Why Most People Have No Clue How to Build for Damage in Monster Hunter

[@cybercyrus6402]

I get the premise and agree with parts of the video, but the video also misrepresents the actual balance players should hit. You show the crit boost example which is true, but then use that as justification for running high levels of these uptime skills without actually comparing how much dmg one might give up to get 5 points in say earplugs. That's not to say that it won't end up still better to get earplugs, but it's just worth understanding that more dmg vs more dmg uptime is not so black and white. Then again it seems like your videos are aimed more to convince people to stop blindly following meta, so this prob isn't as important to understand for people who barely understand their builds outside of someone gave me this and said it does the best.

[@niscent_]

typically, to reach 100% affinity from zero you have to spend 10 armor skills (wex 3 + expert 7), and that only increase your raw damage by 25%. the real reason why the meta is about full damage builds is that all the benefits you can get from those dps uptime skills can simply be replaced by playing better. the meta is basically for people playing close to speedrun quality, just more sloppily (hence why the meta is not heroics build). brachydios: don't get hit, position better to not walk on top of the slime. alternatively, just have some nullberries instead of rolling 12 times. roar: learn to i-frame the roar. especially for sword and shield, you can backstep on the roar into perfect rush, instead of using 5 skills worth of slots. partbreak: you deal more damage more often because your build is pure damage and you play better, whatever you're trying to break you will eventually break. you will break those wings, you will flinch and topple nergigante. shara ishvalda: don't walk into the sand. i've hunted him more than enough to say it's really doable. teostra: cool drink and elderseal, now there's only one dot that can affect you and even with a greatsword your elderseal will keep him locked out of his aura if you are playing well. this and he's not the hardest monster to stunlock... vaal hazak: you do have to pay the effluvia resistance tax, just like you pay the health boost taxe to every monster. otherwise you are oneshottable. daora: stunlockable. elderseal application seals the deal. at the end of the day it's still: if you are not good enough yet, pay the skill taxe and get all those quality of life improvements. best advice to any inexperienced hunter. and having a full tank build so that you can learn the pattern of harder monsters is great too.

[@naota909]

@@niscent_ while i generally agree with the strats, this doesn't take into account arena size and invading monsters additionally item usage is still considered downtime the strats are perfectly fine for post-post-endgame (maxed out guiding lands) when the attack to part-flinch ratio is justified, but not for post-endgame (progging tempered guiding lands monsters at sub optimal item levels which is what 95% of the player base reaches then stops)

[@niscent_]

@@naota909 yup, that's why i said the meta is only relevant for people playing close to speedrun quality, and definitely not for hunters who are still discovering new things. all those strats work, but there's so much you have to learn before being able to apply them. every single thing about position only become possible, and even super easy, once you become familiar with how the monster move and combo his moves together.

[@naota909]

@@niscent_and the non-meta is still relevant to the meta players who haven't reached post-post-endgame

[@nuke2099]

@@niscent_ The meta isn't even for people playing close to speedrun quality and its listed as not being for that on the meta subreddit.

[@lux_less]

Damage uptime is what makes bow my favorite weapon. I can build my damage before anything else and still be able to consistently hit the monster, in critical range, while it's the monster's "turn". Same reason I love adding evade window on dual blades and other weapons that have very little commitment. I'd also say that learning to roll through roars is a very good idea for anyone looking to take their hunts to another level (as well as it being very satisfying and a good bit of practice for rolling through normal attacks). Then earplugs isn't as necessary against a lot of monsters.

[@loayzc10]

Meanwhile, Lance uptime: -_________-____-____________-

[@naota909]

^ man of culture

[@DarkTyrant]

A sleep resistance charm alone buffed my time to hunt a Nightshade Paolumu from 15 to 10 min since I didn't have to worry about falling asleep from the gas and could just focus on attacking.

[@naota909]

Using skills to completely nullify area of denial attacks = less time spent running around like a chicken without a head

[@lred1383]

for me, sleep res was needed just to make that fight not suck ass. After my first nightshade kill, had enough materials for a single piece of gear... made the pants for sleep resist because that was the only way i was going to fight it again

[@Frost.x7x]

Yea I have a 3 sleep res gem load out just for that stupid monster😂 turns it into a joke fight vs a nightmare (pun intended)

[@Pokepunk]

i just use energy drinks

[@hoshii.8533]

This. I just started MR and got my ass handed to me fighting the Viper Tobi Kadachi. I went out of my comfort zone and made a poison resistance armor, world of a difference. This is the game trying to communicate to you to not be stubborn and actually make use of items/ mechanics in the game like elements/ resistances.

[@IDeVaste]

A lot of people never got the point that highest EFR(effective Raw) isn't nessesary highest DPS, and that utility skills or specifically Slugger / Earplugs are one of the biggest DPS increases, talking about 10%+. The Papermath elitist just claimed that you don't need earplugs/utility skills for highest dps and can just dodge roars, besides the fact that you wont always do that on average, it also means that you're dodging instead of attack a monster. WIth Earplugs 5 you can land a free True charged slash at every roar which is 2000~ damage and 10% of monsters health....or a whole blade dance and not having to intterupt your combo before the roar comes to dodge. IF you shoulder bash to counter the roar with GS, the monster will move and all your raw increases skills dont give you anything since you can TCS during the roar. Makes me genuinely happy to have more voices about how dps really works!

[@bradleyrichmond726]

Love your videos!! Glad you're helping support these kinds of opinions!

[@Sunaki1000]

In world Earplugs is silly, you can very easily just roll trought it. I was realy average at that time and I could do that. Evasion would make a lot of sense, it is free Defense plus easy Roar Rolling.

[@Da5kone001]

@@Sunaki1000 did you read the post at all? how do you roll and hit the monster at the same time.

[@Sunaki1000]

@@Da5kone001 Spacing. Rolling towards it.

[@Da5kone001]

@@Sunaki1000 so to be clear you have found a way to attack while you roll?

[@adrians8249]

Another little addition: Resistance value 20+ gives you also the blight status effect resistance. So, for example against theostra/lunastra, get fire res over 20 to avoid rolling all day long. And better than slotting in common blight resistance, since you also get the elemental dmg lowered this way.

[@halloweentimemachine]

This is super helpful info! I just want to add for people that this is only for elemental blights, not status blights. So, for example, Teo could still give you blast blight (explosions), but you won’t get fire blight (burning damage)

[@codesymphony]

I like 75% blight res and no additional ele res so I can still proc coalescence

[@luminous2585]

There's definitely great advice in there. I would also recommend players who struggle with a monster because of mechanics like flinch and roars and therefore can barely get a hit in to run those skills, but I think your 17% number is very exaggerated. A lot of the damage that you deal to the monster doesn't come from getting a hit in between attacks but from big openings. When monsters tire, stagger, go down, are trapped, get wall banged, KOed. That's where the big damage is, and that's also where you generally won't be interrupted (unless there is a second monster interrupting you.) Also, you obviously don't get all those uptime skills just at the cost of one level of critical boost. The damage you give up by running those skills makes it harder to get flinches and knockdowns. So my rule of thumb would be to run uptime skills as needed when you're really struggling with a monster to get the openings you need, but when you're confident fighting it, then just run damage and you'll likely finish faster.

