The Best Mods for Dragon Age 2

The Best Mods for Dragon Age 2

The last, but certainly not the least, in our list of mods for the Dragon Age franchise, tackles the controversial sequel, Dragon Age 2. Some people hail it as the best narrative adventure in Thedas, with interesting mechanics and ways to role-play Hawke, while others bash the game for reusing assets and being locked in the same 3 locations within the hellhole that is Kirkwall.

Both are true enough, but another undisputed truth is that the game has somewhat aged since its original release. Enter, fan-created mods that aim to fix, expand or sand some rough patches.

The mods below will be split into 3 general categories: visuals, gameplay and fixes/miscellaneous. Check out our lists for Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age: Inquisition, and make sure to read the installation instructions on the mods’ pages linked below.

Dragon Age 2 – Gameplay Mods:

Kirkwall Expanded

By and large, Kirkwall is supposed to be a large and bustling Free Marches’ city-state, rich with trading. The large part certainly exists in the game, but the bustling… This mod adds new NPCs (including female dwarves), new creatures, new merchants, new items and item properties, a few new quests, a new crafting option (“Cooking”), pets, mercenaries, house decorations, and more.

Make sure to read the installation guide on the mod’s page to avoid any problems on the way to a livelier Kirkwall!

Valuable Junk

Have you ever stuffed your pockets full of junk only to receive a few coppers for your troubles? No more! With this mod, merchants will now pay for your ripped breeches with fair silver. It makes the early and mid game much smoother without having much effect on the late game, as by then you’ll be swimming in gold anyway.

“All shops will pay more for your junk. With this mod, shop owners no longer turn up their noses at the treasure you bring in to them. Too long have they charged good silver for their healing potions, but then only given you a few copper for the fruits of your labor.”

Backpack Mod – Inventory Increase

This mod adds several backpacks to the game, increasing the size of the inventory. There are 2 different versions of this mod:

  • Merchant backpacks. This mod adds 2 more backpacks to the game, so that you can reach the actual limit of the inventory in the game, 120 slots.
  • Refugee backpacks. The cheat version of this mod, great for people who don’t want to bother checking merchants. This mod adds 7 backpacks to the contents of the dead refugee that you find the prologue, therefore reaching immediately the 120 slots limit.

Evolving Champion Armor & Evolving Companion Armor

Evolving Champion Armor makes Hawke’s Champion armor sets evolve, with two available versions: one that has attribute stats that increase as the player levels up, another without these attribute requirements.

“Depends on what you want, as some people may find the increasing stat requirements past their normal levels to be irritating. Especially for rogues who have already reached 100% crit chance, warriors who don’t want more constitution, or blood mages who don’t want to invest anymore in willpower, etc.”

Meanwhile, Evolving Companion Armor does a similar thing for your band of misfits. All their armors will improve upon leveling-up, which includes  all romance armor, Aveline’s original armor and the 2 guard armors, and Carver/Bethany’s Warden/Circle/Templar armors.

Better Map and Minimap

This mod makes landmark icons such as area entrances, world map exits, shops, companion homes, etc.) more noticeable by swapping the black color to white. The default icons, distinguished only by a dark gray outline, were barely visible in the vanilla game.

Dragon Age 2 – Visual Mods:

Dragon Age II 4K 60FPS Cinematics Mod

As comes from the name, this mod replaces all the pre-rendered 720p 30fps cinematics in the game. This includes the logos, intro, cutscenes, and loading screens. It was one of those areas where DA2 had undoubtedly aged over the years, but thanks to this mod the cinematics look better than ever.

Dragon Age 2 – Ultimate HD

Now for the heavy guns. Ultimate HD is a one-stop mod for addressing the game’s dated visuals, all without changing them completely and ruining that Kirkwall charm. If you wanted to replay the game after a lengthy time away but were worried that the aged looks might turn you off, this is the best way to proceed.

Unless Bioware finally releases the official remasters of DAO & DA2, of course. Chances are slim, but the prize…

Chargen Revamp

This mod revamps the character creator with many new features. In particular, it adds the modified family presets that allows you to tweak how Hawke’s family looks.

No More Bloody Teeth

The title of the mod speaks for itself, and it removes the blood splatter from characters’ teeth after combat. The rest stay gloriously bloody though.

“Think of this mod as magic toothpaste: it removes the blood that somehow ends up on everyone’s bottom teeth during combat. The rest of the blood remains the default splatter.”

Unique Face Textures for Companions

This mod provides unique higher resolution skin and eyes for the companions, taking care of some of the blurriness of the models. Additionally, it makes Cassandra and Varric look a bit more Inquisition-like.

Here is an alternative mod specifically for Varric, if you want him to look his glorious Inquisition self.

War Dog

Swaps the look of Hawke’s dog to look like the Black Emporium concept art. It also helps you set your loyal dog apart from the common Kirkwall riffraff and the Hero of Ferelden’s mabari at the same time.

DA2 NPC Hands

This mod adds smooth hands for Bethany, Isabela and Merrill, as well as clean hands for Anders. If you have ever been creeped out by characters’ hands, this is the one to go for.

Honorable mentions:

Dragon Age 2 – Miscellaneous & Fixes:

A Gibbed Dragon Age Save Generator For DA2

A generator that can create importable Dragon Age: Origins for Dragon Age 2 with user-specified options for plot, characters, etc. If you find that you want to change some plot point for your active playthrough or change the friendship/rivalries count, this is the way to go.

Varric Dialogue Edits and Restoration + DA2 Epilogue Restoration and Fixes

The mods linked above restore some of the cut Varric dialogues, such as commenting on Hawke’s love interest or expressing why it would never work between the irresistible dwarf and Hawke.

Meanwhile, DA2 Epilogue Restoration fixes certain romance false positives and brings back female Hawke visuals and mentions of Sebastian romance/rivalmance. Small things all, but then again, what are RPGs if not collections of small things that make the in-game world believable?

Written by
A lover of all things RPG and TBS, Catherine is always looking for a new fantasy world to get lost in.

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