Nioh 3 – Beginner’s Guide To Help You Get Started

Nioh 3 is an action RPG that builds on the series’ signature challenge by blending dual combat styles with expansive open‑field exploration. You travel through interconnected regions inspired by feudal Japan, taking on human foes and supernatural yokai while uncovering hidden paths, side quests, and secret enemies. 

With the ability to instantly switch between Samurai and Ninja combat, mastering both styles helps you adapt, survive, and thrive as threats escalate from early mobs to deadly boss encounters.

1. Try Multiple Weapons Early

Weapons gameplay

Nioh 3 offers a wide arsenal of weapons across Samurai, Ninja, and Ranged categories, each with unique mechanics, combos, and combat styles. Experimenting with different weapons early on is crucial — it helps you find a playstyle that fits you while unlocking weapon bonuses and maximizing your damage potential.

1.1 Weapon Mechanics

• Familiarity Matters: Using a weapon increases its Familiarity, which boosts damage and unlocks passive bonuses unique to that weapon type.
• Weapon Stats: Level up weapon-related stats to unlock each weapon’s full potential. For example, swords scale well with Skill and Heart, while heavy weapons benefit from Strength and Stamina.
• Combat Flow: Switching between Samurai and Ninja styles mid-combat can help you adapt to enemy patterns and exploit openings.
• Arts Proficiency: Every attack contributes to your Arts Proficiency gauge. Once full, your next heavy attack deals significantly more damage.

1.2 Samurai Style Weapons

Samurai Stances

Samurai weapons focus on close-to-mid range melee combat and rely on stances and precise Ki management. These are ideal for beginners who prefer defensive and measured combat.

Tip: Use stances strategically — High stance for power, Mid for balance, Low for speed. Switching stances mid-combat is essential against bosses.

1.3 Ninja Style Weapons

Ninja Style Sword

Ninja weapons emphasize speed, mobility, and evasive combat. They work best when paired with Ninja style mechanics like mist evasion and Ninjutsu tools.

Tip: Ninja weapons often rely on mobility and timing. Use evasive maneuvers and hit-and-run tactics to maximize damage while avoiding heavy hits.

1.4 Ranged Weapons

Ranged weapons allow you to damage enemies from a safe distance, control the battlefield, and soften enemies before engaging in melee combat.

Tip: Ranged weapons pair well with both Samurai and Ninja styles — use them to soften tougher enemies or pick off dangerous foes before they reach you.

2. Skills

Sword Skill

Skills in Nioh 3 are passive abilities or bonuses that enhance your character’s combat effectiveness, survivability, and utility. They are a core part of progression and can complement your weapon choice, combat style, and stats.

2.1 What Skills Do

Skills are divided into three types: Common, Samurai, and Ninja Skills. Skills provide a variety of benefits depending on the type:

• Combat Boosts: Increase damage, Arts Proficiency gains, or critical hits.
• Ki Management: Improve Ki recovery, Ki Pulse effectiveness, and stamina efficiency.
• Defensive Bonuses: Enhance guarding, dodging, and resistances.
• Utility Effects: Reduce debuffs, increase loot drops, or improve movement.

Tip: Start with skills that improve Ki recovery, Ki Pulse timing, and attack damage, as these form the backbone of survivability and offense.

2.1.1 Examples of Common Skills

• Vital Spirit – Increases Ki recovery when attacking.
• Aerial Strike – Adds extra damage to mid-air attacks.
• Panacea Curefast – Improves the healing effects of consumables.

2.1.2 Samurai vs Ninja Skills

• Samurai Skills: Focused on stance combat, defense, and Ki Pulse. Ideal for slower, strategic melee play.
• Ninja Skills: Focused on mobility, dodging, mid-air attacks, and Ninjutsu. Perfect for fast-paced hit-and-run tactics.

Tip: Equip skills that complement your chosen weapon and style. For example, pairing Ki recovery skills with heavy weapons helps offset their slower attack speed.

2.2 How to Get Skills

Looting for Skills

Skills aren’t automatically unlocked — you must find or earn them through exploration, combat, and completing objectives.

• Treasure Chests: Some skills are hidden in chests across missions.
• Corpses & Spirit Veins: Certain enemies drop unique skills when defeated. Example: Aerial Strike can be obtained from a corpse reachable via Spirit Vein in Hamamatsu.
• Mission Rewards: Clearing objectives, bases, or defeating bosses often grants skills. Example: Attack Mastery II comes from a chest after defeating enemies in Linoya.
• Special Items: Some skills are tied to Samurai’s Locks or Ninja’s Locks, rare items hidden in the world.
• Skill Points: Completing missions, defeating enemies, or leveling up gives points to spend in Samurai or Ninja skill trees.

