- 34 Spirit covers all Guardian Spirits
- Kato
- Best overall: CCD, Skill Damage, lots of Ki
- Daiba
- CC spirit to knock humans out of LW
- Hit once after knockdown, wait a couple secs then do finishing blow to get them out of LW
- Kara-Jishi
- Twin Raiken: Electric
- Saorise: Farming
- Ninetails: Fire
Good Guardian Talismans: Suzaku, Paired Raiken, Enko, and Daiba-Washi. Latter 2 will flatten any human boss.
- Toughness
- Ki
- Devigorate
- Weakness
- Kekkai
- Also synergizes well with gear that gives you Purification bonuses
- Carnage
- Steel
- Always use after Carnage as it overwrites the Carnage debuff completely
- Divination
- Pleiades
- Extraction
- Guardian Spirit
- Lifesteal
- Sloth
- Earthfolding: Teleport to last shrine
- Incantation: +Onmyo capacity
Has a hidden damage bonus when Ninjutsu power gets to 401. Worth prioritizing if using this for damage.
- Quick-Change
- Suppa
- Catwalk
- Levitation
- Makibishi
- Slows movement, not attack
- Close Combat Damage
- Change to Attack x
- Familiarity Damage Bonus A
- Parry Against Guarding Enemy (weapon) - prevents parry & bounce from guard
- Nioh 2: Adept Lessons - 66 - Sword Guide I
- Nioh 2: Adept Lessons - 78 - Sword Guide II
- Nioh 2: Adept Lessons - 89 - Sword Guide III
- Flowing Shadows
- Iai Quickdraw
- Get just the next Extended Charge time skill, don't bother with Tiger Running or the four-slice variant
- Look for "Skill Damage (Iai)" weapons
- Haze
- Backwave
- Ki Burst
- Relentless: Max out for Toughness
- Sword of Execution
- Doubles backstabs
- Also applies to Finishing Blows(!) plus Water Shadow and Haze follow up attacks
- Great against Yokai who are slow to turn around
Use strong attack and Reaper when in Living Weapon.
- Build for Sword over Kusarigama which doesn't need as much Dex - Heart, Strength, Skill. Max those and maybe Spirit to 100. Get gear dependencies to required minimums. Then split remaining between Dex and Magic.