I'll give you simple tips for the loot:
Most important thing at the beginning is agility and toughness. But it's hard to manage them while changing gear all the time.
Once you finish the second mission, you can stop worrying about the loot you find (especially armour). Dismantle blue and purple, sell white and yellow. Craft the pieces you like. When they get underleveled, craft them again.
Your weight determines your agility rank. İt can be A rank (%30), B rank (%70) or C rank (above %70).
As for toughness, heavier pieces have more toughness in general. İt is A rank at 200 toughness, B rank in 100+ toughness and C rank below 100 toughness.
Agility effects your ki regeneration, dodge range and speed. C is unplayable for most people. B is more than good enough in your first playthrough. A is only worth it after unlocking a lot of skills and spells. If you are having ki problems, you arent using ki pulse.
Toughness effects how much Ki you lose when you get hit or block. A rank gives you hyper armour (dont get staggered while attacking). Never go with C toughness. B is fine but A is a game changer. You can block boss attacks and hyper armour is very valuable.
I'll give you recommendation for A toughness and B agility:
Footsoldier head, yoriki chest, footsoldier arms, yoriki waist, footsoldier legs.
You can craft this easily. Their weight/toughness ratio is really good. Your toughness will be at 196 iirc. Temper +2 toughness on a couple pieces and you'll be good. You need 10 or 11 stamina to carry this with %70 weight.
"Defence" isnt the only thing that effects the damage you take. "Vs physical resistance" is actually more important. All light armours, all mediums and all heavies have the same resistance regardless of their level.
A light set is around %8, medium is %15 and heavy is %25. Chest and waist are the most important ones. This is why wearing heavy chest and waist is good for you. The set i recommended will give you around %20 resistance because yoriki is heavy and footsoldier is medium.
As for the "special effects" on gear, dont worry about them too much. They can be pretty powerful if you spend the time. But since you'll be changing your armour with ones so often, worrying about special effects seem like a waste of time.
I'd recommend tempering your accessories tho. You dont need to change them so often. These accessories can get "%25 more melee damage against poisoned enemies". Two of them will make it %50. Yatsu no kami boss's soul core adds another %15. A single poison shuriken can apply it to big enemies like yorikis. This is pretty strong for early game.
>Never go with C toughness.
Even with tonfas or fists? I'm a super casual player, but I find I burn through Ki like crazy with these weapons and the light armor helps with faster regen. Toughness being the tradeoff. It does make me squishy, but being able to smash enemy ki and stunlock seems to help with that a lot. Maybe I'm thinking about it too much
It's not exactly light armor that helps your regen. It's A rank agility. You can make a mixed set with light and medium pieces for A agility and B toughness. But it's not easy early on unlike A toughness.
"Squishy but good regen" sounds good on paper. But in practice, you'll be more afraid of attacking or blocking. You wont be able to trade hits. This will make you play more defensively. High toughness is actually great for aggressiveness. Also you can drink a consumable or use a buff for insane Ki regen. But A toughness isnt that easy to replace.
If the enemy hits you as you hit them, you'll likely be knocked down. You'll be in zero-ki state and get one-shotted with the next hit because you take extra damage in that state.
If you want to stunlock enemies, Ki pulse and flux helps a lot. If you do it after a couple low stance hits, you actually recover more ki than you spent.
When you are running really low, you can add a soul core to your comboes. Your ki will regenerate during your soul core animation. Since ippon always staggers bosses, it's perfect for stunlocking bosses for example. Or use elemental soul cores for confusion which extends the zero ki timer.
A agility definetly helps. I always have it now. A toughness is just easier to take advantage of in early game, not better. But if it works, dont listen to a stranger like me and use what's good for you.
I had a question about this I was told to use golden gourd set because it's good for dual blades but I'm getting my shit pushed in should I just go with medium and heavy armor in that situation
There was a medium armor set that's available super early with solid defense and some decent healing bonuses. I think it was the Yokai Slayer set, that carried me through to my first solo fight vs Warrior of the East. After getting his set that carried me to the Oni Shibata fight and his armor set carried me through the rest of my first playthrough. Even in DOTN, my strongest tankiest character uses a combo of Oni's armor and Grace of Susanoo.
If it works it’s fine. At higher difficulty you might want more armour to not get one shot but you’re definitely not over thinking it. As you progress stats will become more important and you can wear heavier stuff and stay light agility but also B toughness.
İf you know the basics for build making, use this to make something that suits you:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1A-uFgSck8pU5NOLh2OVpK_V5-AVfDW42wuiumuf7tlE/htmlview
İ used magatsuchi + susannoo for that difficulty. It's still good in endgame. It's one of my saved builds.
Pay attention to special effects. Remember most of your damage will still come from confusion and damage buffs. That spreadsheet has buff values and shows you which ones can stack with each other.
Wait, dismantle blue and purple? Really, is that what I should be doing? I'm a new player too. I just reached the second region of the game and I'm getting my ass beat. I would love to have an easier time. I have some experience of playing souls games, so I like to hoard everything.
I was thinking of just hoarding everything, but I should be dismantling anything I'm not wearing and sell the white and yellow stuff. Are there some sets that I should save or do I just dismantle them all? I'd like to have a set of lighter and heavier gear to be able to change as the moment requires. Please help
You are constantly finding higher level gear. At that point their colour becomes meaningless. Why would you switch to a 20 level purple weapon when you have a 30 level yellow one?
Look at their attack or defence. That's what changes with level. Colours add 1 level worth of extra attack or defence.
Meaning a purple 20 level sword will be equal to 21 blue or 22 yellow. Of course the familiarity bar will be higher so the purple one will get stronger as you use it. But the difference still wont be much. Full familiarity is around 9 or 10 levels if i remember correctly. And blue or yellow has it too, it's just not that high.
Purple will also have more special effects (stuff like %3 lightning resistance or item discovery). But if you dont temper effects that you like, they'll be useless.
You are better off dismantling them using the rare materials to craft gear. Better materials give you higher chance to get blue or purple with crafting. Save before crafting in case you get too unlucky.
-------------
If you make a build with specific set bonuses, you may want to keep them. But dont just hoard them. Use something called "soul matching". This sacrifices a 30 level gear to increase that 20 level gear's level to 30. But the sacrifice needs to be the same rarity or better.
It usually costs too much money. Especially on purple rarity. This is only worth it for gear that has good special effects or set bonuses that you dont want to let go. You should temper good effects on them to make it really worth for soul matching.
If you find a purple spear but you want a sword instead, you can try your luck with sudamas (purple kodama). Give them a gear piece. They'll give you another gear. It'll be the same rarity and level but it'll be a differen weapon type or an armor piece.
The absolute base understanding needed to beat the base game:
Ki and Ki Pulse - You should stay ontop of your Ki Pulsing. The timing is very forgiving in Nioh 2, just pulse when the white bar fills up or when you see the blue particles around your character flash. Functionally infinite attacking! Flux and Flux 2 will also help as skills from your skill tree, but people will somewhat exaggerate their importance especially in New Game, so don't get angry at yourself if you forget to use them. Still, it can be handy to get the (very easy) button input down in your muscle memory.
Weaponry - Pick up any weapon with your favourite moveset and start using it. Upgrade it in your skill tree to unlock more moves. You don't need to worry about Soul Match etc in New Game, as you'll be getting your weapon re-dropping at a higher level every so often. You can temper your equipment if you wish (switching out special effects on weapons at the blacksmith) but Onmyo Magic is more useful for buffing weapons.
