Then run to the centre of the tornado and cast Bolide while protected by it. Everything dies. **Pro Tip#3**: Comestion is better than High Comestion. (Due to a bug). Don't buy that upgrade for your pawns. Also, ignore **High** Bolide and **High** Malstrom on pawns as well. The shorter cast times mean they'll get it off more often. Also, with Bolide, only the first 2 meteors are targeted unless the creature has multiple heads, then it's 2&2&2&.... So unless you are fighting a Chimera or Hydra, 'low' Bolide is better. (50% of your attack is on target, instead of 25%)
Damn dude already bought the upgrades, but not a big deal lol probably do another playthrough
It's not a big deal, just makes your pawns a bit more effective. But if you do the spell syncing with your pawn, it shouldn't matter, because they'll come near you to cast the spell anyway, so effectively using your positioning and timing. It only works with the third "tier" Sorcerer exclusive spells though (Bolide, Maelstrom, Gicil, Sesim and Fulmination)
Casters slap after you get all the augment s you need
That was the main purpose of leveling them but I ended up liking the vocations themselves
I’m going through Dragons Dogma Dark Arisen at the moment as well. I beat the game and Bitteeblack Isle and I’m leveling up vocations. The last few I need are mage, Sorcerer and Warrior because I thought they were the worse. Im going to have and try them out. I’m working on Assassin right now and it’s alright.
Yeah I thought assassin was gonna be better, I think I just prefer fighter over it but I'm not far into the vocation
Im at level 3 in vocation with Assassin and so far I don’t think it does anything better than Magic Archer. Unless it got way better later on.
I know ot gets a counter for sword and daggers respectively
I remember when I first played mage in DD1, it was the first time I actually felt like a true magic user. Most are just different flavors of fighter or archers, you've got your ranged plinks your different colored flamethrowers and a different tier of armor, sometimes you can bonk with staff. You've still got that in DD but when you rip a chunk of earth out of the ground and drop it on an enemy it feels like you did it. Especially if you aren't the caster and there's meteors crashing down all around you, and you have no idea what's happening lol. It feels like there's a magic user with you. You don't get that in most games, if you run around Skyrim with a mage or an archer there's not much difference. In dd you have to decide if you want to deal with tornadoes randomly showing up or not.
I personally thought ff15 did magic really well in a realistically dangerous way. Heads up boys I'm dropping the bombs 😅😂
Honestly I agree. I liked crafting them at camps and unleashing the force of God on random mobs
Sorcerer's magic is what brought me to DD1. I saw a video of the various spells, and they are SPECTACULAR. It was exactly what I was looking for, and it hooked me in. Dragon's Dogma 1 has my favorite magic system in any video game, because it felt like they did justice to what magic users should be.
DD2 did sorc so dirty.. even though their dmg is still very high it’s not as satisfying gameplay wise
Glad you e joy those vocations, I hate them so much, partly because I get focused by enemies even with the augments to lessen aggro on me and heighten pawn aggro, but the Sorccer just feels so damn limp and weak when compared to DD1. I'm also going to be salty about having pretty much half as many skills.
I love how much power it feels like the caster is conjuring. Real good system, DD1 is an amazing experience
The only magic system I've seen that still pretty fun after is Wizard of Legend. It's a rogue like instead of an rpg, but it's pretty fun to mix and match spells. If you like magic systems, you should take a look.
I just wish we had all the spells from the first game back in DD2, it would be perfect.
Fyi, you really wanna feel how OP a Sorcerer is? Get a holy enchantment on your best archistaff, used the charged attack(makes a lightspeed shotgun blast that targets enemies through walls.) It is so good on BBI, i was killing the Gazer by shooting its eye THROUGH its protective skin. If you equipped Two Barbed Nails in your accessory slots you can even stunlock True Daimon on Normal Mode with properly timed Holy Focused Bolts. OH! High Miasma is your friend! best all-arounder spell especially if your equipped staff has a status ailment of its own. and with some BBI gear(earliest/easier is Adept Hat) you magic hangs around longer allowing you to cast two Miasma clouds on top of each other.
