My overall thoughts are to have the elders show off that they are walking disasters outside of cutscenes so people can keep the mythical elements about them to the extreme.
The only elder that really strongly showed that was amatsu, I don't think every elder needs to show it as monsters like Primordial Mal and Ruiner are elder's as they can take down other elder dragon's
imagine if the elders were once-in-a-blue-moon invaders, but instead of actively interrupting your hunt you can tell they're in the area because of that massive FU storm or some other massive animally, and are more so create an obstacle passively instead of actively, you can take a massive hit and the Kushala wouldn't even notice your presence. it would also be neat to see nergigante invading elder dragon hunts to be a menace to everyone, and the only way to hunt them is through other elder dragon quests. a reward for players who can kill two dragons within the time limit.
@@Ed_man_talking9you’re first point is great but would require a lot to execute well. It may be in wilds in some form. Nergigante not having his own quest would just be frustrating to grind but him seeking out elders especially if they’re almost dead could be cool
@@justinsaunders110 i guess i just wanted to add some challenge to my favorite elder dragon to fight, i might be alone in thinking it would be fun to discover the mystery on how to efficiently farm him instead of just doing a quest without ceremony. at least make your first encounter feel like running into deviljho for the first time, then when you beat the final boss he'll await your challenge like an optional boss, but you can hunt him early if your lucky and skilled enough.
@@justinsaunders110 another mechanic on the nergigante raid i've been brainstorming about is it becomes a race on who can kill and carve the elder dragon first, but i can understand if most people don't want that, at least if it's too challenging for green horns.
i really liked how mhgu had a neopteron as its final boss instead of an overly predictable elder face-off. they should really mix things up more often and suprise people.
If we're going to have the elder dragon endgame in every monster hunter going forward, the vision the developers originally had needs to be preserved. Like you said, they are supposed to be mythical entities with strange powers among the *relatively* grounded creatures. With Wilds seemingly going for unique weather events, I could see new ones being added while Elder Dragons are in the locale. Similarly to how the sky cracks with thunder while Kirin is in the Coral Highlands. Teostra. The Flame King Dragon. It's supposed to be this unrivaled commander of fire, but with even the normal creatures like Anjanath using fire, there needs to be some way to show Teostra is unique. I think the elderseal suppressing an elder's "aura" is a really cool mechanic, but we could take it one step further. Perhaps in Wilds, the stronger an Elder's aura becomes, the more unstable the weather. Streaks of fire and blast particles sweep across the sky, and everything gains a warm tinge of orange. The hunter downs a cool drink to stave off the rising temperature. The particles multiply, and some compress into balls of fire, raining down on all nearby life. Eventually, the particles all spin around Teostra as he raises into the sky. In a few seconds, the temperature skyrockets and a ball of light bellows outward in a violent supernova. I feel this would be a proper revival of an old Elder Dragon, and the only way we can maintain this balance of monster classes. We need to make each Elder Dragon special. I do hope we get more complex hierarchies, with new monsters the likes of Raging Brachydios and Rajang showing their faces. Both would be awesome.
While I don't disagree that Elder Dragons lost their mystique due to oversaturation, I would at least argue that World specifically had a focus on the Elder Crossing, which likely lures many dragons to that land; however, Rise and Sunbreak are less defensable.
I think part of it is that capcom pretty much has to reintroduce many of its elders because they’re often the best and most beloved monsters in the franchise, and as the graphical technology improves, they have the biggest room for awesome new visuals on already fantastic monsters (ie magalas and amatsu). Imagine rise title update 6 where they have an epic shot slowly revealing… Cephadrome!! And while that’s obviously a silly example, something like, say monoblos, could be super cool, especially for older fans, but just will not have the same impact and hype in the fan base as hearing the valstrax theme and seeing the comet. I would love for new monsters to add to other classes of monsters though, ahtal ka is one of the most memorable monsters and one of my favorite final fights. It shows that something doesn’t have to be an elder dragon to be insanely awesome. The whole thing about elder-level threat monsters doesn’t make sense to me. How do people expect an endgame featuring some elder dragons to have less elder dragons but also less elder dragon level monsters? Without fully removing elder dragons that’s not really possible, is it? After all, there will be a phase of the game with elders, and unless it’s all elders, something else fought at that point is inherently on a similar level, and I’m all for it. Ultimately, a new game will be new, and there is nothing wrong with always loving the old ones. The point where it becomes a problem is when you try to hate on them and ruin someone else’s enjoyment of the new instead of just encouraging them to check out the older games cuz they’re super dope and have a feel that just won’t come back because of the power creep inherent to any franchise like this. I started on world and it remains my favorite to this day, but going back and playing through the games before it lends so much more meaning to the later exploits in the series, and they’re such great games. Whatever they do in the future, I’m here for it and ready to enjoy it. I don’t want things to go back to how they used to be because those games will always exist and will always be their own game. If I want that game, I’ll play that game.
I think the saturation comes from the fact that many elders are introduced as special bosses but never return so the devs just make more rather than bring back the old ones
i think besides cutting back the overall numbers maybe giving teo and kush a break may help, they are the poster elders that have been in the most games so maybe running into them everytime we reach the elder dragon part of the game is getting draining
This is a non issue for me. I care about the lore and everything. But I also have never even thought of this being an issue. The only thing I wish MH would do is add more of the less used monster classifications. We need more neopterons and snake wyverns. Outside of that I couldn't care less if they put alot of Elder dragons. I just want cool monster designs and fun fights.
overall i think i agree with your closing statements, to some degree. i feel like the numbers definitely need to be cut back for a while to give some focus to the smaller classes. but i do also feel that due to the abundance of them they are a hit less impactful in a way? like for example, when most of the post-game title updates are elder dragons that ramp up further and further in terms of threat level, it takes away from the previous ones in a way, if that makes sense.
No worries, I get what you are saying. That is a point that is implied somewhat in the video, but one that I didn't fully develop or expand upon due to thinking that part of the script had already gone on for too long. I think ultimately with that it is a matter of DLC execution: there is inevitably going to be powercreep in anything when it continues for a set amount of time, because players will often be expecting harder challenges now that the main story is done with. (I mean just look at base Frontier to Z Zenith, it is insane) DLC provides the opportunity for the devs to be more experimental in their approach, and one of the ways to do that is of course to make things more difficult, or bring back a highly requested elder, or make a unique story for this one monster. You could alternatively choose not to push any boundaries or increase the difficulty, but then that could make the players feel like it is a waste of time. And of course that isn't to say there aren't instances of Elder Dragons that hit different despite the numbers, but it is something that again is dependent on opinion. It's a delicate balance I feel to make sure the previous threat doesn't seem so far outclassed that it is irrelevant, while still making sure players are engaged in the bonus content and can feel the difficulty curve increase. And I mean hey difficulty isn't the only way to keep interest going, you could have a relatively balanced update monster that doesn't blow the final boss out of the water, but provides something else perhaps in its fight, design, gear, or maybe even siege if that's the case that makes it engaging.