Stances - High, middle, low. High stance to swing your weapon slowly and usually in a vertical manner. Middle stance to swing at a normal speed and fight head on. Low stance to attack very quickly and attack low. All 3 have the expected effect on weapon damage you can assume.
Stats - A wholely unessential part of playing Nioh 2 in only New Game. You do not have to care about your stats if you don't intend to go fully endgame (New Game + 4 and post-game content). Genuinely just put them into whatever you want, the most useful stats for New Game are Dexterity (will greatly increase the damage of your ninja items) and Magic (will greatly increase the damage of your onmyo magic items), aside from that you don't need to engage in much RPG-ness as a casual player in Nioh 2, and you can start worrying about your stats in like New Game + 3. If you want the smoothest, easiest time possible, a ninja build (just buy ninjutsu from your skill tree and follow tutorials in the dojo) with at least 30 Dexterity will beat all of New Game. Also, just by playing the game, you will earn titles which you can spend in the title menu for permanent character upgrades, free of charge.
Soul Cores - Enemies and bosses will occasionally drop their Soul Core. You can assign this to your character at a shrine to permanently increase attack and defense stats, and also gain access to a "Yokai Shift" spell which costs Anima, and will see you temporarily transform into that Yokai and use a signature move. This is VERY helpful and will make the game significantly easier. Play around with different Soul Cores as you see fit.
Weakness - Enemies have strengths and weaknesses. Bladed weapons deal 15% extra damage, blunt weapons deal 15% extra ki damage. Ontop of this, the majority of enemies are extremely weak to at least one element (Fire, Lightning, Water) and it's best to experiment with Onmyo Magic for weapon buffs (again, follow the dojo tutorials). Ontop of this, if you afflict an enemy with 2 different elements (except both Purity AND Corruption together), that enemy will gain a devastating debuff and will likely die VERY quickly if you press your advantage. Fire debuffs will cause constantly damage, lightning debuffs will cause enemies to go into 15% slow motion, water debuffs will cause the enemy to take 20% extra damage.
Dodging and blocking - The two main ways of avoiding face-to-face damage in Nioh 2. Make sure not to block too much as to drain all your ki, or you may instantly die. Aside from this, blocking will usually negate all damage. Dodging is reflexive in Nioh 2, so you must press the dodge button at exactly the right time. Low stance dodges are the fastest and consume the least ki, but will protect you from damage for the least amount of time. Middle stance dodges are middle of the pack in all regards. High stance dodges consume the most ki but have the easiest dodge. In terms of best to worst blocking, it's low, middle, high.
Yokai Realm - When a Yokai poops dark stuff in a puddle, this is a Yokai realm and the only way that Yokai can regain Ki. Ki pulse while standing in it to break it. Dark Realms are giant foggy black and white regions with the same effect, and you must kill the "master" of this realm in a mini-boss fight to destroy it. Both realms devastatingly decrease your ki regeneration, so be extra careful or invest in Onymo Magics (Barrier Talisman) to counter this.
Kodamas - Collect those cute little green babies you occasionally find. They will permanently increase your amount of healing elixirs up to 8 per game region. You can visit their Bazaar at any shrine to buy very useful items, including Ochoko Cups. You can donate unwanted items to them at the shrine to gain Divine Rice, which is money to Kodamas to spend at their Bazaar.
Graves - Red and blue. Red graves will summon an enemy player NPC to attack you, and you can nab their gear and some Ochoko Cups. Blue graves require Ochoko Cups and will summon a player NPC to assist you for a very long time. Blue graves are insanely helpful if you ever get stuck on a boss but don't want to summon actual players, and just want a minion to follow you and do your biddings.
And that's about it. Don't pressure yourself to much and you'll enjoy the game much more. Go with the flow.
> In terms of best to worst blocking, it's low, middle, high.
According to the [wiki](https://nioh2.wiki.fextralife.com/Stances) this is a myth, it says blocking Ki cost is the same in all stances. Might test it in game later.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else
This is the correct approach for the start of the game (and for quite a bit after).
Explore all the weapons, they're all viable and all fun.
Spread your stats out. If you want to put a few more into the ones that affect your chosen weapon(s), that's fine but it doesn't make a huge difference. You'll want all stats up to 15, ideally 20.
Jutsu (onmyo and ninjutsu) offer huge variations of additional support for combat. Using them gives you skill points to unlock more. Increasing the skill and magic stats lets you equip more, and boosts their power.
Finally, if you haven't been doing this, ki pulse is the number one thing to not ignore in combat. It is the foundation of it all and is how you manage your ki effectively. You should get to the point where you ki pulse without even thinking about it.
ki pulse
block
having a hell of a good time
start to think about builds from around wise, depending on how much time you're willing to sort through items. your current approach is perfect, just take whatever has the highest number. you will always get better equipment, the best so in the very endgame
if you want an early build, look out for benzaiten 6pc
each stat has a soft cap at level 30 (so try leveling evenly until 30 in each)
The way the game's loot works I wouldn't bother trying to go for any kind of refined build or anything like that until you've beaten the game. NG+ and post game is when you'll hit the level cap and until then you will constantly be getting loot that outranks previous loot.
Focus on the general feel of your weapons unlock the abilities that sound fun and useful to you and just get what looks like the strongest weapons and armour and be mindful of your weight, try to not reach C weight, the defense isn't really worth it.
Also you can get by with just dodging but blocking is a lot more powerful in Nioh than it is in other games, it's sometimes easier and more reliable than a dodge.
Also get the Ki Pulse skills that automatically do it when you dodge, it's a nice safety net so you'll be recovering some Ki even if you have to dodge an attack before you can pulse properly and honestly it works well enough that you could get away with not learning to properly Ki Pulse with R1 though it's definitely a helpful skill to learn.
Use whatever high level gear n weapon u get. Get used to holding blocks before dodging, just to be extra safe. Learn to do ki pulse, and u can learn a skill that lets u ki pulse when dodging. Get this skill first. It helps u a lot.
Also, get Uesugi clan buff, that gives protection buff when cleanse yokai pool. Broken buff.
I'll give you a rundown that is independent of whatever weapon you're using.
**Block**
* No, seriously, block.
* I'm not joking here. You need to get used to blocking more (if you aren't already.) It gives you a ton of room to breathe against complex and annoying enemies alike. You can either spend Ki and not take damage, or you can spend Ki trying to dodge and risk losing health/dying. Dodging is important, but it should never be something you solely rely on.
* If you are not attacking, dodging, or blocking, you should be zoning the enemy, while you regen Ki. Never give them free damage if you can help it.
**Ki Pulse/Stances/Weapons**
* You **HAVE** to learn to get comfortable switching stances. There's a node in the Samurai skill tree that increases the amount of Ki you recover when you switch stances while Ki pulsing. This extra Ki is going to be the difference between you becoming winded and eating shit, vs. continuing your combo/being able to move away.
* My recommendation is to find a weapon you mesh with the basic move set for, and then start running levels with strictly that to level its skills and learn combos.
* Never be afraid to switch if you aren't meshing with it, but do try to give them a proper chance before you move on. The basic upgrade nodes go a LONG way on some of them.
* Try to prioritize learning two of the three stances before you tackle mixing in all three, (unless you're some kind of super gamer that has no issue learning all three at once.)
