Monster Hunter: Why Do Vets Love The Old Skill System?

[@PestilentAllosaurus]

Armors felt like they had more weight in the old world, or truly represented the monsters they came from. A prime example being Deviljho. Sure it boosted your attack but much like Deviljho itself you got hungrier *much* quicker. Wearing the embodiment of the monster itself.

[@austincod21]

Tigrex with speed eating

[@nathananderson7295]

Despite the old skill system being more complicated, I personally find the new system to be even more tedious simply due to the number of skills that you can have at once. Every time I build a new set in world or rise, I feel like I'm forgetting an important skill, or poorly optimizing the ones I'm trying to use. I think a full return of the old system would be best. That combined with the modern armor crafting UI, which makes viewing skills and full armor sets easier, I think it would become much more accessible than it was before gen 5

[@marcusaaronliaogo9158]

Tbh, I like the new skill system because in the old one, mixed sets are kinda hard to make. Also, I think they are probably gonna add some quirks from the old system like the negative skills into mh6 probably from the community.

[@Ben14-u5]

While I like the new one more, You're right. For me, when I'm missing atk boost, crit eye, and agitator on my set, it just feels lacking. Like I feel like when my sets don't have them, it feels missing. Like for example, Swaxe doesn't need much skills. You can put whatever for that weapon, so I can have all 3 maxed and have divine blessing, partbreaker etc. While GS, which relies on 3 skills at minimum, I can't really fit in atk anymore. So there's always that feeling that makes you incontent with the armor skills. In the older games, all the skills you need to worry about is the ones necessary for your weapon, instead of trying to scratch that itch to max out the additional ones. Edit: Although, the reason I like the new one better is that, despite not having stuff maxed out, you can still have the skills but just lesser. Instead of not having them because it's only at 9 and not 10, which is infuriating.

[@kassmalz2069]

@@marcusaaronliaogo9158 bro check out athena A.S.S.

[@bau9894]

I'd say the new system is fine, its just that the power creep gimps the complexity of the new system. if you dont have wex, crit boost, a couple attack boosts and handicraft along with the skill taxes of your weapon it feels awful. the new system would mesh well if they just fix the power creep

[@manikaditha6308]

No... In iceborne the essential skills arent that much, WE crit crit boost is the standard META, few of them are specialised skills like capacity boost, guard, artillery etc, the rest is QOL which is not important for most part, its not hard, the older system is actually harder to minmax because you need 10 points, its kinda hectic if you dont write your calculation or use 3rd party app, to make it worse, talisman can easily change your armors. The good thing is, negative skills exist and limited skills mean less power creep making game more properly balanced.

[@teslobo]

I don't think the issue with gen 5 skills is that they are obtained through a single piece of armour but rather the fact skills are still flat improvements. There were opportunities to dump attack boost, critical eye and similar skills and replace them with more skills like offensive guard or heroics - skills with benefits predicated on a different approach to how you play the game. This way there'd be fewer "why would you not take this?" skills and more theorycrafting a way to play the game and how various skills do and don't align with that style. In Rise I've gone all in on the invincible gambit skill on the switch axe, using the hyper armour to tank damage while stacking silkbind boost, heroics, dragonheart, resuscitate, resentment and defence boost. It's created a completely new switchaxe experience where I lean into the weapon having no defensive options and just powering through the strongest attacks in the game, increasing my own damage tenfold but also increasing the risk when my health is balancing on a knife's edge. THAT is what I think Monster Hunter needs more of, but it's hard to do when flat boosts aren't making any changes to your thought process. Even weakness exploit rewards you for doing the thing you would be doing anyway.

[@Goji-Moji]

I like the old skill system, but I will also say that actually implementing it was much more painful because of how much grindier the old games felt in general. And also because of how unoptimized the UI was.

[@Encorous]

I think this is the point that ultimately comes down to personal taste, but what a lot of old-gen hunters will feel somewhat strongly about: grinding like what we saw in old gen can be okay and even super fun. I remember back in old gen, ganging together with my best hunting buds and getting that one piece that could've taken more than 10 hunts to acquire embedded lasting and impactful memories that I can't help but look back on fondly. Sometimes it was just for a single increase in attack boost tier! But what we consider to be the "tedium" of old gen needs to be met with the fact that some people develop different work-reward thresholds when it comes to what they play. Old gen games were ROUGH for a number of reasons, but that was the subtle beauty of it. Grinding that isn't mindless is what I'd say is the best kind of grinding. Now make no mistake, new gen has hard fights, and some of that can recreate the feeling similarly. But ooh boy, the times when you NEEDED 4 people because monster difficulty was fixed and even then you needed a whole 30 minutes to beat one quest over and over again really made that dopamine flow when the numbers added up and your new armor set was finally, _finally_ complete. (And I'm not one to advocate "artificial difficulty", but the clunkiness of old gen really made monster fights feel like such a simple-yet-beautiful dance that I don't experience much anymore with new entries. I guess there's a unique beauty in the unoptimized)

[@grimms-vi1874]

This video reminded me of the fun that was 'Torso Up' mixed sets. Sure, the result would look like an abomination, but that set was almost comically effective in terms of its potential skill loadouts. Being able to easily turn a couple points here and there into workable skills meant that you could use some of the more unconventional talismans or a weapon with deco slots to pad out some really interesting builds.

[@HandiTips]

Still remember using the Skull Visage through most of my 4U playthrough 🥲

[@HenshinFanatic]

And don't forget Ahtal-Ka set's unique gimmick.

[@Ezoc]

@@HandiTips for me it was Tetsucabra leg armor for lowrank 4u

[@StayNightGaming]

(Almost 13 year vet) For me it was that you could only have a handful of skills, and it felt like a bit of a puzzle to optimise mixsets in that way to find out how to minimise negative skills while maximising the skills you want. Today it's just, no matter what you do, you're going to have some degree of whatever skill. And you can have a lot more skills in general. The most satisfying set I ever made was in 4U. I got an insane: evasion ×3, honed blade, Bombardier, challenger +2, with my bounding dalamadur glaive. I had a really rare edgemaster +4 relic chest piece and a talisman that had evasion +9 and Edgemaster +3. Being able to make that set is still to this day the most satisfied I've ever felt even when I had what felt like every skill in the game in the fatalis set in Iceborne. Bit of a controversial opinion: I think the introduction of Critical Boost in Gen and its continuation since then has single handedly almost broken set building. The skill is so damn powerful that not having it and not maximising your crit as much as possible with it gimp your damage to an enormous degree. Sure the older games had things like sharpness +2, honed blade, etc, but getting those skills often come at a cost of negative skills like handicraft jewels would reduce your razor sharp skill, so you had the risk of doubling the rate of which you lose sharpness. Honed blade only came on specific armour pieces and couldn't be gemmed in. I do miss the old system, but I also like the new system. I just found the old system to be way more satisfying.

[@KoongYe]

In older system, we had to plan out the necessary skills and choose wisely what fits you the best. Like for example, I always prefer having earplug skill so i don't flinch and use the roaring part as an opening. Back in older gens, those openings were very few and far between so earplug was so valuable. In order to slot that skill in I had to give up dmg skills like Crit or Atk. Only in rare occasion, when you finish the game you may have been able to slot in 4~5 good skills. Now, even in low rank, you can pretty much slot in every single skill that you like in your armor set. There's no risk. This brings two big problems: 1. Weapons like Lance, Gunlance that people like to slot Guard or Artillery skills now have massive disadvantage over Long Sword, SnS which doesn't require an obligatory skill to be slotted. 2. The monsters in Rise are already pretty much pushovers but its worse with new wirebug movesets and easy to slot skill system. In order to up the difficulty, mobs in Sunbreak is likely going to have a huge healthpool and faster speed much like they did for Iceborne because of the implementation of clutch claw. Which is a boring way to up the difficulty, and will turn out to be much more unforgiving for the Lances, and Gunlances than Long sword counterparts.

[@z0ro_62]

Man its crazy how easy its become. What forget x or y or wrong wepon well no problem just hop in this tent. No consequences hell someone messing up and then pushing though the quest always made the hunt hilarious

[@JanusHoW]

Yeah. HG Earplugs was all but required for a certain few monsters, like Bloodbath Diablos...you NEEDED it for Bloodbath if you didn't have him down to a science. Plus, it made mount spam in the 4th generation games (4, 4U, Gen, GU) even much easier, since a monster that kept roaring rather than flailing was basically LETTING the hunter topple them.