[@Y4ngCP]

but thats exactly what he said: " if your noticing that u can't hit that monster and don't making uptime damage, look for those skills"

[@vazazell5967]

Roars are giant openings alone.

[@walternunez4118]

Great video, but I think you're overlooking one core mechanic from World which is hunting tools. Mantles are insanely helpful at dealing with most of the problems listed here. Fireproof makes lunastras fire trivial, lightning proof does the same for kirin and status proof makes status dependant monsters like blackveil or nightshade really easy. You just have to be mindful of when to use the mantles so they'll be back up when you need them (tool specialist is so underrated). General comfort skills are still amazing, stuff like evade window/distance and earplugs are universally great but monster specific ones should be left to the mantles with some notable exceptions like fire res for fatalis in case you don't manage the second head break in time

[@bankuei]

100% agree. Too many people look at a speedrunner build, but they don't have speedrunner skill. I tell people to start with a defensive build, learn the moves, THEN up the offense as you get good at evading hits for a particular monster. For 95% of the hunters, something that has "comfy build" stuff will suit them better in actually doing faster hunts without either carting or chewing through heals.

[@albertozalon8477]

Hell speedrunners don't have speedrunners skill. You watch 1 out of dozens of runs to see the perfect one.

[@muhwyndham]

I very much agree with your statement here that comfort skill helps increase DPS. The problem for me is that not until Sunbreak where comfort skill is worth the slot cost, where the worst offender is World Iceborne. To get Earplug 5, you need to sacrifice 2 level 4 slot and 1 level 3 slot. That's equal to 1 Fatalis Vambrace worth of slot. The same story goes for Resistance slot except Blight Resist which is rather easy to reach. The other problem is that there is no general comfort build that will catch most monster downtime without sacrificing DPS from damage skill too much. Ideally, 4 skill that is generally covers most downtime is: - Tremor Resist - Earplug - Blight Resist - Stun Resist But even still there's many monster specific blights/mechanics that warrant extra resistance cost. That doesn't count for recovery comfort skill such as Recovery Boost, Mushromancer, Speed Eating, Free Meal and Health Boost (unless you use full Fatalis set). So yeah, keep try to balance things out, but things like Earplug is too expensive for my taste.

[@niscent_]

you can get evade window instead of earplug, it makes it much easier to roll roars. and it also works for tremors and all attacks that might apply a blight or stun to you. for blights, elemental resistance can also prove less costly, above 20 you are immune to the associated blight, but also, above just by being above 10-15, the associated blight already has a chance to not be applied to you.

[@KenseiShiro]

Earplugs lvl 5 charm goes brrr. No but for real it's also the most slot efficient charm. I always run it

[@gamecavalier3230]

​@@niscent_In addition, you can also get +5 to +15 to all elemental resistances by choosing plants/mushroom ingredients at the canteen, which makes slotting in enough elemental res to get to 20 even cheaper.

[@elk3407]

In Iceborne I was so confused by the meta IG mix set many people were running after raging brachy came out because safi armor might have TECHNICALLY had lower DPS, BUT I never had to stop attacking to heal which led to shorter hunts.

[@niscent_]

my fun build after safi was a 3 safi + 3 teostra, using an insect glaive with a teostra essence awakened ability. never heal and never sharpen, while doing lots of blast procs.

[@tsumaru]

dawg whats your build pls Im struggling with IG

[@Sunaki1000]

Safi was the Meta, and People used Teo as comfort Set cause the Life Drain can backfire?

[@newCoCoY6]

​@@Sunaki1000 other option is safi set with recovery up 3 which results in a net hp gain.

[@ScentSense]

If you're struggling with IG, it's probably not your builds fault. Don't look externally first, look internally and focus on not getting hit before you focus on hitting (hard). Power Prolonger 3, Health Boost 3, Divine Blessing 3, Evade Window 3-5, Weakness Exploit 3, Critical Boost 3, Critical Eye 4-7, Flinch Free 1-3 (I do 1, but you get one level of Wind Res, Tremor Res and Earplugs per rank of FF while you have triple Kinsect buff), Airborne if you want to get any aerial damage, Attack Boost 4, at least 1 Agitator etc etc IG only needs a meta build + Power Prolonger basically. You can start with as many QoL/uptime/survivability skills as you need and remove them as you get more comfortable. Aerial damage is very bad compared to ground damage, and the Tornado Slash combo is a good bit more efficient than the infinite combo on the ground. Keep your Kinsect charged (if the 'bonus' for your weapon is Stamina + Energy, you get both charge effects at once regardless of what ammo you use to charge, which is great), keep triple buff active at all times but prioritize red if the others are proving hard to get (some monsters just hate giving up orange lol), shoot your Kinsect at the monsters weak points using your R2/RT move and hit the clouds it leaves behind for free poisons/blasts/heals, don't neglect to level your Kinsects and give them effective elements, make use of the backwards tornado slash move. I'm not sure how many i-frames it gives normally since I almost always use some level of Evade Window, but I've dodged some pretty damn long attacks while continuing combos just by using that move instead of the forward one. Aerial downward thrust is your highest damage single hit that's easily accessible, so should be your wakeup attack on sleeping monsters. If your Kinsect isn't out when you do it, it will follow up your downward thrust with its own diving attack which works like piercing ammo, dragon piercer, Wyvernsnipe etc and hits multiple times in a line through the monster. Basically, as a rule of thumb, you have to face the camera at the thickest part of the monster and you'll get the Drill off. You'll get more accurate with it in time, but this can add a serious bit of DPS to your already powerful DTs. Slower Kinsects will deal more hits during the drill, but will also obviously be harder to collect buffs with. Whether that tradeoff is worth it or even manageable at all is up to you, personally I don't like to go below 12ish Speed on a high level Kinsect. @@tsumaru

[@HerEvilTwin]

Such an underrated channel, these are great tips. Windproof against Kushala in Iceborn is a must for me, so is Effluvial Res against Blackveil. Earplugs is also so overlooked nowadays, love to run it on my hammer builds

[@athos9293]

Windproof level 5 still doesn't protect you from Kushala's wind

[@Frost.x7x]

Yea I prioritize earplugs 5 over everything 😂😂 nothing pisses me off more than a monster screaming at me.. For the first half of the game until I got the gear/gems for it I kept yelling “fuk off Karen” at my TV and my roommates kept asking me who karen was 😂😂😂

[@_Tzer]

@@athos9293 you can use crystalburst(or any flinching slinger ammo) to lower it's wind aura to windproof level winds. or just elderseal it. or you could run rocksteady or a hunting horn(wind immunity). if you bash it's head in enough it'll also topple and it's aura will lower regardless. Flash pods also work midair and so does brightmoss but you must hit the head with brightmoss a bunch while it's flying. turning em around for a wallbang also disables the wind for a split second. coral soundgong also removes it for a second. horn break also lowers wind level for rest of fight iirc. Stun, paralysis and sleep also lower it's wind. clagger also disables aura for it's duration. it's head is also not covered by wind. kushala's windproof immune wind level is also only on when it's enraged. also known as black wind due to it's coloration. it still has to charge up to that level. i've fought kushala in many a game it's weaknesses noted here for others so my knowledge doesnt go to waste rip poison in world however still good for damage considering it flies a lot.

