Dragonsplague is a disease in Dragon’s Dogma 2 that despite being hard to spot, can have devastating consequences if left unchecked. Unassuming players may rest at an inn only to be greeted with an ominous cutscene and an entire village of dead NPCs, potentially ruining their only save file.

The disease can only be contracted by pawns and can get it by coming into contact with another infected pawn in your party. Even your main pawn is not safe. The very first time you summon a pawn with Dragonsplague, the game will warn you via a tutorial pop-up, but it will not mention it on repeated summons and does not appear as a status effect. Thankfully, it is possible to identify infected pawns before they reach the infamous final stage and preventing it will be much easier than dealing with the fallout.

How To Identify Dragonsplagued Pawns

The fastest way to identify afflicted pawns will be by looking for the Dragonsplague’s telltale flickering red eyes. However, this might not be easy if you have pawns with naturally bright red eyes. If you’re attentive, the infected may also clutch their head in pain while idling around or even mention feeling unwell.

Sometimes, infected pawns may also disobey your commands in battle and even talk back. As the Arisen’s biggest fans, any sign of dissent against you should be taken with utmost seriousness and should be dismissed or dispose of them as soon as possible to prevent further infections.

Dead Pawns Can’t Get Sick

There is no way to cure Dragonsplague except by killing the infected pawn or passing it on to another pawn. If your main pawn is infected, killing them and bringing them back from the Rift will immediately cleanse them of the ailment.

It’s also possible for your main pawn to cure themselves by passing it on to a pawn in another player’s world, but that method is unreliable at best and killing is much faster and efficient. If you have a suspicion that one of your pawns may be infected, it’s always easier to be safe than sorry and throw everyone into the water.

Everyone’s Dead, What Now?

So you didn’t notice the signs, your pawn has decimated the village, and multiple key NPCs are dead. If you decide to forge on instead of resetting your entire save file, you can revive villagers with Wakestones or an Eternal Wakestone obtainable from the Sphinx once per playthrough. Take caution that if the morgues hit their capacity limit, any extra corpses can be deleted permanently from the world.

Barring the above options, it is still entirely possible to complete the main objective of the game, albeit with a hefty cost of potentially locking yourself out of several key quest lines.

Dragon's Dogma 2

Publisher: Capcom

Developer: Capcom

Release Date: 2024-03-22

PlayStation 5, Steam, Xbox Series X|S

Dragon’s Dogma is a single player, narrative driven action-RPG series that challenges the players to choose their own experience – from the appearance of their Arisen, their vocation, their party, how to approach different situations and more. Now, in this long-awaited sequel, the deep, explorable fantasy world of Dragon’s Dogma 2 awaits.