If there is something not listed in this guide, please comment and I will add it. It is also extremely possible that the information posted here is erroneous, so please take it with a grain of salt.

The reason I made this guide is because I noticed there was a huge lack of information online for this game, even the wiki is not fully updated and contains misinformation here and there, you can't even trust posts on reddit either for accurate information, especially when they are months old.

If you're like me, then the flavor text has probably confused you in this game a little too much when starting out. Here's a simple translation of the modes if they weren't clear enough.



On the mission map look for the "STARTING POINT", select it and go to TORII GATE.

TORII GATE is literally just flavor text for multiplayer, people used Torii Gates as meeting point landmarks in Japan.

Inside of the Torii Gate you will see the following options:



Yokai Realm with a Companion = Play with a Friend

Random Encounters = Quickmatch Co-Op with a stranger or a friend that is already in a mission

Battle = PvP

Yokai Realm is what you and your friend choose if you're both in the world map. If one of you is already in a mission and you want to summon a friend, the person inside of the mission has to offer an Ochoko Cup to the shrine and wait for a visitor. If you want only your friend to join, then you have to set a secret word in the online settings of the main menu.

For the friend that wants to join a friend in a mission, you have to choose Random Encounters, set the secret word and search without conditions. You will shortly join your friend.

For a completely detailed explanation of the multiplayer mode please visit this Steam guide.
Co-op Explained

• Max Level: 750
  
• Respec: Yes
  
• Total Amrita Needed: 1,485,204,076,450 Trillion
  
  
• Max Focus Level: 1000
  
• Respec: No
  
• Total Amrita Needed: 3,000,000,000,000 Trillion

Stats Cap: 99




Way of the Nioh Stats Cap: 200




The table below indicates what is earned from improving each statistic, but for more detailed information regarding leveling up, please visit this page: Nioh Wiki Stat Breakpoints[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com]

Weapons always have three statistics they base their damage on, and the rating varies from weapon to weapon. This table only shows the best base rating for that weapon category.

Equipment level caps for dropped items change per difficulty and it is possible for rare equipment to drop 10 levels higher than the cap. The bonus levels (+) work different and are explained in the Divine Gear section of this guide.

34 spirit is the highest Guardian Spirit requirement. The table below shows the amrita requirement per difficulty tier in order to level up each guardian.

Prestiged Points are earned along side with leveling up from the start of the game and they can be accessed from the Titles option in the main menu.

There is two sections of prestige points, one is Agyo (Onmyo Magic) and the other is Ungyo (Ninjutsu Magic). Each section has 8 different bonuses you can level up, however they will only show you 4 at a time, and each time you level one up, another one replaces it until you level up four different ones and it cycles back again.

Each category can have up to 30 points put into them.



You can max out 6 abilities if you don't spread out the points and if you play for a very long time, but when you start the game all you have to do is decide 3 abilities you definitely don't care for, and simply upgrade the other 5. So when you first go into this screen, just upgrade the ones you've already decided you like, eventually you'll only have to upgrade a single slot because it just cycles through all the ones you do like. There is no wrong ones to choose, this is all personal preference, simply choose your 3 least favorites per section and go for the rest. If you continue playing this game for a long long time (past 300 hours) you'll eventually be able to max out 6 sections on both Agyo and Ungyo.



Yes, you can purchase a Koan Manual from the Hidden Tea House. Ignore the part where it says that it resets titles, it's a mistranslation.




Extra information added from this reddit post: Click here for link

What are Focus Levels?
Once you reach level 750, the game provides its die-hard fans with an extra 1000 levels. These level up points cannot be respecced however as they are minuscule increases and serve only as a way to provide a long term goal for players that enjoy the game long after they have completed all tasks and wish to conquer the Underworld.

You can choose to distribute 1000 levels in any of the four categories, however you can only max out one single stat.
It is recommended to invest into a single statistic.

• You gain 1 HP point every 2 levels = 500 HP for 1000 levels
  
• You gain 1 Attack point every 5 levels = 200 Attack for 1000 levels
  
• You gain 1 Defense point every 5 levels = 200 Defense for 1000 levels
  
• You gain 1 Luck point every 10 levels = 100 Luck for 1000 levels

More information can be obtained on this subreddit post.