[@mhchx3]

I just found this channel and in 3 quick videos I learned more from you than the hundreds of hours of random gameplay and "guides" I've watched so far, I love your format, thank you very much I'm a relatively new player (100 hours) and World is my first MH game, I just started Iceborne. So i'm still quite far away from optimal end game builds, and the damage boosts I can get from my available builds are really insignificant, but I would used them anyway because that felt optimal to me, to increase my overall damage numbers by 5-10% felt like a lot. Then, just for experimentation and fun, I switched my build to earplug 5 and some other QOL garbage. I literally kill monsters twice as fast as I used to, I almost feel like a god and more importantly I'm having way more fun now that monster roars and strictly beneficial to ME. I have clean and consistent openers with the claw, and I don't get my combos randomly interrupted anymore. This does so much more than whatever damage or critical boost I can get it's almost laughable. Now my plan is to go for stun immunity (I don't know the exact name), because I still do a lot of mistakes and get hit, and lately I feel like I get stunned by monsters all the time I don't really know why it wasn't like that before, but it's absolutely destroying my damage uptime, and my health bar, and my sanity, the animation is absurdly long.

[@naota909]

That's b/c I know wtf I'm talking about :) Glad it helped

[@j.jbinks9669]

Learning the roll the monsters' roars than *can* be rolled has been rhe most valuable skill I've learned in this game so far. Having those 5 slots free is too nice

[@albertozalon8477]

Yea rolling roars is great but its really dependent on weapon.

[@naota909]

viper tobi - poison res (unless you like healing every 3 sec) tigrex/barioth - partbreaker (literally forces them to the stay toppled more often) Rajang - tremor resistance (non guarding weapons) downtime from any monster with area of effect denial (ice puddles, blast puddles, etc) Stun resistance

[@niscent_]

there's one thing i won't compromise with: rajang has a simple moveset and you absolutely don't need tremor resistance to deal with him. he only causes tremors with the end of his chain punch and his slam. the first one has extremely short range and you should just not be in front of him when he does it. for the slam, his animation is really spelling out the timing of your dodge, of course you'll get hit the first 3-5 hunts, but through those few hunts you will have seen him slam on the ground more than a 100 times and won't ever get hit again.

[@pyrrhos8175]

@@niscent_ Rajang also Tremors at the end of the psycho crusher and I'm willing to take Tremor 1 just for that opening because it's huge. The flex slam, haymaker, and Dempsey rolls are also fucking spammed and often link into other moves which also get value out of the 1 point of Tremor (not to mention if you're fighting Furious for the first time on that god awful iceflow lake in Hoarfrost which is constant tremor). This also depends on your weapon ofc a Long Sword, Armored/Shielded weapon, or Bow will have a much better time dealing with these hits, but there's a reason why even speedrunners run Tremor Res with some weapons vs it.

[@niscent_]

@@pyrrhos8175 so far my best times with gs on mew are number one are around 6min. no evade window, only rolling those tremors. i didn't know his moves had such names. i never saw a rajang put up a guard, so i'm confused on what could even be called dempsey roll. since the first time i fought a rajang, normal or furious, the only moves on which i have even seen tremors happen is the finisher of his chain hooks, when he slams his knuckles to the ground, and his normal slam, the one where he simply leaps forward. fair point for the ice lake though.

[@pyrrhos8175]

@cypobos what you're calling chain hooks is often called Dempsey rolls or sweeping punches. While many know it from Ippo, it was an actual all-out technique in boxing, throwing all your momentum into each consecutive punch in an almost calculated wildness. Back to Rajang, GS gets by on a lot of these moves because of tackle and well-timed prediction draws to force flinches. It's one of the better weapons to use in the MU for that exact reason (as well as sniping the WEXless head with a mostly vertical movelist that avoids the arms). That weapon can get by without it without sacrificing too much comfort.

[@niscent_]

@@pyrrhos8175 the dempsey roll is not for chaining punches, it's a style of defense used to walk into closer range and wait for you opponent to over commit. you'll find the best examples in mike tyson's fights. it's when you get low on your legs for stability and keep on rolling incoming punches. but yeah, let's not argue boxing semantic while talking about mh. i do consider gs to be one of the best if not the best weapon for rajang, just because it's never your turn and all weapons end up forced into a hit and run style, while gs is already good at hit and run. there's barely any move you can tackle though, rajang hit too fast for that. and even for the moves you could tackle, it's better to roll and charge your draw slash instead. and tempered furious jang barely flinch, so prediction hits into his attacks are rather underwhelming.

[@PyroSoul56]

My favorite way of keeping the downtime low is running quick eating 2-3 all the time, as well as a healing boost from food/skills. The damage increase over time is insane

[@genericcatgirl]

A fellow speed eating/healing boost enjoyer

[@alexgalays910]

and it feels SO GOOD

[@IssDiddy]

After I started running speed eating, I couldn’t stop, it saves so much downtime and can save both you and other hunters in so many situations, building qol into your build to sacrifice damage is something I wish more people did because I’d rather them do less damage over getting carted, speed eating is like the ultimate anti cart skill outside of divine blessing secret

[@alexgalays910]

@@IssDiddy Another strat to save on armor skills/jewels BUT at the cost of a bit more farming/setup is to only use Max + Ancient potion as a backup. That's 8 + 20 possible potions that are pretty much instant to use.

[@IssDiddy]

then free meal comes in and basically almost doubles it depending on if it's free meal secret and the varying degrees of luck (I personally think free meal secret is a bit of a waste, but each to their own), that's what I love about this franchise, what is actually the meta is what makes you as an individual play better or feel more comfortable/have more fun playing, not what all the people who preach max damage skills think is meta, especially once you get full fatalis gear in world for example, then you get the best blend of everything in one@@alexgalays910

[@BigDBrian]

1 value point of tremor resistance against Rajang does so much in iceborne

[@ajko000]

this is so crucial, it's why I run speed eating on my earlier or lower sets to make up for the lack of a large enough pool of decos and charms to get the bis skills.

[@Gaming_Groove]

I appreciate you talking about the importance of increasing the number of opportunities, because yes, uptime is the name of the game. Also, looking at skills that allow you to maximize output during each opportunity should be an extremely high priority. This is why focus is, IMO, the #1 damage increase for GS. Turning uncharged attacks into charged attacks, or charged attacks into higher level charges can easily double your damage or more per opportunity. Anything that lets you "do the thing" of your weapon more easily or frequently should be looked at first before just slotting in raw damage or crit skills. It may not always work out to be the best bang for the buck on every weapon, but should be strongly considered.

