Orbs

Orbs are a concept introduced in Dynasty Warriors 4. Equipping these items activates the chosen element while attacking or during Musous.

Dynasty Warriors
In Dynasty Warriors 4, orbs were acquired as items the player could randomly pick up during battle. Item levels ranged from 1 to 4.
 * Fire Orb: Temporarily sets fire to enemies; enemies affected burn and lose damage over time.
 * Lighting Orb: Strikes enemies with lightning; inflicts immediate damage that knock foes to the ground, also spreads out to other enemies in a specified area.
 * Poison Orb: Purple and green bubbles appear; causes enemies' defense to fall from 10% to 25% for about 5 seconds.
 * Blast Orb: Bluish white circles appear; damages defending enemies.
 * Ice Orb: Enemies are frozen in a congregation of ice; keeps enemies from moving.
 * Vorpal Orb: Enemies are struck with a black smog and a red stroke; has a chance of instantly killing soldiers and extra damage to generals.

Orbs in Dynasty Warriors 5 are special items that required certain requirements and had to be performed on Hard or Chaos difficulty in order to obtain them.
 * Fire Orb: Temporarily sets fire to enemies; enemies affected burn and lose damage over time.
 * Requirements: Battle of Si Shui Gate; Allied Forces; get 200 KOs within the first two minutes of the start of the stage.
 * Ice Orb: Enemies are frozen in a congregation of ice; keeps enemies from moving and have lowered defenses.
 * Requirements: Battle of Guan Du; Yuan Shao Forces; defeat Cao Pi within 4 minutes of the start of the stage.
 * Shadow Orb: Can cause instant death to soldiers and heavy damage to officers, at the cost of automatically depleting the Musou gauge at activation.
 * Requirements: Battle of Wu Zhang Plains; Wei Forces; defeat Jiang Wei before Zhuge Liang's death.
 * Light Orb: Breaks enemies' guards and damages them with a flash of light.
 * Requirements: Battle of Wu Zhang Plains; Shu Forces; defeat Zhen Ji, Cao Ren, and Xu Zhu within five minutes of the start of the stage.

Samurai Warriors
In Samurai Warriors 2: Xtreme Legends, orbs are included as a way to customize players' weapons. Orbs can be attained on any difficulty level and are most easily obtained by completing missions in Mercenary and Survival Mode. They can also be rewarded to a player if they receive a high rank after completing a stage in Free or Story Mode.

Similar to the Weapon Fusion option in the Warriors Orochi series, players use can orbs to change a weapon's element and stats. There is an orb available for every element and each stat orb will add +20 of the chosen stat to the weapon. This option is accessed via the Shop in the Orb Synthesis section. The cost varies depending on the quality of the weapon being customized.