@@TheMonarchofDragonsnot new to monster hunter, but new to play myself. I think they shuld make wndgame a tad bit easier. Speaking with only 2 weeks experience. I have been stuck on some DLC end game stuff for a week and I am simply not improving. So I think finding a balance on difficulity and making battles intresting shuld be mandatory. About the elder dragons. The ones like Val hazak, lunastra ETC. I feel like they shuld just call them lesser elder dragons. Mostly due to
here is my 2 cents about "oh they seem to be a lot of Elder Dragon even though they supposed to be rare or mythical creature" first of, list of entry in the encyclopedia doesn't necessarily equate to the actual animal population. you could have a long list of "predators", but predators aren't the most populated class of animal because of eco system. the other thing is these animal are a walking force of nature in the setting. their existence is probably going to affect or worse destroyed some small town or remote village. a survival of said incident might have seen it and report to the guild, or it become rumor. don't forget that there is people who are actively study this class of animal, i don't think it'd be far fetched to discover a new species of Elder Dragon every now and then within the setting.
Monster Hunter Worlds story easily explains away the lore as to why there are so many elder dragons in the new world. Its the reason why the research comission is there in the first place.
I agree that listing off the number of Elder Dragons introduced doesn't really do much to discredit their more modern depictions. Hell, if 20+ Elder Dragons being introduced each gen guarantees that we get more showings like World's Fatalis, then I'm all for it. Numbers alone just means that the franchise is growing, at least to me. What _is_ the problem, imo, isn't even directly tied to the Elder Dragons all that much; at least not to their fights or abilities in a vacuum. For me, the issue is that the power gap between regular monsters and Elders seems to be shrinking or being bridged. I always thought that higher tiered non-Elders like Deviljho were still below proper Elder Dragons in the pecking order, and that even gigathreat rare subspecies like Silver Rathalos and Gold Rathian were at least a decent bit below Elders like Kushala. In Generations, this is notion is actually even officially supported: Deviljho and Silver Rathalos/Gold Rathian are 6-star threat monsters in their Hunter's Note entries, while Kushala and co are 7-star threat monsters. Yet suddenly in World, Deviljho is having DBZ beam clashes and tieing with these Elders - even temporarily overpowering Nergigante, the premire brute strength Elder hunter, in their turf war - and in Rise Kushala is getting punked hard in the Gold Rathian intro (who also somehow climbed up to being a 9-star threat in that game's Hunter's Note vs Kushala's climb to an 8-star threat, a tier which it now shares with Rajang and thus Deviljho). The problem with Elder Dragons then isn't the fault of the Elder Dragons alone. Fighting a dinosaur, then fighting a hurricane is a jump you can feel. But fighting a dinosaur, then fighting a dinosaur that can fight hurricanes, then fighting a hurricane makes the hurricane less impressive for no fault of its own; beings that represent normalcy should not be challenging beings that represent abnormality. There's a reason why Alatreon, Safi, and Fatalis are still very well respected and feared within the MH community. Because a blinged out Rathian isn't flying in and 1v1ing them. Keep Invaders and Rare Subspecies and whatever Espina is in a tier of their own, as the last step _before_ facing Elders (excluding Kirin), and the whole perception of Elder Dragons will change in a heartbeat back to how it was pre-5th Gen. If they want to have a non-Elder fight some Elder Dragons, Akantor and Ukanlos are right there, and have been there since Gen 2.
As some who started with world and then went and played gen u I’d much rather have deviljho and rajang able to go toe to toe with elders it makes them far more fun than if they scaled them back. I mean he supposed to eat kirin horns
Monsters on par with elders have always existed, they’ve just never been able to show that they were until fairly recently thanks to turf wars and such. That being said, I do agree that Elders have been feeling like they’re much weaker than they are in more in more recent games, and having the repel mechanic removed doesn’t help IMO.
Espinas is capable of defeating Kushala and actually did because Kusa is weak to poison and Espinas is incredibly armored. The term Elder Dragon is nothing more than a classification. Nothing more. Large monsters have always been capable of hanging with Elder Dragons. It’s just that their depiction hasn’t been well as shown until turf wars
While I personally didn't care for rise/sunbreak, the one thing I can give that entry respect for is is reviving an old beef nearly 23 years in the making. Seeing a Zinogre throw hands with Amatsu was a sight to behold. And speaking of Amatsu, for wilds I want to see Elder dragons that haven't been used return while scaling back already used ones, as well as see other monster types get more addition while bring back older ones. Bring back the giant enemy crab, Shen Gaoren.
What if Capcom creates a cataclismic event that erases those extra elder dragons? For example, the legend of Fatalis states that "when the world is full of wyverns, the legend is reborn". At the time, many dragons were called wyverns (including Fatalis), so you can interprete this legend as "When the world is full of dragons, Fatalis is reborn". Since we canonicaly kill Fatalis in MHW Iceborn, they could bring him back as Crimson Fatalis, who in a fit of rage destroys many elder dragons in his path as he tries to destroy mankind. It would fulfill his prophecy, recognize the old info that states he can regenerate from death and cut some of the elder dragons.
Perhaps yeah in the sense of the world, but in the game sense variants and Risens have separate entries in the notebook generally, and I mainly used the MH Wiki when it came to counting up all the Elders both in mainline and spinoffs. I was not going to make the total different just due to a few technical specificities, when this is being as broad as possible. Hope you understand.
@@TheMonarchofDragons Idk, that still doesn't change that they're the same monster just recolored or tweaked, they're not new monsters. Which also makes me think that if we're gonna talk about how many Elders were introduced in a game it's not fair to include the already existing ones, and that also counts for the variants, because again, they're not new monsters, it's still the same thing even if you make it shoot black poop instead of brown poop.
@@strateks9611 We will just agree to disagree. I did my video as broadly defined as possible with the count, while you and others don’t count variants or Risens because they are too similar. You have your opinion, and I have mine with how I conducted my video. That’s just the way it goes.
I think it's mostly because of the fact that the jump to HD made Capcom reduce the amount of monster categories in World. The vast majority are dinos and dragons. Gone are leviathans and insects. So it made sense that they'd put in more monsters with Teostra's skeleton. As for Rise, I don't really think the Risen count as unique monsters. They're just deviants except deviants aren't allowed outside of Generations.
With greater understanding and more research comes the opportunity to re-evaluate one's classification systems, and since the number of Elder Dragons seems to be growing rapidly, perhaps a more granular classification now makes more sense.
