Nesting Troubles: Should you poison the river or the nest in Dragon’s Dogma 2?

Dragon’s Dogma 2 is filled with ethical dilemmas, and Lennart of Melve presents the Arisen with a choice-based quest: poison the Saurian nest, or poison the town’s water. You've likely accepted this quest after crafting your first Fruit Roborant for Flora near Runne's Apothecary.

Although there shouldn’t be any moral ambiguity to this situation, here’s what happens when the Arisen is in the mood for some mischief and poisons the river instead of the Saurian nest.

Dragon's Dogma 2: What happens if you drop the poison in the Melve River?

In truth, nothing happens if you decide to poison the Melve river. Although Lennart warns that poisoning the water would be terrible for Melve’s villagers, you’d think he’d be more disappointed with the outcome. That’s what I thought would happen, and since I’m playing as Kanye West, I’m going for a chaotic playthrough. Naturally, y'all know I poisoned that water without a second guess.

Well, Lennart's not bothered in the slightest. In fact, your party expresses more concern than he does. If you poison the Melve river, Lennart just critiques your shoddy aim, but he’s still in good spirits. Ultimately, Lennart is still confident the poison trickled close enough to the Saurian nest, thus driving the poisonous critters away from the village. So whether you wanted to or not, you still did good, kid.

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Are there future consequences for poisoning the Melve water?

Keep in mind, though, that I’m writing this guide with a mere 6 hours of playtime, so I’ve yet to return to Melve and I'm still learning how to revive the dead (I killed Gregor by accident). So my wrongdoings may have negative consequences for Melve in a future quest, but right now I’ve no idea since I haven't compared the results with anyone further along in their playthrough. All of my colleagues wimped out and took the moral high ground on this one, too, so I was out of luck.

I’ll be keeping an eye online for other player’s experiences and will report back if I experience any future consequences. For now, though, I guess I can sleep happy knowing that Saurians won’t invade the already demolished village of Melve, but they did humble me in the Waterfall Cave outside of the Borderland Campground.

Alternatively, assuming you’re a goody goody two-shoes with impeccable aim, then choosing to poison the Saurian nest isn’t all that surprising. The outcome: Lennart (and your party) is overjoyed with the results, and Melve can live another day free of threats as they rebuild what the dragon stole from them. Hooray!

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