Mechanics

Divinity Original Sin 2 rarely explains itself. The character sheet, the two layers of armor, the surfaces that catch fire or conduct electricity, the recipe system and the pickpocket timer are all things the game expects you to work out in play. This guide walks through those systems in the order you meet them, from the creation screen to the moment you steal a skill book instead of paying 250 gold for it, and points to the six pages in this section that hold the full tables.

The character sheet

Six attributes take your points at creation and every level after. Our beginners guide lists them, and the class pages spell out what each one is actually buying you.

Attribute	What it does, according to our pages
Strength	Damage with conventional melee weapons and a little more Physical Armor
Finesse	Ranged and Finesse weapon damage, 5 percent more per point, and the driver behind Scoundrel skills
Intelligence	Spell damage and a slight increase to Magic Armor
Constitution	Vitality, which is your health pool
Memory	How many skills you can carry at once; the builds guide pushes a mage to 16 for the slots
Wits	Initiative, which decides who moves first, and critical hit chance

Beneath the attributes sit two ability trees. Combat abilities shape what you do in a fight; civil abilities shape everything outside it. Our abilities guide gives the exact bonus per point, which is reproduced here because it is the single most useful thing to know when judging if the abilities a preset hands you deserve their points.

Weapon and defense abilities	Bonus per point
Dual Wielding	5 percent damage and 1 percent dodge while dual wielding one-handed weapons
Ranged	5 percent damage and 1 percent dodge with bows and crossbows
Single-Handed	5 percent damage and 2 percent accuracy with daggers, swords, axes, maces or wands, the usual pick for shield users
Two-Handed	5 percent damage and 5 percent critical multiplier with two-handed swords, axes, maces, spears and staves
Leadership	2 percent dodge and 3 percent resistances for allies within five metres, never for yourself
Perseverance	Restores 5 percent Magic Armor after Frozen or Stunned wears off and 5 percent Physical Armor after Petrification
Retribution	Reflects 5 percent of any damage taken, melee, ranged or spell, back at the attacker

Skill school	Bonus per point
Aerotheurge	10 percent more damage against Magic Armor
Geomancer	5 percent Poison damage and 10 percent more Physical Armor restoration
Huntsman	5 percent more damage when attacking from high ground
Hydrosophist	10 percent more healing and Magic Armor restoration
Necromancer	Heal 10 percent of the damage you deal to Vitality
Polymorph	A free attribute point for every point you invest
Pyrokinetic	5 percent Fire damage
Scoundrel	Movement speed and 5 percent critical multiplier
Summoning	Summons start with 10 percent more Vitality, damage and both armors
Warfare	10 percent more damage against Physical Armor

The seven civil abilities are Bartering (10 percent off purchases and 10 percent more on sales), Lucky Charm (extra treasure in containers), Persuasion (a +4 score in dialogue checks), Loremaster (identify items and examine enemies with the Identifying Glass), Telekinesis (move objects from further away), Sneaking (faster movement while sneaking and a shorter NPC sight range) and Thievery (better lockpicking and pickpocketing). The Wayfarer page argues that one party member should always carry Bartering, and the classes guide shows which preset starts with which civil ability.

Talents worth the slot

Talents come in Regular, Race and Advanced flavours and you get very few of them, so each one has to earn its place. Our best talents page ranks seven, summarised below with the catch attached to each.

Talent	Effect	The catch
The Pawn	One extra action point per turn that can only be spent on movement	Attack first and the free movement is gone; any other action before moving keeps it
Opportunist	Attack an enemy that moves past you outside your own turn, once per turn, with any melee weapon	A red circle around the sword icon shows when it will trigger
Far Out Man	Spells and scrolls reach two metres further	Applies to ranged basic attacks and short skills such as Throwing Knife or Backlash, not to area skills
Glass Cannon	Maximum action points at the start of every turn	Stun, freeze, blind and petrify still land, and magic armor does nothing against poison
Living Armor	35 percent of the healing you receive is added to your Magic Armor	Restores missing armor only; it never raises the maximum
All Skilled Up	Two extra ability points to spend	Unlocks at level 2; the page pairs it with the Conjurer
Comeback Kid	The blow that would kill you leaves you alive instead	Works once until you die and are resurrected, and it cannot be taken with Leech

The presets add a few more to know: Hothead raises critical chance while you are at full health, Leech heals you when standing in blood, Executioner grants two action points after a kill, Arrow Recovery returns fired arrows, and Pet Pal lets you talk to animals, which the Wayfarer page calls essential for certain quests and the beginners guide recommends for every party.