[@howard7997]

These are very good points, thank you! When I think back on it, I have very rarely ever failed a hunt due to too little damage if myself (solo) or my party avoided carting multiple times. I try to focus on survivability skills when first fighting a new monster to stay alive and stay in the fight more. As I get better at fighting that one monster, over time, killing it 10-20+ times. I adust my build gradually, as I learn what works best and what doesn't. I save my better loadout each time, and before long I have optimised builds for many different monsters and my hunt times get much shorter. THE biggest modifier I have ever found that seems to speed up my runs is me learning how to fight the monster and learning how to use the environment against it better.

[@Kisuzume]

This also shows why guard can be so successful on SNS. For only a handful of armor points you can maintain a better position on certain monsters, allowing your uptime to go up dramatically compared to dodging and having to run back.

[@zabrac1566]

While the topic of the video is good skills to help prevent downtime, keep in mind that some of the skills mentioned can be mitigated by other means as well and the lesson to learn from the video is more to minimize downtime in your hunts. For example, on most monsters it is possible with dedication and practice to roll their roars at least semi-consistently. While that won't be as effective as Earplugs 5 which makes you immune to them, learning to roll them in general will give you a similar effect even if you are only able to do it half the time. Learning rolls is not as hard as others may make it out and I firmly believe everyone can learn at least some of them with just a little bit of practice! Slotting Resistances and Blight immunities for certain fights is a great lesson though!

[@athos9293]

I've never roared a roar but it sounds edgy asf

[@vazazell5967]

Why is everyone so obsessed with rolling roars, that's super inconsistent

[@zabrac1566]

@@vazazell5967 dunno if everyone is obsessed with it but it can be consistent depending on the weapon and monster. For example I'm not the best player but I can roll any Rathian skeleton roll with near 100% accuracy. Rathian, Rathalos, Palomu, Pukei-Pukei etc etc. The benefit of rolling, countering or blocking roars is that you get less downtime allowing for you to deal more damage or get a potion or sharpen.

[@vazazell5967]

@@zabrac1566 the benefir of not rolling/blocking is getting off more attacks, and more attacks >>>>>> slightly stronger attack that you will achieve with more skills

[@WereSorryThisUserIsLost]

@@vazazell5967Afiinity and Weapon Choice plays too big a role in this that people overlook a lot, sure I could slot Lvl5 EP but with my HH the 30% affinity drop would cripple my main dps which is raw burst damage and would ultimately make me waste more time

[@LagunaFox]

This is literally the in depth reason behind the meme "Rule number 1, don't get hit. Rule number 2, hit the monster until it dies." People who have lots of experience with Monster Hunter already know what it really means but I remember reading that so much on forums and stuff back during 3 Ultimate and 4 Ultimate when new players were asking for help and the new players just taking it as an elitest snobby remark (which ok, sometimes it is) without really getting what people were saying. Not getting hit is rule 1 because if you are getting hit, then first of all you can't attack the monster while you are getting knocked on your ass, second now you have to spend even more time not attacking in order to heal up and maybe even get rid of some kind of blight. The entire premise of Monster Hunter has always been that the monsters are way stronger than you are, some of them are way faster than you are as well, so you can't just go in swinging like a hack'n'slash game. You just can't afford to trade blows, you will die guaranteed. The other thing is people see amazing videos of people solo'ing really hard monsters and they are like "wow, that is a amazing you are so good... what is the set you are using?" They focus so hard on the gear without understanding that sure using heroics and Attack XL and stuff is key to killing a monster really fast, but none of that matters without the perfect timing, positioning and evading monster attacks. Sometimes people say the best defense is a good offense, but MH really works the other way around, the best offense is a good defense. Volvidon armor in 3 Ultimate was literally the best armor in low and high rank for nearly that entire game, and yet some people will look at that and think "what on earth are you talking about?". Being able to get Attack L, Evasion +2 and Tremor Resistance (with an attack charm with slots and many gems) was like the ultimate set you could have for low rank and most of high rank. I got to the "welcome to high rank" quest where you go to fight Great Jaggi and Deviljho pops up and I just went over to him like "sup" and absolutely wrecked his day with my switch axe. Evasion let me roll through his hip bumps and dance moves (and most of his roars, those are still tricky even with Eva +2) and then every time he stomps I just get tons of free hits on his other foot. The evasion and tremor resistance just turned what is supposed to be a scary encounter with a monster you aren't ready for yet into a complete joke.

[@_Tzer]

if you ever want to use safi'jiiva armor i'd suggest putting health augment in and if you can, eat for felyne medic as it increases health regained from all sources including health augment. at least until you get extremely comfortable using it. recovery up is also helpful as it also increases health regained from the augment mostly nullifying the hp loss even if you hit a bad hitzone thats untenderized.

[@carstan62]

I had been perplexed as to the reason Earplugs/Evasion suddenly fell out of favor for speed runs for a while. The conclusion I have come to is that the games have given the players so many more tools for keeping uptime without using armor skills. 4U was when Earplugs started to disappear, and I attribute that to the rise of Charge Blade where it was replaced by Guard. Generations is where we first start seeing the meta being maxed out attack skills for 100% crit and whatnot, and I think this is completely because of Hunter Arts and Styles giving the player built in ways to avoid damage or reach a critical mass of damage where the monster flinches to the point that it's the one losing uptime. World has the same result as Generations where many weapons have built in ways to keep uptime and don't need dedicated armor skills. For example, Longsword's counter, Greatsword shoulder tackle, shields on Heavy Bowgun. Rise takes many of the tools given to players for both GU and World and combines them while giving even more. This is where you get many players complaining about every weapon having a counter attack. Obviously, there are a LOT of players that just copy paste meta builds without putting any thought into it, but I also think there has been a shift from "this armor skill will allow me to do this" to "I need to get better at doing this." I'm not going to say there isn't an appeal to this aspect of the new games, but I personally prefer how it was in the older games, and I think this is a big reason as to why I consider 4U the last older game rather than GU.

[@AhrenAKADan]

So regarding roars I find two evade window makes dodging through roars extremely easy. I still get it half the time without any but it's a way you can supplement your skill choices by mastering a technique

[@biawak-dilondaniel7034]

This is always on my thoughts, all the meta is good but im just a casual player. I often miss those i-frame especially using bow so those extra help really compensate dps loss. I noticed that monster change their phase a lot faster for me to capture or kill when i constantly doing damage.

[@pedromoraes2129]

Resume: Sunbreak brought the idea of extreme fast "hunt-focused" gameplay to a point where you don't think much before hunting, but if you do give a bit of thought you'll realize you can be powerful with way less resources. Even though I thought you would be using more math to explain that, I believe it is pretty much understandable. I found out about this ever since i used elem res, stun res, jewel and even those more specific skills like agitator or challenge. Never thought of their being so useful, and btw, as I was also "playing nice" with the monsters, only attacking when it was completely safe, then i realized even with GS i should act more aggressive; the result is, I halved my hunt time which was incredible and scary at the same time, didn't imagine i could land so much damage that fast. Even made online hunts faster.

