Despite having a rocky launch, Dragon’s Dogma 2 is living up to the hype as a solid RPG title and a worthy follow up to its 2012 predecessor. With that said, the game pretty much throws you into the thick of things and leaves you to figure out a lot of mechanics on your own. Among these is the gifting system, which we will try to explain in this guide.
Complete Gifting Guide | What to Gift to NPCs
Gifting stuff to various characters in the game will allow you to build up your affinity with them. There are a bunch of benefits to doing so, such as the following:
- NPCs can show up at your home and give you presents
- Stores will start discounting their wares
NPCs that have a high affinity will also start blushing, making it fairly obvious if you have already maxed out your affection with a certain individual.
How to Give Gifts to an NPC
In order to give an NPC a present, all you have to do is initiate dialogue with them. Once you have engaged in a conversation, press the “Give Gift” button, which will vary depending on your key bindings or controller of choice.
This will open up your Inventory, allowing you to scroll through all of your items and choose what you want to give them. That’s pretty much all there is to it.
Figuring Out What an NPC Likes
If you are wondering what an NPC would actually like to receive, you can get a few hints by opening the menu and going into the History tab. Here, you will find the NPC Logbook, which lists down everybody you have met so far.
Upon selecting the NPC Logbook, you can scroll through all of the characters that you have met and see various details about them. Among these will be their “Likes”, which will give you a vague hint of what gifts they prefer.
Unfortunately, this will require a bit of trial and error as you will reveal their preferences by basically giving them random stuff and watching how they react to it.
There’s no other way around this if you are trying to discover this stuff on your own. To help you out a bit, though, we have a list of some NPCs in the game and how to best maximize their affinity.
NPCs & Their Preferences
Before going through the list, it should be noted that these will only be general suggestions on what to give them. There is a wide variety of gifts that will be more or less effective than others, and it really just requires a lot of experimentation to figure out the most optimized choices.
Also, not every NPC in the game is going to be particularly helpful even with maxed affinity, so we will be leaving out some characters to save time. Plus, even some of the beneficial ones are still largely untested, so they might not be mentioned here.
Some characters also lose affinity over time if you don’t pamper them on a regular basis or you do certain negative actions around them, so keep that in mind if you’re trying to get discounts!
Some Noteworthy Characters in Vernworth
NOTE: Some of the characters mentioned, such as Mariette, are not always in the immediate region given and can be found wandering around elsewhere or somewhere nearby as well.
- Philbert (offers discounts) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Expensive Items
- Bjorn (offers discounts) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Expensive Items
- Roderick (offers discounts) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Veronika (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Expensive Items
- Glenna (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Expensive Items
- Celina (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Beetles, Fresh or Ripened Fruit
- Mariette (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Sella (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Rare Potions, Spell Books
Some Noteworthy Characters in the Borderwatch Outpost
- Montgomery (offers discounts / gives a tome) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Kassandra (offers discounts) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Zofie (gives gold ore) – Flowers, could be either Beautiful or Adorable Items.
Some Noteworthy Characters in Bakbattahl
- Sara (offers discounts / gives gold ore) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Fresh or Ripened Fruit, Beetles
- Isaac (offers discounts) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Awaran (offers discounts) – Expensive Items, Uncommon Monster Parts
- Bodas (offers discounts / gives gold ore) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Anemone (offers discounts) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Whitney (offers discounts) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Rare Potions, Spell Books
Some Noteworthy Characters in the Sacred Arbor
- Kough (gives a tome) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Fresh or Ripened Fruit, Beetles
- Grisha (offers discounts) – Flowers (not entirely sure of other likes)
- Eldart (offers discounts) – Monster Parts (not entirely sure of other likes)
Some Noteworthy Characters in Checkpoint Rest Town
- Ibrahim (offers discounts) – Expensive Items, Uncommon Monster Parts.
- Morris (offers discounts) – Expensive Items, Uncommon Monster Parts
- Celeste (offers discounts / gives gold ore) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Fresh or Ripened Fruit, Beetles
- Georg (offers discounts / gives fuligin ore) – Likely Monster Parts and Equipment
Other Noteworthy Wandering NPCs / Merchants
- Zonna (offers discounts) – Flowers, Raw Ores, Crystals, Fresh or Ripened Fruit, Beetles
- Arletta (offers discounts / gives an onyx) – Flowers (not entirely sure of other likes)
- Folkes (gives an exquisite roborant / unsure about discounts) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
- Dudley (unsure about discounts / sells the Fulminous Shield) – Monster Parts, Equipment, Rare Potions, Spell Books
And that concludes this quick guide on how gifting works in Dragon’s Dogma 2, as well as a few significant NPCs that you can benefit from when you increase their affinity. While you’re here, we also have a guide on how to decrease affinity in Dragon’s Dogma 2, which covers the complete opposite of everything you just learned!