How a fight resolves

Combat is turn based and every action, whether an attack, a skill, an item or a step, costs action points. You spend what you have and press End Turn. Health only matters once armor is gone: every character wears a layer of Physical Armor and a layer of Magical Armor, physical attacks must chew through the first and spells through the second, and nothing touches Vitality until the matching layer is down. That is why our beginners guide tells you to match damage types to the armor that is weakest, and why control effects fail against a target whose armor is still up.

Surfaces decide as many fights as weapons do. Water conducts electricity to everyone standing in it, oil burns, and Bless or Curse can push an existing surface into something far more useful or far more dangerous. Every character in the game is a sorcerer, so all of them also have Source skills, which hit harder but cost Source Points and need cooldowns.

Weapons come in three families according to our skill combos and weapons page: one-handed (swords, axes, maces, daggers and wands, which can sit alongside a shield), two-handed (swords, claymores, axes, maces, spears and staffs) and ranged (bows, crossbows and wands). Elemental weapons apply their Air, Fire, Water or Poison status on hit, Earth adds a damage boost, and unique additions such as Bleeding, Blessed or Cursed do their own thing. How you hold a weapon grants a bonus of its own.

Loadout	Bonus	What it gives you
Two one-handed weapons	More is Always Better	Extra bonuses for pairing the same one-handed weapon type
One-handed weapon and a shield	Shields Up	Physical and Magical Armor replenish
Single one-handed weapon	Knock Down	Knock enemies down by punching them
Two-handed weapon	All In	Greatly increased physical damage
Ranged weapon	High Ground	More damage from elevation, boosted further by Huntsman

Seven skill combos that work

Because any character can learn any school, the strongest builds mix them. These are the seven pairings our combos page recommends, with the trade-off each one carries.

Combo	Schools	Result
1	Necromancer and Retribution	Heal 10 percent of your damage while returning 10 percent of what you take; hard to kill, but only Necromancer skills deal damage
2	Warfare, Polymorph and Hydrosophist	A heavy-armor sword or axe fighter with crowd control who still needs the team close by
3	Aerotheurge, Hydrosophist, Pyrokinetic and Geomancer	Every element at range and huge damage, at the price of folding the moment anything reaches you
4	Huntsman and Polymorph	Crosses the battlefield freely and hits hard from range; melee is deadly to it
5	Huntsman, Scoundrel and Necromancer with dagger and crossbow	Massive damage, but every weapon swap costs a point
6	Geomancer, Scoundrel and Summoning	Poison and healing on a mobile frame using a staff, two daggers or dagger and wand; stay away from melee and undead
7	Warfare, Hydrosophist and Pyrokinetic	The tank: two-handed mace or mace and shield, fire for damage, water for healing, slow to escape and hungry for points

Crafting

Crafting in Rivellon is combination based: drag two ingredients together and, if a recipe exists, you get the result. Some recipes only work once you own the book that teaches them, which is why our crafting guide exists alongside the full crafting recipes list: the first explains the system and the hidden combinations, the second is the reference. Two rules cover most of what you will make. Potions scale up by combining two of the same size or by adding an Augmentor, and a Cooking Station is just a Cooking Pot placed on any fire, campfire or bonfire.