[@bilgtex]

The sheer satisfaction of making an ideal set that ALSO looks good was unmatched

[@Rose-85]

My obsession with Fashion screamed at me when playing 4U but i was blessed with the Transmog system in GU

[@bilgtex]

@@Rose-85 I got lucky with my Lance and GS setups, but things absolutely got goofy

[@hutternen]

Honestly, with the 5th gen UI and material requirements, I'd love to see the old system come back. The biggest downside to me was the amount of mats to make 1 piece, meaning a mistake (considering old UI, very easy to do) meant 5 more hunts to correct it. A lot of my frustrations came from the UI, honestly. And having less skills to work with means you can't get expert max, WE, CB, attack max etc like we had at the end of ice borne, making more sets competitive. You'd still get those Jho ceana, but the difference outside of Speedrun was not that big.

[@HandiTips]

This!!!! The UI in the old world games was definitely bad and would highly benefit even from the little things like telling hunters what a skill does as they have it highlighted, etc.

[@hutternen]

@@HandiTips And the same skill had 3 names, one for the points, one for the active skill, and one for the decos. T.T I'd add a Athena Armor Set Search feature, or even a filter search and we have a decent system honestly

[@justsomejojo]

Absolutely this! I replay 3U and GU from time to time because of the things in the video, but I appreciate the way more user-friendly UI of the newer games. Having a wiki open at all times has a nostalgic charm, but having the info laid out ingame is much nicer.

[@JaceGarrdok]

Even in older games, I barely ever wore full sets because mix sets were always better, even when "just" replacing a single piece, like 3U full Helios X with Wroggi X Chest. Coincidently, the one and only time I used a full set on purpose was 3U Narga Z, which was practically tailor made for Bow.

[@Kumoiwa]

One thing I liked about 3U is how purposeful armor was. Narga Z had all the core bow skills, Agnaktor Z had all the core Lance skills, Uragaan U had all the core Gunlance skills... Like this for almost every weapon type. But it also had general use sets too like Rath Soul or Helios Z. And with endgame talismans and certain pieces you could personalize these especialized sets to your liking. But at the endgame the strongest sets were mixed sets from final bosses. 4U and GU were more about specific pieces being so good that mixed sets were better even with no talismans in low rank. And then in World/Rise there's literally no point in using full sets and that saddens me. TL;DR: this is just a long comment appreciating 3U armor sets haha

[@Jpmrocks7]

@@Kumoiwa Rise is the same as 3U in that regard with armor sets. Quite a few full sets are good with weapons, but mixed sets, even back in 3U, will always be superior.

[@Kumoiwa]

@@Jpmrocks7 That's true actually. But with the new system there's no point in making full sets because you can just replace the less efficient piece with a better one. In 3U if you wanted to improve on a full set it was like a mini game inside of the game. That feeling is lost.

[@lupvirga]

@@Jpmrocks7 you still had to think about what pieces you needed, grind out the tali, and get the decos while planning out how to minimize your debuffs.

[@MrMisterMisterMr]

Old World skill system be like: "Can you count to 10? Great! You can understand the skill system."

[@thechugg4372]

The old system was so good, skills were just quality of life stuff like maybe I can sheath my weapon faster, or sharpen it faster or see the monster or the map or when we can capture it. Now it's just damage optimization and necessary skills to play the weapons...

[@shindoushuichi0287]

World and Rise have screwed the balance up a lot for skills. I played GU as my first true Monster Hunter play through, right before Rise came out and the difference is insane. I liked the restrictiveness of the older system because it meant you had to be more methodical and strategic with your builds. Hell the fact that you can get away with ONE build to deal with all monsters in Rise is a major issue I have with it. Status's and Elements just don't pose the same threat they did back in the old system. If all I can do is cobble together a set to either get better damage at the risk of some kind of negative skill, that's way more interesting then have two pages of skills, including some I don't even need.

[@squiddler7731]

One think I really liked about the old system was how random talismans had the potential to encourage players to try out skills they might normally ignore. The fact that they could come with a random second skill along with the main one you want the talismans for meant that there'd always incentive to maybe gem in both skills and try out the one you didn't need, and I think that's pretty neat. This still technically exists in Rise too, but for whatever reason there I pretty much never roll a secondary skill that has any impact at all

[@Rose-85]

I remember getting a +12 thunder attack talisman in GU and decided to try making Thunder Dual Blades since i haven't touched that weapon since the Gen days

[@SilversTaurus]

The seondary skill in Rise's talisman are mostly useless and the best ones are hella rare and only be able to get at least 1 point if it consists of 3 thresholds if the skill is tier A/S.

[@ravenousglavenus7656]

Personally, I feel like two major things hold the old system back. The first being how it pushed players into only using a small handful of sets due to the community's obsession with 'meta', and the second being the poor menu system of older titles. Those spreadsheets weren't necessary because the system was complicated - they were necessary because you didn't have a quick way to reference what the pieces you were looking at come with if you weren't using something to keep track of it all. Personally, I like the concept of the older system and I'd love to see something show up that resembles a sort of middle-ground between the two but I genuinely prefer the new system because it encourages experimentation more instead of this hyper focus on crit & attack that the older game had. That focus is still prevalent because meta won't die, but people are encouraged to pursue skills that help them develop a unique playstyle of their own because it's easier to slot in additional skills. World & Rise are still really overtuned in this department, though, and while I prefer the new system I still think it gets pretty excessive. Regardless, while I don't agree entirely with the preference over the old system, I thought this video was an excellent breakdown of the old system and does a great job at shining a light on its positive quirks.

[@loremastre6682]

What do you mean by the Menu’s in older generation games. Having come from Freedom Unite and following through 3U, 4U, GenU, WorldBorne and Rise. The new menu system introduced in World is extremely overloaded in my opinion. If I wanted to find what stats I had or what skills I was rocking, I’d open up my Status Screen or Equipment Screens at the top of the second page of the menu. Whereas in World, I still have to flip through every drop down menu before I can find my friends list. I understand the appeal of the new system, however being from Gen2 and growing from there, the new skill system is rather odd to me. Most monsters don’t have a single useful skill in “meta” builds, take Ice Jyuratodus for example. A Master Rank monster that doesn’t have a single piece anyone would use for their builds. Meanwhile in older games you could swap in a weaker monsters piece for the extra Attack or Earplugs without triggering the Negative effects that a higher tier monster would give you. I’d go so far as to say that the skill system in Monster Hunter has changed 3 times throughout its history, with the second change coming between 4U and GenU.. Mixed sets were super popular at the beginning of GenU. Whereas in 4U people would farm out a full Jaggi set for the attack boost. In GenU most “meta” focuses players first set would be a Bullfango/Jaggi mixed set. That’s when the devs went into the Tier system right afterward for the focus on mixed sets over full sets.

[@ravenousglavenus7656]

​@@loremastre6682 I'm referring exclusively to the creation/smithing process, brother. Smithing menus in older titles are organized by type (helmets, chest, gauntlets, etc. all separate from each other) which is why I suggested that the 'spreadsheets' weren't due to complexity of the system, but simply because people needed to write down the pieces they were interested in using to keep track of the skills they come with. Once you've made the piece, of course this becomes far more manageable, but generally - at least in my experience - you're deciding on the set before you grind it out. It can be very difficult to figure things out when you're constantly swapping in and out of menus, especially if you have a memory as bad as mine. This is especially frustrating if you're trying to build something at a lower rank than yours and need to add memorizing what page certain items are on, too. (World & Rise's menus in general are bloated and disorganized, I agree, but setbuilding is significantly easier not just due to a more intuitive system but being able to observe the whole set at once.)

[@MrBroomX]

Speaking about the crit meta, something I liked in Gen/XX/GU was that event with a crit meta there was variety to it. Weakness exploit, Critical Eye, Chain Crit, Mad Crit, Critical Draw. You would rarely run 2 of those skills together, and it was fun! Some weapons would benefit more from one of them than the others! Also with attack boosting skills. Attack, Tropical/Cold Hunter, Resentment, Resuscitate, Bludgeoner, and I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting some more, but there was variety, you could make weird functional sets! Granted, some of those skills are still in Rise, but we're still.missing a few of them for whatever reason.

[@loremastre6682]

@Ravenous Glavenus Okay yeah I get that now, I didn’t realize you were talking about the blacksmiths menus. Growing up with it I never found anything wrong but I get what you’re saying, WorldBorne’s blacksmiths have better armor crafting menu’s imo. Though i still prefer the old world weapon crafting/upgrading menu

[@ravenousglavenus7656]

@@loremastre6682 All good, buddy. I started with World and worked my way back, and from that perspective I don't think the old menus are that bad, either. I just found myself getting a bit confused when trying to build my own sets and having to use external sources to remember what pieces had what. It took me a lot of time to come up with some of the sets I've built and I think that's why people like to joke about the 'spreadsheets'. If you weren't writing things down, you were probably spending a lot of time just double checking things. But I also acknowledge that this was likely due to technical limitations and I'm not faulting the games for giving it to us the way they did for so long.