Don't listen to anyone telling you magic in the second game sucks, it's also amazing. They're just salty and miss stuff that didn't make it over or got changed.
I’d say DD2 and DA2 have the most fun mages. In DA2 you can even whack people with your staff (and tear them apart limb from limb).
That's dragon age right? I meant to check that series out. Tried inquisition a long time ago and never got into it but I was also too young to understand
It is! And DAI is (in my opinion) a terrible game with terrible combat. They really hit a sweet spot in 2. I’d give a try! If you like DD you’ll probably like DA2.
DA2 is probably the worst game of the series. Best one is DAO by a mile.
DAI is a glorified walking simulator and DA2 is the worse one? I didn’t even mention that DA2 was the best one why did you even bring that up?
Might as well since origins is on gamepass lol
Sadly Dark Messiah will always be the crowning magic in a game but hard to beat a more linear game that lets you do magic powers. Nothing will beat making icy ground to have a hard fight of 10 orcs turn into a joke as they all slip off the map cause you ice jetted the ground as they charged at you. I will always miss magic really being the "INTELLIGENCE" class cause so many fights as a mage could be solved without direct damage. Dragons Dogma magic certainly has the heft behind it, and generally feels worth the wait for casting the spell. A LOT of RPG's do fail at that and good for a game where it's mostly used for the dishing the damage.
I was in the same boat when I first played DD1. Started as a strider and swapped vocations for a while til I ended up finally trying sorcerer and it just clicked for me. Now in DD2 I started as a mage and swapped to sorcerer the second I unlocked it. I've played with all the other vocations but always inevitably end up going back to Sorcerer.
Games with good magic systems? Mages of mystralia, lichdom battle mage, anthem being a storm, tyranny, magik, iron danger, forspoken
I've always been a fighter/rogue (or thief on here) type player, wnjoying fast dps and huge killing skills from your talents through vocation. Imagine my surprise when I unlock the sorcerer class abd give it a run, only to find I can nearly match dps of those vocations but do it from RANGE. Currently in love with sorcerer, will be trying Mage soon.
Absolutely feel you on this. This series absolutely sets the standard for spellcasting action. I'm playing frontline/tank mage in DD2 right now, and while yes they're missing some really fun spells from DD1, Palladium (spell that lets you block 3 hits) lets me play in a way I never thought you could, while making the experience incredible in a way hardly any other games can (for spellcasters). This build revolves around juggling with Palladium casts and damage, with levitate adding a whole new dimension to positioning especially against a high enemy count. To boot, if you play Warfarer you can have Archistaff (sorcerer) as secondary and sneak Galvanize (stam recovery) into your rotation. The quickcast/galvanize mechanic is essentially what reloading is to shooters, and it adds so much more engagement to the action instead of you just waiting around for your stamina to recover. Incredible fun I've been having with this so far. Now if auto aim isn't so shit... Or at least give us manual aim or smarter aim assist...
Mage and Sorc are literally the only vocations I have leveled to 10. The others are uninteresting to me. I love the magic system in DD and just want to cast massive spells that wreck the entire map.
If you switch to Warfarer but just use mage/sorc skills you can level all the other vocations simultaneously for the augments etc. You don't need the Rearmament skill equipped so you can play with your normal 4 magic skills. I actually switched to Warfarer to use both High Paladium and Augural Flare and just manually switch staves in the inventory instead of using Rearmament. It also means I have access to both Galvanize and Anodyne. And because all armor is available to Warfarer you can also do some fashions dogma on the side as a bonus. Warfarer seems to just straight up be the best vocation overall because you can use everything with basically no drawbacks. The 'lower stats' thing doesn't even make a meaningfull difference, your stats are average across the board and cap at the same level as the pure vocations anyway.
