Dropping some Truth Bombs about Defense in Monster Hunter [**trigger warning**]
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- Опубликовано: 12 сен 2024
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Remindes me of the good times when I was fighting Fatalis in MHW in multiplayer. The most effective strategy was for me to use the Velkhana Hunting horn for DEF boost and fire resistance XL. DMG doesn't matter if your teammates die.
yup :D
99% of people run speedrunning sets but cant speedrun for shit haha. For me personally i like to have Evade Extender, keeps me in the fight longer and allows me to get back in faster
@@fishnutz5196 Evade extender has always been a staple of mine and I've actually enjoyed putting even more evasion skills into my sets in Sunbreak since the amount of skills you can put on a set is astounding and I enjoy the game more when I can comfortably survive with "Dark Souls"-like rolling instead of relying on counters and a bunch of damage skills.
My friend enjoys the complete opposite squeezing out every point of dps and then focuses on defense (instead of evasion his comfort is defense for example) and we've been a fun duo throughout
@@fishnutz5196cart speed run goes vroom
I run mostly DPS sets, but there are some comfort skills that I just can't do without as an SA user - Evade Extender is a big one. It also helps with speedrunning since it helps you get to the monster faster without sheathing your weapon, and with repositioning.
the best part is the more hits you can take without dying the more you can experiment with aggressive playstyles and learn to dodge attacks without rolling which are the skills that make you good enough to drop defense
More defense = more SHOULDER BASHES BABY LETS GOOOOO
..but what if rolling at the perfect time is very fun? Evasion mantle especially when using something like dual blades where you can facehug monsters.
@@XxWarmancxX if you want to roll, then roll, nobody is stopping you
I've always blended damage and defense skills together.
I'd rather do 5.2382% less damage, but be able to much more reliably survive big hits whether it's in terms of tankiness or just being able to avoid it entirely.
Plus it isn't just sheer defense, people always ignore things like speed eating and such.
Max attack only matters if you never get hit, being able to take a hit faster or recover faster is more dps than after every hit needing to slowly sip a potion.
I mean, yeah, in a bubble perfect play makes defense and utility redundant, but 95% of us are not that consistent.
You dropped this🧠 it's very big and wrinkly.
@@wits_end.I lost mine but it’s a little bit on the smooth side, let me know if you find it please
@@IssDiddy the smoother it is the more slippery. Sorry man its probably long gone🫡😬
Ah, but this is a proper take chief, going full dps might not be the best option (although Rise with the whole curio system and broken skills like Berserk doesn't promote that kind of playstyle), but one big thing is sacrificing 5% or even 10% damage and a whole different story is basically not having damage at all, that is usually the main critic, but I do agree with you I also prefer a bit of defense and utility on my builds.
@@IanImperial19 No one in the history of ever has advocated for *pure* defense builds with zero offensive skills in them.
I'm a world newcomer, and i quickly realised that health boost was essential , but against fatalis even that wasnt cutting it. thats when i really appreciated defense and elemental resist, running alatreon/kulve allowed me to tank 2 or 3 hits and still have guts. Now in sunbreak i run full defense because health boost is gone and... i hate collecting birds.
what pieces of Kulve did you use?
@@AquilaGuard kulve taroth: fury b+, rage a+, malice b+ and wrath b+. escadora soul for chest and alatreon sns.
Rise birds sucked so badly and it got so tiresome that my friends and I all downloaded a mod that just gave you max bird at the start of the hunt. The game just plays like normal afterward and feels a lot more comfortable. Honestly its how it was meant to be imo.
The birds are the worst !!!
Gettem outta here !
@@celuiquirevient Thank you replaying. I am using GS but am curious on using this combination for extra tankyness. I'm GS, I am sure I have enough damage even in a more tanky build. lol.
I love this war you've been waging against the "Meta" in favor of practicality. It's entertaining to watch, and promotes a more healthy outlook for the community.
It's not all the time, but there are a healthy number of randoms that join with health drain sets and just die
Meta is overrated, play the way that's fun for you
@@iamthehobo They see the speedrunners running Berserk and think they're invincible xD
That playstyle is HARD, especially when you run Bloodlust on top
@@iamthehobo I remember a SilverLos hunt where the same dude with Derelection dual blades literally got to the monster and carted within 10 seconds 3 times in a row...
Average DPS skill fan vs defense boost, divine blessing, speed eating and recovery up enjoyer
Honestly, people should never call themselves experts. The dunning-kreuger effect is real. I just learned today exactly how the lance's damage works and I've been playing Monster Hunter for over a decade. I have hundreds of hours each in games across most of the series. You never know everything, there's always something new to learn. Pride is the real mind killer.
Also, just generally, this is a game concept called damage thresholds. It's a concept you can find in most RPGs as well as some first person shooters.
MH players prefer to call themselves veterans and god know 60+% of the time Ill either do better than em or theyll brag about not dying but wearing a very impractical or tanky set. Its made me avoid ever calling myself anything especially vet granted I started playing only in 2020 so in a pure vet definition Ill technically never be one lol. Still though just prefer when people just want to have fun and we do cool stuff on the side.
I've been playing these games for 9 years, and I can tell you that the difference when you get a new set of armor or upgrade your current set, you FEEL the difference, every time.
playing for 20 years. yes, the deference is felt. i remember the first time a fought a g rank monster, it was like trying to stop a bullet train with paper mache armor.
Yes I agree, also I used to use defense boost 7 all the time when I started playing rise (my first MH, and also my friend's) and I carted almost never compared to my friends that carted at lot more. I always told them to use more defense but they never listened bc of all the videos they saw. Now look at who can solo fatalis, that's right, not me xDD
No one argues otherwise. The discussion is about the defense skill
True that!
@ElMigol_ I'm sorry for not seeing this comment before now, I hope you keep sticking with the series! It has a very special place in my heart and it's been wonderful to see new people enjoying it
“Get good is not an answer” is something I’ve been trying to convey for a long time, and I feel SO vindicated that you’ve explained it perfectly
"Utility skills are DPS skill"
Amen brother! I value speed eating and evade extender more than attack boost. Less time healing and eating equal more damage.
Unless I'm running a max potion loadout I have to have at least speed eating 2.
It's a world of a difference
I guess if you get hit that's true.
@@davidpowers9178 Not a shield player(most of the time) nor am I perfect. So yeah I'll get hit over the course of the fight.
sheild is more reason to get evade extender actually. a sustained beam attack will go from knocking you down with half your health gone to carting you if you actually try to block it, so being able to actually sidestep it is huge!
Maybe get better honestly. Endgame mhwICE was lowkey easy without any defense skills except vitality and divine blessing on your mantles
Oh also the other huge huge benefit of defence is the effectiveness of healing.
If you have health regen, lifesteal, palico heals, hunting horn heals etc they are all going to do more when you have defence.
The health value restored will be the same, but 50hp with 90% damage reduction, is twice as good as 50hp with 80% damage reduction.
This applies if it's your healing, or healing from allies, so even when you bring no healing sources, it's still worth to factor this in if you do hunts multiplayer.
There was a video were somebody in world got defence as high as he could and tested it on teostras nova and it barely did a fifth of his health
RageGamingVideos?
Seen that one, it was glorious
@@Robert_Paprika fr
Link pls?
@@anthonybernard8819 No I'm pretty sure it's Team Darkside
I think the "EVERYONE MUST UNGABUNGA" explosion happened thanks to world. Many more players came in to the series for the first time, and they saw the skilled veterans running nothing but dps skills and assumed that ignoring defensive skills and just using offensive skills was the most optimal way to play the game. Many speed runners parroted this as well, and still do sadly. I usually tell new players to ignore guides about dps, because dps means nothing if you are constantly carting.
I disagree. This mentality came when numbers appeared on monsters. Numbers imply that those can get bigger. And bigger number = better performance. Because defense and health is visible but it's abstract and the damage we receive does not have a number, we don't give it the same weight as a big number when we smack bagelgoose's side for the 40th compilation
This is high level cope, people were running around in full sets with godawful skills in older games until they got something endgame that had at least 1 or 2 good skills because there was barely any information/guides online. 90% of people played with shit sets compared to what even the most casual players use in 5th gen games because of how different the skill system is. Then there is all those guides and tutorials that explain in detail how every fight works and what to do. NOBODY is expecting you to run Heroics on a monster you never fought before, but once you've done a fight 50 times you should be good enough to not rely on QoL skills to get through the fight.
