Larian Studios Forums Divinity 2 - Ego Draconis (English) Divinity 2 - Ego Draconis Looking for Tips and Tricks for first time players

Some friends and I are doing a game club thing where we each pick a game for everyone to play each month. It's my turn next month, and I picked Divinity 2, since it's still my favorite game. I finished this month's game early and so thought I'd play through it now and put together a list of stuff they might want to know, from which choices affect what and which if any are optimal (in spoiler text ofc) to stuff like "mindread everyone" and "you can't buy a house, it's a scam, but it still might be worthwhile if you do FoV."
Which brings me to my question: What are some tips, tricks, things to be sure you don't miss, skills/techniques that seem cool but are actually trash or hidden gems, etc that you know of and think would be useful to have as a first time player?

I'm probably a bit out of date in spite of having played fairly recently as I still haven't un-learnt some of the "truisms" from Ego Draconis which became less of a big deal in DKS, e.g. the extreme rarity of the very useful malachite gems, which become not plentiful but less rare by the end; by which time I still had most of those I'd acquired early in the game! So don't just sell them for easy money but don't hoard them either...

I assume it's still the case that dual-wielding is better than a two-hander as you get more enchantments that way.

You can jump slightly higher if you backflip, which can be useful if you fancy doing some rock-climbing.

I dunno, you'd think I'd remember all sorts of stuff as it's only been a couple of months. Hopefully Raze will notice as he's a walking encyclopaedia.

Dual wielding is the most effective melee technique in DKS / D2:DC (in the original release there was debate whether dual wielding or two handed was better).

Mages should dual wield one handed weapons with the largest magic damage bonus (and/or enchantment) available.

Early in the game a bow can help a mage conserve mana, and a warrior draw opponents in, rather than rushing into the middle of a group (which helps even more than getting a little extra damage).

Rangers are very effective. While I don't normally bother with temporary boost skills, when it becomes available, Way of the Ranger makes normal attacks do significantly more damage, and increases the effective range of the Splitting Arrows skill (which, even without the boost, at close range is a die button for normal opponents, and helps a lot with close to mid range groups).

class question! (mage advice and links to related topics)

Stat Point Distribution: What's the best way? (for a mage)

Dragon Knight Saga FAQ/Guide

In general, if you mindread first, then combat and delay turning in quests as long as feasible, it will maximize experience. It isn't necessary to do so, however (it can help with levelling early in the game), and you'll need to turn in at least a few quests to be able to survive combat.

If you start dying a lot, there is probably another area you can explore first, non-combat quests you can do, or a change of tactics or an upgrade of equipment or skills could help.

I'll second the advice about not hording malachite gems, especially if you quicksave at malachite veins (or turning in certain quests in the FoV section of the game) and reload to try to get 2 or 3 gems from each. I ended DKS with 65 malachite gems (38 from FoV quests), using 2 for level 10 healing aura enchantments and 2 for a quest.

Periodic saves are a good idea, especially before entering new areas, etc.

There aren't any timed quests (that I recall), so even if you are urged to do something, feel free to delay. In general the main plot quests should be obvious, and it is better to do the side quests and explore before advancing main plot quests.

There are a couple cases where NPCs are looking for items or information; generally it is better if you check out such things yourself first, before turning in the related quest to the NPC.

The Healing skill (at level 15) is handy, but you probably only need level 1. There are a couple other skills like that (such as Evade) where the first level is good, but additional levels have less of an effect per skill point, so it may not make sense to boost further if it isn't integral to the character build. Others should be boosted as soon as possible (like Ranger Stealth and Ranger Strength for an archer, or IMO Lockpick for any character). Mana Efficiency is also useful for any character.

When available, the creature is more aggressive, helpful and gets in the way less with a mage head, or (less so) a ranger head. Some people that play ranged characters like the warrior head for the creature (for the Fatality skill), but I found he sometimes just ran off after a ranged opponent and attracted attention from opponents that were otherwise not involved in the fight yet (though that mostly affects large areas with spread out groups of opponents). Even before you can upgrade the head, though, the creature is easily a net benefit.

One specific case is to mindread Beatrice (I think), the quest-giver in High Hall, before accepting or embarking on her quest otherwise the bonus reward never becomes available. Having said that, since DKS reworked it, the quest is such a bugger to complete that it's only do-able late in the game by which time you'll probably have plenty of gems anyway!


Oh, definitely. I do this with every game, even the ones that try to mandate One True Save and no others.

There's something rattling around in my head about the ideal time or the best order in which to do certain quests but I don't have a clear enough mind at this time of day to remember what exactly.

Thanks guys, these tips are just what I was looking for. I didn't realize they made it less necessary to hoard malachite gems, I was going to advise them to hold on to every one they got. I was also wondering, is there any way to reset stat points, even if it's with console commands? I remember being frustrated at wanting to completely switch up my build and being stymied by stat differences, and since then I've kept str/dex/int pretty balanced for flexibility, but it would be nice to be able to spec fully into something.

In DKS / D2:DC the equipment only has level requirements, so you can simply change equipment to suit whatever build you want, use enchantments, charms, extra potions, etc, to compensate for stats you may lack, and then adjust your stats as you level. Mana Efficiency also compensates for a lower mana amount/regeneration (so warriors and rangers don't need to boost intelligence/spirit for enough mana to summon the creature, use the healing spell and combat skills), etc.

I had no trouble playing an archer on nightmare difficulty, not distributing any stat points after level 15. Even without the unused stat points (145 at the end of the game, shortly after hitting level 47; I also had 87 unused skill points then), I could have easily adapted to a warrior or mage build throughout the game (in fact I started off doing an unarmed warrior / archer combo, and then switch to an archer full time after a few levels).


However, the developer mode version cheat window can be used to adjust stats (How do I use the debug to give me stat points?).

To directly set stats, you can use the setstat command, using the form below (to adjust spirit, use the original stat name Stamina).
setstat Strength 80

To just add stat/skill books, the following are listed not quite half way down the 'give' list, after a long section of equipment, and before a bunch of formula.
IT_Books_StatBook
IT_Books_SkillBook
IT_Books_DragonSkillBook