DragonSword: Awakening ships with 19 playable Heroes, and none of them sit behind a paywall. Despite the gacha-style presentation, this is a buy-to-play game where every character is earned through normal play. You unlock some Heroes by clearing main story quests, and the rest by spending a resource called Fate’s Invitation in the Exchange shop.
Quick answer: Eight Heroes unlock automatically at fixed points in the main story, and the other eleven are claimed in the Exchange shop for one Fate’s Invitation each. You earn Fate’s Invitation from clearing chapters and Hero quests, so no purchase or gacha pull is ever required.
All 19 DragonSword: Awakening Heroes, traits, and factions
Every Hero carries a Hero Trait and one or more Status Effects that drive the tag-team combat. Building an effective party means chaining compatible Status Effects together, so the table below groups each character by their Trait and the ailments they apply, alongside the faction they belong to.
| Hero | Hero Trait | Status Effect | Faction |
|---|---|---|---|
 Lute | Amplitude | Stun, Recovery, Knockdown | Johnny Mercenaries |
 Castella | Breaker | Stun, Airborne | Johnny Mercenaries |
 Aria | Blazeflame | Burn | Johnny Mercenaries |
 Johnny | Venom | Poison, Airborne | Johnny Mercenaries |
 Dana | Frostbite | Frost | Red Fox Merc. Crew |
 Kalien | Blazeflame | Burn, Stun | Red Fox Merc. Crew |
 Roxy | Bloodburst | Bleed | Red Fox Merc. Crew |
 Alex | Crushing | Knockdown | Red Fox Merc. Crew |
 Theresia | Amplitude | Bleed, Stun | Organa Order |
 Ornette | Thunderbolt | Shock, Knockdown | Organa Order |
 Sion | Thunderbolt | Shock, Knockdown | Organa Order |
 Tarte | Thunderbolt | Shock, Recovery | Organa Order |
 Kalsion | Blazeflame | Burn | Orbis Kingdom |
 Cerese | Frostbite | Frost | Orbis Kingdom |
 Reina | Gale | Airborne | Orbis Kingdom |
 Astria | Breaker | — | Orbis Kingdom |
 Eileen | Gale | Airborne | Orbis Kingdom |
 Othello | Frostbite | Frost | Lentus Rebellion |
 Charlotte | Venom | Poison, Airborne, Knockdown | Lentus Rebellion |
Heroes you unlock through the main story
Eight of the 19 Heroes join your roster for free as you push through the main storyline. These do not appear in the Exchange shop, and there is no overlap between the two systems, so a story unlock never competes with a Fate’s Invitation. Lute is yours from the opening, and the rest arrive at set quest milestones.
| Hero | Unlock condition |
|---|---|
| Lute | Available from the start of the game |
| Castella | Clear quest 1, To the Orbis Kingdom |
| Aria | Clear quest 3, Mercenary Starting Today |
| Johnny | Unlocked during quest 10, A Temporary Alliance |
| Ornette | Clear quest 20, The Hero’s Quest |
| Cerese | Clear quest 30, Those Left Behind |
| Kalsion | Clear quest 40, Looming Crisis |
| Othello | Clear quest 50, Individual Preparations |
You know a story unlock landed when the Hero appears in your codex and becomes selectable in your party menu. Kalsion and Othello sit at the far end of this list, so if you want the greatsword fire user or the late Frostbite Hero, you have to reach quests 40 and 50 respectively. There is no shortcut for either one.
Heroes you claim in the Exchange shop
The remaining eleven Heroes are recruited in the Exchange shop, and each one costs a single Fate’s Invitation. You can pick any of them in any order once the shop is open, regardless of how far you are in the story. Because Fate’s Invitation is a finite resource, choose Heroes that fill missing Status Effects in your team rather than pulling at random.
- Eileen
- Reina
- Astria
- Roxy
- Alex
- Kalien
- Dana
- Theresia
- Tarte
- Sion
- Charlotte
Spending a Fate’s Invitation
How to earn Fate’s Invitation
Fate’s Invitation comes from clearing content, not from the store. You receive your first ticket very early, right after the Prologue and reaching the Orbis Kingdom, which takes around 15 minutes. After that, every chapter you clear grants another one.
Hero quests are the other source. Completing the questlines tied to the portraits shown in the Heroes folder of the Mission menu hands you an extra Fate’s Invitation each, on top of automatically unlocking their designated character. Every ticket behaves the same in the Exchange shop, no matter whether it came from a chapter or a Hero quest. To claim all eleven Exchange Heroes, you need eleven tickets in total.
Note: The playable characters do not interact with story cutscenes, so pulling a Hero before you meet them in the narrative does not cause any dialogue or scene conflicts. Unlock in whatever order suits your team.
Fragments and Karma for your Heroes
Beyond the Heroes themselves, the Exchange shop lets you trade Fragments for Karma. Spend a Fragment of Memory for high-level Karma, or a Fragment of Afterimage for a character’s exclusive Karma, which costs one Fragment of Afterimage each.
| Fragment | Where to get it |
|---|---|
| Fragment of Memory | Treasure chests, Merc Crew, and the Tower of Trials |
| Fragment of Afterimage | Alchemist shop, in exchange for 100 Fragments of Memory and 100,000 Gold |
The Alchemy Workshop that enables these trades is not available from the start. To open it, clear the second chapter, Savior of the World, then speak with Shanoa in Orbis Royal.
Heroes coming in a future update
Four more Heroes are planned as free additions to the full game rather than paid DLC. Ryza, Jerome, Veronica, and Logan were confirmed in the developer’s official Steam roadmap, which notes their graphics work is already finished and only needs polishing for the live build.
A completely new character takes at least about 8 months — concept art, combat concept, action design, polishing, modeling, sound, and voice work. That said, the 4 revealed heroes already have completed graphics work, and will be delivered after polishing tailored to the current version.
These four are expected later in 2026, with no official date confirmed yet, and the exact method for unlocking them has not been revealed. Whether any additional Heroes arrive beyond this group is still unknown. For now, the 19 already in the game are all obtainable through the story and the Exchange shop, so building a full roster is only a matter of playing through and spending your tickets where they matter most.