Personally, i find the 5th gen issue with Elders is in the game's story progression. I always like to look at how 4U treated Rust Kushala compared to how the 5th Gen treats Kushala. In 4U, it is treated as a dangerous threat that you spend a part of the campaign preparing defenses for all because it is predicted path is going to have it head through the town. In 5th Gen, Kushala just shows up and are easily dispatched by the hunter as a part of the main story. IMO, Elders that aren't intrinsically tied to the main story should be used as post-game challenge content, like how in the old games you rarely meet any Elders outside of the single player boss and/or flagship monster during the course of the main story, other Elders are saved for after the main story is done or just relegated to Multiplayer Hub (which is more for gameplay focus than story focus so the narrative is played more loosely).
In terms of the elders, one of the key components that makes them feel repetitive is the fact that they keep coming back in several of the games the gen 2 trio especially feels like they've been used way too much. I've fought every main series version of Kushala Daora (the base one) and it ranges to complete bullshit at worst, and mildly entertaining at best. the reason Gog and Shara feel so awesome is because they are a 1 time thing/ exclusive to 1 point in 1 game, so it feels more important as a monster. They also had little to no buildup/prior knowledge even compared to other elders, which makes the initial shock value even greater I hope we get a new MH game where there's only 1 elder dragon, but it's important, powerful, and shocking enough to not only be a memorable boss fight, but the initial impact to continue and remain unaffected after multiple rematches.
So what will fill the gap that elders leave in difficulty? I can think of rajang zinogre magnamalo and deviljho as replacements but they already feature in 5th gen quite extensively maybe a Lagiacrus variant?
I think the issue is that "Elder Dragon" is treated as a biological category rather than a tier of significance. You'd run into the same issue if you compared "Small Monsters" or "Endemic Life" to any single class of monster (Except Winged Wyvern). I also see counting different versions of the same Elder Dragon a little unfair as most are just the same monster with bigger numbers & maybe new moves. You'd end up with a whole lot more monsters if you treated Low, High, & Master Rank versions of non-Elder Dragons as completely separate entries, balancing out the ratios somewhat Personally, if I would say there's a problem with Elder Dragons, it would be that a lot are carried over with no in-story justification for them to be there. (Flagship monsters have the same problem) The Magala line should have had it's own side story for why it was in Elgato & the Elder Trio should have as well for Kamura. The reason Elder Dragons feel less special & overpopulated is become about half of them are just there as fanservice & to pad out the roster.
@@strateks9611 I completely forgot to get back to this, I'm sorry. What I meant was that the lore treats Elder Dragons as mythical creatures that don't fit into any other category, while the games themselves treat "Elder Dragon" as a rank of monster. Outside of subspecies, Elder Dragons have nothing to do with each other & are only grouped together out of convenience. This leads to a bloated, disconnected category that only gets worse if you add in their alt versions
I love Elder Dragons, but I wish they would take the focus off them and put it more on the "Regular" monsters. I liked how in the 1st - 4th gen games, you would establish this kind of Rivalry with the flagship monster, like Tigrex, Lagiacrus, Zinogre, and Gore Magala, and that would be the focus for the majority of the Story. But it seems like in fifth gen everything is "Elder Dragon This!" or "Elder Dragon that!" it's like the comparison you made with Pokemon, there's an Elder Dragon for everything. I think what would help is if they limit the number of elder dragons in future games, maybe between like 4-6.
I think the elder dragon explosion in 5th gen might be due to the new engine and how much this class in particular allows the devs to experiment with the combat without having to worry about biology and scientific explanations. The same thing happened in Frontier. And it's also a bit funny because monsters like seething bazelgeuse, regular and scorned magnamalo, violet mizutsune, raging brachydios and many other heavily experimental non elder dragon monsters also exist in this generation.
6:48 I mean, you are kind of forgetting the fact that the playerbase, especially the English speaking playerbase, jumped up by a massive amount in generation 5. So there's also just way more people to be bitching about shit that's not a real problem. And especially for World it made sense for there to be a lot of elder dragons because the whole game was about you investigating why all these elder dragons were all going to the on place all the time. And if we compare World and Rise seperately the number looks way less extreme. Rise only really introducing a handful of new elders again and only bringing back a few which have been established as near universal staples on-par with the raths. (I am counting Narwa and Ibushi as a single one here btw, because those are too much of a package deal to not)
I personally think there's a few things that could be done to make elder dragons feel powerful against 1st off they should take a break in terms of getting lots of new members in 6th gen, I don't monde them coming back to beef out the roster just stop shoving more new ones everywhere for a bit 2. Bring back the repel mechanic from 2nd gen, it doesn't need to be a forced 7 hunt slug, just something that's possible to hunt them over a couple quests, as long as it's still possible to kill them in 1 go this is fine 3. Make the game harder at base line and bring hunter power down and that will be default make elders powerful and scary 4. Give them frontiers extreme blights to show that they are well above the average wyvern in thier elemental power, would also go a good way to helping the difficulty problem
To me it’s more along the lines of demystifying them to an extent. They might be extremely powerful monsters, but just like all the others, they’re still monsters. They’re all animals at the end of the day. And it makes sense for a classification as powerful and successful ecologically as elder dragons to be as numerous as they are.
The very thing that makes an Elder Dragon, well, an Elder Dragon, is being an outlier to anything seen in normal monsters, their mysticism, rarity and impact on the environment is what makes them, otherwise Magnamalo would be an elder too. They also serve a purpose to make monsters like rathalos seem more grounded, which is not so effective when you make Elders so common, Elders end up themselves not feeling special, which in turn just makes normal monsters look boring. Demystifying them damages the fantasy aspect of the game while also affecting the more grounded aspects of the game by literally just rationalizing and agglomerating them. Either way, it's dumb to complain about this, MHW's ENTIRE story is literally built around elder dragons, I REALLY, REALLY doubt that wilds will have that many Elders. Rise barely introduced NEW Elders and just gave older ones a reskin. And with the new technology we have it's really simple to make Elders feel special again. Yk how Elders are classified? Just make them do what they're supposed to be doing to the environment, we have the technology to make it happen and it will truly level Elders to their old status as mystic creatures.
The fact that there are a lot of species, doesn’t mean that they’re not rare. The population of each elder is limited and probably hard to find in lore.
Ain't nobody talking about that to begin with. Not to mention that it literally doesn't matter if there's 2 Kirin left in lore, when you play the game you'll be able to slay infinite amounts of Kirin, so even if we considered this, it wouldn't matter. No one is discussing how it affects the lore of the series, the problem is how the amount of Elders present in later games changes the perception people have on Elders.