[@c_bass1971]

This is a feel good. I love earplugs and felt like I had to make excuses for not just “rolling through it”

[@Yonlop]

Great video as always. I myself just use Earplugs for the sheer coolness of not having to block or roll when the monster is roaring next to the hunter, all the while charging a TCS.

[@Juju_Yirus]

Great video! I've seen so much talk about boosting raw vs critical, or physical vs elemental, yet I've never seen anyone bring this up. The effects of these "damage uptime skills" grow much larger the lower the hunter's skill level is. Now, I get it, everybody thinks they don't need it because they're god's gift to gaming, so I challenge you all to fight raging brachy with and without blast resistance, or vaal hazak with and without effluvia resistance a few times. You will see a difference in clear times. I also get that many hunters don't want to change their armor skills all the time, that's fair. Then take a compromise and slot in evade window at least, since it can sort of act as an alternative to earplugs, tremor resist, windproof, etc. Happy hunting!

[@Da5kone001]

while i get what your saying i think in practice its much more nuanced, you want high damage so you can reliable stagger flinch and knock down monsters to increase up time.

[@jeremywhatley8387]

To back up your point I have this Earplugs/Health Regen build and even though my damage numbers aren’t huge my hunts are really fast. It’s because I’m constantly attacking the monster. The best part is the roars because it’s essentially just a free damage window for me.

[@zat1245]

I started thinking this way when choosing weapons as well. I started minimizing downtime by making sure the weapon I was using kept as much uptime as I could because I noticed my in theory “great damage” was not coming out in practice. I moved that to skills as well. I started asking myself what my problems were and I built and brought items to solve it. My favorite example is dual blades. I prioritized stamina buffs and I use protective polish and Whetfish Fins to decrease the downtime of sharpening and stamina loss taking me out off demon mode.

[@juanarboleda95]

Straight to the point, very easy to understand. What can i say, really good video.👌

[@KaemghinBeardwulf]

Also to add a bit more on the "turn based" side of the beginning of the video. one red bar doesnt always represent one attack. Sometimes, a monster can chain attacks and you can't nevessarily reach them. (example, a diablo goes in the ground, pop out on you, then chain on an other attack, in master rank.) Not all weapon can necessarily sneak an attack here and there so be careful !

[@naota909]

Yup 👍

[@sandymccabe7670]

I am loving the med/recovery gems with paralysis blades can pretty much just demon rush the whole fight even when hit you just keep attacking and heal over time

[@noodleman1705]

wow, im 200MR, over 350 hrs, beaten every boss and ive never considered what youve discussed. been sifting through your videos the last few days and your POV/way of playing has changed mine entirely. ive always just gone with meta. amazing

[@naota909]

most people be sleepin' hard on the devs of this game on god no cap

[@noodleman1705]

on god no cap xd lol@@naota909

[@ParatrooperXI]

i thought i was the only one who builds like this, your my hero

[@Jumooo]

This was me in Generations and G Ultimate.. But in world with the introduction of mantles, I just need to make sure the monster staggers first before my mantle expires.. Speaking of Earplugs, those cost lvl 3 slots, which are hard to come by for new to novice hunters.

[@carstan62]

The Earplugs talisman is goated.

[@guitboxgeek]

I play HH as my main and I have builds almost one each per monster type for specifically the reason you're talking about. Yes, my damage output is lower however I'm more consistently damaging the monster because my set is made for less down-time. Similarly, if you hunt with me I try to keep the right buff on my group for the fight - not just always AuXL!

[@nuke2099]

Most people don't build for damage because they're against using damage skills because its meta. Since MHW there's a growing group of people who would rather pick bad skills over useful ones and they will die on that hill while calling people who use useful skills meta f*gs etc. For example I have seen so many people die on the hill that Defense Boost 7 is worth it and if I recommend Health Boost 3 and/or Diving Blessing instead they say using meta is bad or something worse.

[@Sunaki1000]

And its not like Health boost is something Speedrunners would use... Someone who had trouble and asked whats better, defense, or divine Blessing got the answer "dont listen to this Meta Slaves, both Skills are great". And when I was wondering why Nergigante died in like 3 1/2 Minutes, and if thats a Speedrun, they answered similary, shitting on Speedrunners all together because they dont enjoy the Game right. Everytime I see a Video of someone talking about Elitists in World, I get frustrated cause there is so much unjustified hate towards Speedrunners and Meta Players. Hope this Fans have realized what MH isnt like Destiny, or YGO.

[@vazazell5967]

Health boost>defense boost=divine blessing. Boost saves from oneshots sometimes that blessing misses

[@nuke2099]

@@vazazell5967 Defense boost and resistance defense is the worst in the game. Much rather take Divine+Health over that.

[@vazazell5967]

@@nuke2099 they are still good enough to get you over the defense breakpoint necessary

[@Camohflage]

very good video many people just copy paste meta builds and forget that for most they get more damage if they put "defensive" skills in their build to have more uptime. pure damage builds are only then so much better if you actually play at the top level which most people are not so why not just use some earplugs to get more damage uptime as you suggest

[@mikeesteves8427]

as a charge blade player i do prefer to block roars into counter aed if i have the phials for it since thats one of the fastest ways to get ot aed but there will often be times where i dont anticipate the roar so earplugs is still valuable. sidenote i love it when my cat plays the earplug song in the horn

[@nightsage217]

rockmantle is such a good mantle is precisely able to take on the 2x roar at the beginning of the fight, making a tenderize and a wall bang.

[@_Colossus]

You just saved yourself 5 level 3 earplugs decos or the equivalent by putting on rocksteady mantle.

[@chuckchan4127]

​@_Colossus But you chose Rocksteady over the superior Glider Mantle which gets you slinger ammo free topples on demand.

[@_Colossus]

@@chuckchan4127 why not both?

[@_Colossus]

If you run two hard earplug jewels in your glider mantle and just one level of earplugs in your armor you can potentially have full earplugs as long as you have a mantle on. You just need tool specialist

[@chuckchan4127]

@_Colossus Glidsr plus either Temporal or a Elemental Mantle. Got no space for Cartsteady Mantle.

[@ianp3112]

I leave 3 skill slots or 2 level 4 slots Open on every build for monster specific ailments. Makes the hunt much more smooth, and like you said, much more damage uptime!😊

[@feircy]

This is why I love evade extender on a lot of weapons. Letting you just stick to their butt and get clear out of hitboxes easily

[@TeaBeca]