The regions are unlocked from top to bottom. The first six regions are the main campaign and the last three are DLC, from top to bottom: DLC 1, DLC 2 and DLC 3 as they were released.

The last campaign mission "The Queen's Eyes" is in the Omi region. This is the mission you need in order to progress to the next difficulty: Way of the Strong. The same applies in order to progress to each subsequent difficulty.

Originally posted by Nioh Wiki:

It indicates how much you have used an item. The higher your familiarity, the more Amrita you will obtain when you offer the item at a Shrine. Every item has a level at which their familiarity is maxed out.

Familiarity Increases the base stats of the equipment piece as shown in the pictures below.

Some weapons come with the attribute of Familiarity Damage Bonus A. This increases your weapon's damage roughly by about 15%.

Familiarity Bonus on the other hand, does not increase your damage. It increases the rate at which the Familiarity bar is filled. This attribute is found in armor and accesories and is considered useless.

How do I increase Familiarity without fighting?

Whetstones for weapons.


Nikawa Glue for armor.


Do not use these items willy nilly as they are expensive and hard to come by in the beginning. These items affect ALL equipped items, so make sure you equip all the items you intend to max first before using them.

• Proficiency earns 10 samurai skill points per weapon.
  
• Unlocks Mystic Arts Dojo Mission at 500,000 proficiency per weapon.
  
• Proficiency caps at 999,999, with no benefit.

Proficiency Bonus on weapons and accessories:
This ability is useless as it is unnecessary to earn proficiency at a faster rate, unless you are extremely impatient. But even so, to fully max a weapon you also want to get the titles for each weapon which require you to kill 250 humans total. As long as you are fighting enemies close to your level, you will max proficiency before you are done killing 250 humans.

Samurai Skill Points Proficiency Tiers:

• 500
  
• 2,000
  
• 6,000
  
• 15,000
  
• 30,000
  
• 60,000
  
• 100,000
  
• 150,000
  
• 220,000
  
• 300,000

• Attacking, evading, guarding and taking damage consumes Ki.
  
• High Stance rolls to evade, Medium and Low stance dash to evade.
  
• Agility Rating affects the distance and speed of your dash and roll.
  
• Agility Rating affects your Ki recovery speed.
  
• Some Weapons come with Agility Damage Bonus: A, this provides a rough estimate of 15% damage increase at A Agility and 10% for B Agility.
  
• D Agility Rating provides the worst ki regeneration, ki consumption, slowest speed, evasion, and makes it unbearable to control.

Ki consumption and regeneration is primarily affected by your Agility Rating.


Recommended Weight
After playing around with all weight types, I recommend that if you're going to wear Heavy Armor, then either have enough stamina to go below the 70% weight limit, or have "reduced weight" affix on every armor piece AND have just enough stamina for the 70% B agility. Under no circumstances do I recommend settling for C agility, it destroys your mobility, ki regeneration, ki consumption and total output damage. Also, if and when you do Abyss missions, the weight debuff can entirely cripple you with a D rating.

Equipment Weight Damage
There's been reports from other players that there is a damage boost with various armor weights, after some personal testing I found this to be true when it comes to not wearing any armor at all. Being completely naked will yield more damage (16-17%) than wearing armor with no damage attributes or set bonuses.

There could be a number of reasons as to why this works the way it does, it may be due to the way certain attributes work like "equipment damage bonus" or it may be something the developers added so that naked speed runs would be viable. If you're trying to min-max your gear, the best solution is to test your numbers against the same enemy until you find what works best for you.

Toughness
Affects how much Ki is used up when guarding. At 200 Toughness you gain the ability to prevent staggers from taking damage, meaning you can continue attacking while taking damage even if it kills you. However, there are attacks that will always knock you down, usually heavy telegraphed attacks from bosses or grapples the enemies perform.

This is often a statistic that is easily disregarded by light or medium armor players. Even if you do not achieve 200 toughness, it's still important as there are attacks or situations where blocking is preferred instead of avoiding, as it could result in you falling off the stage and dying.

Ki Damage

Similar but different from Break. Ki Damage only affects enemies that are not guarding, you will deplete their ki faster when your attacks successfully land. General consensus is that stacking this statistic is not as good as it should be, nor does it affect Yokai. But information may be outdated.