[@soupajaggah4534]

I agree with how the armorsets/skills work, I never made a full set in world/rise, but have done that a majority of the time in older games

[@Lormingo16]

I play gen u and I don’t run full sets in grank

[@djdedan]

and? i'm sorry i don't see that as a negative - full set seems obvious, mix sets take some experimenting... how can he complain about customization on one end and then be against mixed sets on the other? Sorry full sets are fine but not sure why that's some type of imperative.

[@lupvirga]

i'm weird, i always make full sets. i just like the look of armor sets. Layored armor based on armors you can make, in my opinion, was the best addition to rise. major issue, it also changed it so you can disguise your weapon and i really don't like that.

[@RoniDraws]

Never used mixed sets, I always build around full sets, its fun to play with skills I would probably ignore following the "meta"

[@speedwagon7984]

Honestly, monsters are changing as well as skill system. For example, in world you can put more defensive or evasive skills because monsters are fast. While in older games, you're limited to which way you want: full defensive or full offensive. But monsters are different so it makes it up

[@alondite215]

I think a hybrid system would be best. On one hand, I like that every point added to a skill in the new system counts toward its benefit, but the problem is that the player has nothing but strength to gain. Set-building decisions weren't meaningful because there was no consequence, only opportunity cost. The old system having negative skills paired with skills to give players a decision to weigh, particularly on the more powerful skills, makes the system far more interesting and accomplishes more than making it just a player-driven custom difficulty, which is about all it is right now.

[@yurareigiryu]

9:42 this doesn't make sense. There will be best armor pieces in either system. In the Jhocena example, you take the best pieces, or most efficient, and slap them together. Mix sets in 5th gen were no more simple than prior gens, only thing that changed is the amount of skills you can cram and Cri Boost. 8:07 if your metric for impactful is sacrificing power for comfort, sure. The new world system allows you to implement skills you would never use because you have space to gem them in rather than they happen to be on the armor/charm you were using. Also, dps wasn't a concrete science as it is now and attack boost/100% affinity didn't make or break sets. Skill stacking is still a major issue in the new world, bringing back the old system without addressing this problem won't convince vets they are reliving the good 'ol days.

[@meikahidenori]

There used to be perks to having a few negative skills too. Some weapons had clear advantages when they had negative affinity compared to ones that had high. The thing that bothers me is there is too many DPS type skills and not enough interesting utility ones. Not everyone plays DPS meta - some of us play Status/Elemental or in my case I go heavy in utility which fits my HH playstyle. Would love to see more variety!

[@Rose-85]

In Rise Sunbreak they should just straight up gives us the choice to craft a deco or something that gives us negative affinity for those Brutal Strike builds

[@Derpy-qg9hn]

Part of me wants to see raw DPS skills removed entirely, as much as I know it won't happen. Keep some of the weird ones around, like Potential or maybe Handicraft, but I think skills would just be neater if they were all little utilities that make your most painful hunts a little bit nicer - Guard Up, Earplugs, Quake Res etc.

[@Rose-85]

@@Derpy-qg9hn i think the weapons themselves should be buffed and make the dps skills a bit weaker, like someone mentioned before, in older games a hunt with skills and a hunt without skills have a decent time difference but in newer games the difference is huge in comparison, i think giving a buff to the weapons and giving more importance to those and just making the skills small optimizations would be alright

[@meikahidenori]

Yeah. Honestly miss that on the old Diablos HH!

[@meikahidenori]

@@Derpy-qg9hn honestly don't mind the RAW weapons, but to balance them ones that have higher element/status (which are alot of the ones with low raw) could be brought up to match. They're not potient enough to use effectively, or are very sparce in what elements they have. HH only has one sleep element Horn! Would be nice to see a even balance.

[@ronwinters3571]

I'm glad rise brought back the system where some armors have skill points for a monsters skill like Bubbly Dance and Magnamalos Skill. It's more flexible then having to wear a specific number of armor from a monster as there's decorations and talismens with these skills again. I also prefer charm/talismen grinding over decoration grinding as you can usually make a great set with a decent talisman vs having to grind for a decoration. I constantly try different whole sets and mix sets in Rise. The Teostra/Kushala/Chameolos/Valstrax/Alumudron/Magmamalo/Mitszune Full Sets are ones I always change between and have loadouts for Full Sets. I also love the Mix Sets you can do with Ibushi/Narwa. People need to enjoy the game and not worry about meta even for Rise unless they are someone who enjoys fine tuning. I like fine tunning and also making wacky sets. Theres a lot to enjoy with Rise. I do hope negative skill is brought back along with Gunner Sets though. To me a lot of these spare skill point problems on some of these sets would be fixed if there was blademaster and gunner options. Some sets are unusable for gunners or blademasters and having them fine tuned for the 2 different groups would add a lot of replayability.

[@MaddixCuhming]

I rather grind for a talisman that helps a build than grind endless for gems that are needed for a build

[@solomon9655]

@@MaddixCuhming Are you talking about grinding through RNG or grinding for materials? Because I’d rather be able to craft decos. In World it could take months of RNG before I got decent decos. In the case of rare decos, years. I never got a guard up deco in Iceborne, I was lucky that it became one of the few you could craft in a later update. In Rise, I got most of what I wanted in less than a week.

[@MaddixCuhming]

@@solomon9655 I perfer rise where u make the decos like guard instead of world where u just hope u get them.

[@lupvirga]

@@MaddixCuhming second worse design choice world had.

[@xHideousFoxx]

my reason for loving the old system (though I can't say it was really used this way) was for its potential to balance mid-game monster armor and end-game monster armor. making it so you get a cooler maybe more interesting set for end-game but the mid-games are safer withless risks, less options, or less defense.

[@kurosan0079]

Just like with most of the features in the older games, I like how it limits the player. You never really feel too powerful in the game. Nowadays, you can just slot full Wex, Crit boost, Crit eye, and attack up, while still having space for defensive skills. Back then, if you're going full offense, you don't get defense. And vice versa.

[@silver3595]

I joke with my friends that half of monster hunter is just Menu Simulator, but i do miss combing through the craftable armor and workshopping my own custom set of mis-matched armor in 4u. trying to get it to look great on top of the skills was a game in and of itself ^^ I had little sticky notes all over my desk with armor sets and materials needed and it was truly such a blast to go farm for it, craft it, then hunt with your own little build. i like world and iceborne a lot, but i dont feel as proud of my armor and weapons as i used to in 4u

[@Scorchlette]

I wouldn't mind negative skills returning with the current skill system. Actually, I think that would be an interesting experience- a much more in-depth skill balancing act to create the build you want, drawing on the benefits of both systems.

[@duckyedits6753]

i 1000% agree with all of these points. old world games just gave me a way bigger sense of satisfaction when theorycrafting and eventually making my dream armor set. it also felt like there was a larger space for creativity, like each time i enter a lobby i was bound to find someone with a totally unique armor set with its own unique set of skills. its one of the main reasons why i grind the 5th gen games a lot less than in previous generations. by the time i reached endgame in rise, i already had a strong armor set that felt “completed” and i never feel incentivized to make new armor sets. in rise i have 4 sets between all of my weapons, but in 4u and generations i would literally max out the armor set slots because there was so much room for creativity. i know the new skill system is way more approachable and intuitive for new players which is why capcom continues to use it and most likely will never turn back, but the old skill system still holds a special place in my heart and MH4U will probably always be my favorite monhun game because of it

[@itsyaboiguzma]

As a self proclaimed boomer hunter (Ay where's my Freedom Unite hunters at) I have always loved the older skill system but as many have said the biggest killer is the old UI. Resulting in mistakes with mis-crafts or just made a small mistake in your math costing more time from the player. I definitely love having drawbacks to my armor such as if I were to be a tank for the team I'd most likely have attack down and defense up or if I'm going full dps on Greatsword attack up defense down etc. There is definitely a way to implement both the fiver system with the old world armor system. The fiver system has significantly more what I'd like to call "skill tax" with certain weapons crafting a set is significantly more expensive than others due to how many skills are in the game. Offensive guard on CB, Artillery, load shells, crit draw, crit eye, guard up, attack up etc. It's incredibly tedious. The old world system seemed complicated but it really wasn't it's pretty simple it's just the UI is terrible. I don't agree with every fiver change specifically removal of paintballs and how the target is almost always on the map. (Wish they would've kept paintballs but had us track the monster via how it engaged in the environment with the footprints, clawmarks etc if we didn't mark it) No real punishment for not being prepared because oh I forgot an item let me just go to camp and get it or oh I forgot to eat let me go to camp and order a meal rather than oh I forgot this incredibly important system or trap I'll need to play more carefully. But I'm optimistic for Gen 6 and what it'll bring to the table after rise sunbreak.

