I’ve done it in Cyberpunk 2077. You probably have too. Rushed through The Heist, ignored the glowing katana on Konpeki Plaza’s roof, and realized hours later that Satori was sitting right there while I admired the penthouse. Or maybe you sold an iconic gun because this inventory mixes legendary items with ordinary weapons. Seriously, who designed this interface?
This guide covers recovering missed iconic weapons: how Herold’s shop actually works, which weapons are permanently lost and how to avoid realizing you can’t complete your collection. Visit my main Cyberpunk 2077 hub afterward for more guides and mod lists. Let’s go!
Can you actually recover missed iconic weapons?
The short answer is: mostly yes, but with unpleasant limitations.
Herold’s Dogtown black market changed things with Phantom Liberty. This vendor is more chrome than human, complete with a flamethrower arm, because why not. He sells iconics you technically discovered but didn’t collect. The system checks your save data, identifies weapons you encountered and puts them on sale.
Here’s how his shop works:
- Location: Petrochem Stadium, Dogtown. Requires Phantom Liberty and enough story progress to access the area.
- Stock refreshes every 24 in-game hours. Skip time if you’re after something specific.
- Prices range from 20,000 to 100,000+ eddies depending on the gun.
- Everything is automatically upgraded to Tier 5, which is rather generous.
Herold isn’t a magic fix for everything, though. His shop has firm restrictions that make narrative sense, even when they’re frustrating:
What Herold Can Sell:
- Weapons that you found but didn’t pick up from the containers or the bodies.
- Equipment from completed missions where you just… forgot to pick it up.
- Items from areas that can no longer be returned to.
What Herold can’t sell:
- Weapons locked behind story choices you didn’t make. If Dum Dum is alive, you won’t get the Doom Doom revolver.
- Equipment from missions you completely missed.
- The short list of permanently missable weapons that’s about to ruin your day.
The system isn’t perfect. Weapons sometimes fail to appear even when you’re sure you saw them. Story-dependent equipment can behave this way: a conflicting choice may stop the game registering a weapon as discovered.
Recovering weapons through Herold’s black market
Here’s my tried-and-tested process for tracking down missed weapons through Herold:
Step 1: reach Dogtown
You need Phantom Liberty installed and enough story progress to reach Petrochem Stadium. The area opens naturally as you play the DLC. Herold hangs around near the stadium entrance. You won’t miss him: he’s the most chromed-up vendor in a neighborhood full of extremely chromed-up people.
Step 2: Check his iconic weapons section
Herold’s inventory is divided into categories. Open iconic weapons and browse. It should reflect weapons you discovered but failed to loot. In practice, several shop refreshes may be needed to show everything.
Prices hurt. Some guns cost 75,000 eddies. Make sure you’ve been doing gigs and selling corporate junk, because Herold doesn’t offer payment plans.
Step 3: wait and refresh
If the weapon doesn’t appear, skip 24 in-game hours and check again. Herold’s inventory follows internal CDPR logic rather than random rotation, and nobody fully understands it. Some weapons appear immediately; others need several refresh cycles.
I’ve read reports of players waiting real-world days, checking every session, before a weapon appeared. Patience is needed, which is frustrating when you’re completing a collection before a fresh playthrough.
Step 4: Make sure the weapon can actually appear
Here’s the frustrating part. If a missed weapon depends on a story choice you didn’t make, such as Doom Doom requiring Dum Dum to survive, it will never appear in Herold’s stock. The game doesn’t consider it discovered because its availability conditions weren’t met in your playthrough.
You can spend hours checking Herold’s store, skipping time, checking again, and the guns never show up. It’s not a bug, it’s a system that works as intended. The plot-dependent weapons are blocked by their specific narrative paths.
Permanently missable base-game iconic weapons
Doom Doom
This one hurts because Dum Dum has to survive several encounters. Don’t kill him during The Pickup, then make sure he survives the trouble with Royce and the Militech ambush. If he dies anywhere in that chain, whether you shoot him or he gets caught in crossfire, Doom Doom is gone. The weapon no longer exists in your playthrough because the character who drops it is dead.
I lost it on my first playthrough by accidentally hitting Dum Dum with a ricochet. Still annoyed about that.
Sir John Phallustiff
Yes, it’s a dildo. Meredith Stout leaves it on the bed after your night together in Venus in Furs. You can use it as a melee weapon with surprisingly good stats: 69% critical chance on headshots and 69% Stun chance on strong attacks. CDPR knew exactly what they were doing.
The catch: You need to romance Meredith Stout, which requires a particular outcome in The Pickup and then meeting her at the No-Tell Motel. Skip that path, and there’s no Sir John. The good news: Herold can sell it if you completed the encounter but forgot to search the bed. It’s recoverable, just story-gated.
Fun fact: on the console, the gamepad is constantly vibrating while you hold this weapon. I won’t even comment on it.
Chaos
The opposite problem to Doom Doom. Kill Royce during The Pickup to get it. Side with Maelstrom and let Royce live, and there’s no Chaos.
What about Act 1 weapons such as Satori and Kongou?
Act 1 weapons occupy an odd middle ground. They’re missable because Konpeki Plaza becomes inaccessible after The Heist, but aren’t permanently lost in the way Doom Doom is.
Satori
Satori sits on Konpeki Plaza’s AV landing pad after T-Bug opens the door. Kongou, a Power pistol, is on the nightstand beside Yorinobu’s bed. You literally see it during the braindance, making missing it more painful. Both weapons are there during the heist, but most players are too busy panicking over the disaster to remember looting.