Personally I go for utility and dps, soundproof, windproof, flinchfree and tremor resistance. So my attacks are never interrupted and I can dodge out when I need to. Pair that with some decent defence and I'm playing a whole different game.
Learn to dodge man
@@MomongaMH That literally has nothing to do with what I said at all..
A lot of game communities share this exact same problem. In PSO NGS, everyone's scraping the bottom of the barrel for 2-3% more DPS. In the first couple of years worth of updates, this could be excused. Then, Dark Falz Solis dropped. Suddenly, I'm going into rooms with tryhards running NEGATIVE defense in the 20%+ range. They drop like flies, then blame everyone else because they didn't DPS hard enough to stagger/phase/kill the boss before they made mistakes on their perfect play-specced character on a boss they have virtually no combat experience against (save perhaps numerous failures and a few youtube guides). It is absolutely infuriating.
Like you mentioned, not everyone is going to be Team Darkside. Most of us just need to focus on the tools to make gameplay comfortable and effective -- or at least have the durability and utility necessary to not drag the rest of the team down when something inevitably goes awry.
My primary Lance build on Monster Hunter Rise is actually equipped with several layers of mitigation like your video mentioned, including regeneration skills to couple with the Kushala Blessing, along with some of the more common DPS caveats plugged in. It won't win any races, but dear god is it consistent. I rarely have to put away my weapon to heal, so I'm almost never leaving myself vulnerable to a follow-up attack or taking myself out of the action. The raw power loss is partially mitigated by the lack of maintenance.
Difference is defense in ngs is so easy that its more a skill issue on their part for getting hit at all. When you got strong parry windows and big aoe squares that show when the attack will land it should be easy. (And it is) Tbh main reason i stopped playing was how defense was so easy. Rise pulled me away for the same reason. Yet somehow i'm loving god eater recently. Anyway back to ngs: This is before you add into the other issue, that being the lack of true builds as all augs are damage or defense. Status resistance basically doesn't matter and the ease of evading all damage really negates damage reduction and hp increases' value. Include the fact that people who don't wait for handouts got to grind tons for BiS augs and pray for BiS weapons and fast runs become far more in demand than a game like monster hunter imo. Progress is far cleaner in mh and can be taken at your leisure.
you should uninstall if you ever get hit on any monster
Oh god don't remind me of the train wreck that is NGS.
honestly, I love running those no defense sets, but... I do it solo.
Because my ass aint team Darkside. My ass is some dumb bitch who occasionally gets her ass beat by a Lagombi. So it would be actually rude for me to go into a multiplayer lobby with my no defense, no health, all out full throttle dick waving damage build.
It's called the good players vs everyone else.
You only touched on it for a moment but, having insanely high defense means that you will be able to constantly output damage without worrying about staying alive. That's something many meta chasers fail to see. The devil's advocate is, if you're higher than average skill level having higher offense can mean more staggers or knockdowns and monsters can't hurt you if they are knocked down.
Yup you just have to find the right balance that works for you in particular.
Ideally no defense, all damage and good movement/dodging will yield the highest dps and survivability. You literally don't die if you don't get hit and you don't need defense of you don't take damage.
That said if you don't have good movement, getting hit and healing is a dps loss, but carting is a bigger loss. Take what you feel you need to survive but understand that higher skill and good movement will always have a bigger payoff.
You should *always* be worrying about staying alive.
If you're going to get hit either way, then taking less damage leads to higher DPS, but you should _really_ be trying to avoid hits as much as possible. At all levels of play, tanking a hit (besides the smallest ones) that you could have avoided will be sub-optimal. If you can't dodge or block attacks, then defense _might_ be enough to push you over your most immediate hurdle, but will not be a great long-term strategy. Instead, taking advantage of the extremely generous quest timer and playing more cautiously will lead to better success rates, and is the first step towards mastering the fights enough to play them quickly.
@@Imagine_Trying In a vacuum, sure. However, idk about you but I'm a human being, so I don't play perfectly like that, and carting is the biggest possible tank to your DPS.
I prefer consistency.
High defense is good, but it can help to balance it with skills that help you avoid the hit to begin with. Evade Extender and Leap of Faith are tremendously useful and can keep from carting and using up resources. The biggest problem with this though is that timing your dodges requires some skill on the part of the player, while defense is fixed regardless of skill.
Defense let’s you get good at dodging, I recommend adding evad window 4 or 5 for comfort and a skill that benefits you when iframing, for an incentive.
@@SaiTaX_the_Chile_boi True. If you make a mistake when dodging you can still have that backup of defense.
Evade Extender level 2 was a huge help in avoiding attacks, closing distance, or reposition.
Combo's immensely well with said Defense boost 7, and with shielded weapons, recovery speed 2 or 3
@@SaiTaX_the_Chile_boi Personally I prefer slapping on evade extender over window. I don't ever need to anything if I can be miles away from the hitbox after dodging once. It also doubles down as a great utility to close in on monsters that move around a lot.
So basically the % increase of defense is pretty low, but because the monster hits can reach a multiple of the hunters max help even those seemingly low % points can save you from carting.
As a player who used to do speedruns with too many hours throughout the series I love this video and couldn't agree more. I learned this game through stacking defensive skills then slowly moving to skills that helped me not get hit until I got to the point that I could go all out. More safely means more confidence and willingness to continue playing and learning this wonderful game.
It all depends on what each person wants. High defense is useful for some builds. Meanwhile have been part of the group who had the philosophy of "if it doesn't kill me in 1 hit i'm good." And that has worked well for me. focusing too much on defense makes me overly rely on not taking much damage and when i fight higher end monsters that comes back to get me. So i usually focus on having enough defence to encourage me to dodge/block better.
1 of my favorite builds in world was the "unkillable lance" where i maxed out all guard skills threw on a challenger mantle and let my squad go hog wild while i shouldered the weight of the world. Good build? Not really. Fun build? Maybe for me. Supportive build? Absolutely. Would i recommend it? Agaist 1-2 Diablos, absolutely, other than that only if you like the idea... It is a niche build that i enjoy using to tank and decoy so my party are able to heal and focus parts easier.
There is a build for every playstyle. It just takes time to find that for some people.
That build sounds pretty fun to me. I might have to try it out.
I think the issue is that most people aren't good enough to be using those no defense builds, and they'd be better off taking a bit less damage and carting less.
The time loss from a single cart usually far supersedes any damage you gain to begin with.
@@KyokujiFGC what I was trying to imply is that there is no "1 build covers everyone" I never hate on people who focus on defensive skills over offensive ones. (Though I know there unfortunately are people in the community that do). The only time armor skills other use annoys me is when they use skills that have nothing to do with the weapon/play style (like using impact based skills on a cutting weapon that has no stun damage outputs). Which has made me question some people. The response usually being either "I like how it looks" or "It's just a place filler" to which I understand. While also giving suggestions to help enhance the fun they have (like suggesting builds such as the tried and true crit draw great swords/longsword builds. Or a fun build like my evade armor set (max I frames when evading and evade distance up). That is a fun dualblade set that rise enhanced with all of the aerial stuff you can do. My usual aim is helping enhance the people I play with's experience by giving them build ideas that match how they play. A friend of mine had no idea that most of his Longsword playthrough of rise was so easy because he used all of the Invincible longsword techs. The moment he swapped to the charge blade his whole outlook on rise changed. And I advised him on gear and skills since he mained longswords for he last 20 years. And due to my nature of trying to work with everything I could help. Another decided to use the hammer for the first time... Me being multiple hr's ahead of them in world at the time made a high rank hammer set ant trialed it for them. Not as a "this is the best" but as a "this is a focused set on ko damage (which was something they liked about the weapon) and it looked kinda cool." (Mostly diablos armor) I even used the set from time to time as a joke since I never had any intent to use the weapon. Heck the "white mage S'nS set I made (full wide area mushroommancer set) purely to help out newbies having a hard time. It's 1 of the reasons I love the game. So many ways to play.