Break

How much Ki damage you do to a guarding opponent. If their Ki is depleted while guarding, they will be exhausted and left open to finishers, marked by a red reticle.

If the enemy has Shorten Recovery Time (Out of Ki) then they will not be exhausted for long so you must act quickly to finish them.

Parry

Should have been called "deflect" or "guard" instead, Parry in this context affects how much Ki is lost when blocking an enemy attack.

Guard Ki Reduction is literally the Parry stat as well with the exception that one is a solid number and the other is a percentage, the naming conventions in this game will drive you nuts.

You will sometimes find the Parry stat in weapons


and Guard Ki Reduction in both weapons and some Guardian Spirits.

At the bottom of every weapon skill list, you will see three green icons. These are not unique per weapon, instead they are shared across all skills, much like Flux, Flux II and Flash Attack.



These skills are considered dump stats and should only be invested in after you have acquired all the skills you need.

Each category has 100 levels and requires 3,050 Samurai Skill points to max one of them as every 2 levels the skill points cost increases by 1. The 100 level cap information was taken from a reddit post, the 3,050 Samurai skill points was something I calculated after I realized the sequence of increased skill points cost every two levels.

Here is the level up sequence of costs:
6,6,7,7,8,8,9,9,10,10,11,11,12,12,13,13,14,14,15,15,16,16,17,17,18,18,19,19,20,20,21,21,22,22,
23,23,24,24,25,25,26,26,27,27,28,28,29,29,30,30,31,31,32,32,33,33,34,34,35,35,36,36,37,37,
38,38,39,39,40,40,41,41,42,42,43,43,44,44,45,45,46,46,47,47,48,48,49,49,50,50,51,51,52,52,
53,53,54,54,55,55

Everything at the Blacksmith can be extremely expensive if you don't know what you're doing. Especially if you don't know what the attributes do, sometimes they're self explanatory and sometimes they are as obscure as they are useless.

Reforging is simply a way to gamble your money to try to cycle through abilities until you land on something you want. This can be a huge money and time sink as it is unreliable, I've spent over a million gold simply re-rolling a stat for 20,000 Gold. I thought I had plenty and before I knew it, I was completely dry.

Leave Reforging as a last resort. Instead focus on Tempering.

Select Temper instead of Reforge by pressing the correct button indicated at the bottom of the screen.


Instructions
Select an attribute you want to change and look at the list on the right for an ability you want. These attributes sometimes have a low value and a high value, example would be something like Wind 17 and Wind 21. Always try to find the highest value.


These attributes can appear anywhere on the list, they could require cheaper Umbracite or they could require more expensive ones. They tend to be completely random. Be careful to not spend a more expensive Umbracite on a lower tier attribute. They will let you pay the difference by spending a higher tier material, usually not worth it.

Min-Maxing
Once you have tempered most of the abilities you want, it gets more difficult to find the last ability on the last slot. So how can you cycle the list of abilities? Reforging doesn't seem to work. Here's what you do: spend an umbracite on a crappy ability and then check the temper list again, you will usually notice different abilities. Keep doing this until you find what you're looking for, this can be expensive but it's a sure-fire way of guaranteeing you get the exact build you want.


Some abilities are from the same category, this is important if you're trying to understand what's the best way to forge a weapon since you cannot put two abilities from the same category into the same weapon. Here are some examples of abilities that are in the same category:

Elemental & Status Pool

• Fire
  
• Water
  
• Wind
  
• Lightning
  
• Earth
  
• Poison
  
• Paralysis

You can only choose one of those to use on your weapon, the same goes for other abilities such as Familiarity Damage Bonus, Agility Damage Bonus, Ninjutsu Damage Bonus, Onmyo Damage Bonus, etc. For a full table of attributes that share the same category pool, please visit the page below:
Nioh Wiki Reforge table[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com].
========================================================


Where do I get Umbracite?
Five different ways:





Some missions will give different quality Umbracite as a first time reward depending on the difficulty you are playing. So keep an eye on the rewards if you're hurting for Umbracite.

• Select Torii Gate.
  
• Select Random Encounters.
  
• Search without conditions.
  
• Kill strong Yokai and finish the mission.

You are guaranteed at the very least one Umbracite as a reward. Sometimes you can end up with higher quality Umbracite as well as several of the regular ones. Drops are affected by luck and Kodama Hunter Blessing that increases Materials Drop by 25%.