Awesome video! Really good to see content that takes in consideration the real aspects of the game. I never think about doing more damage as in having more numbers, but approaching any fight as a whole, considering all the moves/aspects of the monster i'm fighting to be able to adjust my build to counter the most i can. Of course also aim for damage numbers, but it's a mix. So the whole fight is easier, in the end the flow of the fight makes you control it much more than just dealing big numbers and losing all momentum because of having no support/evasion moves to control the momentum. I play mainly Lance in world because of how i can chain combos and pretty much nulify damage from the enemy if i hit my counters right. So i'm always pushing the build towards not losing the flow/momentum i get from the skills i'm using + my Lance style and pushing more damage. With Teostra's effect i never have to stop to sharp my weapon, and can run alot with the lance, mount alot as well. But for Lance, in my experience so far, positioning + knowing how to take advantage of my moveset/movement VS the monster's is what makes a fight easy and solid. I tried many builds focusing just on damage numbers, both raw and elemental, and to me always having more support moves and taking in consideration other factors made the game more fun and the fights more rewarding. This game/series has a depth in combat that makes my autistic brain go berserk learning everything i can about fighting ANY monster. I always say i'll play these games forever, because all the games i played from the series i have still monsters to fight/learn/feel more comfortable with, i still have alot to learn about alot of things in the games. It's not just hit monster until it dies. ALSO, HEALING MUCH? Most fights i do coop i'm the only one healing the team, and of course when i'm out of heals or i'm stunned with low HP (even my auto message says to heal me), i just die. Or someone else dies because they were being healed so far from me, so now they think they are immortal? And don't bother healing themselves. I always use Wide-Range 5 on my online builds. Because a healthy and alive team that can keep the flow going while someone is healing them is great. If everyone in the fight thinks like that, i bet monsters would be KO faster and the fights would be an ease even more to everyone. But i stand my ground, i'll always heal and support, always thinking about how to get the best DPS for Lance in any fight + supporting the team as much as i can, with buffs and heals. Because personally i don't need heals, the Lance is self-healing. And if i defend 100% of the monsters hits, i don't need to heal. And chip damage goes away with the Lance self-healing ability. So i can support the team anytime the monster is not aggroed in me. That is the flow imo. The monster focus on me, i deflect and attack, it focus someone else, i support + flinch/damage the monster. Some fights my attack up-time is so intense that the monster really can't do anything. If i keep the combo + perfectly control and get every counter, i can keep the pressure and just trigger flinches after flinches. And using Blast Damage always seems to trigger them faster. Even if my damage is not the most efficient in numbers, i can make the fight easier and everyone can hit bigger numbers safely.

[@KyouOneZilla]

As a major utility skill stan I appreciate this video because it explains my thought process for the way I play monster hunter. I like to make builds that aren't just "big BIG numbers" and create specific anti-monster loadouts. Because to me that's what being a "Hunter" in this world is, studying and understanding a monster so you can know everything about it and then utilizing that knowledge.

[@PolishGoblinn]

hi, I am entirely new to the game. I just killed nargakuga and I'm before tigrex quest. people on discord all say to me "don't go for earplugs, you should go for critical boost" nu uh, dude if I'm stunned I can't do damage at all. I got earplugs 5 and attack 7 and every time a monster roars it's basically a stun for them, if they roar multiple times then even better for me, free damage. and what's most important it is more fun to just not be stunned by roars, it's just not fun to be stunned by something I can't avoid or predict mid combo or mid air. I play longsword and everytime I'm getting roared at the end of my slash combo (to boost my sword lvl to red) I'm getting so mad, not anymore tho. praise the earplugs.

[@metajmw4717]

evasion + evade extender with dual blades is all the comfy I need

[@datuputi777]

evade window is a hoax extender is the real deal.

[@yujiakweh]

Finally, some validation for my hammer's stamina thief.

[@niallinpain8827]

basically build yourself to be able to HIT MORE instead of hit harder, this is good and I really do encourage counterbuilding and picking in monster hunter. However I can also understand how people don’t want to do that and slot in a lot of damage, building for more damage is a universal boost to your hunts regardless of the monster whereas heat guard doesn’t bother with vaal hazak for example.

[@williamminsinger9956]

Typically people build glass cannon for some reason. Survivability and resistances can give you opportunity to do significantly more damage by the reduced downtime with efficiency. Great bits of info.

[@Harlan453683]

When I first started I was constantly infuriated by roars and stuns so much I maxed out both skills ASAP and never took them off. 220 hours later it's funny watching everyone recoil from roars while I get my perfect setup time for whatever weapon I'm using.

[@artur3306]

While I understand the idea of this Video I still have to disagree some what. There is nothing more satisfying then being able to learn a Monsters moveset to the point where you can even dodge roars. And I dont want that to be taken away from me. I dont care how much I struggle against a Monster over time I can see how I improve against each of them without the need of Lots of defensive skills. I usually habe evade Window amd try to dodge whatever is possible. But you are right in a way that a casual player, who dosent want to focus on learning all movesets should not follow meta damage builds, as those are not effective if you dont know moves

[@vazazell5967]

What are you even talking about, evade window is one of comfort skills metarunners scoff at

[@-siranzalot-]

This is all true and I'm all for building in comfort / defense skills instead of only damage boosting ones. Though the approach which you describe would entail making sooo many specific monster builds and that is work me (and I'm sure many others) are not willing to put in, bar some specific fights. I enjoy having robust jack-off-all trades builds so I can just dive right into hunting

[@naota909]

Really not that bad. (I do it)

[@drgitgud]

i think the best example is running evade extender / window for switchaxe. i just dont wanna play without

[@_Tzer]

my thoughts on meta is true meta is able to do the hunt consistently and get as many benefits out of it consistently. speed is secondary to that. becuse the most effective tactic is successfully doing the hunt not doing it fast and dying a bunch.

[@_Tzer]

this is why blight res is amazing if you are fighting alatreon without something like safi armor or namitreon mixed set

[@ToasTFresh]

For World specifically, this concept is neglected the most in mantles. My friend is the only one I know who selects elemental mantles to avoid brights and other effects.

[@TrashCombine]

Honestly I've taken to using a Crisis gem to just turn status effects into a boon instead. If you get blighted by basically anything you get Evasion 5 and Constitution 5. I'll play entire hunts on fire or blighted because I'm just better off with the blight than removing it. All of that for a simple 1 slot decoration that I could maybe have fit an Expert or Attack Boost in, but why bother when it means I can keep fighting for so much longer? Suddenly it doesn't matter if I get greedy or not perfect on a roll or dodge, Evasion covers me, or it's almost nothing on my Stamina anyways.

[@grimreefer213]

I’m pretty sure wind proof is useless for Kushala, you need all wind pressure negated, which either comes from Kushala’s armor which is quite bad, or a hunting horn song which is very situational. Windproof might help a little bit but you will still get stunned a lot

[@naota909]

depends on what level aura kush currently has at max level aura, windproof wont do anything. but usually that means he's almost dead or you have aura suppression issues

[@monsieurglu]

this change my vision of damge in MH, we tweek our build with a friend for confort (related to uptime damage) but never thought that way. For an average gamer EP5 is way better than crit boost

[@datuputi777]

Yes sir, but you could slot 2 earplug 4 slot on glider mantle leaving you only needing only 1 earplugs(which can be shared with another skill if it's 4 slots). then rocksteady for other mantle this should be long enough before monster flee. I think latent power is underated because people think they won't take damage and even when you get good you could deliberately take damage to trigger it(has same effect as constitution 5 and critical eye 7) There's also the ultimate noob set shara ishvalda.😂

[@Lanzetsu]