Defense has always mattered. Playing through Freedom Unite again (with the Complete Patch this time-it's amazing), and there's a _massive_ gap in Defense, between Mafumofu and Chain or Leather, and the first set you make after that, which is probably Melahoa. But Melahoa is still significantly behind real combat sets, which are later in Low Rank anyway; you're playing most of early game with under 25 Defense. The difference between Congalala's half-hearted swipe and his charge _can be felt in your bones._
It also sounds like a bit of an excluded middle, where people whom argue that Defense doesn't matter aren't formally acknowledging that they're picking their preferred Weapon type against the Monster they're hunting: Defense matters *much* more when getting comfortable with unfamiliar match-ups, and everyone has that one attack they just get hit by more often then they should. In Generations Ultimate right now, I'm doing the 98 Weapon Training Quests again on a new save, and Great Maccao just lands that first hook every time-I can never avoid it while anticipating his other attacks. And the luxury of ignoring that damage due to Defense (fixed Equipment) is what makes it okay. 🙂
_Spreadsheet gaming_ is for sim games, not action combat games; you gonna sit _Wesker_ from _Mega Man_ down and tell him his Hadouken sucks beans and that he should stop? That's not Smokin' Sick Style, Edward Kirk. 😔
It does matter in early game to mid game generally ,however late game monster hunter including MHFU .according to my personal experience any kind of defense boost and divine blessing is generally useless
@@faisaladzikri4870 How could removing 50% of incoming dmg be useless? Especially if you roll it on a bs attack
@@ickerolig in dont know man but i prefer evade window and evade extender, its so good you will never get hit again with that crazy i-frame
MHFU MMMMM was my first one
@@faisaladzikri4870 I find that divine blessing is one of the most infuriating skills in the entire game for reasons which I will now explain.
Reason 1: it's gambling. Because the effect is random, you can never plan around it's activation. This means that you will always have to heal/avoid damage as though you were not running the skill (at which point, why run the skill?). For example, if the monster takes 50% of your hp per hit you aren't going to sit on 50% just because you have a 1/4 chance of surviving the next hit. Essentially all that the skill does is save you healing items over the course of the hunt. To return to the previous example, the best case scenario is that it procs on the first hit and you drop to 75% instead and do not need to heal until you take another one. It's a defensive skill that only works when you are already in no danger of dying.
Reason 2: Opportunity cost. Instead of Divine Blessing you could invest in something like health boost, evade window, guard, defense boost, etc. and have a skill that gives you value 100% of the time, especially when you are in mortal peril. Literally the only benefit of divine blessing is that it is an extremely cheap skill, but even so I would rather invest my skill budget into something more consistent. I will allow that the usefulness of Divine Blessing increases with the number of hits you can tank before dying, so on certain very tanky builds it might be good. But I think the people saying 'just run divine blessing' for your only defensive investment have it backwards: divine blessing is terrible if your build is already squishy.
Thresholding is such an important concept in pretty much every stat-based game, love seeing it be described here.
And regarding the offense/defense conflict (why stack defense when attack means you kill it faster?), thresholding has an answer to that as well:
If you're ever finding yourself getting one-shot by a specific attack from a specific monster, look up its damage values. Find how much damage the attack deals, then what defense value you need to survive it. ("Survive" being whatever health value you'd want to end up at, give or take however much you might be missing when the attack comes.) Take just that much defense and don't worry about taking any more. Just like how small numbers can be the difference between carting and not carting, seemingly large defense numbers might not change how many hits you can take before you cart. Any defensive skill that wasn't needed is free real estate for all those delicious damage buffs. Eventually, when you think "Man, I doubt any of their attacks will hit me and I'm certain I'll kill them before they can land 3" then you don't need to care about thresholding and can happily get away with all the glass cannon metamancer gear sets you want.
If you're only worried about a very rare slip-up, you might be fine with subbing out defensive skills until a bad hit takes away 249 HP with an Intrepid Heart proc. As long as you can comfortably refill and get Heart back before the attack comes again, you're set!
Elemental defenses are also quite important at times too. Valstrax lasers and fairly negative dragon defense do not mix well at all. Legit did have a time where I was wondering why I was just getting melted and then saw the -20ish dragon defense. Popped in some decorations to correct that and was able to take a hit at lower health and not cart.
As for git gud, this isn't a From Software game where having the bulky defense can hinder your dodging ability with fat rolls so having the defense can be used as a tool to eventually reach the git gud while having a safety net for some unexpected shenanigans.
This was back in MH4U, I don’t remember the name of the random but the memory remains.
Chaotic Gore had roared and got my team mate in a frenzy mine explosion about to proc, my Defense had broken 1000 so even with a max guild quest I knew I could tank the hit, and with earplugs the roar didn’t effect me. Just as the frenzy mine was to explode, I staggered my team mate out of the roar giving him just enough time to roll out. I took the hit with around 10% of my health, imagine my defense was anything less.
The extra 100 HP from gathering birds might be all people need if they can't fit other skills in their set. I've seen people carting while I was collecting birds and said to myself, "I guess they listened to the experts and skipped the bird and/or defense boost, this is gonna be a fast quest."
thats relatable and it hurts lmao fr
This. Everytime I host a high-level hunt and NOBODY shows up for ten minutes or more, only for someone to join and cart three times in 5 minutes, a little part of me dies.
Tbf I also stopped collecting the spiribirds, but mainly cause I hate the gimmick and don't want to be forced to waste 5 minutes of every quest just to not die to a wombo combo.
@@skeletonwar4445 5 minutes seems a bit long to gather birds. 2 minutes seems like over kill. Depending on the monster, you may not need max hp, but a bit of a cushion is nice.
@@hero_on_youtube Yeah, my main problem with the birds isn't even the collecting tbh. It's the fact that they have your potential max hp *with* birds on screen at all times.
I don't want to be constantly reminded how much more hp and stamina I *could* be having right now, thanks.
Just makes it feel like you're going into a hunt incomplete and half-assed unless you get all the birds. I hate this specific aspect of them so much.
Me and a friend have been playing through all of MHW and Iceborne and
, as someone who's been using only Hunting Horn in that playthrough, defence boosts absolutely are useful.
I'm a 3rd Gen Hunter(Tri) so I remember having to decide which 3-4 skills I wanted to use very carefully. One of the first things you learn is to upgrade your armor ASAP then your weapons. cant get materials if you cart all the time. Ever since world came with the new skill system I went crazy putting different combinations of no damage/atk skills in my sets. I don't play perfect, I never intend to really and I've had others in the community comment on my 50/50 sets or "comfort" sets and ask why I did it. I tell them finding a balance between skills you feel you need and skills you like takes time and patience, but once you find it its game on and its a world of difference in your ability to hunt monsters both comfortably, which in turns lets you hunt more relaxed and with a clearer head to focus on each hunt. I offered to go on a difficult hunt with them and we go, some could only take 1 hit with a sliver of health left, meanwhile I could tank 3 and have a bit left over for a small 4th hit. Meta has a place in every genre and game, its great when you need ideas when you're stuck or bored, that doesn't mean copy and paste sets from others who play almost perfectly every hunt.
Moral of my story, Use everything and see for yourself what you like to have on your sets. There's nothing better than 3-4 Hunters who feel comfortable in the sets they built and running through some of the most difficult content and (even with a close call or two) not having a single faint. Happy Hunting .
P.S. yes I'm a LS weeb with a healthy side of HBG,CB,GL and the beloved HH
Chill hunting is the best hunting.
Why is this debatable, defence builds always tend to last longer when playing with my friends in mh4u, I had an immortal build so I get to watch the entire thing unfold and one of my friends with defence build was tanking one shot hits from raging bracky
I got my start from Tri as well, and spend ample time on here gloating about my go-set I seek out for ever MH iteration. I call it my "Juggernaut" build.
Main Course:
-HGEP
-Stun Immunity
Entrées:
-Mind's Eye*
-Tremor Immunity*
-Flinch Immunity
-Windproof
I can grab my main course and 2 entrées, and eat GOOD! 😤 So as a hammer main, that means:
-No bs monster combos interrupting my charges
-Very little bouncing
-No bs Stun-kills!!!!
-Monster roars become free damage opportunities.
