Dishonored 2 Bonecharm Guide

This guide will show players how they can use Bonecharms to craft the perfect character for their play style in Dishonored 2. Whether you want to infiltrate locations using stealth, or kick in the front door and kill everyone, using Bonecharms effectively is going to remove a great deal of resistance from your path.

What Are Bonecharms?

Bonecharms are items that you can collect or craft in Dishonored 2. Bonecharms will provide you with effects that can influence Emily or Corvo’s stats in positive and negative ways. Bonecharms that provide only positive effects are called Regular Bonecharms, and ones that will provide both positive and negative effects are called Corrupted Bonecharms. There are also Black Bonecharms, which provide much more powerful effects to your chosen character.

At first glance, players might wonder why someone would want to use a Corrupted Bonecharm that has a negative effect on their stats. Well, imagine the trade off to using that Bonecharm is that the positive stat effects something that is perfect for your play style, and the negative effect doesn’t hurt you at all since you will be avoiding situations where it could.

This is demonstrated with the Witch’s Skin Corrupted Bonecharm. With this Bonecharm, taking damage will drain your Mana before your health. That seems like a terrible idea for players that intend to stealth their way through the game using abilities like Far Reach and Blink, but what if you want to kick in the front door? Maybe you don’t plan to use stealth, and draining your Mana before your health is just a clever way of giving you two health bars. Now it makes more sense.

Crafting the Perfect Character

Once you understand what Bonecharms do, it’s time to get busy crafting the perfect character to fit your intended play style. No, you can’t create a character like you could in games like Fallout 4, but you can put a lot of time and effort into molding Emily and Corvo into an assassin that represents your play style.

Let’s assume that you are planning to play as Emily, and you’re going for a low chaos play through where you are never seen, avoid combat at all costs, and plan to focus heavily on Abilities that promote stealth. Well, there are some great Bonecharms for that style, but there are also some bad ones.

For example, Shadow Embrace, a Regular Bonecharm, causes your Shadow Walk to last longer. This Ability allows you to cross open areas without being seen, so having a Bonecharm that causes it to last longer has an obvious upside. On the other hand, Whirlwind, which raises your Sword’s attack speed, wouldn’t suit a low chaos player at all. You won’t be fighting with your Sword so what sense does that Bonecharm make? The answer is none in this situation. It might fit a high chaos play through with Corvo, however.

Crafting Bonecharms

Crafting Bonecharms is possible when players unlock the shared Bonecharm Crafting Ability. Players can then take Raw Whalebone and carve it into a Bonecharm. Players can also enhance this Ability with Trait Synergy and Witch Crafting. The former allows you to apply the same trait up to four times, and the latter reduces the chances that your crafted Bonecharms will end up being Corrupted Bonecharms. All three levels of this Ability will cost you a total of 6 Runes, so we’d advise that you read our Dishonored 2 – All Rune Locations guide.

Now that you fully understand the different types of Bonecharms in Dishonored 2 and how you can craft your own, spend some time deciding how you want to play the game. If you’re a stealth player at heart, it might benefit you to play as Emily on your first run through the game. When you’re done, load up Corvo and punish your enemies by spilling their blood at every opportunity. Try it all, and use Bonecharms to create your perfect version of an assassin.