I play since MH4 and I never been a really good hunter, I sux, simple as that, BUT I improved a lot since then when I started to use more defensive skills, as you said specifically vs Roars it was insane the amount of downtime I was suffering before, then every roar was a new window for tons of damage with some combos and even heal if needed, but when going for instance over the Charge Blade I could STILL keep it since anyway the roar would count towards an attack to the Shield (specially high tier) or simply switch for other more useful skills. Also later Offensive Guard as you stated is even better. For other weapons such as Dual Blades a lot of the evade windows or distance and sharpness up was better than affinity, and hunts started to be really smooth. Every single time people asked for advice I told them "Go for comfy skills first until you play better, forget the others unless you have free slots or are confident", but the elitist would rage and start to talk about the meta and all the math that would not matter to a noob being carted, so I gave up and focused on getting fun while playing as a lone wolf mostly or with friends. At this day I remember how many times there were checkmate situations and insta-cart because of not getting defensive skills for some monsters and trying to get "better damage", in the tower of MH4, Azure/Silver Rathalos with Roar + Fire Blast = Cart for not getting Ear Plugs (and being quite a scrub at rolling exactly in time)

[@KenseiShiro]

I always knew earplugs is the best damage skill

[@meathir4921]

I agree with the premise of the video, I'm just wondering where you got the numbers that Crit Boost 2>3 is a 4% decrease since Crit Boost is like... the biggest damage boost one can get with max affinity. Should be noted that this also depends on player skill and build. Some monster matchups make certain skills more or less relevant. You already brought up Offensive Guard for roars (or just rolling them), another great example is Teo's fire aura being easy fightable with a Health Aug if you're competent. For instance, I don't really bother with Windproof into Kushala since the tornadoes are the real problem as a Hammer main (his wind aura doesn't cover in front of him at his head).

[@naota909]

CB 2 to 3 is +4% gain

[@niscent_]

crit boost 3 add 5% damage to your 135% crit damage from crit boost 2. it's not a 5% increase. going from 135% to 140% is only a ~3.7037037% increase. in general, if you have limited slots and want to optimize between investing in your crit chance and crit damage, you want to get your crit chance equal to your crit bonus damage. including the possible bas ecrit chance and base crit damage. and that works for the vast majority of video games. in monster hunter, base crit damage are 125%, so 25% damage bonus on crit, once you reach 25% affinity, you should already start investing in crit boost. it gets a bit different in most games because the standard is that base crit damage are 200%, so +100% bonus damage on crit, so you are better off first maxing your crit chance before investing ressources into increasing crit damage. it's counter intuitive, but this is valid even in games where it's easier to increase crit chance than crit damage, or the opposite. even when it's 5 or 10 times cheaper to increase one of the two stats. and i use "cheaper" in a very broad sense, including more accessible, needing less equipment slots, and so on. if you're curious i'll write the mathematical explanation for it. but the gist of it is: if it's cheaper to get one of the stats, it means you need to spend less ressources to increase it, and you can spend those ressources you saved on the other stat instead.

[@meathir4921]

@@niscent_ No, I know the affinity stats and Crit multiplier. I just didn’t realise that arguably the most important skill for EFR was… 4%.

[@niscent_]

@@meathir4921 and the 4% is rounded up here. it's not the most important because it has a crazy great impact, it's the most important because it's the last few inches of dps you can squeeze out of your build. also, in end game iceborne, all fatalis weapons have minimum 340 true raw. attack boost is +3 dmg per level, that's only a ~0.88% increase, and it gets worse as you get other sources of raw attack. and that is not accounting for the fact that you already have agitator 7 for the 20% affinity, and likely attack boost 4 for the 5%. literal shit compared to the 3.7% increase of crit boost 3. another fun fact: without crit boost, each 5% of affinity only increase your dps by 1.25%. with crit boost 3, it's 2% more dps per 5% affinity.

[@ultimasurge]

Its ok. Most people dont understand multipliers .

[@cinderycinder2155]

This is why I ALWAYS preach to baby hunters that slotting even one level of flinch free, tremor resist, or wind resist can do a WHOLE bunch for you!

[@juanvaldivia8001]

Not me watching this video without making my own builds and just looking for cool builds online

[@kori228]

true for Rise too 😂 was fighting Khezu, took absolutely forever cause I kept getting paralyzed slotted in full paralysis resistance and Guard Up, wrecked in without worrying

[@serenity3157]

For R.Brachy I just use fireproof mantle with 2 maintenance same as my other mantle. No blight really save time.

[@_Tzer]

before people start hating earplugs remember brute tigrex it's definitely geared against them. but evade window feels better because it's roars actually do damage.

[@T.N.T.15]

It is hilarious that is exactly how i make my builds without actually noticing it. I always build surv first so i can get back into the fight faster

[@adrians8249]

That's why I play insect glaive. I only need to slot flinch free 3 and on top of that, I get with 3 kinsect boosts active (which you need always active if you're good) also earplugs 3, windproof 3 and tremor res 3. So I only need to slot earplugs 2 in gems and I'm fine (windproof is needed much less, so wp 5 is not worth it).

[@thwidded]

Incredibly useful, i'm close to hitting endgame and raging brachy and alatreon are kicking my ass, gotta look into less attack and crit and more on other skills

[@johnathon5385]

This helped a lot thank you. Im new been playing a week. Didnt know you could stop legiana flying by hitting its wings.

[@noodleman1705]

i decided to go back to this, lets say for teo, after slotting x3 fire res, what is the priority of decos after? or for nerg, after slotting part breaker, flinch free and and ear plugs, whats the priority of offensive jewels?

[@levelNeroZero]

man i get hit like five times before i can attack and when i have opportunity to attack i miss the attack

[@bisdakaraokeatbp]

This is really useful, never thought about these things before and as I'm still kinda new to the game, thank you for the tips will surely consider this in my upcoming hunts~

[@lonejohnwolf]

So if I use a Vaal Hazak set to constantly heal over time at quadruple the normal rate, then I get a lot more damage uptime as I often heal ZERO TIMES in a fight! That makes so much sense actually LOL! Do you think that speed eating is a great option then if you're running sword and shield? As you should know sword and shield sheathes REALLY fast, and then drinking a mega potion in about 1 second as you're repositioning shouldn't be that difficult. I do have one question about the whole idea about getting in damage after every single monster attack though. What if the monster does a combo? Do you count that as one "attack" as it's a string of swings and/or slams? That's the only part which wasn't very clear to me at least.

[@Frost.x7x]

I agree with this 100%. META builds work because those guys are phenomenal at this game.. and almost never get hit so the max dmg builds make sense for them and of course they’re going to be the strongest. For us casuals, like myself.. I completely ignore the meta builds cause I need earplugs and flinch free. They’re just a must have for me at this stage for my experience lvl

[@simpson6700]

the problem with all these defensive skills and new players is that when we're playing the story we're constantly building new armor with different slots and with the abysmal decoration drop rates we have to compromise with lvl1 decos and bad armor. just getting to earplugs 5 was a big undertaking and then i don't have enough space for elemental defenses anymore. and since we always build new armor we can't rely on armor loadouts or specifically making space for the resistance decos to change every hunt. i don't think this video was very helpful, because it ignores this new player struggle.