An issue many elder dragons share is the sameness, the Gen 2 trio (Kushala Daora, Teostra and Chameleos) all share the same body type, and there have been thrown out till tedium. I even say Velkhana feels too much like a Kushala if it wasn´t for its moveset. That´s why I think Ceadeus and Dalamadur feel more memorable, because there aren´t just another Kushala clone, and why many didn´t like how Safi´Jiiva end looking just like an european dragon. They should make elder dragons much more different to each other, or just show up much more less.
Honestly I don't mind Elder Dragons. I like a lot of the newly introduced ones in World and Iceborne. However, I personally think that some variations to the quest design would be great: have more Elder Dragons have shortened (maybe even longer?) questimers like e.g. Fatalis - that fight is still incredibly frantic and difficult for me, even with full fati gear. I would also like repels to be a thing again, so that the hunter doesn't just kill every Elder the moment they fight it the first time. Maybe also alternative objectives for the intro quests of Elders like just having to survive for ten minutes while an Elder is around/raging, survey sudden damage to the environment/map or again just repelling it from a trading route. I think some Elder Dragon quests should be more of an event that affects the world, especially since the new games seem to focus more on that aspect.
Tbh I was a little dissapointed when Rajang returned in iceborne and its ecology was centered around hunting and eating Kirin. Kirin in my head was supposed to be a powerful, almost untouchable spirit of lightning, so being regular prey of a big monkey felt wrong. On further reflection though, it made more sense. The elders are flesh and blood (maybe a bit of magic too) at the end of the day. A kirin would still be devestating too nearly all non elders, but Rajangs lightining resistance makes sense as a match up. As I say to Tierzoo fans, there is also more then ecology than power rankings.
That whole ecology aspect of Rajang is not new tho, so it's not like it's now just happening that Elders are somehow being dethroned, we just can now see it, elder level monsters were always elder level monsters.
One big problem is how saturated endgame is with them, when the main stories usually have you hunting one or two personally. For endgame, i want Elder dragons to have more equivalent, Non-elder dragons that are on the same level like Deviljho or Rajang.
I don't know how other people felt about it, but I loved the endgame of base Rise before they added more elder dragons. With there being only 2 elder dragons (and those 2 not really being that useful for their armor if I remember correctly) it felt like almost every monster was useful. Instead of it being all Elder Dragons and EDL monsters with the occasional regular monster's piece of gear.
I have a tank that's either going to be incredibly hot to you or ice cold. But It makes sense why so many elder dragons popped up, especially in worlds. The elder dragons are monsters that don't have an explanation for how they use their powers It's simply an animal they don't understand yet. And when you find a new continent, there's going to be a lot of new animals that you have no understanding of yet. I would say that future generations should take some of the monsters that were considered elder dragons and reclassify them with time. They would show that the guilds gaining knowledge as well as actually making progress in their studies. I do think there are a few that should stay as elder dragons like flagship elder dragons, final bosses, and the Kaiju ones but any elder dragon that's not introduced as a god of the environment they're in can and should be reclassified at some point
My only specific issue with EDs is that they've lost the gravitas of their presence in the 5th gen games and have become normal monsters. This is only in regard to the non-colossal EDs i.e. Teostra, Kushala. The ones you can measure a length record for and fight in normal maps. It started specifically with Iceborne and they lost their presence fully in Rise and Sunbreak. I started with the gen 2 games. When you accepted an ED quest then the maps would be completely devoid of monsters except for maybe a Vespoid in some zones in certain maps. This was explained in lore as all the monsters fleeing the area as they do not want to be near EDs. A great depiction of this was made in the Legends of the Guild movie. The repel mechanic they had really made their fights personal. It was you versus one specific individual. You made a powerful creature go on the run and you were pinpointing their location in order to finally corner them. You could also "identify" them in a sense by the scars (part breaks) you left on them. Only Loa and Kirin didn't have repelling mechanic. 3rd gen was a really exclusive club for EDs. All of them were a special occasion and it happened in arena maps. Only normal Ceadeus retained the old repel mechanic. 4th gen was somewhat odd. While the repel victory condition was still there for the non-colossal EDs you would never see that individual again in a repeat quest. They sort of wanted you clear it one go. Getting a repel is sort of a half failure. With 5th Gen World did a great job in giving them presence at the start. You saw affects their presence had like heat waves you see in the air if a Teostra or Lunastra was present. Val Hazaak was the first standard ED in which non-ED monsters would be present alongside it, but that was its gimmick to show it could infect and absorb the Effluvium from them. That and the Effluvium does also make small monsters rabid as well. The repel mechanic is also gone unless it's a story beat. Then Iceborne came. Sometimes small monsters could be present alongside all EDs but they could also appear alongside one other Large non-ED monster. Rise then took away all their gravitas and they became normal monsters. Small monsters would be present and not run away from them, and they will also always appear with 2 other Large monsters.
I'd love to see something like Velkhana just freezing EVERYTHING around her by just walking around in Wilds, like what happens in World but taken to the "extreme", said extreme being what they're supposed to do to begin with.
I honestly don't get what ppl are complaining about, this is not like in pokemon where they feel obligated to put every existing mon in to the new game, some of the elder have not seen the light of day again since they debute. And in universe, this only shows the advancements of hunting since one of the main goal of the hunter guild is to safely keep track of and discover the existence of world threatening monsters such as the elder dragons. So it still make sense in game that we see more of them and less of bird wyvern.
I haven’t watched the whole video yet, but it feels like elder dragons have a similar problem to legendary pokemon - most of them are in every game since introduction, and with the growing numbers they take up more roster slots as time goes on (since they are so popular). A palkia caught in sw/sh doesn’t feel nearly as significant as catching one at Spear Pillar, and doesn’t feel quite as special now there’s 66 legendaries to catch across the series. Similarly, fighting gore Magala in a plot which doesn’t revolve around the frenzy, or Kushala Daora for the 50th time since dos removes the mystique these elders once had, and the once-rare or unusual becomes predictable and commonplace. EDIT: you covered it! Glad I wasn’t alone in thinking of this comparison!