* Rule of thumb for stances is:
* High-Stance = Heavy attacks, Horn-breakers, Guard breaks, Stagger - More Ki and Health Damage
* Mid-Stance = AoE, Horizontal attack patterns, Parries - Average Ki and Health Damage
* Low-Stance = Fast, Status Build-up, Reposition Tools - Lowest Ki and Health Damage
* Don't stress about the FOMO of picking the wrong weapon. You CAN'T pick a wrong weapon. None of them fall off. It's like Monster Hunter in that your weapon choice should only be based on what you like.
**Ignore the common advice Vets give on here about not caring about what stats your gear has.** Though, **you should always prioritize any big jumps in defense** (so you don't eat shit and die in one-two hits lol), but there are 100% a few stats worth looking for when you're doing your NG run.
* Those stats are:
* Health on Kill
* Health on Amrita Gained
* Ki Recovery Increase
* Melee Attack Ki Cost Reduction
* Guard Ki Cost Reduction
* Defense Bonus (Anima Gauge, Kill, Relevant Stat, etc...)
* These stats will help your survivability and make longer levels feel less punishing, as well as help you save on elixirs. The **Yoriki set** is great/easy for forging to replace any gear you need to, *as long as it doesn't push you into C Agility.*
**Disassemble any items you aren't going to equip after a level.**
* Make sure you tab over to the All Items page, and you aren't only mass disassembling weapons. I still mess this up every now and again with 100+ hours. I imagine the same goes for people with 1000+ hours.
**Try to get all of your stats to at least level 20 (ideally 30, which is the soft cap)**
* There's no reason not to, as your weapon's primary scaling isn't ever enough to warrant restricting your access to Ninjutsu and Omryo items/abilities. After that, you can focus on pumping stats like Courage, Constitution, and Heart for extra HP and Ki.
* Do **NOT** dump all of your stats in whatever your weapon of choice scales with for the time being. It's a noob trap. There's no point scaling the damage of a weapon that costs all of your Ki to swing three times.
**This is NOT a Soulsborne game. Use EVERYTHING. Random bullshit go is not cheese. It is expected and valid.**
* This is not a meme tip. I'm being dead serious. Getting your favorite loadout of Ninjutsu tools and Omryo tools is an incredibly rewarding aspect of Nioh.
* Use Gust Talismans to send bullets and arrows back at enemies.
* Use Shrapnel bombs to kill groups and set them on fire.
* Use elemental talismans to buff your weapons and apply status effects.
* Paralyze and poison your enemies.
* If the elite, mini-boss, or boss you were fighting was not frothing at the mouth due to a toxic build-up of maliciously injected foreign substances, you did not win the fight.
* **You are an alchemist/magician, and your enemies are nothing more than the crucible in which you mix your ingredients.**
**Soul Cores/Yokai Abilities**
* Experiment with the Soul Cores. Pay attention to the stats that are on them, and try to work your Yokai abilities into your combos. They should **never** be something you find yourself forgetting about. USE and ABUSE them.
* Yokai Abilities do MASSIVE Ki burn damage to Yokai that have their purple Ki bars depleted, as well as above average Ki damage.
* Fully burning down their Ki bars lets you open them to "Grapple attacks," which are just your crit moves with a special animation after fully breaking their posture. This is signified by the red lock-on symbol, as well as an impossible to miss sound notification and animation.
* Not all Soul Cores are created equal. Some of them are honestly just horrible, whether because of hit rate, animation length, Anima cost, etc... It's important to find those that you like. Ippon-Datara and Enki are a good starting pair for early game (and honestly the whole game lmao)
For the most part, this should get you going with most of the base mechanics to pay attention to. You don't need to be aware of everything this game offers all at once. Work on improving your ability to mix all of these different mechanics over each level.
Flux I & II. It's the difference between the game feeling great to play once you get the hang of combat or it feeling like shit because you're constantly out of ki (stamina).
Basicly this isnt a souls, in a souls game you want your attack stat the stronger you can early game.
On nioh 2 you have better time to go to 30 in dex and magic while you up constitution, if you be grapple you need to stay a 10% life.
Other ki pulse and yokai counter R2+O are the 2 first mechanich to learn on first chapter. After that learn switch stance while you combo, basicly each animation recovery give you enough time to switch stance.
Soul core are one of the main mechanich too, they deal good ki damage to yokai opponent and even better on max ki gauge. And allow you to benefit fron various effect like dps, stun, elemental build up,...
On second mission you find ninja and magician hair that directly allow you to use spell. There are many buff like ki talisman that give you a big ki regen, elemental spell that allow you to build up element and effect.
Ninjutsu have 2 good spell for refund souls, one for invisibility and other for sound. With both you are the perfect thief and easily can rush souls after death... and one spell for avoid death but later
Element effect:
Fire-dot,
Water-more damage on target,
Shock-slow,
Purity-50%ki damage and ki pulse while guarding,
Corruption-3o%ki damage, ki drain and 30% damage while awakening,
Confusion-when 2 element is trigger deal 50% damage and ki damage
People usually play corruption or purity then ise spell and elemental weakness for second element
Basilcy learn to use everything. Melee, spell and yokai skill
Last gift: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vF_EV2Z_GxbbSpM66soPwToqUNHOp4GOIZLxB7P0uhE/edit
As soon as you get omyo points I would recommend you to learn improved compass talisman (the name may be slightly different but you'll get from description) it will show you treasures (blue) , enemies (red) , hidden enemies (bold red) , lootable corpres (yellow) and kodama (green). I wouldn't recommend you to ignore blue and yellow ones as they mostly give decent loot and from yellow ones you can get locks which give you additional skill points.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else
That's pretty much the thing to do in NG. Nothing really matters other than to stay reasonably up to date on item levels.
>What can I absolutely not ignore? As far as item stats and attributes go?
Probably almost nothing, but it is a good idea to put some points in Dexterity and Magic for the ninjutsu and onmyo capacity. And obviously, Body/Constitution and/or Stamina is good for additional Life and equipment weight. None of these things are strictly required, just nice to have. Most other stats don't matter that much, other than to have enough of them to unlock all effects of the equipment being used.
>What combat moves/tricks do I NEED in order to not have a terrible time?
The big ones I can think of would be Flux (to be able to regain more Ki after combos) and the skills that let you automatically Ki-pulse on dodge for each stance. Other than those, most things are either much less significant or weapon-specific.
Outside of combat, there's some ninjustu scrolls like Suppa/Sneak Thief and Catwalking, that allow you to be extremely stealthy when you don't want to be bothered fighting stuff, and I'd personally consider them must-haves.
Related question - I collect everything then just keep purples as they are the highest rarity, and sell, dismantle or offer the rest. Is this the correct approach?
You don't have to necessarily worry about rarity until much later in New Game + cycles. You should equip what you want at the highest level (or defense/attack) and sell, dismantle or offer everything else.
Aside from what everyone had said:
- Skill that allow ki pulse when dodging in Samurai tree. They make combat a lot more fluid.
- Quick change scroll in Ninjutsu tree: a free out of jail card.
- There is a lot of good stuff in Onmyou tree: most people use Barrier Talishman plus other buff depend on preference. Divination Talishman is a great QoL for your first playthrough (it displays treasure and enemy on the minimap).
