SHIN SANGOKU MUSOU 4
(DYNASTY WARRIORS 5)
BODYGUARD FAQ
   (v1.1, 4-6-05)
by Edward Chang (chang dot 459 at osu dot edu)

Revision History
v1.1 (4-6-05)
   Added the English names for everything for people playing the US version.

v1.0 (3-3-05)
   First version.


TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Introduction
2. Obtaining Bodyguards
3. Training Bodyguards
4. Bodyguards in Battle
5. Frequently Asked Questions
6. Credits


1. INTRODUCTION

This is a FAQ for the latest in Koei's Musou action series, Shin Sangoku
Musou 4 (which will be released in the US as "Dynasty Warriors 5", odds
are). DW5 brings new life to the bodyguard system. Rather than having a
squad of generic bodyguards, you'll now have one 'companion general' who
can assist you in battle. This new bodyguard is an apt fighter themself
and can help you out with a variety of skills and special abilities.

This FAQ makes use of SJIS encoding in order to display Japanese
characters. I included this feature so that if you do not know
Japanese, you can easily match up the characters on your TV screen
to the characters in this guide. You will need to have support for
viewing Japanese characters on your computer, however. Certain versions
of Windows should have it built in; otherwise, you'll either need to
get a program like NJStar Communicator, or you'll need to get 
Japanese character support for Internet Explorer and open this file 
in IE instead of Notepad/Wordpad.

The only websites authorized to post this FAQ are www.gamefaqs.com and
www.kongming.net. If you see this document elsewhere, not only are they 
posting without my permission, but they likely do not have the most 
current version of this FAQ. Emails to me asking questions already answered 
in the FAQ, even if the answers are not in the version you are reading, will 
be deleted without response.


2. OBTAINING BODYGUARDS

You have 8 bodyguard slots that are shared amongst all of your generals.
You begin with 4 bodyguards; obviously, they suck. Every time you
complete a battle, there is a chance that a new bodyguard will ask to
join your army. At this time they'll be given a rating (more on this
in a minute) and they'll join your army. If you already have the 8 slots
filled, you can either dismiss the new recruit or dismiss one of your
old bodyguards to make room for the new recruit.

Each bodyguard will receive a rating when they first ask to join your
army. This rating will determine how good they can get once they are
fully trained. Each rating has two parts; the first part is one of the
following:
一国 Ikkoku: One stat from life, musou, attack, and defense grows quickly
二国 Nikoku: Two of those stats grow quickly
三国 Sangoku: Three of those stats grow quickly
天下 Tenka: All stats grow quickly
In the US version, these stats are simply called "C", "B", "A", and "S"
respectively.

Obviously, the last one ("Tenka") is the best, and of course the rarest.
The second part determines how their stats grow upon levelling up:
神童 Shindou: Stats begin high, growth limited
秀才 Shuusai: Initial stats and growth average
傑物 Ketsubutsu: Stats begin low, growth high
奇才 Kisai: Initial stats and growth high
In the US version, these stats are called Veteran, Remarkable, Brilliant,
and Superior. Thus, you should avoid Veterans and Remarkables and shoot
for Brilliants and ultimately Superiors.

Again, the last one ("Kisai") is the best; although not as obvious,
this list is arranged in order, so that once fully maxed, a Ketsubutsu
general is much better than a Shindou general. Growth is also more important
than which stats grow quickly; a Sangoku no Kisai (Superior/A) turns out to 
be better than a Tenka no Ketsubutsu (Remarkable/S) in the end.

The chances of getting the best stats are rather low; in both cases
the best title appears with only about a 7% chance. Thus, the best
possible title of Tenka no Kisai appears only about 7%x7% = 0.49% of the 
time.

The gender and name of the general that asks to join is random. The
weapon they use is limited by gender. Males get spears, crossbows, and
staves. Females get swords, bows, and fans. Incidentally the chances
for all of these appearing is approximately equal, except for fans,
which are the rarest. There is a good reason for this, and that is that
the fan-using bodyguards are arguably the best, as although they are
comparatively poor fighters they have the special ability to heal you 
during battle.

The look of each general is determined randomly; the color scheme of
their look, however, is determined by what general you were using when
the bodyguard asked to join you. The colors are as follows:
Wei General: Blue
Wu General: Red
Shu General or Zuo Ci: Green
Lu Bu: White
Yuan Shao or Zhang Jiao: Yellow
Diao Chan, Dong Zhuo, Meng Huo, or Zhu Rong: Purple


3. TRAINING BODYGUARDS

After each battle, bodyguards gain points like you do. A multiplier
appears depending on difficulty, so that a bodyguard will train faster
on harder difficulty. However, if the bodyguard dies during battle,
their points modifier automatically drops to x0.5, so training on high
difficulty all the time is not necessarily best.

The bodyguard gains rank, up to the highest level of 6. The number of
points needed for each level is as follows:
Lvl 1: 0
Lvl 2: 1000
Lvl 3: 2000
Lvl 4: 4000
Lvl 5: 7000
Lvl 6: 10000

Along the way, the bodyguard will gain skills. There are 8 different
skills that a bodyguard can have:
回復 Kaifuku: Bodyguard will heal self when low on health
猛攻 Moukou: Bodyguard will gain Attack x2 when low on health
鉄壁 Teppeki: Bodyguard will gain Defense x2 when low on health
鼓舞 Kobu: Own army's morale rises more easily
心眼 Shingan: Reduces combo needed to rank up items (see below)
推挙 Suikyo: Always makes a bodyguard ask to join you
献品 Kenbin: Adds one to the number of obtained items
探武 Tanbu: Adds one to the number of obtained weapons

In the US version, these skills are called in order: Heal, Rage, Wall, 
Fame, Link, Hire, Item, and Find.