Tip: Explore thoroughly and revisit earlier areas to collect missed skills — some are gated behind exploration mechanics or hidden paths.

2.3 How to Equip Skills

To equip skills, you need skill points and skill slot capacity. Early on, your slot capacity is limited, but you can expand it by finding Warrior’s Texts, Samurai’s Texts, or Ninja’s Texts. Bring these texts to a shrine to unlock additional slots.

1. Visit a Shrine.
2. Open the Skill Management Menu.
3. Select the skills you want to equip based on your playstyle.
4. Confirm your selection — equipped skills are active immediately.

Tip: Prioritize equipping a balanced mix of offensive, defensive, and utility skills early in the game. As you gain more slots, specialize based on your preferred style and weapons.

2.4 How to Increase Skills Capacity

Skills have a skill cost and you have a limited skill capacity for each category (common, samurai, ninja). Skill capacity doesn’t increase just by leveling — you must collect special items:

• Warrior’s Texts increase general (common) skill capacity.
• Samurai’s Texts increase Samurai skill capacity.
• Ninja’s Texts increase Ninja skill capacity.
• Memorandums: Collect 4 of the same type (Warrior/Samurai/Ninja) to get +1 capacity for that category. Memorandums come from exploration milestones or by trading Yokai Teardrops with certain merchants.

Having higher capacity lets you equip more and larger skills to tailor your build.

2.5 How to Respec 

You can reset and reallocate your skill points at any time once you pass the tutorial/prologue and reach the open world. Simply go to the Skill menu and press L3 on PlayStation or 3 on PC. This respec works separately for Samurai and Ninja skill trees and allows you to experiment with builds without penalty.

3. Playstyles in Nioh 3 — Samurai vs Ninja

Ninja style gameplay

Unlike many RPGs with fixed character classes, Nioh 3 lets you shape your build through combat styles, weapons, stats, and skills — and the game’s core combat depth comes from mastering two distinct playstyles:

You get access to both Samurai and Ninja styles in the tutorial, and can switch between them instantly, even mid‑combat. This Style Shift system is one of the game’s biggest innovations, offering tactical flexibility and dynamic fights.

3.1 Samurai Style 

The Samurai style is similar to classic Nioh combat:

• Direct melee engagement with heavy, powerful strikes.
• Focus on stance switching: High, Mid, Low (fast to strong) to change your moveset and effects.
• Relies on Ki Pulse — a timing mechanic to instantly regain Ki after attacks, letting you maintain pressure and extend combos.

3.1.1 Core Mechanics

• Stances affect speed, damage, and Ki cost — mastering stance transitions is key.
• Ki management is essential — Spam attacks without Ki Pulse and you’ll be vulnerable.
• Arts Proficiency fills as you attack/guard, powering up your next heavy attack.
• Deflect/Parry is a Samurai skill that can turn an enemy attack into opportunity.

3.2 Ninja Style 

The Ninja style is faster and more evasive than Samurai:

• Speed and mobility over raw defense.
• No classic stance swapping; instead you have a fluid, agile move set.
• Uses a Mist system instead of Ki Pulse — you can reposition or avoid damage more easily after attacks.

3.2.1 Core Mechanics

• Evade restores Ki and refills gauges if timed well, giving Ninja a very mobile edge.
• Ninjutsu tools (shurikens, bombs, feathers, etc.) recharge during combat as you deal damage — providing ranged and tactical options.
• Ninja attacks build Arts Proficiency quickly due to rapid strikes and mobility.

4. All Core Stats

Leveling up

Stats in Nioh 3 define your character’s combat strengths, defensive power, and performance. The game allows you to increase the stats by leveling up your character. There are seven main stats you can level while progressing.

• Constitution: Greatly increases Life HP, increasing your survivability.
• Heart: Affects Ki and Ki recovery speed.
• Stamina: Affects Life and maximum equipment weight.
• Skill: Boosts Arts Proficiency and Ninjutsu power.
• Strength: Enhance Martial Arts damage and effectiveness.
• Magic: Influence Onmyo Magic potency in combat.
• Intellect: Helps Ki recovery and supports some weapon effects.

4.1 How To Earn Stat Points in Nioh 3

In Nioh 3, stat points are earned by leveling up, and leveling requires Amrita, which acts as experience points. Your stats directly influence your combat effectiveness, survivability, and weapon potential.

