When creating your character and Blade Twin at the start of Rise of the Ronin, you also pick your stat spread and a special extra skill. This is called your Blade Sharpening Origin, and it does make a noticeable difference in your character. We have made our ranking of the Blade Sharpening Origins to help you pick the best one.
Every Rise of the Ronin Blade Sharpening Origin Ranked
There are six of these, and all give you the general idea of your best weapon loadout, initial stats, and one automatically unlocked skill.
6. Unsharpened
This one is obviously supposed to be akin to playing extra hard mode. You start with the most barebones stats and are meant to build yourself up. This is probably a wonderful idea for those wanting an extra challenge of hunting down skill points, but that is just an added grind. From the perspective of worthwhile ways to start out the game, this one is clearly the worst. The fact that the origin information also insults it only makes Unsharpened deserve this ranking even more.
5. Beginner
There’s less to complain about here, but that still doesn’t make this one much better. The even stat spread of 75 is nice, but it comes at the price of a free skill or a suggestion on weapons to use. This one is fine for someone well-versed in Nioh and Wo Long who understands some of how weapons work. But calling a class with little information “beginner” is a little unfair. This origin is much better suited to someone restarting the game for a new character, even though builds aren’t really a thing.
4. Seducer
The recommended weapon loadout for this one is decent, but the problem is the special skill. You’ll definitely encounter dialogue choices early on that you could only make if you knew things like “Liar.” It’s kind of like a Bethesda game, but it doesn’t actually matter. Normal dialogue choices only seem like they will make a difference when they really don’t. Due to that, there are much better choices to make skill-wise.
3. Killer
I should preface this by saying that I originally chose Killer when I started the game, but knowing what I know now, I probably still wouldn’t. Even though I used an Odachi the whole game, the skill for this class just isn’t the best because it is so conditional. Being able to Counterspark arrows or bullets is so timing-dependent that this skill could be useless if you’re not great at it. However, this still gets third because the strength stat boost is nice.
2. Breaker
There’s not much of a gap between this and first place; it all comes down to skill. Being able to assassinate two close foes in sequence is an undeniable advantage. It will make sneaking and clearing enemy camps entirely worthwhile. This skill isn’t that difficult to get early on, but it would make a massive difference if you get it out of the gate. Out of every weapon in the game, the Bayonet is also the most unique, so you also have that added bonus.
1. Sapper
Despite the fact that Rise of the Ronin offers difficulty options, it’s still not an effortless game. The skill you get with the Sapper gives you one additional health item if you die or use a banner with only a couple remaining. This raises the minimum number you can keep on hand, which can mean the difference between survival and death. The other skills like this one are also rather costly in terms of skill points, so getting one free is very worth it.
This is what we think of all the Blade Sharpening Origins in Rise of the Ronin. Which one will/did you pick in the game? We’d love to hear about it in the comments.