New to the series, Currently only played MHW and have only just gotten to the End game of the original game so the first 6 dragons are what I've faced. My issue with the Elder Dragons I've seen from that game is that you have 5 of them thrown at you in the end. The narration from the game wasn't even telling you to hunt them but the commander telling others to hunt them only for you to be the one to go after them all. After Nergigante, I would've preferred you only be tasked with finding one and then the task of hunting the others be unlocked under special conditions: The Huntsman hunting the Flaming Chimera like Elder Dragon would've been better if you ran into him and "competed" in hunting it down with him (though I know... this game didn't have AI hunters but giving scripted hunts like with Pickle would've been nice. Imagine the Huntsman helping you in the fight by setting up explosives or hoping onto its back to distract it as though another player were doing it). For the Ancient Forest Tornado Dragon, end up finding a wounded ally, maybe the other A-list hunter's handler you've met at the beginning of the game. She doesn't appear on the map but has a green dot above her head as a clue that someone is nearby and when you do find her, she asks you to look for her Hunter, and after looking for clues, you find him facing off against the wind dragon inside the giant tree leading up to the Wyvern nest only for both of you to be thrown outside the tree through the hole and sent to another zone entirely, where the battle ends up ensuing (continuing considering he was already fighting it). You and your handler were tasked with the Undead Dragon so looking for it would've been your task for the story mission. No real complaints honestly other than making fighting it optional as it is doing as it's supposed to and remaining in its habitat. (to which, honestly they all were so -1 for the narrative from the commander on forcing you to face the dragons that aren't disturbing the peace) Then after all that, you face the last boss who is a giant laser shooting infant. Nothing to hate about that fight. It was the longest of the elder dragon fights but was also not as difficult as it could've been. Still haven't fainted against him but I can see where the challenge is if you don't start with the hands to knock him off balance. As for the overpopulation of Elder Dragons, area specific ones makes sense, especially if the narrative is reasonable like Nergigante being an Elder Dragon that eats Elder Dragons, finding one of the biggest land walkers alive to be heading for his final resting place as the main plot of the entire story. What isn't good is cramming in as many legendaries into a game just so people can play your game more to "collect all 10,000!"
To add on to the Multi-Mission Elder Dragon Sieges, I think they should make the four mission four phases. I watched the video where he mentions the Bug that was originally underwhelming before stunning him with the second phase as it showed why it got the name "Walking Fortress." But for something like world, it should be a decision to continue the hunt in a new area with new mechanics due to its desperation making it pull up a new bag of tricks and revealing trump cards that has given it's classification as a threat among all others, an apex predator like no other.
Elder Dragons lost the mythical status the moment they were treated like everyother slay quest be readily avaible. As dumb as it sounded Elder dragons were capable of being repelled if not enough damage was done to kille them and retain the damage done to them in the next quest where they can most likely be slain, course if you're properly geared you can kill them outright. But the quest were only 30 minutes long. This gave those quest and subsequently the elder dragons the feeling of true unnatural diasaster urgency.
In my opinion, i would like to see more members added to other category’s such as fanged beasts, carapaceons and etc because outside of flying wyverns the elder dragons I’m pretty sure are second place for most members in it’s category. And to me this dampens their mystical property’s simply due to the amount of elders we have. Another would also be taking a break from elder dragon and elder teir flagships because we had them back to back to back. We had valstrax, then nergi, then velkhana, then we had magnamalo who was elder teir and then now we have melzeno. I think a non-elder dragon or elder dragon teir monster flag ship is very much needed more than ever to strike a balance.
@@justinsaunders110 well, I’m finding it kinda boring that we got five elder teir monsters in a row. Not saying their bad it’s just that i would like to break the mold a bit. But if you fancy having the next flagship that powerful then thats all good and perfectly fine.
I think Elder Dragons won’t be as numerous in number as in World. Worlds story is directly about the Elder Dragons as a classification themselves and the elder crossing. It makes sense to see so many elders considering we are following them at the time when they are all migrating. I feel they may tone it back in Wilds.
I'd say, while yes, the Elder Dragon classification can be seen as bloated, I believe it still works because of how "often" some of these dragons show up. Lao Shan Lung only appeared in the first couple generations, and only returned for a final hurrah in GU, most of the dragons in the new world stayed in the new world. Ceadeus, Goldbeard, and the Mohrans stayed in the 3rd gen and the first half of the 4th gen. Shah and regular Dalamadur stays in 4U and so on so forth. Because some of these are exclusive to certain games, with some of them only having canonically one of their species that end up being wiped out for the time being. Only a few of these Elder Dragons end up appearing more than once, usually being the trio originating in gen 2, Kirin, and only recently, Shagaru Magala, due to the appearance in 4U, GU, and Sunbreak, and Fatalis, due to appearances in gen 1, 2, 4, and Iceborne. So while the total amount that exist is technically "bloated," it shouldn't really matter unless more than half of these dragons show up in one game.
I still don't get why Nergigante is an Elder Dragon, like compared to other Elders like Kirin, Amatsu, Ibushi, Narwa, Nakarkos or Gogmazios, what does Nergigante do? Like the classification of Elder Dragon is supposed to be for the unique, mysterious and powerful monsters but Nergigante just feels mundane, I didn't play World just to be clear but Nergigante feels like it could've been a normal class of monster, same with ones like Namielle, Vaal Hazak, Velkhana, and Malzeno and also maybe Kulve Taroth too. Like take Akantor and Unkanlos they're not Elder Dragons despite having specialized arenas, they're Flying Wyverns (despite not having wings or any means to fly, tbh they should probably be reclassified as Brute Wyverns) Edit: Xeno'jiva should've been classified as a ??? class like Gore Magala.