In my experience, numbers games are fine and cute and all, but up-time is precious to me... even more so, up-time where I'm pressing the monster with consistent damage. If I'm healing, eating, sharpening, fainted, traveling, staggered, or catching clouds (courtesy of monster launches), I'm not damaging the monster, which costs me time. And some hunts ("We Run This Town" 😡😡😡😡😡🤬) are specifically designed to waste your time.
Some skills get easily overlooked: speed sharpen, mushroomancer, blindsider, freemeal, speed eating, survival (spores), etc. but none of them are useless.
It's times like these I'm super happy to be under my rock away from the meta-proper. I seem to have MUCH more fun, and builds that cater VERY closely to my hunting style. ...Which, as verbose as I've been about it, boils down to》
TL, DR: HIT IT TILL IT DIES!
Edit: Which witch witch which's?
My rise set rather simplistic but it suits me. Max attack defense and 100% affinity yep that's it that's what I did nothing fancy just 100% passive skills that are always working. Alot of people look at me like I'm stupid but I've literally never failed a solo hunt so clearly I'm doing something right.
Nobody can ever convince me Defense isn't a good/useful skill or that I won't even notice the difference between having Defense Boost Level 7 and not having it. When I play and I fight actual monsters, *I feel* the difference. I play better knowing there is room to make mistakes and to be aggressive, rather than be passive because I made an "optimal" glass cannon build that has significantly fewer windows to attack safely and mistakes are punished with fewer rewards.
It might take me longer to win with a defensive set compared to if I just strictly built for attack or affinity or whatever my weapon gimmick is, but I'm not doing myself any favors by spending 15 minutes on a hunt and carting twice versus 25 minutes without carting at all.
Aspects of skill building for survival aren't always purely health based. Sometimes it's not about "can I survive taking the hit" but more about "what will help in handling the attack". Analyzing why you get hit and choosing your skills in regards to that is just as important to survival. If you get hit because you get caught by roars, maybe invest in Earplugs. If your stamina is running low while evading/blocking, consider stamina efficiency skills. Maybe you have a hard time making distance, consider evade extender, etc. If all else fails and you are taking the hits, defense/element resist will cover your ass.
Admitedly though, defense stacking is very much easier in Rise with all the decoration types that give you a crapload of lvls. Capcom is pretty much shouting at the player to "please don't forget we exist too".
Best comment. When I first started playing Monster Hunter (World), I took note of the things that would absolutely cart me all the time and that's how I started out having Stun Resist, Evade Extender, Speed Eating, Quick Sheathe, and Earplugs lol. I just started removing some of them in the endgame when I finally got better at the game 😂
i never played rise or world, but i played the hell out of 3u and gen u, and just about all my sets ran with evasion +2 (or +3 in GU? i forget). i might not be getting those speed kills to grind out the best gear quick, but im not dying, im hunting monsters, and im having a great time.
The one "comfy" skill i truly swear by on my comfort builds is stun resist, because being stunned is the the absolute worst thing ever
You got hit to get stunned and now the monster has a free window to hit you again for free, this is almost guaranteed to happen unless your cat gets off it's ass and kicks you, and no other movement penalty type effect (stuff like roars, tremors, or wind pressure) come with a guaranteed hit before the effect takes place, so even if you get hit because of the effect there's a good chance that's the one and only hit whereas stun starts with a hit and gurantees another
Edit: scratch that, Free Meal is another one of the GOATs for me, because it doesn't matter if a hit deals 99% of my health if i can pop max potions like tic tacs
@@Spike2276 Agree with Stun Resist. Literally the 1st skill I KNEW I had to have after learning the game for the 1st time. And I knew I needed lvl 3 for it lol. 90% reduced duration at lvl 2 does SQUAT because stuns last for AGES
@@thepuzzycatzz4313 Stun resist at levels 1-2 are very monster dependant, some monsters will follow up too fast and you'd need to not get stunned to guarantee safety, while others will have some leniency and allow for you to get away with stun resist 1 or 2
Then again stun resist 3 exists, isn't too hard to get, and works 100% of the time, even if it's not slotted into all my sets i still hard recomend it for anyone who is having even the slightest trouble with MH
I like to conceptualize it as effective HP. Every 80 defense adds +100% of your current max HP to your total effective HP.
With 80 defense and 250 HP, eHP is 500. 160 defense, 750. And so on.
It only has "diminishing returns" in terms of relative eHP, e.g. 1000/750 < 750/500
It scales linearly. Heal less, poke more.
The actual conversation is really about opportunity cost with skill points. There are WAY more offensive skills in the game, and we can only have so many skills, so giving up one or two for the comparitvely rarer defensive skills usually reduces downtime, which is a dps increase unless you never get hit (which even the best players can't claim).
That is, I believe the calculation is damage times (80/(80+defense)), so I am not sure your table is "technically accurate" with the values given (the "tiers" might be "off by 1") but like you said the exact values aren't really material to the conclusion. With how varied monster damage is in the game, this isn't something you'd min/max an exact amount of armor for, rather a way of conceptualizing what you actually get from more defense, which is a linearly scaling amount of effective HP.
I recently got back into Sunbreak after a hiatus that lasted for a little over a year. Let me tell you: pumping defence made a huge difference while relearning the game. It's also been great as an extra layer of safety while learning other weapons
Honestly i agree. I was learning Iceborn Fatalis and using as much defense as possible i were able to lern the moves and get further in the fight that i could better start doing damage and finaly beat him. Learning can be much easier if you dont always have to reload the quest due to carting too much or only healing 24/7.
Plannung on grinding Sunbreak after i finished all of Iceborn.
I love using elemental CB, Valstrax set gets attack out of your defenses, it’s a win win.
@@SaiTaX_the_Chile_boi that reminds me of alatreon set using the elementar resistance. Unlucky its so little Its not really a damage increase as far as I can tell for ls
Pumping your defense also bumps up your resistances (if you run Defense Boost 7 + [Insert element here] Resist 3 which in turn reduces the damage of elemental attacks further and drops your chance to get statused)
This is one of my favorite aspects of Monster Hunter that I don't see many people talk about. Thinking about skills and stats to be "meta" isn't a good way for the average player to think about them. Think about them as tools to help you with the aspect of the game that you find the most difficult, or least enjoyable.
I hate getting screamed at by monsters, so I always take earplugs. Sure I'm losing out on some slight damage, but I'm making up for it by not having to deal with a part of the game I really hate. Or back when I was first starting out and would get killed easily, I put points into health boosting skills and defense skills until I got better at the game and didn't need them anymore. Its one of the beauties of this game that its designed in such a way that you can choose how you want to play, and what parts of the game you want to make harder or easier.
Showing this video to some friends. Might help them finally understand why I can face tank Primordial Malzeno's biggest hits several times in a row 96% of the time while they eat dirt constantly. High defense, max health, Mega Armor Skin and Armor Charm + Talon combo tends to make you a pretty tough hunter to bring down. This is before even factoring in Defense Boost lvl7 to boot.
This is exactly how I see things in Dark Souls meta discussions! People will argue that if you're skilled and just dodge you can be naked or wear little enough to do the better dodge, and just focus on damage to end the fight quicker.
On top of that, enemies usually do so much damage that they'll kill you very quickly if you can't dodge anyways.
Buttttt, with armour seeming useless under these conditions, I've seen people point out that yes, armour is usually not good enough to really tank the harder bosses, but there is a point where you can squeeze on enough armour to have a tiny bit of extra health, and just by upping it from a one or two shot to a three or four shot, you can get out of so many deaths by just running away and healing with your scrap of health remaining.
It's like saying "all you have to do to be a olympic sprinter is run faster."
The comparison does not stand: armoring up in monster hunter is a necessety while in ds it is a choice of what roll type you prefer. Consider the different s of dodging and the statement just sounds nonsesical. Its like choosing between evade window and bonus defense and everyone will obviously pick the first since zero damage with a slight skill requirement is better than just less damage. It becomes different when you discuss oneshots, but again just meet the treshold and toss away all the excess defence points.