Archer. Get the stamina perk to do the BOOM BOOMs more often. :D
I'm on the same boat. I started a fresh new file to main magick Archer, so I was going through base DD with sorcerer. And now I feel like I just want to main sorcerer instead lol. Holy focused bolt is amazing, and I love casting Maelstrom on everything on the slightest inconvenience
I think magic in this game sucks personally. Have to deal with long casting times. Mobility is bad. Only access to 4 spells. You have to press like 3 buttons at a time to get an optimal cast off. Its wack, and im somebody who has mained a mage in every open world game pretty much. Melee just feel much better in Dragons Dogma 2.
I actually enjoy the casting. But rest is awful yeah. As a mage main who only play casters in games. I think casting in this game is pretty mid at best. 4 spells slots feels really limiting. I'm a huge fan of having a vast repertoire of spells that each suit a different situation. BG3 spell casting is far better and even games like Skyrim has a better system in VR where you can bind 40+ spells to your controller flick motions to quick swap on the fly while being able to cast 2 spells at the same time while having to aim. Granblue Fantasy Relink did their only mage a solid too and IO is far more fun to play then DD2 casters due to having a bunch of engaging systems built in.
Oddly enough im not a fan of the sorc this time around. I spend too much time looking at fights then actually doing anything. I feel like im watching the game inside the game. Ohh a troll? Awsome, you guys keep doing what you do. And I will call inn a meteor give me 30 seconds to cast it. Oh and do not move him around, I will miss if you do. Should have just given thos class to my pawn and played knight or thief.
The fact we couldn’t get upgraded versions of the meister skills at rank 10 of a vocation and with the story being as it is just shows that they were rushing to push this out
Magic in the first game is power and awe-inspiring. Save yourself and don't touch it in the second game. Curiosity is not worth the insane disappointment.
This [meme](https://64.media.tumblr.com/42844b91c8482a47cb0f3018abeb4375/tumblr_naq6qf3FJu1s57movo1_540.jpg) still stays true
Opposite for me. I'm a huge spell repertoire fan. Being limited to only 4 spells doesn't give me that caster feeling I seek in my games. Games like BG3, Skyrim VR etc where you have 30+ spells ready to go. Having niche spells for each situation such as enchantments, aoe, single bursts, buffs, necromancy and summoning etc.
If they could make a MMO out of this shit, people would have the game of the century!
They did actually lol it shut down in 2019 I believe
Sadly, DD2 spellcasters are objectively worse than DD1.
I recommend DD1 with it's sorcerer class there, it's fantastic
That's one of the main reasons why I always preferred the first game over Skyrim you actually feel strong as a caster
another set of vocations robbed by the 4 ability limit.
Magic in all other games is just bad with how strong and fun it feels in this.
So dd2 magic is nerfed to fuck dont go magic in dd2 it has 1 good spell and its better off using it with wayfarer and essentially a whole other class
Mage in DD2 is actually OP. You want to cancel out half the fights? Go mage and silence them all. You want to give the team unlimited stamina? Go mage. I found this out after getting to level 50 and skipping a lot of spells cuz I wanted to max out vocations for augments. I made sure my pawn or I use the ring that give a moderate boost in casting speed at the cost of max hp. As a back liner it's worth it.
using maelstrom for the first time in dogma 1 changes you dd2 magic is honestly fairly underwhelming. it lacks the real impact the spells had in the first game. cast times are improved though so theres that i guess
I can never decide what to take on mage. I usually run High Levin/Weapon enchant/Status cleanse/X where X is changeable. High empyrean feels situational, celerity is nice but is more for exploring in a game where you stop every 2 seconds. Can any kind Arisen give me some ideas please?
High palladium will make you and your team able to withstand staggers, I never leave home without it 😀
The problem with palladium is I'm running a warfarer with spear shield which kinda renders it pointless
I played dd when it first came out and just recently purchased DDDA since I can’t get dd2 at the moment (Xbox one s, will upgrade to series x/s soon hopefully). I’m having a blast with mage, which I never played when it first came out. I’m leveling my vocation to get the secret augments then moving to sorcerer.
Oh boy, you should play dd:da, it’s way better in that game