Minecraft Dungeons II Talismans and Artifacts Guide
In Minecraft Dungeons II, your build spreads across more item types than the first game allowed. Two passive families define playstyles: talismans, the new always-on items that grow with your hero, and artifacts, the returning active-use powers bound to buttons. Together with the 12 combat slots and four armor pieces, they give every hero a personal toolkit that can be rebuilt between runs.
Talismans: passive bonuses that grow
Talismans are a brand-new item type in the sequel, and they are entirely passive. They occupy their own slots beside your combat slots and armor pieces, and their bonuses are always on — there is nothing to press and no cooldown to watch. What makes them special is that they level up with the player, growing stronger the more you use them, and the achievement list tracks this: one achievement is earned for upgrading a talisman to level 3, the same ceiling that enchantments follow.
The official hands-on preview showed three examples of what talismans can do: one that summons a loyal wolf companion to fight beside you, one that grants bonus health, and one that speeds up soul collection. Those three paint the range of the category — talismans can grant a companion, toughen your hero, or feed your resource economy, and presumably a full catalog covers more ground still. Like other gear, talismans drop as loot, and the town systems apply to them: the merchant can stock special pieces and the blacksmith's reroll path reaches special gear.
Artifacts: active powers on buttons
Artifacts return from the first game as the active half of the toolkit. These are usable powers bound to buttons, fired on command, and they come with their own slots. The official footage showed four of them:
- Redstone Mine Launcher — fires a volley of explosive redstone mines that cling to targets.
- Picnic blanket — throws food on the ground for area healing. The launch demo called it essential for boss fights.
- War banner — plants a flag that buffs the whole team's melee attacks, making it a co-op staple.
- Vine and control artifacts — root or lock mobs in place for crowd control.
Artifacts stack with the rest of your loadout in ways the preview deliberately showed off. The featured combo was a crowd-control chain: vines to hold mobs in place, poison to soften them, then flaming arrows that also summon mines — artifacts, status effects and ranged builds working as one sequence. When you are building a hero, think of artifacts as the punctuation: the war banner before a melee push, the picnic blanket before a boss phase, the vines before a heavy volley.
Companions and pets
Companions fight for you and draw aggro — enemies spend time attacking them instead of you, which is a defensive tool as much as an offensive one. The wolf, summoned through a talisman, and the iron golem are the in-game companions, and the launch demo leaned heavily on the wolf as a bodyblock: a durable companion holding a boss's attention while the player repositions or helps a teammate. Group revives pair especially well with a companion keeping pressure off the downed hero's rescuer.
Pets are a separate category from companions. Blub, the round soul-saturated creature from The Sift that soaks in the dimension's glowing liquid, comes with the Deluxe Edition; the Twisted Chicken, the glowing chicken seen in official screenshots, was the pre-order bonus. These are companions in the cosmetic sense — they travel with you — and are listed separately from the combat companions above.
The D-pad mini inventory
With so much gear in play, swapping items mid-mission needed to be fast, and that is what the D-pad mini inventory solves. It lets you swap equipment without opening the full menu — a tap rather than a pause. The right artifact at the right moment can decide a boss fight, and reaching for the war banner or the picnic blanket through the D-pad is meaningfully quicker than navigating the full inventory. The full menu still handles enchanting and deep loadout changes; the mini inventory is for the decisions you make in the middle of a fight.
FAQ
Do talismans replace artifacts? No — they are different tools. Talismans are always-on passives; artifacts are button-activated powers with their own slots and cooldown-style usage. A hero runs both at once.
Do talismans upgrade like enchantments? Yes. Talismans level up with the player and top out at level 3, matching the enchantment ceiling, with an achievement tracking the milestone.
How do I get new talismans and artifacts? Talismans drop as loot like other gear. The merchant's upgradeable stock and the blacksmith's echo-shard rerolls also apply to special gear pieces.
Is there an official catalog of all talismans and artifacts? No — neither system has an official catalog yet. This page documents how the systems work and names only what official footage has shown.