You cannot earn Umbracite from selecting Yokai Realm with a Companion unless the mission you select has it listed as a reward.

This end game area will sometimes drop Umbracite.

========================================================

The idea of soul matching is to take a low level item and to increase it's level by sacrificing a higher level item. The following list is going to be a quick reference guide so you understand Soul Matching a little easier at first glance.
For more in-depth information visit: Nioh Wiki Soul Match[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com]

• Costs Gold or Patronage.
  
• Multiple melds will increase the cost of that item.
  
• The cost also increases as the item level increases.

Divine and Ethereal:

• Matching an item with another item of the same category will reduce it's cost by 50%.
  
• Matching an item with another identical item will reduce it's cost by 70%.

Matching Cost Increase
Every time you match an item and increase it's base level, the cost will increase if you try to soul match the same item. The number of times you match something does not appear anywhere, but matching something more than two times is not recommended as the cost becomes astronomical.


Inheritable Slots
This icon indicates that this skill can be inherited by another weapon. In order to do this, you must max the familiarity of the weapon that currently has the skill you want to move, then use it as a material for a Soul Matching meld. The levels of the items do not matter, all that matters is the familiarity, if it remains at anything less than max then you will not be able to transfer the skill.


Soul Matching Plus Gear
Matching plus gear does not increase the cost of melding as long as the base item level remains the same. So if you match a +2 with a +2 and get a +3 and continue to match items all the way to +10, the price will remain the same based on the original formula of the item level, item type and item name.


Soul Matching Cost Reduction
This ability can be found randomly on weapons and gear as well as forged items, but you cannot temper it. Any soul matching that this item is involved in will be discounted by the percentage shown, whether it's used as a base or a material. Be aware that the cost will still increase based on how many soul matches you have completed with the base weapon.


Reset No. of Soul Matches
This ability is found in ethereal gear and it CAN be tempered. Soul Matching will reset the number of soul matches an item has had, effectively reducing future costs.


In order to unlock the look for a certain armor or weapon piece you must first obtain the actual item, rarity is not important. The only catch is that it cannot be unlocked by obtaining the equipment through a revenant or even dismantling it afterwards.

• Obtain the item by defeating an enemy that drops it
  
• Forge the item from a smithing text you obtained

This section only covers the most basic attributes for now, if you want more detailed information on ability pools please click the link below for more information.
Nioh Wiki Reforge Table[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com]

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

• Fire
  
• Water
  
• Wind
  
• Lightning
  
• Earth
  
• Poison
  
• Paralysis

Elemental and Status passive attributes on your weapons are not as strong as Onmyo enchantments, however they are pretty good depending on the weapon you are using and the enemy you are facing. For example: You want water on your weapon to fight fire wheels easier, but then you equip fire talismans for slimes or vice-versa. Elemental damage scales in proportion to the damage you deal, so keep your stance in mind when fighting enemies weak to certain elements.

• Weaken Armor (Head)
  
• Weaken Armor (Torso)
  
• Weaken Armor (Hands)
  
• Weaken Armor (Legs)
  
• Weaken Armor (Feet)
  
• Weaken Melee Weapons

These abilities work on a per-hit basis, so if you have 22.9% on any of the weaken attributes, it means that every hit you do has a 22.9% chance to apply the effect. These abilities are recommended on fast multi-hit weapons. I personally wouldn't recommend them on slow weapons like axes or odachis as I have gone through hordes of enemies without activating it once. But it performs okay on certain skills like Mad Spinner for axe or Tiger's Blade for Odachi, where you hit an enemy multiple times.

• Unlimited Ninjutsu
  
• Unlimited Onmyo
  
• Unlimited Ammo
  
• Unlimited Elixir
  
• Unlimited Stones - Ethereal

All of these attributes have a chance based on their percentage to not consume the listed category. So whether you use an elixir, shoot an arrow or a bullet, cast a spell or throw some bombs, they all have a chance to not consume an item. The higher it is, the more often it happens. Even a 5% chance activates often enough to be useful, so keep that in mind.