4.1.1 How to Farm Amrita

• Defeat enemies: Each enemy drops Amrita when killed. Tougher foes and mini-bosses give significantly more.
• Complete missions & side quests: Rewards often include large Amrita bonuses.
• Collectibles & objectives: Some exploration objectives, hidden enemies, and treasure chests drop Amrita.
• Use Spirit Stones: These can automatically add Amrita toward leveling thresholds if stored.
• Recover lost Amrita: If you die, your Amrita drops at your grave. Return quickly to recover it; otherwise, it disappears. 

4.2 How to Level Up

Shrine

1. Visit any Shrine or Bodhisattva Statue.
2. Select Level Up in the menu.
3. Spend your collected Amrita to increase your character level, which grants stat points to invest.
4. Leveling also boosts core stats thresholds, unlocks new skills, and improves weapon scaling.

Tip: Fight enemies close to a shrine for faster Amrita farming; they respawn when you fast travel or reset the area.

4.3 How To Invest Stat Points

When leveling, you choose which stats to allocate points to. The best allocation depends on your playstyle and chosen weapon type, because weapons scale differently with your stats.

4.4 Recommended Stat Points Allocation by Weapon Type

Tip: Early-game, prioritize Heart and Stamina to survive encounters and maintain Ki for attacks. Strength, Skill, or Magic can be specialized later.

5. Map Exploration in Nioh 3

Exploration is a core part of progression in Nioh 3. Unlike some RPGs, the game rewards players for thoroughly investigating every area, finding hidden items, optional enemies, and completing objectives.

5.1 Exploration Levels

Each map or region has an Exploration Level ranging from 0 to 4. This level tracks how much of the map you’ve explored:

• Level 0: You haven’t discovered anything.
• Level 1-4: Higher levels reveal more map details, hidden icons, and unlock extra rewards.

5.2 How to increase Exploration Level

Petting animals

• Discover new areas and hidden paths.
• Activate shrines in the region.
• Clear enemy camps and complete Crucibles (special mission events).
• Complete map objectives, including side quests.

Higher Exploration Levels grant buffs and minor stat increases, making your character stronger as you explore. 

5.3 Collectibles & Hidden Items

Exploration rewards include rare and useful items that improve your builds:

• Kodama Spirits: Returning them to shrines grants blessings (stat boosts, drop rate increases).
• Chijiko Spirit Balloons: Shoot them with ranged weapons to unlock additional exploration progress.
• Scampuss Paths: Follow friendly Scampuss animals to hidden loot and secret areas.
• Skill Texts / Samurai & Ninja Locks: Unlock new skills and abilities for your character.
• Rare Crafting Materials: Needed for forging or enhancing weapons and armor.
• Enemy Bases: Clearing them can drop large amounts of Amrita and rare loot.

Tip: Keep track of uncollected items via the map (press R2/Right Stick) — it shows your current Exploration Level and remaining collectibles.

5.4 Shrines & Map Progression

Warring States map

Shrines serve multiple purposes during exploration:

• Safe Checkpoints: Rest, heal, and fast travel.
• Level Up: Spend Amrita to gain stat points.
• Respec Stats / Skills: Reset your character build without penalty.
• Map Contribution: Activating a shrine increases your Exploration Level for the area.

Make it a habit to activate every shrine you discover — this improves both Exploration Level and farming efficiency.

5.5 Tips for Efficient Exploration

1. Use Ranged Weapons: Shoot Spirit Balloons from a distance to increase map completion without engaging enemies.
2. Follow Scampuss: They often lead to secret areas or hidden chests.
3. Check Every Path: Many hidden paths contain enemy bases, skill locks, or valuable materials.
4. Clear Enemy Camps: Doing so not only increases Exploration Level but also yields Amrita and loot.
5. Return to Shrines Frequently: This ensures collected items are safe and lets you respawn closer to newly discovered areas.

6. Combat Mechanics 

Sneaking Ninja style

Nioh 3 introduces dynamic combat with instant switching between Samurai and Ninja styles, giving players flexibility to adapt on the fly. Understanding Ki management, stances, Arts, and defensive tools is essential to survive and deal maximum damage.

6.1 Ki — Your Stamina Gauge

• Ki is used for attacking, dodging, and blocking.
• Running out of Ki leaves you vulnerable to enemy attacks.
• Ki Pulse: Press the designated button immediately after a Ki-consuming action (attack or dodge) to restore Ki instantly.

Perfect Ki Pulse:

• Restores more Ki than a standard pulse.
• Deals damage to enemies if timed correctly.
• Essential for maintaining combat pressure and surviving against multiple foes. 

 6.2 Arts Proficiency

• Attacking enemies fills your Arts Proficiency gauge.
• Once full, your next heavy attack becomes stronger and gains additional effects.
• Arts Proficiency reduces Ki consumption for empowered attacks and increases overall damage.
• Both Samurai and Ninja weapons benefit, but builds may scale differently depending on weapon type.