[@Bowmen-xc8nb]

I like the World system a lot because you can take some defensive/comfort skills without sacrificing much damage (or when it comes to Fatalis sets, literally just running max CB/CE/WEX/ATK/PP/AGI/Coal and STILL having ~8 points to throw in your comfort skills of choice).

[@zifnab]

I think that even implementing the threshold system without the negative skills would go a long way, the real issue is power creep in the form of having too many skills as you rightfully pointed. Not saying that negative skills wouldn't contribute but it feels like their contribution is a bit overstated when the real issue with 5th gen is really having the mentioned double digits number of skills Just not being able to have *everything* you want and having to weight what you value more paired with what monster abilities you are willing/unwilling to deal with, should create interesting enough conundrums when you build a set at least for how I personally see it

[@TheVictor126]

what I like about the old system is that there is a lot less skills and a lot less damage world and rise have extremely inflated numbers compared to older entries, because there is so many dps skills and you can fit most if not all of them if you played well in older games and had no damage skills, you would finish way faster than trying the same in iceborne at the same time, fast kills are a bit too fast with that many skills (hbg in world being the worst offender), and weapons that require more dps skills end up overtuned or undertuned because they are balanced around it and you still need all other skills to reach 100% affinity, crit boost, etc...

[@user-pn4px5lr8w]

I started with Worldborne too, and I went back into 4U, GU, and 3U, in that order, while Iceborne remains my favorite in the series. I personally looked at either skill system as a means to an end. I just find what I want in both systems dependent on what the games offer me in terms of power, and utility. I won't dispute that there is more to think about with the old skill system, and there is a good feeling that comes with constructing a set you enjoy using. If the old system was to be reintroduced, I wouldn't lose any sleep, and just adapt as I always have with these games. If it never comes back, that also won't bother me 'cause I can just resume business as usual.

[@lupvirga]

the new system wouldn't be so bad if they had negative skills to go along with them. like, maybe have armor not give negatives but Gems ALWAYS give some negative points.

[@freddoesvox9033]

I remember farming full high rank rathalos armour in Rise because it is an all round good set. In Gen u i remember making a set that had about 4-5 skills and it only had 2 deco slots, it was super satisfying relying on my talisman and armour pieces

[@HandiTips]

Yes! It's such an awesome feeling. You still have so much freedom with talismen and Decos!

[@scorpiopede]

I mostly agree with this, but there is ONE point that does not make me miss the old skill system and every time I hop on Generations Ultimate again it just frustrates me again, which is talismen. Because skills are threshold based, talismen make-or-break sets, and they're so incredibly tedious to grind for. I've wanted to make a good Blunt edge set in Generations Ultimate for a long time since I used it in base generations, or even a good gunlance set, but I've yet to get a SINGLE talisman that gives either of those skills at decent values along with other useful skills or even good slots, and the same is true for Guard, and this kills the kinds of sets I can make, because now if I want to run a weapon I like, such as the Crystalbeard Insect Glaive/Gunlance, I need to sacrifice a LOT of potential damage just for one mandatory skills to make the weapon first. The only way I'd like for this system to come back is if we ever got the ability to transfer skills on talismen together to prevent the absolutely awful grind necessary to get JUST the right combination just to use one weapon you want. Or if they're going to keep the new system, bring back negative skills or better balance offensive skills so we aren't required to pack them all into one set. As a lance main, the inability to get all the offensive skills in Rise AND Guard does bring back that risk vs reward aspect, but it's SO much more severe in here than in older games that I'm crippling myself just to play a style I enjoy.

[@Joker22593]

In the old games, I used Computer Programs to pick my armor sets for me because I hate solving the Knapsack problem manually. In the new games, I'm actually quite comfortable finding armor sets manually most of the time but that's also because end game armors sets are just tailor made to certain weapons now, only requiring small adjustments. Back in the day, you really had to scrounge together all the best skills using mixed sets.

[@someguy8273]

I also felt like a goddamn genius whenever I found a way to make negative skills fit into the synergy of my set. It was like getting an entirely extra skill for free. The main problem with the old system was they did a poor job explaining the system (my first title I made it well into high rank before I realized I wasn't even activating half the skills I thought I was) and many sets were dependant on RNGeezus blessing you with the perfect talisman. I really think they could have simply improved the old system instead of replacing it, but I do understand why they opted to scrap it for a more casual friendly system.

[@MikhailKutzow]

First off: Love seeing a Fiver willing to play and enjoy the older games, even if you still prefer the newer ones. I think the Monster Hunter community could do with a lot more Fivers who do so - and in turn with more Vets who are willing to at least acknowledge some of the benefits of the newer games. You totally hit a lot of why I like the older system. I think a lot of the division over it is what people value. If you value whichever lets you be more powerful, then yeah, the 5th gen system is going to be better. But if you want a more interesting journey to get that power, where each skill matters, then the older system has you covered. Really, I think Decorations need to go if they continue with the newer skill system, or at least get overhauled. In older games, there were so many options for them - raise existing skills, remove negative skills, finish skills that your armor doesn't quite reach the threshold to activate, or use a lot to add a n entirely new skill. In the 5th gen games, they let you largely have whatever skills you want, almost independent of your actual armor set. One perk, though, of the newer skill system: Certain skills that provide very minor bonuses are a lot more usable - especially with how size 1 decos got overhauled in Rise. Even if we go back to a version of the older skill system, it would be nice if minor skills were easier to get. Something to let them still play a role without making you feel "this is a waste to have this instead of a better skill."

[@CaffeineManu]

I think world is the most problematic one tbh, in rise currently we have interesting G-rank skills that work pretty well with each other without being negative skills directly, example being chaotic gore magala armor, and berserk skill being technically a negative skill as you lose health, but on exchange you have 100% uptime of Resentment and Strife

[@JanusHoW]

Right now, the Valstrax full set is pretty meta in Rise, especially when paired with Nargacuga weapons. It's got plenty of good slots, and it's got Weakness Exploit 3, though 2 points come from the gloves alone. Speaking of meta, it's not attack, but critical hits and sharpness that are the meta. The overwhelming majority of sets I've seen generally have some (but not all) the following skills: Weakness Exploit 3 Critical Boost 3 Critical Eye 4+ Attack Boost 4+ Speed Sharpen 3 Protective Polish 2+ Handicraft 1-2 (not more than that!) Master's Touch 3 Interestingly, you don't see Razor Sharp on any meta builds. However, there are some skills that provide such a huge benefit that it's worth sacrificing points in the above skills for: -Rapid Morph for Switch Axe and Charge Blade -Quick Sheathe for Long Sword -Wirebug Whisperer for Hammer (for Impact Crater spam) -Artillery for Sticky Ammo bowguns, Charge Blade and Gunlance -Focus for Great Sword -Constitution & Stamina Surge for Bow -Normal/Rapid Up, Pierce Up and Spread Up for Bows and Bowguns, depending on ammo/arrow type -Blaze/Stream/Bolt/Frost/Dragon Jewels for element-heavy weapons, particularly Sword & Shield and Dual Blades As for me, once I finish some elemental Light Bowgun builds in Rise, I'm going to try building a maximum reward set (Good Luck 3, Capture Master, Carving Master) for the hell of it. Edit: A huge change for gunners in Rise is the shocking ease of applying the Steadiness, Recoil Down and Reload Speed skills. In Rise's system, all you need are three Level 1 deco slots each for the latter two skills, and two Level 1 slots for Steadiness and you can fire off and reload all but the heaviest of shots with almost zero recoil and reload them at the same speed as you might with Normal shots. In fact, when everyone is wailing about how broken Long Sword is becoming, no one talks about how incredible OP, if still flashy, the gunner weapons are thanks to this. What's more, many of the ammunition types (including Sticky) have been tweaked to be affected by your weapon's raw, and with most gunner skills being only 2 or 3 ranks, it's not too difficult to nearly max out Attack Boost even after applying skills like Spare Shot, Artillery, Ammo Up, and Recoil Down/Reload Speed. As a result, Sticky Ammo 3 has become the HBG meta. Edit 2: With the return of Crouching Fire/Siege mode in Sunbreak (and it appears to be akin to Valor HBG from GU) and the new Setting Sun Silkbind, we can surely expect to see the return of Pierce as the HBG king.

[@BadEnd98]

Most Nargacuga weapons are outdated in current meta actually.

[@z0ro_62]

Damn man what a trip down memory lane remember making all kinda of crazy sets just bearly avoiding -10

[@Zaney_]

There is one other issue with the old skill system, at least in the new system no points are actually wasted towards a skill, you get a lesser version of it but in old world, it just puts 9 previous points to waste. Thershold system tends to be wasteful, overall just tends to be a frustrating set building experience, along with the horrible charm rng. the only saving grace was the p3rd charm system with fixed charm tables and being able to save scum and do save states.