Deflects long range projectiles back in the direction they came from after a successful timely-guard. This can be an amazing defense against those annoying archers, but the execution has to be frame-perfect and ultimately a wasted slot of an attribute if you're not performing this often enough. If you want to use this skill then I would recommend you wear the Genius Strategist set for the 2-set bonus that extends the timely guard opening. If you're using a Sword then you can also use the Mystic Art Skill - Sword of Salvation for another timely guard increase, but they do not stack based on my experience.

If you see a piece of equipment that has the Special Effects as red text, then it means you cannot benefit from the bonuses because you do not meet the requirements to equip it, as shown below.

Fire (Scorched)

• Causes damage over time.
  
• Duration of effect can be shortened by dashing/rolling.
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash or Daion-jin's Sake.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will also make you immune to future elemental debuffs.

Lightning (Electrified)

• Slows attack speed and movement (Stacks with Sloth effect).
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash or Daion-jin's Sake.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will also make you immune to future elemental debuffs.

Earth (Muddied)

• Target will take double Ki damage.
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash or Daion-jin's Sake.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will also make you immune to future elemental debuffs.

Water (Saturated)

• Increases Physical damage received by about 20%.
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash or Daion-jin's Sake.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will also make you immune to future elemental debuffs.

Wind (Blustered)

• Lowers target's Physical Attack power, weakens their ability to block attacks.
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash or Daion-jin's Sake.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will also make you immune to future elemental debuffs.

Confusion

• When you stack 2 elemental status effects on a foe, they are inflicted with Confusion.
  
• Confusion increases damage taken while the status is in effect.
  
• Yokai stagger with every hit taken.
  
• Humans will suffer reduced Ki recovery and slower movement speed.
  
• Confused is indicated by a Yin Yang icon on the HUD.
  
• Visually represented by a red and black haze emanating from the affected target.
  
• This effect is also known as Discord, because Zenyatta from Overwatch uses a similar ability.
  
• Can be cured by using Sacred Ash.
  
• Daion-jin's Sake will NOT remove Confusion, but it will prevent it from refreshing.

Poison

• Does not deal direct damage.
  
• Builds up the ailment/debuff per hit inflicted.
  
• Deals damage over time (DoT) once it has been applied.
  
• Can be cleansed by using Antidote or Sacred Ash.

Paralysis

• Does not deal direct damage.
  
• Builds up the ailment/debuff per hit inflicted.
  
• Paralyzes the target for a long period of time until they are struck again.
  
• Being paralyzed opens up the target to Finishing Blows/Grapples.
  
• Can be cleansed by using Antiparalytic Needles or Sacred Ash.

Stench

• Coats the player in a terrible stench.
  
• Stuns the target after they ingest any usable medicine, elixirs, ninjutsu items, etc.
  
• Auto-Recovery and self-healing effects will still work.
  
• Can be removed by coating yourself in water (barrels) or by using Sacred Ash.

• Onmyo and Ninjutsu spells are replenished at Shrines.
  
• Every Onmyo and Ninjutsu spell has three levels.
  
• Each level has it's own cost and provides you with the amount of uses listed.
  
• Duration and effect are based on your Dexterity/Magic and Ninjutsu/Onmyo stats.

Unlike what you may have thought, leveling up a spell does not lower the overall cost, instead each level acts like it's own spell and you can equip any version of it. So you'll either have three or six or nine of a spell after equipping all the levels.




Greatly reduces the movement speed of your enemy.
If you're just starting out and you're wondering what to get, then know that Sloth is all you need for the first two difficulties. This is an extremely powerful skill starting out, but don't get comfortable as bosses have increased resistance to debuffs the further you progress through the difficulties. It's also not a good idea to use against certain bosses more or less, but it can still grant you a breather if you need one. You will use this ability less and less the further you progress, but it's still a great situational tool.

Greatly reduces enemy defense.
This ability has been estimated to be in the 60%+ range. This is your saving grace end-game, If you ever run into a boss that seems almost impossible to hurt, then this is what you need to use.
But don't get used to it, boss resistances will sometimes make this debuff last a total of 10 seconds, so if I were you I'd look for an opening and then apply sloth followed by Weakness, then destroy the boss.

Reduces enemy attack power.
This is decent in co-op, and decent if you like to trade damage often. But it doesn't last that long end-game and if you're wearing anything other than heavy armor, then you're wasting your time since it still won't save you from getting one-shot.