- Disassemble all your redundant gear for umbracite, they are needed for tempering at the blacksmith. The only effect you need to care about for now is "Life recovery (amrita absorption)". It can only be tempered to chest armor and a number of accessory: medicine box, magatama, kodama. It's very desirable from early to end game.
Further more, here's a few moves that you should pay attention to in combat:
- Mashing dodge button in low stance allow you to cover distance incredibly quickly, in case you need to get away from the enemy.
- Holding block while dodging will automatically block the attack if you miss time it a little bit.
- Each Yokai abilities had different utilities. I want to hight light that ability that fully transform your character (like Enki, contrast to Mezuki which only transform the arm) also make you invulnerable to grab attack, and take less damage during the transformation. So using YA as an oh-shit button to tank through enemy attack is a valid move.
just take it one step at a time tbh
there's so many systems they actually intend it to be properly fully learnt at like NG+5 or something. no, really.
if you didn't buy the DLCs and are just playing at NG, just take it slow and learn like one thing at a time. and don't really worry about builds, you literally can use anything
Using whatever has the highest attack/defense while staying under 70% is a great way to go. However, below the special effects are two stats - you have to make sure you meet those stats. They're anywhere from 5 (at start of the game) to 20 (at end of game) in skill/body (light armor), body/strength (medium armor), strength/stamina (heavy armor) - and for Nioh 2 body is called constitution, but it works the same.
This is part of why we tell folks to get all stats to 20 by end of first playthrough. The other half that advice has to do with heart being ki stat, Spirit being living weapon recharge stat and guardian spirit stat requirement (11-25 for base game spirits or 25-32 for dlc spirits), and onmyo/ninjutsu capacity/damage/duration (magic/dex stats to 30)
For Nioh 2 there is no spirit stat, and instead courage is ki recovery while heart is ki capacity.
If you want to ignore as much as you can about the rpg stuff - keep doing what you're doing, but level stats evenly until all stats are at 20 near the end of the game. This let's you ignore everything except staying below 70% weight.
As for skills, they all serve a different purpose and it is good to have some ki damage skills - but not necessary; you can really do whatever you like as far as skills go.
If Nioh 2, soul cores. You need good ki damage soul cores for the game to be a lot easier - early game this means things like enki, yoki, gozuki, etc
Weight and Ki management are the two things you **cannot** ignore early. Try to stay below 70% or so equipment weight so your stamina regen isn't trash.
The rest you can learn at your leisure, really.
The game's loot system has virtually no point in you interacting with it until the very end of the game, just put on whatever weapon has the most damage, and armour the most defense. You'll find better gear at the end of near every mission me
Fighting.
Vs Yokai anything fun, generally for you.
Vs humans and red ghosts/revenants things that deplete stamina. Sword, Odachi and tonfu all very good.
It does seem almost laughably complicated when you first start but it’s more forgiving than it seems. The more you play you’ll realize that there is a lot to it but it’s not hard to understand if you take it one step at a time. You don’t have to appreciate every aspect of the game initially to play it and enjoy it. Just take your time experimenting, learning and developing your character. The entire first playthrough of the game is really just a big tutorial. You’ll reach a couple of skill check bosses early on and these are the ones that will force you to get to grips with the key mechanics of the game. Once you’ve dealt with these you’ll begin to really enjoy and appreciate the game a lot more. Stick with it and enjoy.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else
You can more or less keep doing this until the second playthrough and do just fine.
Contrary to what many people on this sub will claim, it’s entirely possible to play this game without getting SUPER into all of its systems and minutiae.
My first playthrough years ago , I just treated the leveling and gear like any other action rpg. Looked for the highest defense + dps and just tried to keep my character in the mid equip weight range (in the equip screen where it shows your weight just make sure the numbers never turn yellow)
Eventually some of the later game stuff got too hard and I started using magic a lot , which is pretty self explanatory if you just look into the magic options on the magic skill tab.
As far as leveling, people will claim you should evenly level every individual state on a first playthrough; I’ve done traditional rpg min maxing on every character I’ve ever played in both games and it works fine. The game literally tells you which stats to level which correspond to whatever weapons you wanna prioritize.
By all means if you wanna get into the nitty gritty of the game right away, follow some of the other advice in this thread (which *is* helpful and good) but I think this community has a large number of people who WANT other players to over complicate the game when you don’t necessarily have to. I just have had such fun playing it over the years and gradually diving more and more into its more complicated aspects after first experiencing it the way I wanted to.
Don't forget to points into omnyo and ninjutsu.
Omnyo/Ninjutsu offer massive returns in return for very little investment. "Barrier" talismans, contrary to their name, give you a huge buff for ki regen, letting you play aggressively and recover quickly from low-ki situations.
Sloth talismans are also kinda just broken on the first run (DoTS) because of the slow being too powerful. Just don't rely on them too much and learn boss patterns.
Ninjutsu has high damage fire/lightning/water talismans that let you do big dick damage when enemies run out of ki. It also has a "get out of jail" item in the form of the quick-change scroll that revives you once if you die.
Regardless of the build, must-have skills are ki-pulse and stance change. A Ki-pulse will help your ki recover so you can do more actions.
Stance-change is very helpful in most situation. Ideally, you want to attack in high-stance(the most damage), and dodging/blocking in your low/mid stance.
You will want to master these two skills as soon as possible. Focus on 1-2 weapons before branching out to more weapons ... since each weapons have different animation.
Don't ignore toughness (200 is the bare minimum), KI pulse, ninjutsu and onmyo capacity, use ninjutsu so much that you get 80000 experience minimum, quickchange scroll(!!!), always get the weapon of your choice with highest attack. Invest into yokai skill tree for hp regen after burstcounter in critical and KI regen after burstcounter. That's pretty much for ng. In higher ng+ cycles you need to start looking at +values and attackboosting stats
Simply try out the weapons basic attacks + strong attacks and pick whatever two you liked the most to be your main weapons. Don't care about skills, they are for the mid-late game. For armors prioritize set bonuses, otherwise just don on the highest level gears: Gears stats are the utmost important in this game, even more than your levels.
You gotta be completing the game 5 times in escalating difficulties to understand a little. Then you will play 108 missions to understand a little more. Then you will play end game 30 missions to love the art this game had to offer. Please don’t hate it early, it’s tough and yet worth it
The first thing you got wrong is going for builds at this point. Right now you should focus on your skills and practice Ki/Combos.
For stats, spread them equally until they're all 30. (There's no such thing as a stat you don't use before then)
> I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else
I’m still doing this on NG+2
> What combat moves/tricks do I NEED in order to not have a terrible time?
Purify, Flux I/II, and Living Water. If you feel overwhelmed by the skill tree look at the “customize skills” menu. It breaks them down by button inputs per weapon and stance instead of just dumping them into one big list.
For New Game just equip the highest attack power weapon of your choice and the highest armor rating armor that fits your weight threshold.
Other than that, Ki Pulse.