Elder Dragon is a size fits all category essentially: if it can't be placed into any other category via lineage, has a huge effect on the ecosystem and its monsters, and has an air of power/mystery then it is an Elder. With Nergigante in particular, though he has no elemental or weather capabilities, his sheer strength and brutality alone is enough to make him a reliable menace to Elder Dragons. Combine that with his healing factor and he can reliably beat down and pursue Elders, taking their punishment and dishing it back tenfold. The game explains that he has a diet mainly consisting of Elder Dragons; though that is due to the huge amounts of Bioenergy they contain, and his rampage across the Elder's Recess is causing Elders like Teostra and Kushala to move out. The Official Complete Works Book goes into further detail on his first discovery, explaining that he was sighted during the first and second fleets expedition to the New World, chasing down a Kushala and Teostra respectively. It isn't until the events of the game that he is properly documented and classified. Same thing goes with Kulve Taroth: who appeared when the first fleet washed up on the New World, but hadn't been seen since. In terms of the others to make it short: Kulve - First sighting as already mentioned; manages and/or has a role in the Caverns Of El Dorado thanks to magnetism powers over gold. Vaal Hazaak - Manages the Effluvium levels in the Vale (bacteria responsible for decomposition), and in the rare instances when a Vaal moves out of the Vale massively alters the ecosystem. This is mainly shown with the Blackveil variant, who carries the Effluvia into the Ancient Forest thanks to the spores growing on it, causing a temporary take over while it is still there. Velkhana - Elder Dragon that existed only in fairy tales up until Iceborne, supercooled water allows it tremendous control over the cold. Namielle - Able to cause floods in the generally dry, high altitude Coral Highlands. Malzeno - A weird case considering Primordial's existence and the emphasis on story rather than anything ecological. But we know in the lore that Malzeo drove back Gaismagorm back when it was first trying to surface, and it is clearly a powerful enough force that the Qurio form a symbiosis with the species, and are determined to have that back when we encounter the Primordial in Sunbreak. Aka and Uka are weird in that they have vestigial wing structures located in their front legs, which tie them directly to pseudo-flying wyverns like Nargacuga and Tigrex, hence why they are classified as such and not Elder Dragons (despite being Elder Level). And in regards to Xeno ehhhh perhaps, but I have to think on how Xeno grows due to the influx of Bioenergy from Elders within the Everstream, and is the one manipulating the Elder Crossing in the first place. Many of its development notes have the idea basis to be a "Emperor Of Elders", and even if it was a ??? in our first encounter, the report by the Guild immediately afterwards, and its direct evolution into Safi'jiiva in Iceborne places it into an Elder Dragon. Whereas with Gore a recent lore note in Sunbreak claims another reason for its ??? status could be that it has genetic material owing to other monsters, making it a weird hodgepodge that while has a lineage, can't directly be put into one category because it is all jumbled up. I say all this in mind knowing that I'm not really that big of an ecology or lore nerd with the series. I'm not one to obsess over it, and honestly think that some things within the series just aren't worth it to think too hard on, especially when it comes to certain aspects of the world. Ultimately this comment here is to just divulge some info from the games and books the best I can since you seemed confused about classifications (which is understandable). If you need any more info or people to ask: I do recommend following BannedLagiacrus on Twitter, as well as getting yourself copies of "The Official Complete Works" Monster Hunter World book, or any of the other Monster Hunter Illustrations. Banned is a reputable source who spends a lot of time digging through in-game information and books, translating various lore details people may not know, and the books are your best source for getting both in-universe information, concept art, and statements from the developers. Hope this helps! twitter.com/BannedDino www.barnesandnoble.com/w/monster-hunter-viz-media/1137330342 www.amazon.com/Monster-Hunter-Illustrations-2-Capcom/dp/1772940860
@@TheMonarchofDragons I mean I don't think any of the Elder Dragons should be reclassed or anything, what's done is done, I just mean in a meta sense some of the Elder Dragons don't give off the same feeling as other Elder Dragons and they feel more arbitrary, and we've seen Elder Dragon tier monsters before that aren't classed as Elder Dragons like Akantor and Ukanlos, Deviljho, Shen Gaoren, Ahtal-Kha, Bazelgeus, all deviants and rare species like Molten Tigrex and Abyssal Lagiacrus, even Magnamalo will turf war with Elder Dragons in Rise and I believe mostly ends in draws so it feels like (specifically in World) the developers just made the powerful endgame monsters Elder Dragons to make them feel special rather than because they *needed* to be Elder Dragons, like more of a "tell don't show" kind of Elder Dragon
Monster Hunter Frontier went out of its way to interpret Elder Dragons as unstoppable godlike monsters that’s capable of destruction on a scale that’s world ending especially when you fight them and made them feel special and all powerful, but to be fair Frontier went over the top on alot of monsters. I will admit they don’t feel as special anymore due to that oversaturation.
I don't think it's fair to include Risen version to the count. They're just basically the same elders, just improved. You don't include all anomaly version of regular monsters to the count, do you? Also since in World, some MR monsters replace their HR version, it doesn't feel like we have too much elder dragons. Basically Ruiner is just MR Nergigante, or Blackveiled is just MR Vaal Hazak.
To be fair, the Elder Dragon bloat might be helped if 19 of them weren't snakes, whales, octopus, and whatever the fuck gaismagorm is. Like, just classifying those differently would help a ton
I’m fine with the increase in elders, though maybe slow it down a little, as long as they are unique. Now, obviously they should be unique, but what i mean is, well, we have never really gotten another kirin have we? Besides oroshi, kirin is still very unique and stands out a lot even though its one of the *original* elders. So, make more like it, not the fight, that can go to hell, but basically we should have a mix of dragons, weird dragons, and not dragons. Dragons is obvious, i mean elder *dragon* , but they should still have unique abilities. Weird dragons as in say, the serpents, or unique skeleton use like what valstrax does with the gore skeleton or snake dragons like dalamadur, or the morhans with whale bodies, not just more upright dragons like kushala or teo. Then, not dragons, also self-explanatory, but there has been a significant decrease of elder dragons that aren’t dragons. Theres really only two that count: yama tsukami and nakarkos, both squids and clearly not dragons or even cephalopod-shaped dragons, so basically elders that clearly are not dragons but are still classified as so because of some factor of their biology or power. It is a damn shame that we only have two of this concept of an elder dragon and definitely need more, they make for great final boss material if capcom decides to not go the athal-ka or standard elder route.
I don’t think Elder Dragons were ruined, perhaps demystified but that is not neccesary a bad thing. Lore-wise i don't anything was ruined, the fact that they're so important to the ecosystem made them just as mystical as old-games, not so mysterious. It's like when we discover for the 1st time what the real Kraken look like, the myth is killed.....But the fear and respect of such a powerful animal remain. Although the way EDs were portrayed in questlines is MUCH more insulting, there's not the panic or urgent feel related to it. No event, no difference with other powerful monsters.
as a bow main who just got started with rise i absolutely DESPISE kushala and teostra because their gimmicks literally punish you for maining ranged weapons
Maybe not introduce so many Elder Dragons in Wilds. Come up with just a few then bring the classics that sort of blend with the new ones and the biomes of the new game. Even as a way to re-introduce monsters who have only ever been in one game prior.
7:56 okay so people are literally just complaining because they don't actually know what Elder Dragons are lol. this isn't a "too many elder dragons" issue, this is a "explain the lore better" issue
Idk I don’t play mh for the lore so what a monster is defined as doesn’t really matter to me. They could have called fatalis from iceborne a bird wyvern and it wouldn’t have affected my enjoyment of the fight at all, I would of been like oh I can capture him since it’s not an elder dragon.
They're the worst part of the game... which doesn't make them bad necessarily. But they are an inferior experience to the early and mid game when most of your tools and options still work because the monsters don't have "muh human intelligence".
My overall thoughts are to have the elders show off that they are walking disasters outside of cutscenes so people can keep the mythical elements about them to the extreme.
The only elder that really strongly showed that was amatsu, I don't think every elder needs to show it as monsters like Primordial Mal and Ruiner are elder's as they can take down other elder dragon's
imagine if the elders were once-in-a-blue-moon invaders, but instead of actively interrupting your hunt you can tell they're in the area because of that massive FU storm or some other massive animally, and are more so create an obstacle passively instead of actively, you can take a massive hit and the Kushala wouldn't even notice your presence. it would also be neat to see nergigante invading elder dragon hunts to be a menace to everyone, and the only way to hunt them is through other elder dragon quests. a reward for players who can kill two dragons within the time limit.