Duration Example: 00:54 at 30 Magic & 303 Onmyo Power
Summons fire to envelop your weapon.
This is another great starter and I highly recommend it as there are plenty of slimes throughout the game that are weak to fire, but more importantly this makes Umi-Bozu much easier. All elemental talismans are useful in one way or another at applying their elemental debuffs, so if you just need more damage output, you can't go wrong with just activating one.

Creates Amrita when your attacks hit.
If you think this is for leveling up, it's not. This achieves three things: Refills your living weapon gauge, activates passives that require Amrita and heals you if you have the attribute on your torso armor called "life recovery from amrita absorption".

Reduces your defense but raises attack.
This has been reported to not work in conjunction with Power Pill. A good ability otherwise, so long as you don't get hit. Reportedly does not stack with a lot of attack buffs, so end-game this may seem like a wasted shortcut. I don't use it much anymore, since I love getting hit.

Increases elemental resistance.
If you're into passive abilities like me, then you will like these. But full disclosure: these do nothing end game. They do not prevent you from accumulating elemental build up, they don't really lower damage all that much and they're definitely not going to stop anything. Want something more reliable? drink Daion-jin's Sake.



Duration Example: 05:50 at 30 Dexterity & 354 Ninjutsu Power
Duration Example: 08:18 at 82 Dexterity & 605 Ninjutsu Power
Allows you to survive an enemy's attack that would otherwise kill you.
This is your bread and butter. These scrolls allow you to survive any hit that kills you, you will immediately respawn above the spot where you died. But here's where the dilemma comes in: you can safely land or you can do a landing attack and deal lots of damage, but you will be completely open in doing so and you may die in the process. So just out of experience I recommend that you hold block when you respawn and spam the button to recast it (careful, don't cast twice), then dash away until you're safe enough to heal.

Duration Example: 02:56 at 30 Dexterity & 354 Ninjutsu Power
Move in total silence (except for attacks) and take less damage from falls.
This is probably my favorite non-required ability from Ninjutsu, because it allows you to safely and quickly backstab any enemies as long as they don't see you. You can even run towards an enemy, just be careful to not do a dash attack as that will alert enemies around you. Backstabs are completely silent however and you can abuse this ability in conjunction with Suppa scroll to get behind enemy lines and then start taking out their archers.

Duration Example: 02:56 at 30 Dexterity & 354 Ninjutsu Power
Reduces the distance at which enemies can find you, aka invisibility.

• If you walk too close to an enemy, they will see you and Suppa will fade away.
  
• If you run too close to an enemy from behind, they will hear you and Suppa will fade away.
  
• If you try to apply Suppa while you have aggro, it will not work.
  
• If you are playing co-op and one of you is found, both of you will lose the Suppa buff.
  
• If you run into a Yokai cloud that spawns an enemy then you will lose the Suppa buff.
  
• If you kill an enemy even with a backstab, you will lose the Suppa buff.
  
• Long story short - you will lose the Suppa buff if you are spotted.
  
• Do not use Suppa without Catwalking.

Duration Example: 00:43 at 30 Dexterity & 354 Ninjutsu Power
Increases Attack Power by an estimated 10-15%.
This reportedly does not stack with many other damage increasing buffs including Carnage Talisman. So it may be okay early game when you don't have a lot of enhancements, but end-game this will start feeling like a wasted shortcut. I personally stopped using this in Nioh difficulty.

Summons fire around you while casting and then throws a fireball at your target.
Unlocked by defeating Jin Hayabusa in The Master Ninja mission, Osaka (Summer) region.
The drop is random, all three levels of this jutsu will simply appear in the Ready Jutsu menu of the Shrine after it is found. If you have the points, it's a great fire spell.

Unlike Flame Dragon, this is not a Ninjutsu spell. This is a skill for katana that you can equip once you've obtained it by defeating Jin Hayabusa. The unlock is not an item, it's simply a message window saying you've obtained it, but it's also a random unlock just like the Flame Dragon Spell with no pre-requisites - you simply have to defeat him over and over and get lucky. This is equipped in the "enemy out of KI" section for the katana skills.

In order to unlock the Hidden Teahouse, you must complete the Spider Nest Castle mission in the Kinki Region (third region).


