A new Skyrim mod inspired by the Stone Masks of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure turns the Dragon Priest masks into cursed JJBA cosplay. The overhaul to the RPG game system turns the masks from simple equippable pieces of armour into powerful, dangerous artifacts that bind to the wearer and imbue them with the spirits of the Dragon Priests themselves.
The Curse of the Dragon Priests mod by creator grasscid takes inspiration from popular manga and anime series JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure – specifically the stone masks which appear in its first two parts. Much like the masks of JJBA, these new Skyrim masks cannot simply be equipped from your inventory. Instead, upon activation, the mask will forcibly bind itself to your face, “having the Dragon Priest possess and reshape your flesh entirely for himself.”
The longer you keep the mask on, the stronger its power will grow – reaching up to 4x its base potency and, in some cases, gaining additional effects. For example, Volsung’s mask, which grants you additional carry weight, cheaper store prices, and underwater breathing, also adds the ability to walk on water from the third stage of growth onwards. Hevnoraak’s mask, which makes the wearer immune to all forms of disease and poison, also ramps up your armour effectiveness as it gets stronger.
It’s not all fun and games, however – the mod description warns that, left unchecked, the influence of the Dragon Priests can end up “leaving you a soulless husk, if you let the mask (and by extension, the Dragon Priest) grow too powerful.” Once the mask reaches its most potent form, there is an occasional chance that the mask’s respective Priest will take over your body entirely – causing you to become a disembodied soul.
In this state, you must face the fully empowered Demon Priest – yes, they’re a fully fledged Demon now – in battle to reclaim your corporeal form. If that sounds too intimidating, you can attempt to wrest the mask from your face preemptively, but it’s no simple process; you did, after all, allow this thing to clamp itself permanently to your head. Getting it off, then, requires a process of exorcism utilising an unbinding spell – which forces the ghostly Demon Priest to be ejected from your being, at which point they must be defeated (albeit at a hopefully lower power level than they might otherwise have attained).
It’s not all fun and games once that’s over, either. Even successfully unequipping a mask (unequipping feels like too light a term for what we just described, quite frankly, but you understand what we mean) leaves you with debuffs that mirror the boons previously bestowed upon you by the cursed artifact. Such power ultimately comes at a price, after all, and wielding these dangerous relics takes its toll on your very life force.
It’s a fantastic system of risk vs reward, emphasising the greedy lust for power demonstrated by the likes of JJBA’s Dio Brando – who takes advantage of the Stone Mask’s power in the events of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure. We certainly know how tempting that ever-increasing dripfeed of strength can be, but be careful how deep you go…
If you crave growing even stronger, one Skyrim mod lets you transform into a dragon. If you’d rather put in the work for your abilities, another Skyrim mod turns the College of Winterhold into an actual school. If you’re after a safer way to obtain unlimited power, our list of Skyrim console commands and cheats should let you do whatever you want in the open-world game – just remember that with great power comes great responsibility.