@@mccvvnuh this is a good and major point of difference but I meant it as being within your roll class. In Elden Ring I'll equip what I can before entering a heavy roll and while that game does make your roll distance smaller incrementally before reaching the threshold, the frames are the same and I have taken note of times where I barely survive an extra hit. I'll also concede that I'm pretty sure defence in ER is a lot less meaningful unless you stack it, but there are opportunities to equip defence talismans and use items like boiled crab to stack it up. I guess another big difference is that in the souls games you have to prioritise defence over damage if you want to get much for results, while in MH or even DS1 and 2 to a degree you can just upgrade your armour without having to unequip any offensive talismans or rings. Other than maybe using upgrade materials in DS that could've gone towards a weapon.
Anyways lots of important differences but the main thing I noted is that the breakpoint between when you die from a hit and when you barely survive is important in both assuming you can then get distance to heal. It's about how many hits rather than how much damage you can take since you usually top up your health
I think there is an inherent problem with skills like those (defense boost/ fortify). They become borderline useless once you reach a certain threshold as a player.
Once you're able to dodge through attacks or avoid them all together (as you've fought the monsters plenty of times), there is no more use in those skills, they dont do anything passively.
Skills like Evade Window are in my opinion way better crutches, as they teach you a certain aspect of the game and you can slowly remove levels as you progress yourself.
imo, defense boost would be a much more desirable skill if it wouldnt just increase armor, but also increased the time between ticks of status ailments like fire, poison, venom or make you unaffected by them in the first place.
This is a great idea!
Evade Window I'm a bit mixed on, since it can teach bad habits (mainly, dodging too early) and there's nothing to indicate when your dodge was in the normal dodge window or not, though this could always be fixed with a small visual and audio cue being added to it, similar to how Generations added cues for guard points. Evade Extender meanwhile, can both get you out of the danger zone immediately, which I feel tends to have more impact for less investment, and that's before getting into the skill also having offense utility
yeah the problem is when, even the best evassive player gets hit... and it hurts, a lot. On their health and in their pride.
@@Vexal50True but even skills like evade extender could be called crutches because of how it makes it way easier to reposition and get out of a sticky situation when you should have been getting out way earlier.
Whether it's a crutch or not. Hmm, I dunno. I sometimes wear my LR or HR sets that only have like 3 evade window or none at all and I always felt it was fine.
Though I mainly use evade window to stick as close to a monster as possible.
I like that proposition to incentivize Defense with having it provide secundary benefits.
It's reminiscent of the elemental resistances negating the linked ailments, i.e. Fire Res preventing Fireblight once you reach 20 res.
I'd probably have it, if not outright prevent them, at least reduce the duration of non-elemental ailments if you have enough levels sloted in.
If Elden Ring teaches anything, its that "5%" is a lot more than people give it credit for, especially when its to your survivability.
(And yes, I am talking about the Deathbed Companion debuff)
Defense does matter in monster hunter, there’s a reason in frontier that every star on your quest difficulty takes away 150 defense from you
Great video and data. Only thing I can think that wasn’t discussed was food skills. Moxie and double defender are a huge help.
This is something I’ve always kind of known, maybe because I’ve mained lance for years. That weapon really teaches you how small damage numbers add up QUICK if you never have to retreat to heal (or run back from a cart).
But man is it therapeutic to hear someone who actually understands the mechanics and numbers spell it out like this, lol.
yeah, the tiny hits... i remenber hunting hellblade glavenus with valor style and i was like... yeah im evading everything but jeez my health, or back in 3U hunting a rathian and hiting her from below the legs... each step, it took damage, and when you realize, half your health is down... the smal hits count so much
The problem people have with spiribirds isn't that they aren't useful, but that their functionallity is nothing but a tax on fun that isn't present in other games. They don't give you a buff, they remove a debuff; everyone would be happier if the game just worked like every other game in the series and the max health boost they give you was just the standard health you start with.
On the note of defense and comfort skills, I agree; unless you are insanely, inhumanly good at playing absolutely pixel perfectly to the second, having some survivability and comfort on you build is better than damage.
People say that defense has diminishing returns when in reality it's linear, even on the spreadsheet you can see the amount of hits you can take increases at consistent intervals.
The same logic can also apply to attack, a +10 on attack is great when the average weapon has 100 but less so when it's 300, but still a linear increase.
I avoid maxing defense and attack in favor of utility. Defense sucks because I just gotta get good and doing 1 or 2 more percent damage isn't worth it. So skills that negates wind, tremors or screams are the way to go.
Not everyone gets stronger the more you say "get good". This video is good.
but, the one who do gets stronger... they Got Good
It's good to have a balance between dps and defensive skills. However, in iceborne, defense boost is useless once you reach 1000 or more defense, which is pretty easy once you augment your armor. Skills like tool specialist or divine blessing are much more useful, and health boost, of course.
In terms of Rise specifically, I think the real question is what are you supposed to do with the dozen lv1 slots you probably have, if not Defense? Can't remember what I had exactly offhand but I think I had one slot to prevent getting nerfed by Longsword teammates, three slots to resist whatever element/status the monster has, and then I'd still have a half dozen slots left so it may as well go to Defense.
I also use them for defiance, sort of a cheap earplugs for me. Simply a comfort skill that helps me not grt stunlocked, helps le avoid scenarios where a second monster comes to the same place and roars letting the one I'm hunting have a free hit
It's defiance, defence, and intrepid heart
I think a lot of people who think defence is unpractical (read: not saying useless) are just going of off world knowledge where we had vitality and divine blessing 5
Defiance and interpid heart. They let you eat roars and other small annoyances
As a hh main i made a tanky build with max defense and a maxed out magia charm.
I was able to play constantly tanking every single attack and healing off all of the damage for every single hunt since i figured out that playstyle. I heal faster than any monster can damage me, and constantly putting up sonic barrier removes any knockback.
That is the most satisfying experience ive had in a MH game ever.
The true power of a HH main
We bow before you
Magia charm bell, max defence boost, intrepid heart, powder mantle.
Usually top dps or near to it, because I never have to stop. While all the dps min max players have to worry about things like dodging, knock back, and mechanics, I'm here womp womp womping the boss non stop because it can't do shit to me.
That's peak gameplay.
So you are the happiest when there is no stakes, no threat, no chance of losing? The biggest problem I have with these "Immortal tank" builds is that they're just soooooo boring to play. Unless I stand still or actively don't heal I will always beat the quest after 25 minutes, isn't that amazingly dull?
@@MomongaMH it's more about just feeling like a badass but you do you bruh.
@@MomongaMH depends on my mood, I can always play a different weapon like dual sword or lance, or just swap to a game like elden ring or lies of p if I want to scratch the itch for more punishing combat.
There's still skill needed for hunting horn, mostly regarding placement of your seeds and timing the pop, I do take two points of redirection and use that as my dodging tool of I need it. Usually if multiple dangerous mechanics have happened in a row and I have lost my intrepid heart already.
In the end, recap: def is important, but def boost still not, that's it
as someone who's continuously survived party wipes with full defense, i find this as an absolute win xD
I disaggree with you. Most of the heavy hits you discribe there are really telegraphed attacks that you see coming several seconds to prepare to dodge. You describe a senario where the player is just standing there afk and waiting for the hit. But thats not the gameplay especially Monster Hunter Rise is. All weapons are balanced around being able to quick counter attacks without sheathing your weapon, so you could put out higher damage. Of course every one can fight how he wants to play. But i think the trade of you have to take for having higher defence is not worth the damage you lose. If you haved reached endgame in Sunbreak you have reached a skill in the game and you normally dont get hit by these telegraphed attacks any more. And the more damage you do the less you are going to have to dodge these strong attacks. Sure if you want to fight 30-40 minutes with every endgame monster defence will be great, but you also have to restore your health potions more often cause you will get hit from attacls others learn to dodge cause they will oneshot from it otherwise. And you also saw on the chart that the 100 or even up to 200 defence you get max from defence boost 7 is only usefull in some cases. You are not garanteed to tank one more or even two more hits because of it. So in my opinion its not worth it
While I agree that "not carting" is the most important part of the hunt, which is why I grabbed meta builds and slapped evade window to it, a monster that dies quickly has less opportunities to kill you. Recommending meta sets to begginners is definetly a bad idea, especially if they are dumping def because "if you don't get hit" mentality, but higher dps does help a lot with avoiding mistakes by shortening the hunt/knocking down the monster/clagger more often. Balancing defense and atk around your own skill level should be the objective, not bolting directly to the extremes.