Unlocking this provides with the ability to join a Clan, purchase Transformations, Emotes, and rare exclusive items only found in the teahouse.


Choosing a clan grants you permanent bonuses to your character. These bonuses improve slightly if you donate items and stick with the clan long-term. You can switch clans whenever, but there is an 8 hour cooldown window before you can switch again. For a full list of clans and their bonuses, visit the following link: Nioh Wiki Clans[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com]



Clan battles are decided from how many items were donated. After the week has ended, the clan will give you a large amount of glory and gold based on your donations and depending on whether the clan won or lost.

Good question, no easy answer to it. But you can arrive to the answer yourself by thinking about a few things. Do you want to farm item rewards before you settle down with a clan for good? or maybe you want to test the waters with some based on your playstyle and less based on your weapon of choice, because if one thing is for certain it's that everybody starts using different weapons later in the game. Whatever you're looking for, I'll add a table below with clans and their rewards this way you can at least consider if you want to farm first or go focus on their abilities instead.

This table only shows their primary rewards that never change. Their daily rewards are best seen in-game as those change...daily.

Summoner's Candle
Allows you to retrieve your Amrita and Guardian Spirit without having to find your grave after you died.


Himorogi Branch
Allows you to quit a mission and return to the map without losing any Amrita. You get so many of these, it's impossible to run out.


Himorogi Fragment
This is what you use at the start of the game to quit out of missions, but once you start getting Himorogi Branches, then forget about these because they make you forfeit all Amrita.


Hora-Gai Shell
Calls the attention of nearby enemies. You ever get the feeling you're about to run into a trap? why not make sure by blowing the horn and calling them to you? Now you can fight on your own terms and who knows, maybe they'll activate traps and kill themselves on the way to you.


Spirit Stone
If you think amrita items are only for rewarding you with more level ups, then you are gravely mistaken. Spirit stones and similar items provide an amrita gauge boost (your living weapon super) and if you shortcut these, you can use your living weapon back to back with little down time in the heat of battle.


Sacred Salt
Sends visitors away. Just in case you ever summon a griefer or a cheater, this is how you get rid of them.


Amulet of Camaraderie
Do you play with a friend? do they constantly run off on their own and die who-knows-where? this is the item for you! now you can resurrect them from anywhere in the map. Purchase these from your local Hidden Teahouse. Where's the Teahouse? who knows! it's hidden!


Visitor Charm
Did your visitor get lost? maybe they ran off killing everything on sight? this is how you summon them back. However, this doesn't work on Yokai Realm with a Companion. Also, you don't have to wait for someone to get to you in order to fight the boss of the mission, they will be automatically transported.

Upon beating the final boss of the Omi Region (trust me, you'll know it's the final boss) you will unlock divine gear as well as the following solo quest, signified on the map by a red boat.



Complete this quest and you will unlock the next difficulty, Way of the Strong. Afterwards you can change the difficulty by opening the country map and then pressing the same button again to change difficulties.



However, I recommend you continue on the same difficulty (way of the samurai) and complete the DLC content as that is pretty hard on it's own and will give you time to prepare for way of the strong.

Divine Gear is unlocked as soon as you defeat the last boss in the Omi region of the main campaign, you will be awarded with various level 150 divine gear pieces.
Tip: one of these rewards should be the Kusanagi Tsurugi, keep it for an achievement later on called the "Holy Trinity", this requires you to equip Kusanagi Tsurugi, Yata Mirror and Yasakani Magatama at the same time.

Plus Gear
Divine equipment has the potential of growing in strength by finding equipment that has a plus '+' beside it, such as 150+1. These are miniscule increments in strength from one digit to the next, but ultimately end up being a huge improvement overall. It should be noted that these are different from the actual item level.

Soul Matching Plus Gear
In order to improve gear, you must Soul Match equipment of matching or higher gear. Two '+5' equipment pieces will not yield a '+10', instead you will end up with a '+6'. Refer to the table below to gain a better understanding.

Soul Matching plus levels on equal level gear or lower will not increase the Soul Matching cost.

Later on you will be able to soul match higher level equipment such as 150+4 with a 176+7 gear, this will only transform your base item into 176+5, as the plus level still adheres to the formula, however the soul matching cost will increase since the base item level was improved.