[@frmCast]

As someone who started with old-gen monster hunter, i like the incremental skill system that 5th gen has. one major drawback to setbuilding in old gen that turned me off from the idea so often was having an idea for a set, but having it just barely not add up by a point or two, and not being able to sacrifice anything on the set to make it work, so in the end the whole idea kind of falls flat. it would be less of a let-down if the +8 had any amount of impact on the set, even if it's less potent than the full skill also, as a HH main, requiring 10 whole points of maestro investment means i'm either using 5 slots for a single skill or i need to get really lucky with a useful talisman that has maestro on it , because almost nothing has the skill on it. usually resulting in having to sacrifice damage (on a weapon that already suffers in damage output) to mitigate the issue of having a song wear off at a bad time. i do like the idea of negative skills, and am not really sure why they removed that mechanic, as it helps prevent the issue that gen 5 sees a lot where you stack so many powerful skills onto a set with no consequence that the meta becomes incredibly stale. i feel like a nice middle ground would be to keep the incremental system (tho maybe rebalance it to tune down the power on some skills) but also add in negative skills, that way there is still the sense of sacrifice, without the disappointment of not quite being able to reach the skill you wanted.

[@TwilightYonder720]

So my problem with the old skill system was that every skill needed 10 points, this just prioritized offensive skills over all even more, what would you choose and waste mats on decos for Quick Sheath, Speed eating, wide range etc over the clearly better Handicraft, Crit eye, Rapid Fire etc like since your so limited so your just better off just getting the better skills with mixed sets. I feel like this could be fixed by having a lot of these be 5 skill points but it would come around to how the new games are. Honestly it's not a bad thing to have sets that can actually have both offensive and support skills like the newer games, like in 4U I wanted to fit in Guard Up but I literally could not since the lvl 3 slot decos only gave 2 skill point because who knows why meanwhile in World Guard Up with a single deco. The newer games honestly just reminded me of all these skills since I just really ignored them in the previous games despite 100's of hours Not to mention how Talismans worked before like you'd get so many bad ones like C-Range C+ 1 with a slot and like you have 10 of them, now 4U and GU fixed that with melding for better talismans but still

[@hekucarrasco2870]

Tbf in older games offensive skills were less broken that they are now, yeah they made the hunts faster, but they were not the main source of damage, besides in G-rank you could esily put some minor offensive skills with other QoL. I always played with quick sheath on GS no matter the other skills. If you are obssesed with meta that's ln your mind, not on the game, if you can try new skills on world and rise that's bc the new system is so broken that you can put all these skills on top of meta skills, at this point they could remove all crit amd attack skills and put those stats directly in the weapons, there would be no difference.

[@rasmus90]

The old games also had issues of just plain balancing the utility/defensive skills to be worth the investment, so some of the offensive skill priority wasn't quite the fault of the system, but rather the numbers. For example, I play regen HH in every game, from Freedom Unite to Rise, and while in World/Rise, getting 4x Rec Speed is a matter of 3 level 1 decos, which doesn't get you all *THAT* much in terms of offense, but in 4U/GU, that's 15 levels of a medium difficulty skill you need to pile up (five 2-slot decos!). That's same as Attack Up (M) or Crit Eye +2. You sacrifice quite a bit to get that, but I still kept going with it due to HH melody synergies. Now, if that skill had a level 1 deco with +2 like what Divine Blessing gets in late High Rank from Gold Rathian farm? HOOO BOY!

[@smileyjojo4913]

Thats what risk and reward systems are. You want a safer more defensive playstyle? Go ahead, but don't expect godlike dps. Older MH was never about hyperfocusing on dps and speedruns.

[@TwilightYonder720]

@@smileyjojo4913 as for risk and reward I didn't mind negative skills most of the time would be interesting to see a rework but idk where you guys got me making "Meta" or "godlike DPS" from my comment was just the less skills just prioritized better skills over lesser ones, like the oldest MH I played is 3U and I mostly used Rath Soul and that's just Crit Eye and Ear Plugs not overpowered but much better then a lot of GR gear and honestly Rath Soul and Helios are just much better then most of the G Rank gear until the very end so you can't really blame anyone for getting those especially when Gold Ceadeus is the first Mon for G Rank

[@Rusty_Spy]

@@smileyjojo4913 except most utility and defensive skills barely had any tangible benefits, or the benefits were far less rewarding for the cost compared to offensive skills. The trade off wasn't remotely balanced outside of the really good skills like evasion or divine blessing.

[@loremastre6682]

My biggest issue with WorldBorne hunts is that the skill system almost negates the need for careful planning. The Old system, with the reading and math requirement made everything super rewarding when it turned out right. Even slotting for Defense to negate the Negative or finishing the last point you needed to get for Attack Up L or Earplugs was amazing. Now all you need is an overtuned monster who’s literal purpose is to give you every skill in the game despite having no tactical reason to do so. The armor sets in the older games had more direct impact on what monster it was from, Narga had Crit, Evade Dist and Evade. Now you get 4 different monsters in one armor set, you look like a mass of WTF and get every skill in the game. No planning just spamming, it’s fun. The new armor system bores me before I can finish 3 or 4 hunts because there’s no reward. All you get is “okay that’s done, what’s next” it never ends. I started with Freedom Unite and the series has changed dramatically since then, Climb speed went up, stamina drain while running went down. The monsters are faster, hit boxes on certain attacks got tightened. Weapons got rebalanced (yes I know, LS is insane but it used to be worse. Hit like a GS with the speed of an SnS) In Freedom Unite, you didn’t have an extra item box in the field to switch your items. That planning all has to be done with 30 inventory slots, before you left your house. If you couldn’t make room for Antidotes then you either ran Poison Immunity or Evade skills.. or just learned the monsters well enough to roll out of the way in time. The monsters used to obliterate your health bar, I know it’s a bit of a meme now. I was super excited when World was announced because the gameplay showed a Hunter getting half his HP getting chunked by a regular attack from Great Jagras or smth. The Old World games post Gen3 reduced monster damage a bit, which was good for newer players but for me it made it seem like the “risk/reward” of getting hit to finish the last hit of my combo or roll out of it to avoid getting one-shot wasn’t an issue anymore. Again, a good thing for newer players but I’m not a fan of the faster/ less risky style those games have **** they’re still really fun to me but for a different reason ****

[@sangheilicommander1056]

i do like both systems but if i could make a choice i would just make negative skills tied to armors that are potent. for example if you had a arm piece that gives 2 Wex and 2 slots it would also come with 1 point of negative stun. without being able to remove the negative skill the only way to get 2 wex is to slot it in on another armor part or use a charm / necklace ( depending on what system would be implemented. or run with the negative skill and get the risk reward. TLDR: basically i would make negative skills like armor set bonuses so you need to deal with them or build around them.

[@RoseWovenScythe]

I still think you have to choose the damage or qol in base rise. So far. Obviously that's not going to be even remotely the case in Sunbreak, but at least right now with the five weapons I play, if I want qol skills, I definitely have to give up SOME damage. But this video is extremely nice to think about.

[@SoulbreakerNB]

my introduction to monhun was from a psp title called monhun freedom unite. it was a challenge at first but enjoyed the game for thousands of hours of gameplay. Even if I haven't experienced playing the game together with someone else, I still enjoyed the solo play, even today. I soloed monhun double cross, world and currently, rise. personally, I didn't really like world with its tracking system and all. but I like how it looks in my PC. I just played the repack with mods that allows me to play dlcs or events offline. Completed iceborn solo up to that earth dragon and unlocked the rng biome area. Personally I like gen ultimate than iceborne when it comes to complexity but for a bit of blend of good looking monhun game and a bit of complexity, rise was a nice mismash of both and I really appreciate it because of that. I love how we have doggos in-game now lol. I like the old games but if I ick one title from the series that I love the most is Freedom Unite.

[@GlitchedVision]

another beneficial example of negative skills is a certain skill that inflicts you with some form of elemental blight at all times paired with another that gives you a boost to your stats while blighted, plus the way old school bubble blight made you slide while evading often gave experienced hunters moments of extra time while evading or closing distances making precision both a bit harder to achieve and yet more forgiving at the same time.

[@alfonshedstrom9859]

I think a mix of old and new would be ideal. Make ’minor’ skills like Resistance or Speed Eating require 5 while the major skills sit at 10 as before

[@Some-guy-on-the-internet]

I started playing 3U a little while ago and I really like how the skill system works. I'm still in low rank but I made the Volvidon armour set because I main LBG in 3U and the skills on that set complement it really well. I have a few attack up decorations to bring the attack boost up to M and a cold resistance +1 charm to completely negate the cold surge. Although it's nice that gen 5 sets can be packed with more skills, the way decoration slots have levels now limits what skills you can equip. In past gens, all skills have equal value and you just need enough slots to equip the desired decorations.