So defence is linear. It's surprisingly simple, if you look at the reciprocal. You cart in this many hits that would barely one shot you without armor. A more interesting note though is how, the higher your armor is, the more relevant divine blessing becomes. As the amount of hits you can take increases, divine blessing becomes less of a chance and more of a statistic. It would be interesting to see a table of the odds of you tanking 1 or 2 extra hits with divine blessings at different defence tiers.
That's an awesome insight in divine blessing. So divine blessing is even more useful the more of the stat they say you don't need much in. Lol! Great catch
It's not Linear. Defense isn't linear it's more... on a Slope
If you don't run stun, para res etc it doesn't matter if you have 5k defense you're going to be locked out of doing anything. Running your defense up that high might just teach the wrong habits.
Why learn how to dodge that attack when you know you can tank it + wirefall recover + heal.
The healing in this game is insanely easy so much so that going passed 1 shot protection range for ultimate attacks and 3 for heavy hitters is beyond overkill.
Yeah if defense boost gets you an additional safety hit that's great, and it should be built for if you want it. But going that all out for defense (1360+) and sacrificing your damage is going to make hunts such a slog of a marathon where you might actually run into focus/stamina issues where you start playing worse because you've been getting smacked around for 35 minutes on one hunt with no end in sight.
I'm all for keeping up your own playstyle and doing what works for you, and if you hunt solo more power to you. In multiplayer however if someone's skills are 50 percent or more defensive ones they're getting pretty close to "I'm not worth the extra hp my presence has added to this hunt" range
I am only casually into MHR as my first MH title, but I appreciate the lesson here in analytics. Quality teaching 👍
I've seen someone having an interesting take on defense once:
Take your meta dps build on your first time out against a monster and see what happens, if you cart once change something in the build for fortify and see if you can complete the hunt.
If you cart a second time then it probably happened when the monster is already low health anyway so may as well be safe about it and take a full defensive set and just go for the kill.
Since mh world you can swap sets in your camp, and playing this way you are learning how to get better without any defense but if things go wrong you can always fall back to your best survival set.
when i first played through sunbreak, i found a full defense hunting horn build that allowed me to stay on top of the monster and spam my healing songs nonstop. It took the amount of carts on most of the higher level quests such as gold rathian and the investigations from like 2 to per quest to almost 0, and that's including the other plays that got to join. Some of the most fun i've ever had in these games.
I loved this video, i think it perfectly encapsulates why its important to experiment and put together a set thag feels good for your particular style of play.
I tend to put as much as I can into Guard and Guard Up because my weapon of choice (gunlance) has limited evasive options, so blocking is usually more useful. Health Boost and Defense Boost in combination with Guard and Guard Up can dramatically increase my survivability
Good ol uragaan armor. Love being an unkillable wall.
Evade Extender and Evade Window make the Gunlance Hops insanely strong.
@@lootizin8068 this, holy shit, being able to hop like a madman is amazing.
Ironically enough, gunlance has one of the best evasive options in the game with its reaaaallyyy long backstep
Without doing the math: defense can be the difference between a one-shot and a two-shot or a two-shot and a three-shot or a potion being enough to be safe after a hit and a potion not being enough and that's super useful.
I enjoy how everyone has their own way of playing monster hunter it’s so nuanced like souls games. However I like to just make a set with all the skills that I like make it work for every element(I main swaxe) and I’m pretty much good for the rest of the game lol. Never used defense boost I’d rather just upgrade my armor and survive through the thick of it.
Yeah I've driven friends insane in world and rise because I hate stun in the 5th gen games but because the game is so modifiable I can be effective and essentially delete it from the game.
@@MoonChild8189as an Insect glaive user I can't live without flinch free
I just can't be bothered to deal with roars/wind constantly disrupting my air-dancing
@@kaden-sd6vb Doesn't the orange buff give that? I believe it was only missing in world. It's either the orange bug buff or having all 3.
I believe it's, as you said,less of a "we don't know the numbers" or "we don't care about the numbers," but it's more about the mindset of "if you play perfectly," because that's the end goal. We all want to have that perfect hunt; land all our counters, make use of all gaps in the monster patterns, take no hits, etc. The "experts" don't look at someone who is just trying to get to the next hunt, or is realistic in the fact that "I am going to get hit in this hunt." I'm glad you made this video, because you're right: there is no PERFECT SET that goes for every play style, let alone every weapon.
Defencemaxxing doesn't just have to be a crutch for bad players. Good players can use it just as if not more effectively. Also, while Monster Hunter may be more mainstream now, I think most players will drop the game once they reach the end. The people who continuously play and grind the endgame are outnumbered by casual players.
@@tetsuc4bra577 I guess I wasn't clear that I was speaking from a monster hunter content creator or forum expert view point. Sorry about that. But I think we agree, and giving advice on defense boosting can give you that extra hit against a monster you are learning. Whether you're a hardcore or casual player.
I think that at a certain point focusing on defense is just a waste of your time. I think that as long as your defense is high enough to take at least 2 hits, it's better to focus on healing skills both from armor and palicos rather than go for more defense.
Personal anecdote. In World I mained Bow for Iceborne and my main set was True Critical Element, Silver Sol gear with Garuga legs. Had Health Boost 3 slotted in and was comfortable until postgame, where everything started to hit much harder. I remember Rajang could 2 shot me. When Arch Tempered Velkhana dropped I got full 1 shot and slotted in Ice Resistance and used Iceproof Mantle. I could still barely survive 2 hits, sometimes not even that.
Defense matters a lot, but when damage numbers bloat that insanely you just can't keep up. The Gunner defense modifier is partly to blame for that, I think. Most ranged attacks from Monsters don't do pure element damage they do split physical and element. Even stuff like Teo Supernova or Rajang's laser. So the decreased physical defense and increased element from Gunner gear usually ends up with you taking roughly the same from ranged moves but *much* more from physical.
Even as a defense-oriented player in so many games, I didn't know all this stuff about defense, and it's crazy to think how much the landscape of information has been muddled by a very unfortunately regular level of "defense is useless, you'll die"
Thank you iixxion for this well-needed message
(anyway i have 636 defense because I hop around too many weapons and armor sets to settle on one good set lol)
Honestly... There are some players who die constantly because they never learned how to play.
same, I've been doing anomalies solo in the lvl50range and I have just 600-700 armor and always wondered why grabbing a few armor bugs sometimes made a huge difference, while other times not. I tend to alternate almost every hunt and all my gear is below lvl10.
Gonna be honest, I do think defense boost is a useless skill. It’s like it does nothing. That being said, Divine Blessing 3 and Health Boost 3 saved my ass when playing through the early master rank gameplay
Yes!
Max upgraded armor with max defense boost, max embolden, max defiance, heaven sent(optional but helps), intrepid heart, dango defender (green and orange), furious and spirit birds of course helps a LOT in survival.
Especially with a ranged weapon.
This has saved me so many times with those instant charges of Hazard Flaming Espinas.
It's awesome that in Rise you can get decorations for these skills rather easily. Even more so that the dango food skills are much simpler to activate.
Something i would like to add about divine blessing it may only have 25% proc rate but it dose scale with ur defense
I'll still go evasive skills or things that do more than just front flat front defense. Or things that help the weapon itself making the already defensive moves or active defenses I can trigger myself better. I do love intrepid heart tho!
I see this a lot in the monster hunter community. So many good perks and ideas get left behind simply for meta chasing.
I dont care if you kill an AT Velkhana in like 7 minutes, it's not a 10 minute hunt. Play to your strengths, and more importantly play to have fun!
- From your local defense boost, wide range running GS main that will always (attempt to) heal you. c:
This video reminds me thate there are two kinds of engineers. The ones that know how to make numbers and the ones that know how to read those numbers.
I see this all the time in MMOs, people will numbercrunch and make spreadsheets. They don't explain the nuances of this information other than "this will let you do 2-3%" more damage at the massive sacrifice of other stats that would provide survivability.
Then the masses would just slurp up this without understanding and it even drips down to casual players which gimps them in learning the game.
Def boost is LITIRALLY just the defensive version of Attack boost, both are foundations of which u build your relevant sets around. Unfortunately tho, according to "the almighty meta gods" nothing is more important then high dmg output.
