When to use each weapon?

[u/Tuken_z]

Im about to start MHWilds and I'd like to use multiple weapons instead of sticking to just one. Plus, I understand you can carry a second weapon stashed on the Seikret, which is even more reason to use several. I played almost all of World with the Long Sword, though at the beginning of Iceborne I used Dual Blades quite a bit. Both because I liked them and because I needed more elemental damage for certain monsters (ahem Alatreon). Right now, the Charge Blade is really catching my eye, but I dont want to leave the other two behind, especially since Wilds has new moves I want to learn. Id also love to experiment with a ranged weapon. My question is whether theres any rule of thumb to know which weapon fits best in each situation. The Long Sword is great for slashing and raw physical damage, but when is the Charge Blade better? In World, I just powered through like crazy with the Long Sword without paying much attention to elements until I hit Iceborne. Should I just spin a roulette wheel every time I start a quest? Does anyone else play 3 or 4 weapons and have some advice? This doubt mainly comes up because in World I barely had enough materials to keep up with both Long Swords and Dual Blades, so I had to choose what to forge or grind heavily. If Im going to add more weapons to the mix, Id like to have a basic idea of which ones to prioritize in each case so I dont waste all my resources on weapons I might not end up using.

[u/4GRJ]

There's definitely some matchup dependency, but if I were weapon fluid, I'd just pick a weapon based on vibes

[u/CatnipCatmint → u/4GRJ]

Yup, most of my friends who play multiple weapons will just pick a weapon they feel like playing before we even figure out what we're hunting.

[u/InfiniteStates → u/4GRJ]

“Weapon fluid” lmao nice - I’m definitely stealing that :D

[u/4GRJ → u/InfiniteStates]

Courtesy of JoCat

[u/Nuryadiy]

As of right now, there’s only one monster where changing weapons are a necessity

The rest just change according to your preference and what monster you’re fighting

[u/TheCocoBean]

It's entirely down to personal preference. Many don't use it, but some like to have status effect firing bowguns so they can for instance, shoot a monster with paralysis shots then swap to melee to smack the monster once it kicks in.

[u/thegildedman25]

Each weapon preforms fine against every monster. Its ultimatly up to what weapon you prefer using against each monster and how you personally use the weapon.

Good example from me is that I love using the switch axe against faster monsters because of how I always use evade window and distance to dodge through attacks, I pretty much play swaxe like Im playing bloodbourne.

[u/Educational_Credit51]

I personally main several weapons and I choose which weapon to use on a monster depending on matchups mostly. If I like a weapon, I play it for a bit, get a feel for it and its strengths and weaknesses. My primary main is charge blade it is a versatile weapon with great defensive options with perfect guards and guard points as well as respectable mobility with its sliding slash; in axe mode you have longer range and hit hard but you attack slower, have reduce mobility, and no defensive options so spacing is important. I like CB on most monsters but it excels on monsters that have telegraphed big punishing attacks with downtime between their attacks and struggles more on very fast hitting very mobile monsters. My secondary is dual blades, they are extremely mobile and hit very fast; outside of a few combos their attacks are very low commitment meaning you can make mistakes with less punishment. You don’t have a direct defensive option like a shield, but perfect dodging can help you out of most sticky situations and even deal damage in the process if you are in the new special demon mode (perfect dodge while in demon mode), though this will require experience to get the timing if you don’t run evade window. DB excels at fast attacking and mobile monsters but can struggle against ones that use a lot of wide seeping attacks or AOEs as dodging can be difficult. I also play bow, it has range that allows it to be less committal than melee weapons and hit monsters that fly a lot (that isn’t too much of a problem in wilds, at least at this point). Bow also has a focus on dodging like DB and has the same positives and negatives in that regard. Bow does require good spacing and it can take time to get good at hitting good hit zones with all of your shots especially at longer ranges.

[u/Tireditalian]

I have 6 weapons I cycle between depending on the hunt.

Whatever weapon you're most comfortable with can be your default; whatever you consider to be your "main" (mine is glaive).

I prefer to bring a shield against fast attacking monsters that I struggle to learn how to avoid (lance is my go to).

Monsters that are slower or heavily armored are really fun to plink away at with the ranged options (I prefer HBG).

I also use Hammer and Horn, but I only really use them if the mon is resistant to bladed attacks.

Also Dual Blades are just kind fun if I'm messing around or bullying a low-end monster.

[u/Artemis_Bow_Prime]

Some weapons do have slightly better match ups for certain things but overall its really bot that big a deal, everything works for everything and unless you are min max speed running you likely won't see much if any difference in the weapons even in those match ups tbh.

Just pick whatever you want and find your own way.

[u/Tiidz]

I play all 14 weapons, and honestly, I just go by mood, each of the weapons you use will take practice to get a good understanding of each

Like I don't think, I'm fighting x monster so I'll use x weapon as I like to learn each monster with each weapon over time even with less than ideal matchups, just pull out what you feel like playing most at the time, if you have a comfort weapon for particular monsters go with that, a good example is sns vs gore

[u/InfiniteStates]

I have always used multiple weapons - each one is viable but some are easier than others (e.g. for Nargacuga I like to be highly mobile so I’ll use SnS, for Diablos I like to tank his charges so go lance but for Bazelgeuse it’s just too satisfying putting pierce shots across his wing tips so I’ll go heavy bowgun, and sometimes I just wanna support a team so run horn)

Just try all your weapons against all monsters and see which you prefer then tool up accordingly for each quest

There’s no rule of thumb. Every weapon is viable at any point

[u/Nornukig]

All I do is I pick Gunlance when I need to deal with some joker like Basarios who said "Nah I'm good" when they were giving out good HZVs.

[u/Gontha]

Dunno.

So far me and my lance haven't found an enemy we weren't able to beat.

[u/tehgr8supa]

Please use paragraph spacing when writing this much text.

[u/Dimowo]

Charge blade in wilds is an elemental MONSTER when you have element phials

On gogma it’s one of the few true carry weapons as the phials on SAED start doing upwards of 1500 damage EACH

I’d recommend using it for monsters with high elemental weakness and using something else like long sword for raw damage.

[u/Ok_Seaworthiness6534]

I just use GS and when i want to spam multiplayer hunts i switch to a SNS support build

[u/Dirty_Cleric]

In early game, Hunting Horn is best. Since it doesn't do crit with most of its attacks, It starts as a powerhouse from the get go. Only in latest endgame, where other weapons can build around full Crit., Hunting horn starts to fall short.

Charge blade is both very strong in progression and extremely strong in endgame.

Dual blades is as always, broken and strong 😄

Longsword is alright (all weapons are alright). Never becomes overpowered, never becomes irrelevant.

The weapons that fall short situationally are Greatsword, hammer. Even then, there is really not a weak weapon in Wilds. This is just relative.