Good news: Herold can sell them. Since you technically discovered Konpeki Plaza and the weapons registered in your game data, they’ll eventually enter his inventory rotation. Expect around 50,000+ eddies for Satori, but at least you can get it back.
La Chingona Dorada
Appears on the altar table 24 hours after Heroes. Return to the location and collect it from the table. Forget, and Herold will eventually put it on sale.
Dying Night
Obtained from the weapon vendor on the seventh floor after Last Caress. Harder to miss because it’s a direct vendor interaction, but Herold can help if you somehow skip talking to Wilson.
Alternative methods of weapons recovery
Vendor buyback
Sold an iconic to a vendor? Why would you do that? I’ve done it too, in a panic over a full inventory. There’s a tiny window to buy it back. Most vendors have a buyback tab showing recently sold items.
The catch: this only works before you leave the vendor’s area. Exit dialogue and walk away, and the buyback list clears. Sold Skippy to a ripperdoc and fast traveled across the map? Gone. It may eventually appear at Herold’s, or it may not.
I tested this with several non-iconic guns, and buyback is extremely temperamental. Items sometimes disappear while you’re still standing there. Don’t rely on it for recovery.
Iconic weapon checklist: CET menu
An interactive Nexus checklist tracks iconics in real time using Cyber Engine Tweaks. Its menu shows collected weapons, those still available and those permanently missed through story choices.
This does not restore the weapon, but prevents future losses by alerting you before you leave the location. The mod checks the status of your current mission and inventory, then tags the weapons you’re about to lose access to.
Tips for iconic weapon collectors
After missing weapons on my first playthrough, here’s what actually works:
- Before leaving any mission area, scan the entire location. Iconics have a distinctive bright orange-yellow scanner outline that’s hard to miss when you’re looking. I now do a full 360-degree sweep before leaving mission areas. Sounds paranoid, but it’s saved me many times.
- Save before major story decisions involving character deaths. Doom Doom, Chaos and other story-dependent weapons are locked by particular choices. If you’re unsure whether a decision affects availability, make a manual save. You can reload if you realize you’ve closed off a route.
- Check every container and body during combat missions. The game doesn’t pause to say, “Hey, that dead boss has an iconic.” You kill them, loot drops, the next objective appears, and you’re running toward it while the weapon despawns behind you.
- Visit hidden vendors. Blue Fang and Headhunter, both knives, are sold in remote areas: the Badlands and West Wind Estate respectively. These vendors don’t appear on the map until you physically discover them. Exploration matters.
- Complete NCPD Scanner Hustles thoroughly. Gang leaders’ crafting specs are easy to overlook. Stand over the body and open the loot menu after killing them. Don’t rely on automatic pickup or quick combat looting.
- Check Herold’s store periodically as you progress through Phantom Liberty. Its assortment is updated based on your story progress, so the weapons you missed earlier may pop up after reaching certain milestones. I made it a rule to visit him after completing major quest lines.
For Phantom Liberty:
- Choose Reed’s path if you want to craft Erebus.
- Take Slider’s key during Treating Symptoms. It’s in the hideout and looks like random junk.
- Kill Dodger during Waiting for Dodger to get Rosco.
- Climb Dogtown’s pyramid for the hidden weapon. Don’t skip it.
My take on these strange design decisions
Herold’s black market is a temporary solution to the design problem. Players shouldn’t need a dedicated DLC merchant to recover weapons they missed because the game didn’t communicate its importance clearly enough. The iconic weapon should feel iconic the moment you get it, not hours later when you check the wiki and realize you’ve passed by something unique.
CDPR added recovery systems after enough complaints about missable content, and that’s good. Permanently missable weapons expose the fix’s limits, though: the shop can’t recover story-dependent equipment without contradicting narrative consequences.
Remember: save often, loot thoroughly and double-check bodies. Night City doesn’t give third chances, but at least it sometimes gives second chances now.
Your iconic weapon questions
What happens if I accidentally dismantle or sell an iconic weapon?
You can’t dismantle iconic weapons, so nothing happens!
Can I craft an iconic weapon without the original?
No. You need the physical weapon first. In version 2.0+, crafting specs are single-use: they disappear once you craft the item. The base weapon must be in your inventory to upgrade it through Crafting. Without it, crafting is locked even if you somehow have the spec.
Why isn’t my iconic weapon appearing on the apartment stash wall?
A known bug that’s frustrated players since 2.0. Stash-wall displays are unreliable: weapons randomly disappear despite being in storage. Try removing and replacing the weapon, updating the game, verifying files or using mods. Some players say only X-MOD2 weapons display correctly, which… fits this game’s bug history.
Do iconic weapons respawn, or can I obtain multiple copies?
No. Iconic weapons are unique, once-per-playthrough acquisitions. Lose one by selling it, and it’s gone. You can’t farm another copy through normal gameplay.
Which components upgrade iconic weapons?
Components matching your weapon’s tier. Going from Tier 5 to 5+ costs 75 components; Tier 5+ to 5++ costs a hefty 200 Tier 5 components. Get them by dismantling unwanted weapons and equipment of the same tier. Upgrading several iconics means dismantling a lot of loot.
Why is crafting locked when I have an iconic weapon’s spec?
You probably sold the base weapon. Even with the spec, the original iconic must be in your inventory to craft higher tiers. That’s the most common reason for locked crafting. Yes, realizing what happened is frustrating.