[@Slendysis]

I think a balance of limited but powerful skills, with negative skills and a single point either way activating the skill would be a good direction to go. Negative skills are a good balance and I like skills like Polar Hunter, Negative Crit, or the combo skills

[@mos5678]

Yeah... I do think there is something with the old games that should've been carried over. Not the skillsystem as a whole because I will be honest, I rather dislike how a gearpiece can either have zero effect or push the threshold into a big buff with no downside. Would be really interesting to see negative skills make a return though.

[@aiexmonsterhunter]

I think both systems have their pros and cons. Pre 5th gen definitely feels more rewarding, but also much more obtuse and hard to grasp. By the time you reached the endgame you had so many different armor pieces available that trying to find the ideal combination for your needs was quite daunting, more so if you had to take your charms into consideration. I myself usually wore full sets during the game's campaing and used external software to design mixed sets once I got to the last tier of quests. This is somewhat of an issue as well in IB/Rise, but way less prominent. Balance-wise, the old school system was definitely more limiting due to the thresholds and negative skills. Gen 5 meta sets allow you to have pretty much everything you want with very little payout, and I agree it might be too much. I'd say a good middle ground would be to keep the incremental system from 5th gen (since it's a lot more intuitive) but increasing the amount of skill points required to get the same effects as a balancing measure. For instance, you would need 10 points of Critical Eye and 5 points of Weakness Exploit to get their maximun effect (+40% and +50% affinity respectively) instead of 7 and 3 like in Rise. Having negative points back could also be really interesting, and much more impactfull since you wouldn't be able to negate their effects so easily with the incremental system. PS: 10:18 Well, considering Fatalis armor in IB and Valstrax armor in Rise, I'd say most people have used a full set not too long ago.

[@lux_less]

Last time I wore a full set in Iceborne was when Safi released. For Sunbreak, it was the chaotic armor. I never wore a full set while progressing. I never had to grind a monster out, and that was a negative to me. In World and Rise, half of the mixed set pieces you need while playing through the game can be made after the first required hunt of the monster. The only time I farmed a monster in 5th gen that wasn't endgame, title update was Tobi-Kadachi in WorldBorne lol. However, in my recent replaying of 3u and Gu, I've made the alloy armor (so much mining), wroggi armor, lagiacrus armor, and high rank Jaggi armor in 3u so far. Ceanataur and Rathalos, low and high rank, in Gu. Granted, I made a mixed set in Gu, being BuJaBuJaBu. But who doesn't love making it.

[@melleamushroom]

The old system was a lovely experience, at least from my GU experience, but it felt very restrictive in an uninteresting way. I think 5th Gen fixes this in a smart way with gradual skills, where one point will give you something, but without those negative skills it becomes monstrous. Another thing, since skill counts are growing as well, negative skill counts could increase too. Having those gradual negatives would make builds complicated and very unique. (Edit: grammar is hard)

[@FrnzFrdnnd]

Great video. It's literally my thoughts about the current skill system. Defensive skill are literally nonexistent in gen 5, outside of some popular options like you said (evade window/distance). Though that's also a problem with the difficulty itself. The games ain't hard enough to make us use this skills (tremor resist, wind resist, etc). The increased health pools indicates that we need to do more damage than anything else, so attack up and critical eye are a must if you don't wanna have 40 minute quests every time. The multiplayer scaling also influences this. I really hope we get a rework on the skilk system for gen 6, which I predict is already going to happen. They know our complains, they know what skills aren't being used, which ones are overused, etc. That doesn't mean we are getting the best possible result out of it. It could backfire and they get rid of defensive skill altogether. We gotta wait and see.

[@King_Gum]

See id love to see the old system with modern QOL. Even as a third fleeter, I cannot stand mixed sets in old style cause I have to do 3+ button presses to get from the headpiece I'm looking at to the chest piece of the same set. In 5th gen that would be 1 button.

[@TaqSoto]

Having played GenU and experiencing the old system myself it wasn't bad. I just hate the idea of putting on a piece of armor and not getting anything from it. With the new system even if you only use one piece you at least get something from it. Overall I think the new system is better despite the skill bloat. I would like to see negative skills come back though. There were a few that I actually liked like Taunt, being a hammer player. Made the monster face me more often which made getting my head shots much easier.

[@TowerBooks3192]

Reminds me of the time I started to gun in Freedom Unite and the Death Stench set was the first one that offered an auto-reload skill that made HBG so fun.

[@vinaboy1993]

I like both systems for different reasons, but I doubt the old system will come back as we knew it, but if it were to come back in some sort or form, then probably mixed together with the new system Have small incremental Increases, but the skills effectiveness will jump at certain thresholds either with a bigger increases or a small bonus skill slapped on, kinda like Attack and Defense Boost in W:IB This way, one can still amass as many skills as they want, but the increases won't be as impactful, unless they reach the thresholds, which will give a bigger boost

[@soratheorangejuicemascot5809]

I like that my favorite mix set in 4u doesn't even give atk up or any kind of offensive bonuses. Its just a bunch of skills that can make you immune to tremor, roar, and then some razor sharp.

[@gregorycollins2314]

After hearing him saying "when was the last time you wore a full set" personally i love wearing full sets because they look badass to fully wear instead of mish mashing a bunch of armor pieces just to trigger a skill

[@deinonychus1948]

I will say one thing about the old games, more specifically; MHGU... and that is that Layered Armour or Transmog as they called it may have been more tedious (and I honestly prefer the new way of doing it) but it sure as hell feels more rewarding doing Transmog... I recently made a Transmog set for my Fatalis Armour set (I was grinding Thunderlord Zinogre at the time sooo, Status Resistance and higher Thunder Resistance was essential for me) and you can probably guess that it looked ugly as hell! So I hunted some G-Rank Nerscylla for the arms and legs and some High Rank Gore Magala for the chest and waist... needless to say; it now looks WAY better, sure I'd have preferred to have the Nerscylla and Gore Magala armour there to layer over my armour from the get-go without having to hunt them but here's the thing; in G-Rank, do you ever have a good reason to hunt a Low/High Rank Gore Magala? unless, like me you grinded for his weapons; the answer is likely no I will say that while old style skills will in all likelihood NEVER come back; compound skills probably will, we kinda already have them in the form of set bonuses from World and special skills like Stormsoul and the Elder Dragon Blessing skills from Rise... that's something they need to play around with more!

[@magiv7573]

This is anecdotal so it really shouldn’t be given much weight, but i feel the fact that set building sims are so much more prevalent for the older games is just a testament to how much more depth the old system has. I remember in early XX theory crafting sets and charm set ups with friends using athenas ASS (iykyk) to develop the early meta as much as possible Meanwhile in iceborne I was able to figure out the best sets at any given rank entirely on my own with only a few minutes of thought - I also feel that the change in skill and armor system weirdly represents the concerns of older MH players as a whole since world.

[@miguelangelmendez7767]

I would love to see a Monster Hunter game with old world mechanics (negative skills, breakable tools, paintball) mixed with quality of life changes of 5th gen (Radial Menu, Layered weapons/armor, etc). Like a throw back game for old veterans, so new players can also experience old world in a easier way as well.

[@navolas2]

I honestly, even thinking back to the older games, can't remember the last time I wore a full set. I have been playing since Tri. I had no idea how the skill system worked back when I started and honestly remember thinking it worked the way it currently works. I love wearing mix sets though and wore so many back in GenU. That being said, I do find myself engaging more with creating mix sets in Rise than I did in the older games. The skill system in rise is much easier to work with (and search through) I can easily make a mix set that I want for a weapon I want to use. Meanwhile in the older games, I almost always used Athena's ASS. I think a large number of people used that tool. With the amount of pieces of armor to look through and the number of skills it just make things easy to figure out.

[@MistaFinni]

I started with 4U as a Dual Blades/Switch Axe main, though I had no idea what I was doing AT ALL so I don't really count it as my first game. With that in mind, I started with Rise, then World, and going through Iceborne right now as a Charge Blade main. Playing through Rise again after some time in WorldBorne made me want to pick of Switch Axe again so now i'm playing that too. After watching this video, I really really wanna play through Generations and would LOVE to go back to 4U and finish what I started. (I rememeber getting stuck on a zamtrios (post goremagala egg quest(???)))

