Dragon’s Dogma 2: Guide to Pawn Inclinations and Specializations
Pawns are your trusty AI party members who will accompany you all throughout your journey in Dragon’s Dogma 2. Every Pawn acts mainly independently while following simple commands like “Go!” “Wait!” “To Me!” and “Help!” although you cannot directly command them to use a skill or spell at your discretion. The game provides a way of changing your Pawn’s AI behavior to suit your combat and utility needs in the party. This mechanic is called Pawn Inclinations, and understanding how it works will make your party far more efficient in combat. In this guide, we will elaborate on the types of personalities and specializations and how you can change these values at your discretion.
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What Are Pawn Inclinations?
Your Pawns will have 4 different personalities and means of approaching combat in the game. The Kindhearted Personality will make Pawns act more passively and use support-oriented skills. They will prioritize actions like regaining your stamina, carrying knocked-out Pawns to you, and catching you when you fall from a great height. Pawns with the Straightforward Personality will instead prioritize getting into the middle of combat and drawing enemy attention to themselves. They will play more aggressively and deal as much damage as they can. Pawns with the Simple Personality will explore more independently and will gather items for you, while Calm Personality Pawns will play more defensively, only attacking when they feel that they have an advantage.
This mechanic is important as it dictates how the AI will act in different situations; it would be troublesome if the Mage is given the Straightforward trait and gets too close to enemies or if the Fighter got the Kindhearted trait and focused on dealing out heals to your party. Getting the right Pawn with the right Inclination will go a long way in making combat encounters easier to deal with.
Pawn Specializations
Specializations are passive traits that Pawns can have, which provide unique utilities for the Arisen’s party. There are five known Specializations: Chirugeon, Logistician, Forager, Woodland Wordsmith, and Hawker.
Chirugeons will use curative items on you and your Pawns if they have any healing items with them. Logisticians will automatically craft consumables and other items for you and will redistribute them between party members. Foragers will highlight the locations of certain items for you. Woodland Wordsmiths will help you understand the Elvish language, and Hawkers will buy items from your inventory for gold. Both Inclinations and Specializations can work together to create great synergies that will greatly help you in your quest.
How to change Inclinations and Specializations
To change your Pawn’s Inclination, visit the Pawn Guild in any major city and speak to the vendor inside. These shops sell Rift Incense of different Inclination types that can be used in your camp to change your Pawn’s personality, but these cost Rift Crystals to use. If you’re tight on Rift Crystals, you can also buy Ambivalent Rift Incense to randomly roll a new Inclination for your Pawn, as each costs only 500 Rift Crystals. For Specializations, some tomes are one-time-use items to give your Pawn a Specialization of your choice. You can obtain these tomes as quest rewards from different NPCs, so keep questing until you get one.
Best Inclinations per Vocation and Specialization
With certain Vocations, you want your Pawns to be as effective with their skill usage as possible so that they will always be helpful in and out of combat. For Mages and Sorcerers, you’ll want the Kindhearted Personality as these vocations have access to the most support skills with elemental buffs for weapons and healing magic. For Fighters and Warriors, get one with the Straightforward Personality to maximize their presence in enemy groups, and for Archers and Thieves, give them the Calm Personality to make them fight in range more often or for Thieves to make them utilize their evasion.
As for Specializations, give the Simple Pawn a Logistician scroll to make them craft with the materials they have gathered. For Mages, the Kindhearted personality with the Chirurgeon trait is a great combo to further play into their role as a support. If you have extra room in your party, get any Pawn with the Woodland Wordsmith, as they can passively translate all Elvish speech for you, giving you access to quests in the Sacred Arbor.