Recipe family	Examples from our recipe list
Weapons	Shiv = Sharp Piece of Metal + Cloth Scraps; Improvised Staff = Long Branch + Shell; Primitive Harpoon = Long Branch + Sharp Piece of Metal
Potions	Minor Healing Potion = Empty Potion Bottle + Penny Bun Mushroom; Physical Armor Potion = Empty Potion Bottle + Amadouvier; Small Magic Armor Potion = Empty Potion Bottle + Whisperwood
Resistance and stat potions	Fire Resist = Empty Potion + Guepinia; Strength Potion = Empty Potion Bottle + Amethyst Deceiver; Intelligence Potion = Empty Potion Bottle + Calocera
Grenades	Fire Storm = Bottle Filled With Oil + Fuse; Nailbomb = Empty Grenade + Nails; Frost Grenade = Empty Canister + Water Essence
Arrows	Arrow Shaft = Long Branch + Cutting Tool; Knockdown Arrowhead = Antler + Cutting Tool; Explosive Arrow = Arrow Shaft + Explosive Arrowhead
Food and drink	Dinner = Any Meat + Cooking Station; Dwarven Stew = Dinner + Mug of Beer; Mug of Beer = Empty Mug + Beer Barrel
Dusts and runes	Bonedust = Any Bones + Mortar and Pestle; Stardust = Stardust Herb + Mortar and Pestle; Pixie Dust = Stardust + Bonedust
Scrolls and books	Teleportation Scroll = Sheet of Paper + Air Essence + Feather; Empty Skill Book = Blank Scroll + Blank Scroll; Skill Book = Empty Skill Book + Skill Scroll
Armor and utility	Handmade Leather Armor = Needle and Thread + Leather Scraps; Lockpicks = Soap + Any Key; Backpack = Rope + Leather Scraps

The crafting guide goes further than the list in a few places worth knowing: Source Orbs upgrade grenades into Blessed and Cursed versions and turn a ripped-off face into a Mask of the Shapeshifter for its race, herb mixes such as the Alertness Herbmix come from pairing a mushroom with Drudanae, and the Armor of Eternals needs an Eternal Artefact, an Eternal Plate, Metal Scraps and a Source Orb all at once.

Stealing

Thievery is the fastest way to gear a party in the early game, and our stealing guide is built around one routine. Save first. Press C to sneak and stand behind the mark, ideally while another party member keeps them talking so they stay put. Smoke Cover lets you work even under direct observation. Take small items while your Thievery is low, then drop the loot on the ground at once: the NPC will notice something missing and search you, find nothing, and you pick everything back up afterwards. If you are caught, only a bribe or a Persuasion check ends the conversation, and a stolen item still in your pack when a merchant recognises it brings the whole town down on you.

Each unique NPC can be robbed once per playthrough and has a Thievery requirement of their own, and every attempt is capped by weight and by gold value. The caps climb through fifteen steps as your Thievery grows.

Weight cap	Value cap	Weight cap	Value cap	Weight cap	Value cap
2 kg	300 gold	12 kg	6,000 gold	22 kg	57,700 gold
4 kg	450 gold	14 kg	9,400 gold	24 kg	90,750 gold
6 kg	1,100 gold	16 kg	14,800 gold	26 kg	142,850 gold
8 kg	2,350 gold	18 kg	23,300 gold	28 kg	224,750 gold
10 kg	3,800 gold	20 kg	36,650 gold	30 kg	353,650 gold

One more use for the skill: pickpocket an enemy’s potions, arrows and food before you start a fight with them, and they will have none of it to use against you.

Frequently asked questions

Why do my stuns and knockdowns keep failing?

Because the target still has armor. Physical control needs Physical Armor at zero and magical control needs Magical Armor at zero, so strip the right layer before you spend the skill.

Can I buy skill books instead of stealing them?

Yes, at 250 gold apiece from merchants according to our stealing guide, which is exactly why it suggests buying one and stealing the second.

Where do the crafting books come from?

Our crafting guide only notes that certain recipes are locked behind their book; it does not list book locations, so treat any recipe that refuses to combine as one you have not read about yet.

Which of these systems should a new player learn first?

Armor and surfaces, in that order, because they decide every fight in Fort Joy. Then Thievery, which pays for the rest. The Divinity Original Sin 2 hub lists the class pages, builds and quest guides that build on all of this.