A comprehensive guide to successfully protecting Empress Nadinia with advanced strategies, common pitfalls, and step-by-step execution
The Critical Mission: Shadowed Prayers
Within the Beastren capital of Bakbattahl lies a pivotal narrative moment in Dragon’s Dogma 2: the Shadowed Prayers quest. Your success or failure in this mission directly determines the survival of Empress Nadinia, a key political figure whose presence influences later story arcs. This guide provides a detailed, actionable strategy to ensure her protection, supplemented with expert tips to navigate the mission’s unique challenges.
Successfully safeguarding Empress Nadinia requires precise timing, careful observation, and an understanding of the quest’s non-combat mechanics. A single misstep can lead to irreversible narrative consequences.
Upon arriving in Bakbattahl and gaining access to the royal palace, your exploration is swiftly interrupted. The Arisen is approached by Menella, a Beastren soldier, who reveals a clandestine plot to assassinate the Empress. This initiates the “Shadowed Prayers” quest, which tasks you with infiltrating a public gathering to identify and neutralize the hidden threat before they can strike.
Essential Preparation: Securing Your Save
Before engaging with Menella to formally start the quest, one non-negotiable preparatory step exists: rest at an Inn and create a manual save. Dragon’s Dogma 2 employs a single autosave slot, which will be overwritten the moment the quest begins. An Inn save acts as a crucial safety net, allowing you to retry the mission if you fail to identify the assassin in time or accidentally confront the wrong individual. Neglecting this step risks locking in a failed state.
Pro Tip: This quest is a puzzle-stealth encounter, not a combat challenge. You do not need to equip weapons or consume potions. Your success hinges entirely on observation and interaction. Travel to the palace entrance with only your wits and a prepared save.
Identifying the Assassin: A Visual Investigation
Menella provides two distinct physical identifiers for the assassin: hair tied back in a specific style and a visible scar on their right arm. The search occurs in a dimly lit, crowded hallway, making visual confirmation difficult. Rushing this process is the most common cause of failure.
To overcome the poor lighting, employ a multi-layered approach:
1. Activate Your Lantern: Hold it aloft to cast light on nearby NPCs.
2. Adjust Game Settings: Temporarily navigate to the options menu and increase the in-game brightness or gamma to its maximum setting. This can drastically improve visibility in dark areas.
3. Utilize Photo Mode: This is your most powerful tool. Enter Photo Mode (default F9 on PC) to pause the scene. You can then freely move the camera to scrutinize each character up close, checking for the tied-back hair and right arm scar without time pressure.
Advanced Strategy: The assassin typically lingers on the periphery of the crowd, often near the edges of the hallway or behind groups of people. Systematically scan from one end of the hall to the other using Photo Mode to avoid missing them.
Execution and Consequences
Once you have positively identified the correct individual (double-check both identifiers!), approach and use the Grab command (default R2/RT or right mouse click). Your Arisen will immediately subdue the assassin, ending the threat. A cutscene will follow, showing Empress Nadinia safe and granting you an audience where she expresses her gratitude. Successful completion often yields unique rewards and unlocks continued interactions with her court.
Critical Warning: If you grab an innocent bystander, attack anyone, or simply take too long, the assassination will succeed. Empress Nadinia will be permanently killed, removing her from all subsequent story events, dialogues, and potential quests. This narrative branch cannot be reversed without reloading your pre-quest Inn save. The stakes for this mission are uniquely high, affecting political dynamics in the late game.
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No reproduction without permission：SeeYouSoon Game Club » Dragon’s Dogma 2: How to complete Shadowed Prayers A comprehensive guide to successfully protecting Empress Nadinia with advanced strategies, common pitfalls, and step-by-step execution