[@derrickmoore8585]

Bro, I check out the channel. This is a really good video. This is the best MHW advice pro players thanks bro

[@WhyrenGP]

i usually run earplugs so every roar (that isn't tigrex) is basicly a free opening for me.

[@StayNightGaming]

This is key. I've been saying this for many years, your skill as a player vastly outweighs any amount of meta damage stacking. Unless you're in maybe the 85th percentile of players or potentially even higher, the "meta" damage skills arent going to improve your kill times as much as improving your damage uptime. Perfecting your timing, spacing/distance management, and not wasting movement are where it all counts. I had a conversation with someone that didn't want to believe this, until I showed them a video of Rainy soloing nergigante naked with a chargeblade faster than that person could kill it with their meta set. I've been playing for about 14 years personally, and for the last 8 or 9 years I've consistently included evade window into my mixsets, or other quality of life skills that reduce overall downtime - my kill times with my own mix sets are significantly better than when I use full meta sets. Granted, players that are a lot better than me using those meta setups will of course get faster kill times, but the ceiling to reach that point is very high.

[@niscent_]

it's all about finding balance between optimal damage and comfort skills. and then it's all about progressively taking off the comfort skills as you get better. personally i still stick to using focus 3 and handicraft 5 on the longsword, because i'm average at this weapon and don't care about getting better.

[@LaserTractor]

Well what's funny is that most players hit something like Rajang once in 3-5 of it's attacks at best And after that small hit they get punished by rajang crazy movements and attacks So losing that 1 hit is not so much for damage uptime😂 But if we're talking about "good" hunters who hit after every attack - then your video is relatable It's again about getting good. Like in every game, difference between two players (one kills barioth in 15 minutes, the other in 30 minutes) may be not 2x, but 8x I generally blame defender weapons for this😂

[@ShatterIsMyName]

I blame defender armor too bro. Im replaying on PC and was trying to get the Shara Ishvalda LS. This dude with full fatalis gear MR120 or something. Joined. Immediately got repeatedly fucked. Probably doesnt help that Im on PC and people can just mod shit in and still be bad at the game

[@vazazell5967]

Even bad hunters can hit Rajang more often with a right build

[@R_C32]

Would you say that the temporal and rocksteady mantle would be the best offensive options then? Since rocksteady lets you ignore knockbacks and roars, and temporal allows you to keep your damage uptime up by preventing the necessity to heal whenever you happen to get hit?

[@_Colossus]

Generally they are the go to mantles yes. But there's some things to consider. Those two mantles come at a hefty recharge time. They can't always be active even with tool specialist 5. Also temporal mantle loses active time for every instance you get hit. Rocksteady mantle will even cart you sometimes because of it's no knock back interaction with some monster attacks.

[@Zamoxino]

they are for most players. if u will get good enough to avoid most stuff and dont lose your temp then evasion mantle might be a lot better cause of very big %dmg boost after every evade. rocksteady might be risky depending on monster but it becomes one of the best mantles for most weapons if u have HP aug on weapon and u can just leech the missing hp back.

[@ReanRavindra]

hey that is me right there fighting val hazak and swaping my crit boost for evuvlium deco and i dont need to worry got my hp cut in half most of the hunt and pop null berry :D

[@Hennetsims]

After 570 hours in World I can say I still have no ideal how to build sets best i got is a stun 60% and just bonk the head and hope the other people got there dps builds for all the stuns

[@shinmalestat9272]

Moral of the video, dont rely on meta builds. Meta builds come from speed runners who have it down on rolling through roars and positioning. Most people dont have these skillsets. Also, dont let trash talkers talk you out of using these "uptime" skills. You play what is fun for you and if you dont want to try to roll through a roar then dont feel ashamed of using earplugs. The skill is in the game for a reason.

[@Michael-bn1oi]

Me doot doot on horn, no need earplug, no hear monster. Go bonk.

[@DevideNull]

Never use earplugs. It will only give you a lot of free damage window every time the monster roars.

[@Aythos]

Idk feel like you're assuming below average player. For some monster (arch tempered Velk & Nami, Fata, Alatreon, Lunastra, Vaal) I would also recommande to use specialiased build, also evade window and guard up for some weapon but outside of those I really don't much use for utility skills. Or maybe I'm the one overestimating average player because I'm used to play veteran. Either way you should have specified which player you are speaking to, if you think it is true for everyone or only beginner/casual.

[@TheChosenOne462]

but by your logic wouldnt health or defense increase your dps uptime too? since you arent spending time to heal or cart you have more dps uptime

[@naota909]

every player has different dodge rates for certain moves

[@Zamoxino]

point of the video is true and great but not mentioning evade window is just pain... not only it can work as earplugs for solo monsters but also will work on like 90% of the attacks at least in world. the more u can stick to weakpoint the better.

[@naota909]

window useless on charge based weapons (GS, hammer)

[@Zamoxino]

@@naota909 mhm for sure... especially if u will facetank chain of attacks with tackle and be at 40% hp at the end of your combo and u will be forced to the attack or die. also of course it will work better or worse depening on weapon. jesus xd just show the example for weapon that works well with it. u also have evade extender as very good example cause it can improve your chase potential with weapon out and also add some safety if u are not skilled enough to attacks

[@CVSooner777]

I’m very confused. In the video you mention subbing out one crit boost for an earplugs, but one level of earplugs doesn’t really get you anything. Earplugs is such an expensive deco and has so many levels, so I’m confused how you would slot in level 5 without essentially sacrificing almost all your damage decorations. Is that what you are suggesting? I’m not doubting you btw, I just legitimately don’t understand. The main reason I haven’t used many of these uptime skills is because they are so expensive as decos. Is using up all the large deco slats worth it?

[@_Tzer]

monster hunter is 90% skill anyways considering naked builds have been done and beaten fatalis after all what of the series that inspired dark souls' gameplay.

[@12431265]

It is really unfortunate to me that so many people nowadays just take advice from others on how to make gearsets vs what it was like in the old days. I love the changes in world but I came from an environment in monster hunter where due to charms and generally how the game worked you would need to think about what you needed in the moment which got me really into the idea of optimizing armor sets for my playstyle. i'm fairly decent and dodge timings so i don't normally run earplugs but getting all the sharpness increases is always good, i'll even go for speed sharpener to minimize downtime while sharpening and often times aim for skills on the food buffs that will give me less stamina consumption or some other general benefit. running tremor res or wind res is always nice if you know a monster has it and stun res is a fantastic option to help learning a monster if you wanna remove the punishment for getting hit a bunch or ignore the flash of a tzitzi.

[@partydeer1640]

Most of the time when i see a build with a Challenger Charm V, 90% of the time i throw it away and put on earplugs charm. Skill bloat is a groeing probpem and i hope Wilds brings the game back a bit to the old gen way of skills and perks

[@seanboglio3605]

That's my philosophy on builds... people say I'm playing "comfort".. these people only run Fatalis gear even to kill a jagras and can't play the game unless it's a 4hunters on 1 monster action with high burst weapons.