[SPOILERS] Any lore reason as to why...

[Naewyng]

... killing a drake doesn't require the last hit to specifically come from the arisen, and specifically target the heart of the drake?

In dd1 they made a big deal out of this, and it was why the Arisen was needed in the first place, because regular people couldn't kill dragons regardless of how much they tried. And indeed, if you just let your pawns fight, they can't kill the drakes in dd1, but they can kill them in dd2...

[RollClassic]

Because then Trickster wouldn't be able to kill drakes?

[SadPlatty©]

Haven't confirmed if it is the same for the lesser dragons, but if only drakes can just be killed, I would suggest then it is because "Drakes" and "Dragons" are not exactly the same species in a "Fantasy" setting (they are in the sense that a Monitor Lizard and Bearded Dragon are both "lizard" species).

Dragon Age actually shows this in a way too :
- Drakes I don't believe even had wings in DA
- They couldn't speak/where unintelligent
While the Dragons
- Have 4 limbs + wings (Wurm has only back legs + wings which are their front limbs)
- Generally hyper-intelligent

So like - drakes are likely removed enough in the sense that they are the (mostly - as they do talk) mindless dragon-kin that cause trouble, but are "imitations" of the actual dragon, and just like our forgeries of magic items, are much less powerful.

[Shard of Manus]

1. Drakes and Dragons are fantasy creatures. People that keep talking about how Drakes, Dragons, Wyverns etc. are all completely different things need to recognise that it depends on the setting. As an example, in Lord of the Rings "fire-drake" was just another term for any dragon that breathes fire.

Made-up monsters don't have specific rules.

2. In Dragon's Dogma there is only one 'Great Dragon', which is THE Dragon. Everything else is some variant, whether Cursed Dragons, Drakes, Lesser Dragons, Wyverns (from DD1), Wyrms and Dire variants etc. -- these are all still dragons. All the dragons are former Arisen, but it's been said they were warped in the Rift and it's assumed they are formed after dying somehow.

The only exclusion here would be the Ur-Dragon (whether that even still exists in the lore in DD2), which was a dragon that existed outside the limits of one world.

===

All dragons in DD1 could only be slain by an Arisen, and only by striking the heart. The reason for this change in DD2 is unexplained, and to be honest is quite the shame - as the OP says, the whole necessity of the Arisen is that they are the only one whom can defeat a dragon.

[Outlaw Mugen]

Originally posted by RollClassic:

Because then Trickster wouldn't be able to kill drakes?

a cutscene with a Godsbane would be sufficient

[Naewyng]

Okay, I don't get why people are talking about dragons in other media, since they're irrelevant, since this is specifically a lore question about dd2 universe dragons xD

Originally posted by RollClassic:

Because then Trickster wouldn't be able to kill drakes?

But even this wouldn't be an issue, sure it deals 0 damage, but it could just act as a trigger, if the dragon is on 1 hp, then a heart hit with the censer will kill it.

Originally posted by Shard of Manus:

All dragons in DD1 could only be slain by an Arisen, and only by striking the heart. The reason for this change in DD2 is unexplained, and to be honest is quite the shame - as the OP says, the whole necessity of the Arisen is that they are the only one whom can defeat a dragon.

Yea that was my issue with it as well, what's the point of the arisen if people can just form up armies and take down dragons?

[Viconia DeVir]

No idea what people are talking about but in the first game drakes, wyrms, and wyverns can only be killed by the Arisen. You have to land the last hit on their heart for them to die.

[Viconia DeVir]

Originally posted by Naewyng:

But even this wouldn't be an issue, sure it deals 0 damage

Pretty sure in the first game it doesn't need to do damage. It just needs to be a hit. In the first game you just needed to hit the heart for the drake to die.

[Viconia DeVir]

As to why the lore is different here, idk. The lore is a mess in the sequel.

[gotaa]

Originally posted by Naewyng:

... killing a drake doesn't require the last hit to specifically come from the arisen, and specifically target the heart of the drake?