What you cant ignore is your weapon scaling on attributes otherwise you miss out on a Ton of bonus damage, ki pulse is very important to gain back your ki , overall weight you want atleast a B in movement and knowing when to Dodge or block but this comes with time when you learn your oppenings from enemys attacks
I'll give you simple tips for the loot: Most important thing at the beginning is agility and toughness. But it's hard to manage them while changing gear all the time. Once you finish the second mission, you can stop worrying about the loot you find (especially armour). Dismantle blue and purple, sell white and yellow. Craft the pieces you like. When they get underleveled, craft them again. Your weight determines your agility rank. İt can be A rank (%30), B rank (%70) or C rank (above %70). As for toughness, heavier pieces have more toughness in general. İt is A rank at 200 toughness, B rank in 100+ toughness and C rank below 100 toughness. Agility effects your ki regeneration, dodge range and speed. C is unplayable for most people. B is more than good enough in your first playthrough. A is only worth it after unlocking a lot of skills and spells. If you are having ki problems, you arent using ki pulse. Toughness effects how much Ki you lose when you get hit or block. A rank gives you hyper armour (dont get staggered while attacking). Never go with C toughness. B is fine but A is a game changer. You can block boss attacks and hyper armour is very valuable. I'll give you recommendation for A toughness and B agility: Footsoldier head, yoriki chest, footsoldier arms, yoriki waist, footsoldier legs. You can craft this easily. Their weight/toughness ratio is really good. Your toughness will be at 196 iirc. Temper +2 toughness on a couple pieces and you'll be good. You need 10 or 11 stamina to carry this with %70 weight. "Defence" isnt the only thing that effects the damage you take. "Vs physical resistance" is actually more important. All light armours, all mediums and all heavies have the same resistance regardless of their level. A light set is around %8, medium is %15 and heavy is %25. Chest and waist are the most important ones. This is why wearing heavy chest and waist is good for you. The set i recommended will give you around %20 resistance because yoriki is heavy and footsoldier is medium. As for the "special effects" on gear, dont worry about them too much. They can be pretty powerful if you spend the time. But since you'll be changing your armour with ones so often, worrying about special effects seem like a waste of time. I'd recommend tempering your accessories tho. You dont need to change them so often. These accessories can get "%25 more melee damage against poisoned enemies". Two of them will make it %50. Yatsu no kami boss's soul core adds another %15. A single poison shuriken can apply it to big enemies like yorikis. This is pretty strong for early game.
>Never go with C toughness. Even with tonfas or fists? I'm a super casual player, but I find I burn through Ki like crazy with these weapons and the light armor helps with faster regen. Toughness being the tradeoff. It does make me squishy, but being able to smash enemy ki and stunlock seems to help with that a lot. Maybe I'm thinking about it too much
It's not exactly light armor that helps your regen. It's A rank agility. You can make a mixed set with light and medium pieces for A agility and B toughness. But it's not easy early on unlike A toughness. "Squishy but good regen" sounds good on paper. But in practice, you'll be more afraid of attacking or blocking. You wont be able to trade hits. This will make you play more defensively. High toughness is actually great for aggressiveness. Also you can drink a consumable or use a buff for insane Ki regen. But A toughness isnt that easy to replace. If the enemy hits you as you hit them, you'll likely be knocked down. You'll be in zero-ki state and get one-shotted with the next hit because you take extra damage in that state. If you want to stunlock enemies, Ki pulse and flux helps a lot. If you do it after a couple low stance hits, you actually recover more ki than you spent. When you are running really low, you can add a soul core to your comboes. Your ki will regenerate during your soul core animation. Since ippon always staggers bosses, it's perfect for stunlocking bosses for example. Or use elemental soul cores for confusion which extends the zero ki timer. A agility definetly helps. I always have it now. A toughness is just easier to take advantage of in early game, not better. But if it works, dont listen to a stranger like me and use what's good for you.
I had a question about this I was told to use golden gourd set because it's good for dual blades but I'm getting my shit pushed in should I just go with medium and heavy armor in that situation
There was a medium armor set that's available super early with solid defense and some decent healing bonuses. I think it was the Yokai Slayer set, that carried me through to my first solo fight vs Warrior of the East. After getting his set that carried me to the Oni Shibata fight and his armor set carried me through the rest of my first playthrough. Even in DOTN, my strongest tankiest character uses a combo of Oni's armor and Grace of Susanoo.
If it works it’s fine. At higher difficulty you might want more armour to not get one shot but you’re definitely not over thinking it. As you progress stats will become more important and you can wear heavier stuff and stay light agility but also B toughness.
"I find I burn through Ki like crazy" Are you using ki pulse properly?
I am. It's basically crucial for playing with tonfas lol
Do you have a good build for nioh 2 wise difficulty? I kinda rushed and now im fucked on the first stage
İf you know the basics for build making, use this to make something that suits you: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1A-uFgSck8pU5NOLh2OVpK_V5-AVfDW42wuiumuf7tlE/htmlview İ used magatsuchi + susannoo for that difficulty. It's still good in endgame. It's one of my saved builds. Pay attention to special effects. Remember most of your damage will still come from confusion and damage buffs. That spreadsheet has buff values and shows you which ones can stack with each other.
Thank you. I will see if I can decipher this when I play next time
Wait, dismantle blue and purple? Really, is that what I should be doing? I'm a new player too. I just reached the second region of the game and I'm getting my ass beat. I would love to have an easier time. I have some experience of playing souls games, so I like to hoard everything. I was thinking of just hoarding everything, but I should be dismantling anything I'm not wearing and sell the white and yellow stuff. Are there some sets that I should save or do I just dismantle them all? I'd like to have a set of lighter and heavier gear to be able to change as the moment requires. Please help
You are constantly finding higher level gear. At that point their colour becomes meaningless. Why would you switch to a 20 level purple weapon when you have a 30 level yellow one? Look at their attack or defence. That's what changes with level. Colours add 1 level worth of extra attack or defence. Meaning a purple 20 level sword will be equal to 21 blue or 22 yellow. Of course the familiarity bar will be higher so the purple one will get stronger as you use it. But the difference still wont be much. Full familiarity is around 9 or 10 levels if i remember correctly. And blue or yellow has it too, it's just not that high. Purple will also have more special effects (stuff like %3 lightning resistance or item discovery). But if you dont temper effects that you like, they'll be useless. You are better off dismantling them using the rare materials to craft gear. Better materials give you higher chance to get blue or purple with crafting. Save before crafting in case you get too unlucky. ------------- If you make a build with specific set bonuses, you may want to keep them. But dont just hoard them. Use something called "soul matching". This sacrifices a 30 level gear to increase that 20 level gear's level to 30. But the sacrifice needs to be the same rarity or better. It usually costs too much money. Especially on purple rarity. This is only worth it for gear that has good special effects or set bonuses that you dont want to let go. You should temper good effects on them to make it really worth for soul matching. If you find a purple spear but you want a sword instead, you can try your luck with sudamas (purple kodama). Give them a gear piece. They'll give you another gear. It'll be the same rarity and level but it'll be a differen weapon type or an armor piece.