Ethereal gear drops are unlocked in Way of the Wise difficulty. These are a step-up from divine and provide new bonuses that can be reforged at the blacksmith. However, you should know that it's not worth breaking up your set just to equip orange quality equipment, that will ultimately result in worse performance overall. If you are seeing a gigantic difference in defense or attack on the ethereals, it just means there's a big level difference betwen the items you have equipped and the ones you just found.

• Increased stats.
  
• Rarely drops from revenants.
  
• Access to new attributes that can be reforged.
  
• Will come with a "Grace" set bonus if it's not already part of a set.
  
• Cannot be forged at the blacksmith but can be soul matched.

How do I unlock the Abyss?
Unlock Way of the Strong by completing The Queen's Eyes mission in the Omi Region.
AKA - the last mission in the main story (DLC excluded).

How far can I get?
There are 999 floors but they are locked by progression.
The floors below are available in the listed difficulty.

Where are my Elixirs?

Instead of Elixirs, you use Spectral Salves. You start with 4 and find more by taking the boats by the lake and exploring the different stages.

What are these debuffs?

You will be afflicted with four random debuffs upon entering the Abyss. They are not turned on until you enter the boss fight down in the cave. Should you cleanse all four, one new debuff will be applied if you choose to stay after you defeat a floor boss.

The descriptions of these debuffs can be found by opening your menu.

What are the boats for?
There are four boats and four colors, these colors correspond to the colors of the debuffs you are currently afflicted with. Boarding a boat will take you to a stage so you can find a missing Kodama, once you find it the debuff will disappear. Getting rid of debuffs is completely optional, but highly recommended.

What happens if I die?
If you lose your Guardian Spirit and you die again, you will be kicked out of the Abyss and forfeit all rewards and all defiled items you currently had.

What are defiled items?
They are basically unidentified items like in any other game. However, if you defeat a maximum of three floor bosses, they will have improved chances of having better stats or becoming Ethereal quality.

What are droplets of decay?

Acquired by defeating floor bosses, these droplets of decay can be used to defile your own equipment.


Accessed from the Shrine, you will see a new option.

Here you can defile your own equipment to improve it's stats or the chances of it becoming Ethereal equipment.


How do I identify or purify defiled equipment?
As soon as you beat a floor boss and choose to exit the abyss, the defiled equipment will be identified and shown on the rewards window. In order to improved the statistics of the defiled equipment, defeat a maximum of three bosses.

This game is awfully optimized, it's not a big secret. It's a fantastic game but probably one of the worst ports I've ever endured. If you're having issues, follow the next steps.

First and foremost: when you load the game, you will see it stutter and then it will stutter again after a few seconds. It always does this when you return to the main map. The game is loading things in and out of memory at this point, if you try to load another mission too quickly while it's doing this, you will crash your game and potentially corrupt some files, so give the game some time to complete these processes.


If your game has crashed a lot recently, there's probably corrupt files. Right click your game, go to properties then Local Files and select Verify Integrity of Game Files.

"oh but I already did that once", do it again smarty pants. I have validated my game files three times and each time it found new issues. Corrupt files are no joke.


These are my settings, if you have issues with the game then try these settings.

Turn off the Action Camera in the options, this can cause crashes when you're playing online as a visitor, or in certain spots where the camera is up against the wall. The camera collision will break and it will zoom out and show the entire map, usually causing your game to crash or worse.

If you are still experiencing tons of issues, try to turn off as many background applications as you can, whether it's Wallpaper Engine, Chrome, battlenet, nvidia shadowplay, fraps, etc.

• Validate Integrity of Game Files
  
• Update Drivers
  
• Scan for malware[www.malwarebytes.com]
  
• Use CCleaner[www.ccleaner.com] to clean computer and fix registry
  
• Defragment drive
  
• Restart Computer
  
• Turn off background processes
  
• Turn off shadows, occlusion, reflections and blur
  
• Run the game
  
• Turn off Action-Camera in the options

Information gathered and filtered from the Nioh Wiki, Reddit and various forums. A lot of information has been copy-pasted, but edited for clarity and transparency.

Links and sources below:

Nioh Wiki[nioh.wiki.fextralife.com]

Nioh Reforge Table by Sljm8D[docs.google.com]


Image by gillytin.[gillytin.tumblr.com]