[@jamestdfm]

As a veteran I can simply say that the old skill system was fun af, and negative skills were nice too, torso up was the way What I don't like about the new system is how slots work, having skills locked to triple single slots or double single makes things so weird, there are way too many skills in any build too, having 3-4 skills back then was already quite a bit

[@jachauntaeons2067]

I started with MH Freedom Unite and I've been with the franchise for about a decade at this point and I probably enjoyed the armor building experience the most with Freedom Unite and World/Icebourne, two completely different styles of building. I think the fact that the RNG mechanic of the charm system was just not as prominent in either games vs 3U, 4U and GU made me feel like I actually relied on my own set of tools to build something amazing rather than having that one charm that could make or break a build. Granted, I know that World/Icebourne had the decorations randomised but for me missing 1 or 2 skills was easy to compensate for with something else and the process of getting decorations was made easy by literally just hunting and playing the game. I don't personally feel like having to compromise in the old skill builds was particularly more rewarding but I did enjoy that you had to have a variety of builds for certain situations and certain weapon types vs in 5th gen where I literally have a 1 build fits all set. On the otherhand, I also enjoy seeing how absolutely bonkers I could push my builds in World/Icebourne, especially when I got the Fatalis B set and just seeing how versatile it was since I could make it either a pure DPS or a more tanky or even an amazing support set on the drop of the dime. If you had to twist my arm and ask for my preferred system, I'd have to give it to 5th gen, it felt more accessible and I just don't remember being fond of the old skill system since I felt like the tailsmans really did make or break a build and it was hard to compensate for a lackluster tailsman vs a lack of decorations. Just my personal opinion.

[@GUN1GRAVE]

finding a good talisman to mix set WITH STYLISH ARMOR PIECES is super satisfying in 4u. rajang waist with some deviljho leather was the jam. sleek and cool looking.

[@averageplayers5288]

The last time I wore a full set was when I was playing Iceborne for the first time. I made a mix of the alpha and beta Narga set for the evasion skills.

[@didnt_ask_for_handle]

perhaps having negative incremental skills, but having full sets cancel out negatives themselves and mixed sets having to deal with them would be interesting. Then full set is rigid in where you can take it but no downsides and mixed sets require extra planning for the reward. It may also be easier for new players who aren't ready to build sets yet while learning the game

[@dragoon3219]

As a veteran (since 2004 in fact) I just want to go on record saying the skill system barely matters to me. It just doesn't. Long as it works it's fine. Neither is better in my opinion. I honestly barely even noticed the difference transitioning from Unite to World. It all functions pretty much as it always has. It just has a different coat of paint now. One thing I can say about the new system though is I _LIKE_ the negative skills being gone. They were a nuisance that added nothing. Anyone that says otherwise generally does so because they feel it made the system "more complicated." My response to that is simple 1) It didn't, you just didn't use sets with negatives unless it was negatives that didn't matter and 2) complicated does not equal good.

[@klauserji]

been playing mh for ages; and agree to this. the skill system barely matters. true hunters will always find a way to maximize things (and fun) out of it.

[@lubbo5261]

Negative skills did add something to the game, not every negative skill had to be something negative like Critical Eye -3 which in combination with the Negative Crit boost skill was really good.

[@dragoon3219]

@@lubbo5261 No, it wasn't. That skill is still around as a weapon skill and it still sucks. It works exactly as it did as a skill and provides a _chance_ (only 25%) that a feeble hit will instead be a critical. You're better off just doing a normal crit build. Hell, you're better off not having any offensive skills and neutral affinity. If it turned every feeble hit into a crit then it would be good, but that isn't how it works.

[@rogue_0314]

Edit: this is in addition to the points made in this video, I hadn't finished it yet and was listening while I typed, and I agree with everything in it Hi, third fleet member here, although world is what got me into the series after I forgot about it. I really enjoy both systems, roughly equally. I like the old system because there's far less pressure to build for the meta, and I can focus on skills i really like for a given build, plus I can use different skills for most weapons. In the new system, there is immense pressure from the many in the community to build for the meta, and that often is nearly identical from weapon to weapon, save for a couple small changes and one or 2 large changes for a couple weapons. However, in the new system, I feel as though it progresses better, since you are working for pieces and not sets. Generally you improve a little with each piece, whereas progression felt a little strange and a little bit slow in old world because you only really improved with a set most of the time. I think the new system has the most potential for freedom, but also the least pressure for it in the community, unfortunately. Luckily there are still plenty of people who encourage a "screw the meta, just have fun" mindset

[@nicholasmiller9468]

Honestly, I feel you can merge the modern with the old without going absolutely insane with a full return to form. I like the idea of having negative skills, but at the same time I feel like having the raw numbers just overcomplicates a system that could easily be based on factors of 1 rather than 5, 10, 15, etc. You'd still have the risk and reward of using a set with a hard positive and negative buffs, but rather it being points, it simple come down to "this increases this skill by 1, and decreases this by 1", and you could feel proud to make a build that compensates and perfects that satisfying balancing act

[@paolomarucchi-chierro4930]

Another cool way people used negative skills was with brutal strike they'd get -10 to crit eye to get their affinity as low as possible to increase the power of brutal strike from bloodbath diablos set

[@successfulfailure1298]

I’m a vet from 3U, and actually never played world, I skipped from GU to Rise. I prefer the new skill system. In the old games I pretty much always had 1-3 armor sets. It took a while to get my sheet of paper and scroll around figuring out what I wanted in my set. So most of the time I would make some attack or crit sets and call it a day. In the new system I spend, ironically, a lot more time creating armor sets. It’s easier and more fun to make individual sets for every weapon I use. I’ve got two full pages of sets, with more on the way, and that is way more than I would’ve dreamed of in 3. I think the ease of getting into it, while portrayed as a negative in your video(and the opinions of many), is actually a positive for me. It encourages me to try different skills I wouldn’t normally and I’m excited to farm for my mixed sets. I still love the old system but I do hope they keep the new one, though negative skills would be a good addition back.

[@zerocharisma573]

At 10:20 you ask when the last time players used a full set was. I use the full Bazel set for my GL build in Rise and I have every skill maxed out that you could ever want/need for that weapon.

[@MrSpiderspider12]

I think the final boss armor from GU planted a seed for the fifth gen skill system Because GU is a switch port of 3DS master rank expansion of Generation that was exclusive to Japan So devs had plenty of time before releasing World to say "Huh....players like having more skills" And i heard from a video about Street Fighter that a player did an supposed near impossible moveset in competition and Capcom made future SF entries to have that moveset to be able to be more easily used to recreate that feeling of power And in my opinion same thing happened between GU(XX) and world

[@The_Jho]

This is kinda funny, in the timing of me watching this video, I decided to make a new character in iceborne to get a full feel for hunting horn in that game, and I wore full guardian armor, full odogaron a+ armor, and am finally getting to the point of mixing up the armor, so the last time of me using a full set is today with the full odogaron

[@Chris_Tootoo]

As a first fleeter I have a great amount of respect for the old system. Having negative abilities and stats with certain armours/sets meant that you could have an insane amount of abilities which in turn make your power level increase to an insane degree, but the negatives helped make things more balanced along with the amount of work you would have to do to get your perfect build. My SilverLos set in 4U was incredibly powerful with jewels and talismans would give me a maxed out Damage and Fire Damage. The absolute power I had with that set with my dual swords meant that I had a broken damage output, but the extreme negative skill in Recovery Level meant that if I got hit I would feel it. Being a glass cannon was fun and exhilarating as a G rank play style since getting hit with a certain attack meant an instant KO, but at the skill level you’d be by that time meant you could effectively dance around Elders.

[@Not_SARU]

i started as early as 4U and i actually prefer the new skill system. it just made adding QoL while largely retaining damage potential while in old games i had to sacrifice core skills for something as simple as divine blessing which nowdays comes as a part of good pieces like the goldian mail. Its just less punishing to add any QoL skills at all while the old games hard punished you for running any at all

[@parishharris819]

As someone who has put about as much time into rise as GU and even more time than rise into 4U, I can safely say that I prefer the old skill system simply because it is more engaging and mixed sets are more fun to build. The fact that when building sets in the old world you have to look at the impact to the entire set versus which skills can give the highest damage on an individual piece in the new world just clicks with me more. Although, that isn't to say i don't like the new armour system, because I really do. It's still very fun to build sets for rise but I just prefer building them in the older games

[@Stripeddinos99]

In gu, whenever i got a new charm id open up athena's ass and usually went on the lookout for that saucy set that i could perfect, that absolutely gorgeous tenderizer 6 triple slot makes the jho ceana set absolutely work. Sharpness 2, razor sharp, wex, crit boost and expert 1? That was the absolute meta that everyone tries to achieve, and when you reach it, it just makes you want to see what else you can do with that charm, hell i even made a striker guard hbg set with a guard 7 crisis 4 triple slot deco. In rise/world i would simple throw decos on sets and bam i got it. I love both skill systems, but the older one feels way nicer when you finally get what youve been looking for. Rise does it with its charms, but its like hald old world feeling. And world is just welp, guess ill go farm for that charm and go to the steam works for those decos

[@pcdeltalink036]

Yeah the old system took some work but it was strangely satisfying. I started with MH3 and I remember spending a good amount of time with a notebook and pen building my dream armor on paper, lining up the skills it would have, the positive and negative stats, charm possibilities, etc. It took time but it just felt so good when I had the whole thing laid out and could see the end goal and what it would have. Even better if you went with a mixed set and you had this feeling of accomplishment cobbling together this mish mash of armor sets that combined make something far superior to one of those sets all by itself. The new system almost feels OP given how many skills you can get on a set of armor. It's a bit easier to put together, sure, but it lacks that same feeling that the old system provided. I like the improvements but I also don't like how much easier it is.