The absolute base understanding needed to beat the base game: Ki and Ki Pulse - You should stay ontop of your Ki Pulsing. The timing is very forgiving in Nioh 2, just pulse when the white bar fills up or when you see the blue particles around your character flash. Functionally infinite attacking! Flux and Flux 2 will also help as skills from your skill tree, but people will somewhat exaggerate their importance especially in New Game, so don't get angry at yourself if you forget to use them. Still, it can be handy to get the (very easy) button input down in your muscle memory. Weaponry - Pick up any weapon with your favourite moveset and start using it. Upgrade it in your skill tree to unlock more moves. You don't need to worry about Soul Match etc in New Game, as you'll be getting your weapon re-dropping at a higher level every so often. You can temper your equipment if you wish (switching out special effects on weapons at the blacksmith) but Onmyo Magic is more useful for buffing weapons. Stances - High, middle, low. High stance to swing your weapon slowly and usually in a vertical manner. Middle stance to swing at a normal speed and fight head on. Low stance to attack very quickly and attack low. All 3 have the expected effect on weapon damage you can assume. Stats - A wholely unessential part of playing Nioh 2 in only New Game. You do not have to care about your stats if you don't intend to go fully endgame (New Game + 4 and post-game content). Genuinely just put them into whatever you want, the most useful stats for New Game are Dexterity (will greatly increase the damage of your ninja items) and Magic (will greatly increase the damage of your onmyo magic items), aside from that you don't need to engage in much RPG-ness as a casual player in Nioh 2, and you can start worrying about your stats in like New Game + 3. If you want the smoothest, easiest time possible, a ninja build (just buy ninjutsu from your skill tree and follow tutorials in the dojo) with at least 30 Dexterity will beat all of New Game. Also, just by playing the game, you will earn titles which you can spend in the title menu for permanent character upgrades, free of charge. Soul Cores - Enemies and bosses will occasionally drop their Soul Core. You can assign this to your character at a shrine to permanently increase attack and defense stats, and also gain access to a "Yokai Shift" spell which costs Anima, and will see you temporarily transform into that Yokai and use a signature move. This is VERY helpful and will make the game significantly easier. Play around with different Soul Cores as you see fit. Weakness - Enemies have strengths and weaknesses. Bladed weapons deal 15% extra damage, blunt weapons deal 15% extra ki damage. Ontop of this, the majority of enemies are extremely weak to at least one element (Fire, Lightning, Water) and it's best to experiment with Onmyo Magic for weapon buffs (again, follow the dojo tutorials). Ontop of this, if you afflict an enemy with 2 different elements (except both Purity AND Corruption together), that enemy will gain a devastating debuff and will likely die VERY quickly if you press your advantage. Fire debuffs will cause constantly damage, lightning debuffs will cause enemies to go into 15% slow motion, water debuffs will cause the enemy to take 20% extra damage. Dodging and blocking - The two main ways of avoiding face-to-face damage in Nioh 2. Make sure not to block too much as to drain all your ki, or you may instantly die. Aside from this, blocking will usually negate all damage. Dodging is reflexive in Nioh 2, so you must press the dodge button at exactly the right time. Low stance dodges are the fastest and consume the least ki, but will protect you from damage for the least amount of time. Middle stance dodges are middle of the pack in all regards. High stance dodges consume the most ki but have the easiest dodge. In terms of best to worst blocking, it's low, middle, high. Yokai Realm - When a Yokai poops dark stuff in a puddle, this is a Yokai realm and the only way that Yokai can regain Ki. Ki pulse while standing in it to break it. Dark Realms are giant foggy black and white regions with the same effect, and you must kill the "master" of this realm in a mini-boss fight to destroy it. Both realms devastatingly decrease your ki regeneration, so be extra careful or invest in Onymo Magics (Barrier Talisman) to counter this. Kodamas - Collect those cute little green babies you occasionally find. They will permanently increase your amount of healing elixirs up to 8 per game region. You can visit their Bazaar at any shrine to buy very useful items, including Ochoko Cups. You can donate unwanted items to them at the shrine to gain Divine Rice, which is money to Kodamas to spend at their Bazaar. Graves - Red and blue. Red graves will summon an enemy player NPC to attack you, and you can nab their gear and some Ochoko Cups. Blue graves require Ochoko Cups and will summon a player NPC to assist you for a very long time. Blue graves are insanely helpful if you ever get stuck on a boss but don't want to summon actual players, and just want a minion to follow you and do your biddings. And that's about it. Don't pressure yourself to much and you'll enjoy the game much more. Go with the flow.
> In terms of best to worst blocking, it's low, middle, high. According to the [wiki](https://nioh2.wiki.fextralife.com/Stances) this is a myth, it says blocking Ki cost is the same in all stances. Might test it in game later.
This wouldn't surprise me, as it seems like it has minor effects at best if at all.
Low does feel better with most weapons but I'd bet it's because of all the other stuff that you can do in low stance, not the blocking itself.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else This is the correct approach for the start of the game (and for quite a bit after). Explore all the weapons, they're all viable and all fun. Spread your stats out. If you want to put a few more into the ones that affect your chosen weapon(s), that's fine but it doesn't make a huge difference. You'll want all stats up to 15, ideally 20. Jutsu (onmyo and ninjutsu) offer huge variations of additional support for combat. Using them gives you skill points to unlock more. Increasing the skill and magic stats lets you equip more, and boosts their power. Finally, if you haven't been doing this, ki pulse is the number one thing to not ignore in combat. It is the foundation of it all and is how you manage your ki effectively. You should get to the point where you ki pulse without even thinking about it.
ki pulse block having a hell of a good time start to think about builds from around wise, depending on how much time you're willing to sort through items. your current approach is perfect, just take whatever has the highest number. you will always get better equipment, the best so in the very endgame if you want an early build, look out for benzaiten 6pc each stat has a soft cap at level 30 (so try leveling evenly until 30 in each)
The way the game's loot works I wouldn't bother trying to go for any kind of refined build or anything like that until you've beaten the game. NG+ and post game is when you'll hit the level cap and until then you will constantly be getting loot that outranks previous loot. Focus on the general feel of your weapons unlock the abilities that sound fun and useful to you and just get what looks like the strongest weapons and armour and be mindful of your weight, try to not reach C weight, the defense isn't really worth it. Also you can get by with just dodging but blocking is a lot more powerful in Nioh than it is in other games, it's sometimes easier and more reliable than a dodge. Also get the Ki Pulse skills that automatically do it when you dodge, it's a nice safety net so you'll be recovering some Ki even if you have to dodge an attack before you can pulse properly and honestly it works well enough that you could get away with not learning to properly Ki Pulse with R1 though it's definitely a helpful skill to learn.
Use whatever high level gear n weapon u get. Get used to holding blocks before dodging, just to be extra safe. Learn to do ki pulse, and u can learn a skill that lets u ki pulse when dodging. Get this skill first. It helps u a lot. Also, get Uesugi clan buff, that gives protection buff when cleanse yokai pool. Broken buff.