In dd1 they made a big deal out of this, and it was why the Arisen was needed in the first place, because regular people couldn't kill dragons regardless of how much they tried. And indeed, if you just let your pawns fight, they can't kill the drakes in dd1, but they can kill them in dd2...

My guess it's an oversight by the devs. This game is either a lot like 1 or worse.

[SadPlatty©]

Originally posted by Shard of Manus:

1. Drakes and Dragons are fantasy creatures. People that keep talking about how Drakes, Dragons, Wyverns etc. are all completely different things need to recognise that it depends on the setting. As an example, in Lord of the Rings "fire-drake" was just another term for any dragon that breathes fire.

Hence my comparison to Dragon Age, where the differences between them are pretty "night and day" compared to this where the rules just got re-written for the sequel without full clarification.

Otherwise - if we are looking at "Fantasy" as a whole, it's because people cannot agree on one word to use for the species of sometimes flying lizards with varying intelligence, limb count, and elemental capabilities.

Like - in theory, Dragon's Dogma would suggest Wyrms and Dragons are the same creature, hence they called it the Wyrmhunt vs Dragon Hunt. As I haven't confirmed it myself if the lesser dragons can be killed by anyone also, I can't say "They are all the same thing with the exception of the dragon selecting Arisens" as I wanted to however, as it might be false. Especially as DD1 had the achievement "Kill a Wyrm, Drake, and Dragon in one playthrough".

[Angel]

it's probably just a simplified gameplay change, dd2 has multiple instances of this

[Viconia DeVir]

Why do people keep bringing up Dragon Age or other medias? We're talking about Dragon's Dogma lore. It's been established by the first game that drakes are fallen arisen specifically fighters, or any red vocation. Wyverns are fallen arisen from strider or yellow vocation. Wyrms are mage or blue vocation arisen. The game very clearly established this as well as their defined physical characteristics. It also established that they can only die by the hands of an arisen.

[SadPlatty©]

Originally posted by Viconia DeVir:

Why do people keep bringing up Dragon Age or other medias? We're talking about Dragon's Dogma lore. It's been established by the first game that drakes are fallen arisen specifically fighters, or any red vocation. Wyverns are fallen arisen from strider or yellow vocation. Wyrms are mage or blue vocation arisen. The game very clearly established this as well as their defined physical characteristics. It also established that they can only die by the hands of an arisen.

Bring the others up as examples to show that - just because they have names, doesn't mean the name is anything more than a brief reference (basically it's calling every avian a bird vs talking about hawks vs eagles sometimes, but more often it's 1-to-1).

Each IP has it's own lore, but that doesn't mean they don't have some level of "source" they base this off of; to pull one of your bits down :
"drakes are fallen arisen specifically fighters, or any red vocation"

This means that at least the Drakes somehow differ from the Wyrms, but the quest-line in DD1 was literally "Wyrm Hunt" - it didn't specify kin that where mages in their previous life however, it was any and all Dragon-kin. DD2 then muddies the water further via what OP is posting about, and they also are not divided up into elements (from what I can tell - they can all cast lightning/meteor for example when this was the difference between Drake and Wyrm).

[Viconia DeVir]

Originally posted by SadPlatty©:

but the quest-line in DD1 was literally "Wyrm Hunt" - it didn't specify

The people from the first game use both the "Great" Wyrm or the "Dragon" interchangeably when referencing Grigori. From the wiki:
https://dragonsdogma.fandom.com/wiki/Grigori#The_Dragon,_the_Wyrm,_and_'Grigori'
"Common folk of Gransys commonly refer to the Dragon as either "the Dragon", or "the Wyrm" - in fact the term 'the Wyrm' appears to be the commoner term, especially when referring to the current great Dragon that threatens or threatened them. People in the ancient past, such as Salde, and those from other realms, such as Olra both use the term 'wyrm', and 'dragon'. "

[Naewyng]

I did not test this, but can somebody test to see if the big dragon at least requires the final hit to be from the arisen and to the heart? Or if even the big dragon can be killed exclusively by pawns.