6.3 Samurai Stances

Samurai Style features three stances: Low, Mid, and High. Each stance changes your moveset, attack speed, and Ki cost. Switching stances mid-combat allows you to adapt:

• Low stance: Fast attacks, low damage, quick Ki recovery.
• Mid stance: Balanced speed and damage.
• High stance: Heavy attacks, slower speed, more Ki consumption.

Tip: Changing stances during combat is critical to counter different enemy types. 

6.4 Burst Break & Enemy Counters

Red glow on enemies signals a powerful, unblockable attack. Timing is critical — this is a key mechanic for surviving boss fights and elite enemies.

Burst Break: Press R2/RB just as the attack is about to land to: Cancel the enemy’s attack, deal Ki damage to the enemy, and reduce their stamina, opening them for follow-up attacks.

6.5 Martial Arts, Living Artifact & Defensive Tools

Sword Martial Arts

• Martial Arts: Special moves learned during progression that augment your combat options.
• Living Artifact / Guardian Spirit Gauge: A gauge builds up next to your life bar as you gain Amrita. Once full, you can transform into Guardian Spirit form, granting: No fatal damage for a short period, and elemental damage effects on attacks.

• Defensive Tools: Include projectiles, bombs, and other items that recharge during combat.

7. Use Resources Wisely 

Searching loot

In Nioh 3, resources such as crafting materials, gear, and Amrita are limited, especially early in the game. Using them efficiently can make the difference between struggling in combat and powering through missions. Knowing when to forge, upgrade, dismantle, or sell gear ensures your character stays strong and prepared for tougher enemies.

7.1 How to Craft and Upgrade Gear

Crafting and upgrading are central to progression in Nioh 3. Weapons and armor define your combat effectiveness, and leveling them properly can significantly reduce difficulty in challenging areas.

• Blacksmith: Forge, upgrade, or enhance gear using collected materials.
• Dismantle unused gear: Break down weapons/armor to gain Soul Ores and crafting mats.
• Strong foes & bosses: Defeat them to obtain rare materials for high-level upgrades.
• Map collectibles: Hidden chests, Scampuss paths, and Spirit Balloons often contain valuable upgrade resources.

Tip: Focus on upgrading your main weapon first; dismantle mid-tier or duplicate gear for extra materials.

7.2 How to Sell and Offer Gear

Make an Offering for trading gear

Managing inventory efficiently helps maintain both Amrita and gold, the two key currencies for leveling and crafting. Selling or offering gear in the Shrine ensures you are not holding onto items you don’t need while gaining useful resources. Go to the Preparations tab and select the Make an Offering option.

• Sell unwanted gear: Trade weapons/armor for gold to buy upgrades, ammo, or consumables.
• Offer gear at shrines: Convert unneeded gear into Amrita, which is used to level up your character.

Tip: Offer duplicate or low-level items for Amrita; this is often faster than farming enemies for experience.

7.3 How Smithing Texts Work

Smithing Texts are essential for unlocking new weapons and armor at the blacksmith. Without these texts, you cannot forge some of the game’s strongest gear, so exploring and collecting them is a priority.

• Found in treasure chests, mission rewards, and exploration loot.
• Unlock new weapon and armor types for crafting and upgrading.

Thoroughly explore each area for hidden chests and collectibles; missing a Smithing Text can block upgrades to key weapons.

7.4 Rerolling Gear Effects

Even the best weapons can have suboptimal stats. Rerolling allows you to optimize effects like damage bonuses, elemental properties, and stat boosts to suit your playstyle.

• Requires materials and gold at the blacksmith.
• Focus on rerolling main weapons to maximize damage output.

Tip: Don’t waste resources rerolling secondary weapons early — prioritize your primary weapon first.

7.5 Soul Match System

Soul Match is an advanced system for leveling up weapons, increasing their base stats, and scaling. This ensures your gear remains viable as enemies become stronger in mid- and late-game areas.

• Unlock via a side quest in the story.
• Use Soul Ores to improve weapon level.

Combine Soul Match upgrades with rerolls to create highly effective weapons.

7.6 Loot vs. Crafting

Loot drops from enemies

While crafting is important, loot drops often provide stronger gear faster, especially early on. Balancing exploration, combat, and crafting is key to building a powerful character efficiently.

• Prioritize collecting gear from enemies and exploration.
• Use crafting to upgrade or optimize gear rather than creating it from scratch.

Tip: Rely on loot drops early, then upgrade weapons with dismantled materials and rerolls.

Best Guides for Nioh 3

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Best Ninja Weapons Tier List

Best Weapons Tier List

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