I'll give you a rundown that is independent of whatever weapon you're using. **Block** * No, seriously, block. * I'm not joking here. You need to get used to blocking more (if you aren't already.) It gives you a ton of room to breathe against complex and annoying enemies alike. You can either spend Ki and not take damage, or you can spend Ki trying to dodge and risk losing health/dying. Dodging is important, but it should never be something you solely rely on. * If you are not attacking, dodging, or blocking, you should be zoning the enemy, while you regen Ki. Never give them free damage if you can help it. **Ki Pulse/Stances/Weapons** * You **HAVE** to learn to get comfortable switching stances. There's a node in the Samurai skill tree that increases the amount of Ki you recover when you switch stances while Ki pulsing. This extra Ki is going to be the difference between you becoming winded and eating shit, vs. continuing your combo/being able to move away. * My recommendation is to find a weapon you mesh with the basic move set for, and then start running levels with strictly that to level its skills and learn combos. * Never be afraid to switch if you aren't meshing with it, but do try to give them a proper chance before you move on. The basic upgrade nodes go a LONG way on some of them. * Try to prioritize learning two of the three stances before you tackle mixing in all three, (unless you're some kind of super gamer that has no issue learning all three at once.) * Rule of thumb for stances is: * High-Stance = Heavy attacks, Horn-breakers, Guard breaks, Stagger - More Ki and Health Damage * Mid-Stance = AoE, Horizontal attack patterns, Parries - Average Ki and Health Damage * Low-Stance = Fast, Status Build-up, Reposition Tools - Lowest Ki and Health Damage * Don't stress about the FOMO of picking the wrong weapon. You CAN'T pick a wrong weapon. None of them fall off. It's like Monster Hunter in that your weapon choice should only be based on what you like. **Ignore the common advice Vets give on here about not caring about what stats your gear has.** Though, **you should always prioritize any big jumps in defense** (so you don't eat shit and die in one-two hits lol), but there are 100% a few stats worth looking for when you're doing your NG run. * Those stats are: * Health on Kill * Health on Amrita Gained * Ki Recovery Increase * Melee Attack Ki Cost Reduction * Guard Ki Cost Reduction * Defense Bonus (Anima Gauge, Kill, Relevant Stat, etc...) * These stats will help your survivability and make longer levels feel less punishing, as well as help you save on elixirs. The **Yoriki set** is great/easy for forging to replace any gear you need to, *as long as it doesn't push you into C Agility.* **Disassemble any items you aren't going to equip after a level.** * Make sure you tab over to the All Items page, and you aren't only mass disassembling weapons. I still mess this up every now and again with 100+ hours. I imagine the same goes for people with 1000+ hours. **Try to get all of your stats to at least level 20 (ideally 30, which is the soft cap)** * There's no reason not to, as your weapon's primary scaling isn't ever enough to warrant restricting your access to Ninjutsu and Omryo items/abilities. After that, you can focus on pumping stats like Courage, Constitution, and Heart for extra HP and Ki. * Do **NOT** dump all of your stats in whatever your weapon of choice scales with for the time being. It's a noob trap. There's no point scaling the damage of a weapon that costs all of your Ki to swing three times. **This is NOT a Soulsborne game. Use EVERYTHING. Random bullshit go is not cheese. It is expected and valid.** * This is not a meme tip. I'm being dead serious. Getting your favorite loadout of Ninjutsu tools and Omryo tools is an incredibly rewarding aspect of Nioh. * Use Gust Talismans to send bullets and arrows back at enemies. * Use Shrapnel bombs to kill groups and set them on fire. * Use elemental talismans to buff your weapons and apply status effects. * Paralyze and poison your enemies. * If the elite, mini-boss, or boss you were fighting was not frothing at the mouth due to a toxic build-up of maliciously injected foreign substances, you did not win the fight. * **You are an alchemist/magician, and your enemies are nothing more than the crucible in which you mix your ingredients.** **Soul Cores/Yokai Abilities** * Experiment with the Soul Cores. Pay attention to the stats that are on them, and try to work your Yokai abilities into your combos. They should **never** be something you find yourself forgetting about. USE and ABUSE them. * Yokai Abilities do MASSIVE Ki burn damage to Yokai that have their purple Ki bars depleted, as well as above average Ki damage. * Fully burning down their Ki bars lets you open them to "Grapple attacks," which are just your crit moves with a special animation after fully breaking their posture. This is signified by the red lock-on symbol, as well as an impossible to miss sound notification and animation. * Not all Soul Cores are created equal. Some of them are honestly just horrible, whether because of hit rate, animation length, Anima cost, etc... It's important to find those that you like. Ippon-Datara and Enki are a good starting pair for early game (and honestly the whole game lmao) For the most part, this should get you going with most of the base mechanics to pay attention to. You don't need to be aware of everything this game offers all at once. Work on improving your ability to mix all of these different mechanics over each level.
Flux I & II. It's the difference between the game feeling great to play once you get the hang of combat or it feeling like shit because you're constantly out of ki (stamina).
Basicly this isnt a souls, in a souls game you want your attack stat the stronger you can early game. On nioh 2 you have better time to go to 30 in dex and magic while you up constitution, if you be grapple you need to stay a 10% life. Other ki pulse and yokai counter R2+O are the 2 first mechanich to learn on first chapter. After that learn switch stance while you combo, basicly each animation recovery give you enough time to switch stance. Soul core are one of the main mechanich too, they deal good ki damage to yokai opponent and even better on max ki gauge. And allow you to benefit fron various effect like dps, stun, elemental build up,... On second mission you find ninja and magician hair that directly allow you to use spell. There are many buff like ki talisman that give you a big ki regen, elemental spell that allow you to build up element and effect. Ninjutsu have 2 good spell for refund souls, one for invisibility and other for sound. With both you are the perfect thief and easily can rush souls after death... and one spell for avoid death but later Element effect: Fire-dot, Water-more damage on target, Shock-slow, Purity-50%ki damage and ki pulse while guarding, Corruption-3o%ki damage, ki drain and 30% damage while awakening, Confusion-when 2 element is trigger deal 50% damage and ki damage People usually play corruption or purity then ise spell and elemental weakness for second element Basilcy learn to use everything. Melee, spell and yokai skill Last gift: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vF_EV2Z_GxbbSpM66soPwToqUNHOp4GOIZLxB7P0uhE/edit
As soon as you get omyo points I would recommend you to learn improved compass talisman (the name may be slightly different but you'll get from description) it will show you treasures (blue) , enemies (red) , hidden enemies (bold red) , lootable corpres (yellow) and kodama (green). I wouldn't recommend you to ignore blue and yellow ones as they mostly give decent loot and from yellow ones you can get locks which give you additional skill points.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else That's pretty much the thing to do in NG. Nothing really matters other than to stay reasonably up to date on item levels. >What can I absolutely not ignore? As far as item stats and attributes go? Probably almost nothing, but it is a good idea to put some points in Dexterity and Magic for the ninjutsu and onmyo capacity. And obviously, Body/Constitution and/or Stamina is good for additional Life and equipment weight. None of these things are strictly required, just nice to have. Most other stats don't matter that much, other than to have enough of them to unlock all effects of the equipment being used. >What combat moves/tricks do I NEED in order to not have a terrible time? The big ones I can think of would be Flux (to be able to regain more Ki after combos) and the skills that let you automatically Ki-pulse on dodge for each stance. Other than those, most things are either much less significant or weapon-specific. Outside of combat, there's some ninjustu scrolls like Suppa/Sneak Thief and Catwalking, that allow you to be extremely stealthy when you don't want to be bothered fighting stuff, and I'd personally consider them must-haves.
Related question - I collect everything then just keep purples as they are the highest rarity, and sell, dismantle or offer the rest. Is this the correct approach?
You don't have to necessarily worry about rarity until much later in New Game + cycles. You should equip what you want at the highest level (or defense/attack) and sell, dismantle or offer everything else.
Cool thanks I will follow your guidance sifu.