"Rank Up" items refers to the fact that if you kill a general that, for
instance, normally drops an Attack +1 item with a 8 hit combo, that he'll
then drop an Attack +2 item. With the Shingan skill, the combo needed is
reduced. Upgrading a +1 item can be done with a 6-hit combo, upgrading
a +2 item requires only a 12-hit combo (as opposed to 16), and upgrading
a +4 item requires only an 18-hit combo (as opposed to 24).

When the general reaches level 3, they will gain one skill out of the
first three (Kaifuku, Moukou, Teppeki). Upon reaching level 5, they will 
gain one skill out of the second set of three (Kobu, Shingan, Suikyo). 
Upon reaching level 6, the general may or may not receive another skill. 
If upon reaching level 6, none of their parameters (life, musou, attack, 
and defense) are maxed, they will receive no new skill. If one to three 
of these paramters are maxed, they will receive one new skill. Finally, 
if all four parameters are maxed, they will receive two new skills. The 
new skills are chosen at random from the entire list of eight; obviously
the only way to get either Kenbin or Tanbu is at level 6.

Upon reaching level 4 or 5 the general may receive an element added to
their attacks. The element is the same as the orbs for the playable
characters (Fire, Ice, Yin, and Yang). What determines what element
a general gets is unknown; it may be random. A general who receives
an element at level 4 may get a new element at level 5, which overrides
the previous element.

Because of the dependence on maxed stats, obviously a Kisai will have more
skills than a Shindou.


4. BODYGUARDS IN BATTLE

You can issue limited orders to your bodyguard in battle by pressing 
the select button. You can see the current order below your health bar.
The sword icon means they will attack; the shield icon means they will
mostly defend; and the hand icon means they will stay in place and not
follow you.

The points a bodyguard gets is mostly determined by their number of
kills. Stil, if your bodyguard fails to get any kills, they will still
gain some points. Bodyguards regain health whenever you do, as long
as they are fairly close to you, so if your bodyguard is hurting,
you should pick up that meat bun even if you yourself aren't so injured.

Finally, the last special deal with bodyguards is that if both you and
your bodyguard has full musou (you can tell because their hands are
glowing) and you are close together (your hands will be joined by
lightning), your musou will become the special "Geki Musou Ranbu", 
which is even more powerful than the True Musou attack. This attack
hits everyone with a wave of lightning and then both you and your
bodyguard will perform your respective true musou attacks. This appears
to break guard (at least, I've never seen anybody be able to block the
whole thing).


5. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q. The generals I get suck! How can I get better ones?
A. There appears to be a small dependence on how good your own general is.
Power up your general and try again. To get new bodyguards very quickly,
I suggest using a powered up general and playing Guan Yu's Escape, Wei
side, and taking along a bodyguard with the Suikyo skill (to guarantee
that a new bodyguard will join afterwards). With Red Hare equipped, you
can easily clear Guan Yu's Escape in about 30 seconds by just running
up to Guan Yu and defeating him, as long as you're on Easy difficulty,
that is.

Q. When I look at my bodyguards in Camp mode, they look different than
in battle!
A. This is a known bug. There appears to be no solution, and at any rate
it does not impact the gameplay.

Q. How rare/common is each title?
A. This table is taken from several thousand trials (credit goes to
all the contributors of Shin Sangoku Musou 4 Wiki who compiled these
stats:
            Shindou    Shuusai   Ketsubutsu   Kisai    Total
Ikkoku       11.40%     11.73%       13.49%   3.14%   39.76%
Nikoku       11.98%     10.31%       10.31%   2.22%   34.81%
Sangoku       5.07%      5.74%        5.36%   1.59%   17.76%
Tenka         1.68%      2.35%        3.32%   0.42%    7.67%
Total        30.12%     30.12%       32.38%   7.37%

So as you can see, the rates of getting Ikkoku and Nikoku are about
the same, Sangoku is rarer, and Tenka is rarer still; on the growth
front, the chances of getting Shindou, Shuusai, or Ketsubutsu are
about the same, while Kisai is rare. Getting Tenka no Kisai, the most
powerful bodyguard, is a little worse than one-half percent.

Q. What are the best skills?
A. Personally, I think Moukou and Teppeki are comparatively useless, as
if your bodyguard is getting low on health often, you aren't doing such
a great job. Kaifuku is useful in a pinch, but the best skill seems to
be Kobu, since it affects your entire army, not just your bodyguard.
If you play 2P mode and both players use a bodyguard with Kobu, the
rate at which your morale raises (or enemy morale lowers) is insanely
high. Shingan isn't all that useful in the long run and Senkyo is only
useful when you're farming bodyguards; it's useless after you've got
all the bodyguards you want. Kenbin and Tanbu are pretty useful when
you're shooting for all level 20 items or shooting for getting good
3rd weapons.


6. CREDITS
Thanks go to:
Koei as usual.
All contributors to Shin Sangoku Musou 4 Wiki (http://musou4.s114.xrea.com)
eibra for telling me the English names to the ranks and skills.

The only websites authorized to post this FAQ are www.gamefaqs.com and
www.kongming.net. If you see this document elsewhere, not only are they 
posting without my permission, but they likely do not have the most 
current version of this FAQ. Emails to me asking questions already answered 
in the FAQ, even if the answers are not in the version you are reading, will 
be deleted without response.

This FAQ Copyright 2005 to Edward Chang. Redistribution in any form,
including reprinting in electronic or print media, without express
permission of the author is strictly forbidden.