Best Kunai Build For Naoe In Assassin's Creed Shadows

Published Mar 22, 2025

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Assassin's Creed Shadows has many different weapons available to its two protagonists, but Naoe gets some extra Shinobi tools in her arsenal that can be lethal when built around. Naoe can certainly hold her own in combat, but is better suited to the stealth approach thanks to her Assassin, Shinobi, Tanto, and Tools skill trees.

The first tool Naoe gets access to is the Kunai, a lethal thrown blade that can make taking over camps and castles trivial with the right combination of abilities and gear. Prioritize unlocking these abilities early on; you'll never have to leave cover when taking out your targets.

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Best Skills For a Kunai Naoe Build

Best Gear For a Kunai Naoe Build

Best Skills For a Kunai Naoe Build

Learn These To Get Almost Endless One-Shot Kunai

The Assassin's Creed Shadows Tools Skill Tree.

If you want to build around Naoe's Kunai, you'll need to spend most of your mastery points in the Tools mastery tree. Don't ignore other skills completely as they have powerful abilities, especially Assassin and Katana, but prioritize tools first.

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Whenever you can, upgrade the Kunai Assassination Damage on the mastery tree. This will let you perform assassinations throughout Assassin's Creed Shadows on all types of enemies, so you never have to risk leaving cover to get a kill. Pair that with the Everlast ability, and upgrade the Large Tool Bag to get more Kunai, and you'll never find yourself without one. Here are all the Tool abilities you should focus on upgrading as soon as possible to strengthen your Kunai:

Ability	Effect	Requirement
Kunai Assassination Damage I	Removes 1 additional Health Segment with Kunai	Knowledge Rank 2; 3 Mastery Points
Kunai Assassination Damage II	Removes 1 additional Health Segment with Kunai	Knowledge Rank 4; 5 Mastery Points
Kunai Assassination Damage III	Removes 1 additional Health Segment with Kunai	Knowledge Rank 6
Larger Tool Bag I	Increase maximum capacity for all tools. +1 Kunai, +1 Shuriken, +1 Smoke Bomb, +1 Shinobi Bell	Knowledge Rank 2; 2 Mastery Points
Larger Tool Bag II	Increase maximum capacity for all tools. +1 Kunai, +2 Shuriken, +1 Smoke Bomb, +2 Shinobi Bell	Knowledge Rank 4; 3 Mastery Points
Everlast	Kunai can no longer break on hard impact and can be retrieved indefinitely	Knowledge Rank 6
Tool Professional	Increase damage with Tools by 3, 9, and 18 percent	Knowledge Rank 1; 1,2,3 Mastery Points respectively
Tools Mastery	Chance to refill a Tool on use, 1 percent increase per unlock	Spend 4, 11, 18, 28, 39, 49, 60 Mastery Points

Best Gear For a Kunai Naoe Build

Light Armor Options To Improve Your Tools

The best light armor option for a Kunai build is the Tools Master Gear. I picked this up from the legendary chest in Katano Castle, which only requires taking out two Samurai Daisho, and I haven't swapped it for anything since. Not only does the Tools Master Gear look the part, with Naoe covered in kunai, shuriken, and bombs, but it also has a special engraving that throws a kunai at the closest enemy after you perform an Assassination. That, combined with the improved Kunai assassination skill, is another way to get a double assassination on an enemy further away.

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You can choose whatever headgear you like to pair with the Tools Master Gear, but you should work towards getting the Tatsu's Triumph legendary trinket. This trinket will improve your tool damage based on the number of points you've spent in the Tools mastery tree, which will boost your Kunai damage massively the more you progress. You can find this in a hidden chest in Ogura Peak, Yamahsiro Region.

The smoke bombs and shinobi bell aren't as reliable or strong in Shadows as other tools, so only use mastery points on them if you really want to.

Kunai quickly became my favorite weapon for Naoe early on in Assassin's Creed Shadows, thanks in part to having access to it once the prologue was over. After finding the right gear and investing some mastery points into the tools tree, it becomes one of the most powerful weapons Naoe has access to. It also makes clearing out large enemy bases much easier and more satisfying.