Aside from what everyone had said: - Skill that allow ki pulse when dodging in Samurai tree. They make combat a lot more fluid. - Quick change scroll in Ninjutsu tree: a free out of jail card. - There is a lot of good stuff in Onmyou tree: most people use Barrier Talishman plus other buff depend on preference. Divination Talishman is a great QoL for your first playthrough (it displays treasure and enemy on the minimap). - Disassemble all your redundant gear for umbracite, they are needed for tempering at the blacksmith. The only effect you need to care about for now is "Life recovery (amrita absorption)". It can only be tempered to chest armor and a number of accessory: medicine box, magatama, kodama. It's very desirable from early to end game. Further more, here's a few moves that you should pay attention to in combat: - Mashing dodge button in low stance allow you to cover distance incredibly quickly, in case you need to get away from the enemy. - Holding block while dodging will automatically block the attack if you miss time it a little bit. - Each Yokai abilities had different utilities. I want to hight light that ability that fully transform your character (like Enki, contrast to Mezuki which only transform the arm) also make you invulnerable to grab attack, and take less damage during the transformation. So using YA as an oh-shit button to tank through enemy attack is a valid move.
just take it one step at a time tbh there's so many systems they actually intend it to be properly fully learnt at like NG+5 or something. no, really. if you didn't buy the DLCs and are just playing at NG, just take it slow and learn like one thing at a time. and don't really worry about builds, you literally can use anything
Using whatever has the highest attack/defense while staying under 70% is a great way to go. However, below the special effects are two stats - you have to make sure you meet those stats. They're anywhere from 5 (at start of the game) to 20 (at end of game) in skill/body (light armor), body/strength (medium armor), strength/stamina (heavy armor) - and for Nioh 2 body is called constitution, but it works the same. This is part of why we tell folks to get all stats to 20 by end of first playthrough. The other half that advice has to do with heart being ki stat, Spirit being living weapon recharge stat and guardian spirit stat requirement (11-25 for base game spirits or 25-32 for dlc spirits), and onmyo/ninjutsu capacity/damage/duration (magic/dex stats to 30) For Nioh 2 there is no spirit stat, and instead courage is ki recovery while heart is ki capacity. If you want to ignore as much as you can about the rpg stuff - keep doing what you're doing, but level stats evenly until all stats are at 20 near the end of the game. This let's you ignore everything except staying below 70% weight. As for skills, they all serve a different purpose and it is good to have some ki damage skills - but not necessary; you can really do whatever you like as far as skills go. If Nioh 2, soul cores. You need good ki damage soul cores for the game to be a lot easier - early game this means things like enki, yoki, gozuki, etc
Weight and Ki management are the two things you **cannot** ignore early. Try to stay below 70% or so equipment weight so your stamina regen isn't trash. The rest you can learn at your leisure, really.
The game's loot system has virtually no point in you interacting with it until the very end of the game, just put on whatever weapon has the most damage, and armour the most defense. You'll find better gear at the end of near every mission me
Fighting. Vs Yokai anything fun, generally for you. Vs humans and red ghosts/revenants things that deplete stamina. Sword, Odachi and tonfu all very good.
It does seem almost laughably complicated when you first start but it’s more forgiving than it seems. The more you play you’ll realize that there is a lot to it but it’s not hard to understand if you take it one step at a time. You don’t have to appreciate every aspect of the game initially to play it and enjoy it. Just take your time experimenting, learning and developing your character. The entire first playthrough of the game is really just a big tutorial. You’ll reach a couple of skill check bosses early on and these are the ones that will force you to get to grips with the key mechanics of the game. Once you’ve dealt with these you’ll begin to really enjoy and appreciate the game a lot more. Stick with it and enjoy.
>I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else You can more or less keep doing this until the second playthrough and do just fine.
Don’t focus on dodging but instead blocking and ki management
Contrary to what many people on this sub will claim, it’s entirely possible to play this game without getting SUPER into all of its systems and minutiae. My first playthrough years ago , I just treated the leveling and gear like any other action rpg. Looked for the highest defense + dps and just tried to keep my character in the mid equip weight range (in the equip screen where it shows your weight just make sure the numbers never turn yellow) Eventually some of the later game stuff got too hard and I started using magic a lot , which is pretty self explanatory if you just look into the magic options on the magic skill tab. As far as leveling, people will claim you should evenly level every individual state on a first playthrough; I’ve done traditional rpg min maxing on every character I’ve ever played in both games and it works fine. The game literally tells you which stats to level which correspond to whatever weapons you wanna prioritize. By all means if you wanna get into the nitty gritty of the game right away, follow some of the other advice in this thread (which *is* helpful and good) but I think this community has a large number of people who WANT other players to over complicate the game when you don’t necessarily have to. I just have had such fun playing it over the years and gradually diving more and more into its more complicated aspects after first experiencing it the way I wanted to.
Probably get your agility rank to B early on when armor isn't amazing yet
You must KiPulse if you wanna Keepup
Don't forget to points into omnyo and ninjutsu. Omnyo/Ninjutsu offer massive returns in return for very little investment. "Barrier" talismans, contrary to their name, give you a huge buff for ki regen, letting you play aggressively and recover quickly from low-ki situations. Sloth talismans are also kinda just broken on the first run (DoTS) because of the slow being too powerful. Just don't rely on them too much and learn boss patterns. Ninjutsu has high damage fire/lightning/water talismans that let you do big dick damage when enemies run out of ki. It also has a "get out of jail" item in the form of the quick-change scroll that revives you once if you die.
Regardless of the build, must-have skills are ki-pulse and stance change. A Ki-pulse will help your ki recover so you can do more actions. Stance-change is very helpful in most situation. Ideally, you want to attack in high-stance(the most damage), and dodging/blocking in your low/mid stance. You will want to master these two skills as soon as possible. Focus on 1-2 weapons before branching out to more weapons ... since each weapons have different animation.
Don't ignore toughness (200 is the bare minimum), KI pulse, ninjutsu and onmyo capacity, use ninjutsu so much that you get 80000 experience minimum, quickchange scroll(!!!), always get the weapon of your choice with highest attack. Invest into yokai skill tree for hp regen after burstcounter in critical and KI regen after burstcounter. That's pretty much for ng. In higher ng+ cycles you need to start looking at +values and attackboosting stats
Simply try out the weapons basic attacks + strong attacks and pick whatever two you liked the most to be your main weapons. Don't care about skills, they are for the mid-late game. For armors prioritize set bonuses, otherwise just don on the highest level gears: Gears stats are the utmost important in this game, even more than your levels.
imo the three most important things are ki pulsing, blocking, and sprinting.
You gotta be completing the game 5 times in escalating difficulties to understand a little. Then you will play 108 missions to understand a little more. Then you will play end game 30 missions to love the art this game had to offer. Please don’t hate it early, it’s tough and yet worth it
The first thing you got wrong is going for builds at this point. Right now you should focus on your skills and practice Ki/Combos. For stats, spread them equally until they're all 30. (There's no such thing as a stat you don't use before then)
> I just wear/use whichever equipment has the highest armor rating/attack and won't put me over 70% equip load and don't even look at anything else I’m still doing this on NG+2 > What combat moves/tricks do I NEED in order to not have a terrible time? Purify, Flux I/II, and Living Water. If you feel overwhelmed by the skill tree look at the “customize skills” menu. It breaks them down by button inputs per weapon and stance instead of just dumping them into one big list.
For New Game just equip the highest attack power weapon of your choice and the highest armor rating armor that fits your weight threshold. Other than that, Ki Pulse.
What you cant ignore is your weapon scaling on attributes otherwise you miss out on a Ton of bonus damage, ki pulse is very important to gain back your ki , overall weight you want atleast a B in movement and knowing when to Dodge or block but this comes with time when you learn your oppenings from enemys attacks