I mean it's not just that, it's also that defense doesn't scale the same way as attack. Attack is mostly linear while defense isn't, and the defense boost skill is comparatively weak in how it impacts your defensive numbers. They're both very minor boosts (affinity is better than just straight attack). Defense numbers get huge in the endgame, so the flat increase of defense boost becomes worthless compared to the 10% proportional increase. It just takes too many ranks of the skill for it to be good. They really do need to either give it less investment to reach its highest level if they aren't going to make it stronger.
@@darkbeetlebot Attack Boost 5-7 has the same slot value as Defense Boost 7. 3 points of Attack Boost give 9 raw, which is roughly 2% damage in late Sunbreak. 10% + 35 defense + 5 elemental res is easily 12-15% damage reduction. It's slightly worse in World, but not by much.
at 18:45 you forgot to add the base 35 that def 7 also increases so it does actually get you up to the next tier already
Looking at these data, it seems like the less you get hit, the better raw defense becomes as compared to divine blessing since you're mostly concerned at that point with surviving the few hits you do take, rather than maximizing your long term survival
I’m bookmarking this video because it gave me an enlightening, new perspective on stats in video games. Normally, I’m pretty mathematical, but this is something even I missed. It's not about the continuous probabilities, which are only accurate over an infinite integration regime, it’s about the number of boxes one can fit in the package, in a manner of speaking.
Video games are discrete. Everything in a video game is about integer numbers, not real numbers. So, with anything one does in the game, it's about how many times, on average, a particular action or event can occur within some given span. This is where being able to fit that "just 1 more thing" into the span can mean the difference between success and failure, the difference between ease, or, at least, manageable, and absolute sweaty frustration.
What this video is showing to me is that one must transition from a probabilities and percentages viewpoint (which only works for continuous domains or infinite integrations) in interpreting the results of these calculations to an action-economy and opportunities viewpoint (how many things fit in the box) which is more aligned with actual discrete gameplay in the game.
Since Rise allows you to throw such a ludicrous amount of different skills in your build, I always find myself equipping as many comfort skills as I can, but funnily enough, I stopped running defense boost despite using it constantly before.
My main weapon is the IG, and from my experience with it, its built in defense buff with the extracts, and general mobility end up giving it everything it needs to survive without issues even at the highest level. Instead of raw defense, I tend to focus on other means of survival: evasion skills, divine blessing + dango defender (significantly more reliable to proc this way), the elder dragon trio blessings (specially Teo, poison and venom immunity is truly fantastic) and Risen Valstrax's armor set boosting all my elemental resistances to a point where they make up for any lack of defense in just about any scenario.
With my setup, defense boost would actually find itself a place very easily, but I still tend to favor some offensive skills instead to strike a balance between offense and utility. I also personally really dislike intrepid heart, precisely because it prevent knockback from any hit: while that can simply prevent an inconvenience, it can also enable a monster's multi-hit attacks to do more damage than you'd have otherwise taken while protected by s.
All of those people that decry defense boost 7 are the reason they gave us the Ai Followers, so that we could finish some of the multiplayer missions without the PROS triple carting and leaving before everyone returns to the lobby.
I don’t necessarily think defense is useless in monster hunter in general but I’d much rather have a skill that helps me avoid the damage by increasing invincibility frames ( or shield skills perhaps paired with stamina increases if I’m using a shield weapon sometimes just standing in a monster’s face and just blocking rather then needing to consider which way to dodge is nice )
In 2nd gen, where you cant sleep on footstep chip damage, having high defense with dual blades or sns allows you to keep hitting those legs to achieve a trip without worrying about your HP being quickly depleted.
Defensive skills alongside higher defense provides leeway to overcommit more consistently with heavy attacks such as GS,hammer or charge blade; whilst a speedrunner overcommits in a premeditated way with their minmaxed offensive setup, they know that stagger or topple is coming next....
5% of 1 is useless. 5% of 100 is mildly mediocre. 5% of 1000? Now you're cooking. The people who claim "Def Boost" is useless... they're nimrods.
The eye opening video that Big Attack Boost doesn't want you to know
Do you have a spreadsheet for how resistances work? I used to ignore them, (and still do mostly) but using Mail of Hellfire to fight magma almudron/astalos was a bit of an eye opening experience. -50 res kinda just makes you explode when you get hit by elemental damage
I do not, but come on over to the discord somebody might have an answer!
Not sure if Rise has changed it, but Elemental Resistance reduces damage to you by percentage. And after reaching 20 RES, you'll become immune to that elemental blight.
Now, this doesn't mean that you're safe with 100+ RES, as monster attack usually deal mixed damage with both physical and elemental just like you do with elemental weapon.
Quick question, do these armor tiers also apply in World as well or is it just in Rise? I apologize if you answered it at some point in the video but I can't recall it.
Yup this is how defense works in all versions of MH!
@@iixxion I'd like to ask a bit more about that: is the damage reduction "linear" inside those 80-points (so more defence = more damage reduction always), or is the damage reduction stepped between those 80-point steps (so that 79 does nothing, but 80 halves damage etc.)?
As much as I love my attack buffs, I still always (when I’m able too) try to run divine blessing. I know it’s relying on RNG to reduce damage, but it procs just enough for those few times to be worth it
And as much as I argue offensive skills to be meta, I still feel like that’s exclusively for the “perfectionist” hunter who’s DNA needs monster hunter pumping into their blood to live. I always disliked it when people considered defensive abilities “bad,” they are the safety net to help carry you through a fight until you start getting better at avoiding hits. Without defensive abilities, I don’t know if I’d ever even get into monster hunter when I was a noobie
Hell I’m not even afraid to admit it, I on occasion, used the Defender armor of world cause I like the comfort. Is it my favorite armor or do I consider it my best armor? No, but those skills and stats turn monster hunter from a hyper active, focused, and challenging game, into a more relax and chill one where I can mess around and have more fun without worry for bad play cause I can afford to take more hits
Bro if people can’t understand “more hp means less death” there is no way in hell they will understand anything
You can't kill the monster if you can't stay alive until then.
A lot of my favorite skills are mostly utility; speed eating, faster red health regen, less sharpening strokes, and then I typically eat for percentage defense or some such. In Rise it's Dango Defender, Medic and whatever element defense up the monster has (if applicable, otherwise I'll choose something like reducing a hit guaranteed). Defender with Blessing fudges the RNG a bit more in your favor, but in most cases I can keep up the offense with less downtime. Less time drinking because I'm recovering red health faster and drinking potions faster, also sharpening weapons faster too. Obviously I have offensive skills put in, but utility helps out incredibly. Heck, even free meal is excessively strong. It might be chance based, but every time you save a potion, that's just another heal for later that you don't have to restock!
I use defence boost, and ngl, it saved my butt from carting many times. Some people were mocking me for using defence boost. What i see is that many people stand against the defence, and cart in the first five minutes.
I don't really like defence boost, I just prefer evasion skills and stuff like divine blessing over them.
@@alephkasai9384 Yeah, they are really cool, somehow i found slots to stuff them in the armor slots. They do a really good job.
@@alephkasai9384 Evasion skills follow the same philosophy: You're increasing your "don't die" thing so your "don't die" thing makes you not die more.
Also weapons provide their own internal defense. I know a lot of people stick to there one weapon, I do too, but in world the tips told me that melee offers more physical defense, lower elemental and reversed for range. When certain monsters hit me a little too hard with bow, I switch to IG or CB. Has helped me a lot with certain non element monsters like Diablos and Tigrex.
i love how their excuse is always "if you're good enough"
I am good enough to not get 3rd cart when I fight pickle in world for 30 minutes
Imma be honest... it's the truth, mostly. So long as an attack doesn't one shot you then you should not get hit right after that. Even then, the big one shots are usually pretty well comunicated.
I'm not saying go in naked but why bother with so much defense if it's just exposing you to more chances of actually getting hit?
Funnily, that's how I always respond to my friends who look around for meta build on the internet. "Sure, you can remove those Vitality Boost etc if you're good enough."
But of course, they're not good enough to use those set without dying constantly.