[@MiraSmit]

In Sunbreak I first made the Kadachi set since it was the first master rank set that was better in defense than my high rank dear. Than I made the Channeler's armor and finished the story with it. After that I went into mixed sets.

[@Stratelier]

I've commented about the difference between old/new skill systems in various videos before, and that the skill points system was always sort of a deconstruction of armor set bonuses to begin with. Some ideas: - Imagine the old system except the standard activation threshold is +5pts instead of +10. The +10 threshold was often impossible to reach purely through Decorations, you generally needed 1-2 pieces of an armor set (or a good RNG talisman) to "get started", especially for high-tier skills like Handicraft. - Or, imagine the World system except that the Lv.1 version of a skill (with multiple levels) does basically nothing. Like every skill is a 2-piece set bonus. Consider, for example, the Ibushi and Narwa signature skills in Rise: either of them grant Great Luck at Lv.5 BUT at any lower level they only provide token elemental resistance (which is always outclassed by dedicated element resistance skills). - I would love to see negative skill points/levels return even if the negative skills _themselves_ do not. As mentioned, this provides interesting tradeoffs and balances (such as Handicraft and Sharpness decos being mutually exclusive due to how they negatively impact the other) that the player must be aware of, even when it doesn't ultimately impact their loadout. And, as a general rule, the sense of accomplishment is always proportional to the challenge of getting there. You can't reach top of the world by climbing foothills, you need _mountains._

[@dolphinboi-playmonsterranc9668]

Having less skills makes every point you can squeeze out more meaningful 1:00 Maybe they needed the spreadsheets because of player error lol I honestly think it comes down to the question everybody faces at some point: "How can I make myself stronger?" instead of "How can I eliminate my weaknesses?"

[@smileyjojo4913]

This whole situation ironically reminds me of another one of Capcom's games: Resident Evil. Rise is a lot like Resident Evil 6, with cartoony action pumped up to 11 in exchange for slower methodical play. The thing is, RE6 has gotten tons of sales. Does that mean that Resident Evil 1 or 4 aren't worth playing? Cause they're older and clunkier? Really? It's ridiculous to me that fans of old MH are demonized so much simply for being disappointed with their series heading in a different direction. Its ok to have been upset that Resident Evil became so action focused, and I think its the same exact situation here.

[@bakublader1999]

My biggest gripe, which you mentioned, is having pieces that are just objectively better/worse. Take the garuga greaves for example. You can convert the skills on the armor into a slot value (atk boost has SL1 for example). Then you just grab the legs with the highest SL that has relevant skills and EVERY other piece becomes borderline irrelevant. That's the main reason I don't like the new system. With how common skills are and this slot value system, the amount of versatility in sets just plummets. In IB endgame I craft Fatalis armor, Velkhana legs+helmet and I have a build for about 90% of all weapons. It absolutely kills diversity.

[@theawesomestuff2408]

This is an excellent point. Challenger Charm V is the peak example of it IMO. Slot level 2 Affinity skill with 5 levels that instantly gets maxed for the cost of a Charm, and you just need Raging Brachy parts for it. It dwarfs even the other Affinity Charms that need Fatalis or AT Velkhana parts and have less skill levels.

[@blazingruin2975]

I definitely enjoyed the Older Gen MH skill system more. Sets did feel way more balanced and you often had several sets/mixed sets for a specific monster. With 5th Gen, I really don't ever find myself creating a set to specifically counter a monster. While one could, the need for it isn't really there.

[@BadEnd98]

Nah they're not really balanced ever since older gen at all. It's just too hard to mix a good set all by yourself and the lack of skills amount you can mix in that make people rather use much less effective sets and be ok with it

[@ritten7452]

The two systems are the same thing, one just has negatives and is more restrained. The "problem" with new world isn't that it's all positive skills. It's that the threshold for skill activation is lowered and the amount of points we have has been raised per armor piece. This could easily be fixed if they just lowered the amount of skill points armor pieces had, but I think they want to go in the opposite direction. Quick sheath, speed eating, recovery up, evade up, defense up, in other words, defensive skills were all devalued in old world because they were usually pointless if you just played well. Sure having tones of skills makes you a bit OP, but it does allow you to try those defensive abilities without much damage loss. As for why damage matters, it comes back to playing well. Defense is usually only useful for mistakes, where as offense allows you to kill faster meaning less time for you to make mistakes leading to defense becoming even more useless. The point is, having a chance to try extra skills allows for more variation. As for negatives, they were largely inconsequential. In old world they rarely reached the threshold. Instead they should just make negative skills into their own skills. Negative crits are a thing, and now regen for resentment uptime or no blight recovery for resuscitate up time could be an interesting way to play.

[@RaggedLands]

I do feel like the Incremental system has one advantage: It's easier to understand for a beginner. Maybe this is a UI issue though - something like a "progress bar" with certain cutoff points being marked would be a better presentation for the threshold system.

[@hyunka2756]

There's less options in having to choose between attack up or evade extender due to thresholds than in having the freedom to put up to X points in a skill to increase its effectiveness? The old system is way better on paper than it is in practice and that's why it was changed. All negative skills ever amounted to was having to waste one slot into leaving things at -9, and you couldn't even opt to leave the negative skill in favour of getting another skill instead because it would require another 10 points for it to activate. There may have been a negative skill or two that had a use, but it's just an accidental exception. With the new system you get to adapt your gameplay while keeping things balanced, there's many more ways you can handle a monster when you can choose what to do with your slots than when you have to work around something as arbitrary as a gear piece having -3 to handicraft. Besides, in anything beside end game sets (and without extremely, extremely rare jewels) you still have to sacrifice points in a skill to get another. If you don't go around looking for meta-sets for every stage of play and cheat in some jewels, you're gonna end up with a varied mix of skills of your choosing with a few points or less skills but maxed out. Also, new world monsters accommodate the new system in that they're stronger in general. You talk like the amount of skills makes monsters a breeze, whereas in Iceborne going to certain encounters without skills like divine blessing is a suicide for the average player, and attack skills prevent you from taking 30+ minutes because monsters have less openings with the improved AI.

[@Soudavanahhh]

I’m going to interject my opinion, because it’s the Internet. I started playing MonHunt on the Wii as a wee child. I never built for skills, but was playing Fashion Hunter instead; therefore, I can’t say I know about the skill system. I do remember there being a Gunner version and a Melee version of armor though. I think it’d be cool to have something like that, but instead of gun vs. melee it’s Old World vs. New World and you can only mix and match with armor in the same version. I honestly haven’t put much thought into this, but I treasure the time I spent with friends on the newer installments. I don’t want to scare away new blood with a seemingly intimidating system- buuuut I also want to experience the old system for myself though. It could be a middle ground vets look for, though I do imagine balancing issues could be a problem.

[@jesfest]

I'm at the part where you ask when I last wore a full set in newhun. Like yesterday lol. I wear the rakni set on my dual blades, and before that, royal ludroth set. I'm an old school hunter who played the first monster hunter. On PS2. I don't concern myself with speedruns or the meta, I like to use my own noggin and try to find things that work with my own playstyle, or just what I want to accomplish. I prefer the new system, but don't like the lack of negatives that further reinforce a particular playstyle. Give me some armor pieces that give good skills for one playstyle, but also a negative skill, too. Make them give the same penalties as they do bonuses. Imagine a negative 5 in divine blessing lmao.

[@Aesieda]

Good video, we need more people like you in the community.

[@princessc.j.6192]

We love the old system cause the work payed off, i was able to combine 5 skills at once in my mghu sets, and now on rise the most i manage to squeeze is 2 so honestly the older system works and yes u did not need a spread sheet, just a pair of legs and headpiece and bam fencer 10

[@RayquaSr.]

Negative skills are so negligible in old world. You almost would never have a negative skill with a mixed set and even if you did you slot in a single gem that makes it go to -9. Pretty simple and very rewarding.

[@marcoasturias8520]

I'd love to see more abilities using negative stats in the future. We already have blunt edge, but we could have much more. Say, something that buff you when you have depleted your stamina, so you probably will use stamina intensive weapons and negative skills to deplete it faster. Hell, maybe even eat some burnt meat just to make it easier!