This is the roadmap I wish I’d had when I first booted up DYNASTY WARRIORS 3: Complete Edition Remastered. I’m laying out a full progression pipeline that covers everything: unlocking Lu Bu first, power-leveling an eight-man bodyguard unit, clearing every officer unlock on Easy mode, and finally chasing down all the 4th Unique Weapons on Hard and Chaos. If you want to see the roster fill out without grinding for dozens of hours, this order is for you.
I wrote this up because the unlock web in DW3 is genuinely tangled. You can waste a lot of time clearing the wrong stages because a character didn’t trigger, or because you played on Normal when the weapon actually demands Hard. My goal here is to give you a low-friction order that uses maxed bodyguards to literally carry your low-level officers through Musou Mode clears, so you spend your time unlocking rather than repeating.
Phase 1: Unlock Lu Bu
Everything starts here, and honestly, it should. Lu Bu is your power-leveling engine for the rest of the guide, so get him before you do anything else.
- Mode: Free Mode
- Stage: The Battle at Hu Lao Gate (Allied Forces)
- Difficulty: Easy
- Execution: Clear the initial gate commanders, farm 1,000 KOs on the peon spawns, then defeat Lu Bu and finish the stage by defeating Dong Zhuo.
The trick here is that Dong Zhuo doesn’t actually become your final target until you’ve done the work — you clear the gate commanders, rack up that 1,000 KO count on the endless peons, and only then do you take down Lu Bu and close out the stage on Dong Zhuo. Farming those KOs feels tedious in the moment, but it sets up the EXP curve for everything that follows, so I’d resist the urge to rush the commander.
Phase 2: Max Level Bodyguards Fast
Once Lu Bu is in your roster, he becomes the workhorse. This phase is about turning his bodyguard unit into a killing machine that never dies, because those bodyguards are what carry your level 1 officers later.
- Officer: Select Lu Bu
- Pre-Battle Settings: Max unit count (8), Promotion Style Custom, Weapon Shield or Crossbow, Command Shield / Support
- Stat Priorities: Allocate all points into Defense first until maxed, then Life, then Attack
- Grind Stage: The Yellow Turban Rebellion or Hu Lao Gate on Easy
- Routine: Protect your bodyguards, hit 800–1,000 KOs, and kill the commander with all 8 bodyguards surviving for maximum EXP payout. Repeat 3–5 times.
The Defense-first allocation isn’t optional in my book. A bodyguard that dies mid-stage is a bodyguard that stops earning, so I always cap Defense before touching Life, and only then pour points into Attack. The Shield / Support command keeps your unit alive and useful rather than suicidal, which matters a lot when you’re trying to keep all eight of them standing through the commander kill. If you can get through three to five clean runs with a full surviving unit, you’re in a great spot for the rest of the pipeline.
Phase 3: Unlock All Characters on Easy Mode
This is where the bodyguard investment pays off. Every new level 1 officer you pick up gets your maxed bodyguards equipped, and those guards just steamroll the stages for you. Here’s the full breakdown by faction — and for the full picture of how these triggers interlock, the characters unlock guide is worth keeping open alongside this page.
Shu Kingdom
- Zhao Yun Clear 1: Unlocks Liu Bei and Huang Zhong
- Liu Bei Clear 2: Unlocks Pang Tong and Ma Chao
- Liu Bei (Stage 1): Play Yellow Turban Rebellion to unlock Zhuge Liang and Wei Yan
- Zhuge Liang Clear: Unlocks Jiang Wei
Wei Kingdom
- Xiahou Dun Clear 1: Unlocks Cao Cao and Xu Huang
- Cao Cao Clear 2: Unlocks Zhang Liao and Sima Yi
- Cao Cao (Stage 1): Play Yellow Turban Rebellion to unlock Dian Wei and Xu Chu
Wu Kingdom
- Sun Shangxiang Clear 1: Unlocks Sun Jian and Sun Ce
- Sun Jian Clear 2: Unlocks Lu Xun and Gan Ning
- Sun Jian (Stage 1): Play Yellow Turban Rebellion to unlock Taishi Ci and Zhou Tai
- Zhou Yu Clear: Unlocks Xiaoqiao
Other Faction & Special Unlocks
- Diao Chan & Dong Zhuo: Play Hu Lao Gate in Free Mode. Defeat Diao Chan (unlocks Diao Chan) and Lu Bu (unlocks Dong Zhuo).
- Fu Xi: Unlocks automatically after clearing Musou Mode with Liu Bei, Cao Cao, and Sun Jian.
- Nu Wa: Unlocks automatically after clearing Musou Mode with all four female officers (Sun Shangxiang, Daqiao, Xiaoqiao, Zhenji).
One thing I’d flag here: the unlocks don’t all come from winning. Some are triggered simply by playing a specific stage with a specific officer, which is why the “Stage 1” entries send you to Yellow Turban Rebellion with Liu Bei, Cao Cao, and Sun Jian. If you’re cross-referencing between factions, this historical officer unlocks guide approach is also handy for tracing which clears feed which recruits. And Fu Xi and Nu Wa are the long-haul rewards — they only show up after you’ve finished Musou Mode runs with the right sets of characters, so treat them as the capstone to this phase rather than something you chase early.
Phase 4: Unlock All 4th Unique Weapons
This is the part that catches most people out. Getting a 4th Unique Weapon isn’t about beating the stage — it’s about meeting a strict, specific set of conditions, and any one of them being off means no weapon.
Strict Requirements
- Difficulty: Must be set to Hard or Chaos (Easy/Normal will not work).
- Mode: Musou Mode or Free Mode.
- Execution: Must play as the specific character on the correct stage/side and fulfill their unique battlefield trigger.
I can’t stress the difficulty requirement enough — if you’re wondering why a weapon never dropped, it’s almost always because you were on Easy or Normal. You also need to be the right character on the right side of the right battle, and then hit that character’s specific trigger condition. Miss any piece and it all falls apart.
Top Core Weapon Targets (Do These First)
| Character | Weapon | Stage & Side | Trigger Requirement | My Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lu Bu | Sky Scorcher | Battle at Hu Lao Gate (Dong Zhuo’s Side) | Defeat Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, and Liu Bei | Essential |
| Cao Cao | Blue Wyvern (Slash Element) | Yellow Turban Rebellion (Han Forces) | Defeat Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang without losing any gate captains | Essential |
| Zhao Yun | Fierce Dragon | Battle of Chang Ban (Shu Forces) | Defeat Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan, then trigger the Zhang Fei Bridge Yell event | Essential |
| Guan Yu | Blue Moon Dragon | Battle of Guan Du (Liu Bei’s Forces) | Defeat Yan Liang and Wen Chou | Essential |
| Gan Ning | Master Sea | Battle of He Fei (Wu Forces) | Clear the Stone Warrior Formation and defeat Zhuge Liang | Essential |
The one I’d watch most carefully is Cao Cao’s — “without losing any gate captains” is easy to blow past if you’re not babysitting the battlefield, since a single captain going down voids the whole run. Zhao Yun’s is the other one that trips people up, because you have to defeat both Xiahou brothers and then still trigger the Zhang Fei Bridge Yell event; kill them too fast and rush the wrong objective and the event won’t fire. Gan Ning’s
Stone Warrior Formation is a real puzzle in itself, and Lu Bu’s run asks you to personally take down the three brothers — a fight worth building toward rather than stumbling into underleveled.
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Conclusion
Work the phases in order and you’ll have Lu Bu, a juggernaut bodyguard squad, the full roster, and the core 4th weapons without burning days on it. The order really is the whole trick here — get the foundation right and everything after it gets easier.