@@hazamax2139that's definitely true yeah, but the only problem with that is that the ones who can actually do that reliably and know the monsters entire moveset in and out are speedrunners and most of them are playing solo, TDS the only exception and that's because they're all basically speedrunners and are coordinating... Add with the fact that most speedrunning videos are always runs that are the most perfect one run they get and we never see the countless resets because of rng and AI being stupid
The one big issue is that most of the people that say this aren't even at this level solo or havent put in the amount of practice needed... most likely just followed meta build templates and yet they go into public lobbies with random players with 0 coordination at all, wanting to try out and see how much DMG their meta set can do only to get carted by a stray hit, or the monster deciding to go from one end of the map to that player in an instant
@@Muyshtic Uuuuuh I mean, I'm talking only rise here which is hands down the easiest iteration. I may have the experience of previous games but I've never been a hardcore speedrunner and if anything maybe TU5 Malzeno gave me some problems while I was running dereliction.
You do not need to be at that level in this game. As I said, if the monster doesn't one shot you with a fast-ish attack you are pretty much good. All attacks give you ample chance to get back up, dodge and heal. I genuinenly think defensive skills are not that necessary, especially if you have either a shield in your weapon or a counter.
Right now I'm playing with a friend who had 0 experience with the series. We are at G rank elder dragons and yeah, he's been dying to attacks he doesn't know but so far he's not once questioned defense or other defensive skills tho he's also a bit of a tryhard in that regard in other games.
I combine shielded heavy bowgun, the uragann armor set bonus, and stupidly high defense. You become able to block things you’d never have thought possible. I survived teostra’s supernova due to having that stupidly high of a defense.
I can personally say defense boost 7 is a life saver on taking damage and not carting. I ran the guardian set and maxed out defense along with guard up and wide range... I'm telling you I was tanking big attacks left and right. Made me love that build so much. No lies detected here.
It's funny you mention this topic on defense because Capcom very well knows what the community is doing and saying because in world... Everyone's favorite monster hunter game the provisions manager in astera was poking fun at the community for saying that the attack stats are all that matters in a hunt and nothing else. Calling those people complete idiots for thinking that way but saying it politely.🤣😂 Even the armorer talked briefly about adding some defense in your sets.
Everyone's favorite visually pretty monster hunter game is telling you to try adding some defense in your builds and folks still ignore doing it.
Dayum I should have but some clips of that in my vid...
@@iixxion You can probably stretch the topic to include shields (lance, gunlance, etc.) and how they'd be factored into all this and their associated skills, and there's your new opportunity for those clips :)
I absolutely love this. People are completely clueless when it comes to data interpretation and you're rocking it! Keep on!
Another thing, it's really easy to get defense boost 7, you need just two Decoration slots at MR so a little investment to don't fail the mission.
I've learned to stop listening to math nerds in gaming and focus on what works for "me". As long as I'm not carting and can still output damage without having to stop and pop potions so much, that's a win in my book. Accidents in hunts happen, I never see a pattern, just prepare for what the monsters throw at you.
I'm glad you covered this because I have started playing Lance with defense boost Lv. 6 Guard 3 critical eye. 2. With Garon Dhar 2 Lance which puts my affinity at 40% high rank. There's no guard up charms for me or armor with guard up as of now. My mistake is probably not using the health boost. But the aim is to be tanky. And my Defense is around 430 defense in High Rank 14. I still get carted by Bazelgeuse, Black Diablos, Nergigante and I really love Lance but it's discouraging to get wiped on the floor unless I haven't mastered Lance. It's definitely hard for me.
wearing 3 pieces of uragaan armor should give you guard up in high rank
@@personman446 incorrect. Uragaan Armor has guard, not Guard UP. I've already looked and it made me upset to know if have to probably wait til Master Rank to acquire the ability
@@AaIsForAaliyas wear 3 pieces of it and you get uragaan blessing, which gives guard up
please actually read the comment I make, if a specific piece granted it I wouldn't ask you to put on any 3 pieces, would I?
@@personman446 oh, I actually forgot about that. The last time I think I used the armor set perk was with my old bow build. Thanks for refreshing my memory
I went full tank against the piss off version of Espinas. Zero damage skill. Just pure tank and the life steal skill. My idea was that if I don't cart or heal. I dps the monster. I use GS and the mini barrel trick to get true charge. I was able to kill it. I think it took me between 20 and 15 minutes. I gave up trying the meta sets on reddit and discord. I always die trying to use them. I can kill most monsters between 12 and 20 minutes. If that means I suck I am happy since I always clear. Most importantly, I solo every risen elder. I solo Nergi and beat world ice cat in my second attempt. I even beat Glavenus mhgu during the surprise encounter. I even completed a full set of Behemoth with random people. But because I use defense, I don't know what I am doing according to reddit and discord. I pretty turn off from ever trying to play with others. I always get criticized despite winning. Sorry for the rant. I got kicked for using HH. Apparently, buff are for losers or so mething.
Dude. I used maxed-out defense builds to get me through Rise, AND Sunbreak.
@MrRAGE-md5rj I use them because they are fun.
Always remember
Efficiency over speed
Dude, I feel you on Espinas. It was refreshing to bump my defense lvl. This is why I was so fond of his introduction, even outside of him being a returning monster when we haven't seen in so long
I was confused wwhen they introduced the risens, cuz people wwere carting a lot, and i was also scared... yeah they werent that hard, so i guess it happened the same to me... i just tank and avoid the most i can.
Reminds me of a guy in a MHWI facebook group.
"Why you dont have agitator 7"
Proceeds to play like tumbleweed versus alatreon
This was cool lol. I’m a spreadsheet enjoyer, but as many things I look up online, I add my own deductions. Spreadsheets are indeed for speedrunners which I am not. So I check the most important offensive skills while trying to slot in nice defensive ones. Just like everything online, you gotta use your judgment!
Yep! Can confirm that it's best to add your own deductions. The "meta" information should act as a sort of baseline that anyone can adjust to their personal preferences. It'll add a little homework but it's worth it lol
One other thing I'd like to point out is that def boost lvl 1 is a 1-skot deco isntead of a 2-slot like most other skills . It also has decorations of every single slot size, and the size 4 deco actually gives you 5 ranks of def boost instead of the usual 3 or 4. This makes it extremely easy to sneak def boost into your set by just filling up unnecessary deco slots
It's also technically easier to max out def boost compared to divine blessing. DiBl requires a 4-slot and a 2 slot as its most efficient while DeBo is fine with a 4-slot and two 1-slots
this video is extremely useful, thanks for taking your time to make it. I used to cart in a bow build, so I changed to lance and it immediately shifted me into having defense boost and guard, so I stopped dying. Now with this information, I'm able to make a decently tanky ranged character while I learn the weapon, because I understand defence better, since no one cares about it!
While I definitely agree people who tell others to slot 7 attack boost and peak performance because defense is useless is definitely untrue, this is my own take with Defense Boost:
The issue with Defense Boost is not really that it is ineffective (or that Defense is bad), the issue is more of how much Defense Boost does as a 7 slots skill
Things like Divine Blessing might trigger 0 times in 3 attacks, but it can also trigger 1-3 times if you are lucky, that is just how it works; stun resistance also can be a difference between guarantee cart and not carting at all, and of course evasion skills
These are some defensive/utility skills you can get instead for 7 slots (some dont translate 1-1 due to defense boost being a lvl1 jewel skill but you get the idea):
1) speed eating 3 + quick sheath 3 (1 slot left)
2) divine blessing 3 + elemental resistance 3 (1 slot left)
3) stun resistance + hb3/blight resistance
4) evade window 5 + extender 2 ...
Utility is also a form of defense. Evade skills might allow you to roll through an attack that otherwise is impossible to do (and open up new strategy), resistance is of course amazing if you have the slots, quick sheath might allows you to do a superman dive in time while speed eating might be the difference between carted before you can regen or not.
Defense boost is just very costly at that for a benefit that might or might not get you an extra hit (eg: you can take 1 small + 1 big hit where DB7 is not an extra hit), and damage skill can also be a defense by breaking the monster parts or shorten the fight length (eg: you might be happier with 3 ele resist and 4 crit eye)
Well defense doesn’t matter if u don’t get hit.
Money doesn't matter if you're a billionaire.
@@iixxion fair enough