@@Ed_man_talking9you’re first point is great but would require a lot to execute well. It may be in wilds in some form. Nergigante not having his own quest would just be frustrating to grind but him seeking out elders especially if they’re almost dead could be cool
@@justinsaunders110 i guess i just wanted to add some challenge to my favorite elder dragon to fight, i might be alone in thinking it would be fun to discover the mystery on how to efficiently farm him instead of just doing a quest without ceremony. at least make your first encounter feel like running into deviljho for the first time, then when you beat the final boss he'll await your challenge like an optional boss, but you can hunt him early if your lucky and skilled enough.
@@justinsaunders110 another mechanic on the nergigante raid i've been brainstorming about is it becomes a race on who can kill and carve the elder dragon first, but i can understand if most people don't want that, at least if it's too challenging for green horns.
i really liked how mhgu had a neopteron as its final boss instead of an overly predictable elder face-off. they should really mix things up more often and suprise people.
If we're going to have the elder dragon endgame in every monster hunter going forward, the vision the developers originally had needs to be preserved. Like you said, they are supposed to be mythical entities with strange powers among the *relatively* grounded creatures.
With Wilds seemingly going for unique weather events, I could see new ones being added while Elder Dragons are in the locale. Similarly to how the sky cracks with thunder while Kirin is in the Coral Highlands.
Teostra. The Flame King Dragon. It's supposed to be this unrivaled commander of fire, but with even the normal creatures like Anjanath using fire, there needs to be some way to show Teostra is unique. I think the elderseal suppressing an elder's "aura" is a really cool mechanic, but we could take it one step further. Perhaps in Wilds, the stronger an Elder's aura becomes, the more unstable the weather. Streaks of fire and blast particles sweep across the sky, and everything gains a warm tinge of orange. The hunter downs a cool drink to stave off the rising temperature. The particles multiply, and some compress into balls of fire, raining down on all nearby life. Eventually, the particles all spin around Teostra as he raises into the sky. In a few seconds, the temperature skyrockets and a ball of light bellows outward in a violent supernova.
I feel this would be a proper revival of an old Elder Dragon, and the only way we can maintain this balance of monster classes. We need to make each Elder Dragon special. I do hope we get more complex hierarchies, with new monsters the likes of Raging Brachydios and Rajang showing their faces. Both would be awesome.
There’s a good chance this will be in wilds in some form. It just a question of how in-depth it will be
While I don't disagree that Elder Dragons lost their mystique due to oversaturation, I would at least argue that World specifically had a focus on the Elder Crossing, which likely lures many dragons to that land; however, Rise and Sunbreak are less defensable.
I think part of it is that capcom pretty much has to reintroduce many of its elders because they’re often the best and most beloved monsters in the franchise, and as the graphical technology improves, they have the biggest room for awesome new visuals on already fantastic monsters (ie magalas and amatsu). Imagine rise title update 6 where they have an epic shot slowly revealing… Cephadrome!! And while that’s obviously a silly example, something like, say monoblos, could be super cool, especially for older fans, but just will not have the same impact and hype in the fan base as hearing the valstrax theme and seeing the comet.
I would love for new monsters to add to other classes of monsters though, ahtal ka is one of the most memorable monsters and one of my favorite final fights. It shows that something doesn’t have to be an elder dragon to be insanely awesome. The whole thing about elder-level threat monsters doesn’t make sense to me. How do people expect an endgame featuring some elder dragons to have less elder dragons but also less elder dragon level monsters? Without fully removing elder dragons that’s not really possible, is it? After all, there will be a phase of the game with elders, and unless it’s all elders, something else fought at that point is inherently on a similar level, and I’m all for it. Ultimately, a new game will be new, and there is nothing wrong with always loving the old ones. The point where it becomes a problem is when you try to hate on them and ruin someone else’s enjoyment of the new instead of just encouraging them to check out the older games cuz they’re super dope and have a feel that just won’t come back because of the power creep inherent to any franchise like this. I started on world and it remains my favorite to this day, but going back and playing through the games before it lends so much more meaning to the later exploits in the series, and they’re such great games.
Whatever they do in the future, I’m here for it and ready to enjoy it. I don’t want things to go back to how they used to be because those games will always exist and will always be their own game. If I want that game, I’ll play that game.
I think the saturation comes from the fact that many elders are introduced as special bosses but never return so the devs just make more rather than bring back the old ones
i think besides cutting back the overall numbers maybe giving teo and kush a break may help, they are the poster elders that have been in the most games so maybe running into them everytime we reach the elder dragon part of the game is getting draining
Teo is fun though. You can cut kush
This is a non issue for me. I care about the lore and everything. But I also have never even thought of this being an issue. The only thing I wish MH would do is add more of the less used monster classifications. We need more neopterons and snake wyverns. Outside of that I couldn't care less if they put alot of Elder dragons. I just want cool monster designs and fun fights.
overall i think i agree with your closing statements, to some degree. i feel like the numbers definitely need to be cut back for a while to give some focus to the smaller classes. but i do also feel that due to the abundance of them they are a hit less impactful in a way? like for example, when most of the post-game title updates are elder dragons that ramp up further and further in terms of threat level, it takes away from the previous ones in a way, if that makes sense.
No worries, I get what you are saying. That is a point that is implied somewhat in the video, but one that I didn't fully develop or expand upon due to thinking that part of the script had already gone on for too long. I think ultimately with that it is a matter of DLC execution: there is inevitably going to be powercreep in anything when it continues for a set amount of time, because players will often be expecting harder challenges now that the main story is done with. (I mean just look at base Frontier to Z Zenith, it is insane) DLC provides the opportunity for the devs to be more experimental in their approach, and one of the ways to do that is of course to make things more difficult, or bring back a highly requested elder, or make a unique story for this one monster. You could alternatively choose not to push any boundaries or increase the difficulty, but then that could make the players feel like it is a waste of time. And of course that isn't to say there aren't instances of Elder Dragons that hit different despite the numbers, but it is something that again is dependent on opinion. It's a delicate balance I feel to make sure the previous threat doesn't seem so far outclassed that it is irrelevant, while still making sure players are engaged in the bonus content and can feel the difficulty curve increase. And I mean hey difficulty isn't the only way to keep interest going, you could have a relatively balanced update monster that doesn't blow the final boss out of the water, but provides something else perhaps in its fight, design, gear, or maybe even siege if that's the case that makes it engaging.
@@TheMonarchofDragonsnot new to monster hunter, but new to play myself.
I think they shuld make wndgame a tad bit easier. Speaking with only 2 weeks experience. I have been stuck on some DLC end game stuff for a week and I am simply not improving. So I think finding a balance on difficulity and making battles intresting shuld be mandatory.
About the elder dragons. The ones like Val hazak, lunastra ETC. I feel like they shuld just call them lesser elder dragons. Mostly due to
@@trueredpanda1538 everything you just said I disagree with
@@trueredpanda1538elder dragons already have a hierarchy the normal elders, the siege elder, and the black dragons.
here is my 2 cents about "oh they seem to be a lot of Elder Dragon even though they supposed to be rare or mythical creature"
first of, list of entry in the encyclopedia doesn't necessarily equate to the actual animal population. you could have a long list of "predators", but predators aren't the most populated class of animal because of eco system.
the other thing is these animal are a walking force of nature in the setting. their existence is probably going to affect or worse destroyed some small town or remote village. a survival of said incident might have seen it and report to the guild, or it become rumor. don't forget that there is people who are actively study this class of animal, i don't think it'd be far fetched to discover a new species of Elder Dragon every now and then within the setting.
Monster Hunter Worlds story easily explains away the lore as to why there are so many elder dragons in the new world. Its the reason why the research comission is there in the first place.
I agree that listing off the number of Elder Dragons introduced doesn't really do much to discredit their more modern depictions. Hell, if 20+ Elder Dragons being introduced each gen guarantees that we get more showings like World's Fatalis, then I'm all for it. Numbers alone just means that the franchise is growing, at least to me.
What _is_ the problem, imo, isn't even directly tied to the Elder Dragons all that much; at least not to their fights or abilities in a vacuum. For me, the issue is that the power gap between regular monsters and Elders seems to be shrinking or being bridged. I always thought that higher tiered non-Elders like Deviljho were still below proper Elder Dragons in the pecking order, and that even gigathreat rare subspecies like Silver Rathalos and Gold Rathian were at least a decent bit below Elders like Kushala. In Generations, this is notion is actually even officially supported: Deviljho and Silver Rathalos/Gold Rathian are 6-star threat monsters in their Hunter's Note entries, while Kushala and co are 7-star threat monsters. Yet suddenly in World, Deviljho is having DBZ beam clashes and tieing with these Elders - even temporarily overpowering Nergigante, the premire brute strength Elder hunter, in their turf war - and in Rise Kushala is getting punked hard in the Gold Rathian intro (who also somehow climbed up to being a 9-star threat in that game's Hunter's Note vs Kushala's climb to an 8-star threat, a tier which it now shares with Rajang and thus Deviljho).
The problem with Elder Dragons then isn't the fault of the Elder Dragons alone. Fighting a dinosaur, then fighting a hurricane is a jump you can feel. But fighting a dinosaur, then fighting a dinosaur that can fight hurricanes, then fighting a hurricane makes the hurricane less impressive for no fault of its own; beings that represent normalcy should not be challenging beings that represent abnormality. There's a reason why Alatreon, Safi, and Fatalis are still very well respected and feared within the MH community. Because a blinged out Rathian isn't flying in and 1v1ing them. Keep Invaders and Rare Subspecies and whatever Espina is in a tier of their own, as the last step _before_ facing Elders (excluding Kirin), and the whole perception of Elder Dragons will change in a heartbeat back to how it was pre-5th Gen. If they want to have a non-Elder fight some Elder Dragons, Akantor and Ukanlos are right there, and have been there since Gen 2.
As some who started with world and then went and played gen u I’d much rather have deviljho and rajang able to go toe to toe with elders it makes them far more fun than if they scaled them back. I mean he supposed to eat kirin horns
Monsters on par with elders have always existed, they’ve just never been able to show that they were until fairly recently thanks to turf wars and such.
That being said, I do agree that Elders have been feeling like they’re much weaker than they are in more in more recent games, and having the repel mechanic removed doesn’t help IMO.
Elder level monsters have always been elder level, turf wars simply did not exist back then.
Espinas is capable of defeating Kushala and actually did because Kusa is weak to poison and Espinas is incredibly armored. The term Elder Dragon is nothing more than a classification. Nothing more. Large monsters have always been capable of hanging with Elder Dragons. It’s just that their depiction hasn’t been well as shown until turf wars
While I personally didn't care for rise/sunbreak, the one thing I can give that entry respect for is is reviving an old beef nearly 23 years in the making. Seeing a Zinogre throw hands with Amatsu was a sight to behold. And speaking of Amatsu, for wilds I want to see Elder dragons that haven't been used return while scaling back already used ones, as well as see other monster types get more addition while bring back older ones. Bring back the giant enemy crab, Shen Gaoren.
What if Capcom creates a cataclismic event that erases those extra elder dragons? For example, the legend of Fatalis states that "when the world is full of wyverns, the legend is reborn". At the time, many dragons were called wyverns (including Fatalis), so you can interprete this legend as "When the world is full of dragons, Fatalis is reborn".
Since we canonicaly kill Fatalis in MHW Iceborn, they could bring him back as Crimson Fatalis, who in a fit of rage destroys many elder dragons in his path as he tries to destroy mankind. It would fulfill his prophecy, recognize the old info that states he can regenerate from death and cut some of the elder dragons.
A rathalos is a rathalos whether it’s red, blue, or silver. I don’t think it’s fair to count the variants of the elders.
Perhaps yeah in the sense of the world, but in the game sense variants and Risens have separate entries in the notebook generally, and I mainly used the MH Wiki when it came to counting up all the Elders both in mainline and spinoffs. I was not going to make the total different just due to a few technical specificities, when this is being as broad as possible. Hope you understand.
@@TheMonarchofDragons Idk, that still doesn't change that they're the same monster just recolored or tweaked, they're not new monsters. Which also makes me think that if we're gonna talk about how many Elders were introduced in a game it's not fair to include the already existing ones, and that also counts for the variants, because again, they're not new monsters, it's still the same thing even if you make it shoot black poop instead of brown poop.
@@strateks9611 We will just agree to disagree. I did my video as broadly defined as possible with the count, while you and others don’t count variants or Risens because they are too similar. You have your opinion, and I have mine with how I conducted my video. That’s just the way it goes.
I think it's mostly because of the fact that the jump to HD made Capcom reduce the amount of monster categories in World. The vast majority are dinos and dragons. Gone are leviathans and insects. So it made sense that they'd put in more monsters with Teostra's skeleton. As for Rise, I don't really think the Risen count as unique monsters. They're just deviants except deviants aren't allowed outside of Generations.
With greater understanding and more research comes the opportunity to re-evaluate one's classification systems, and since the number of Elder Dragons seems to be growing rapidly, perhaps a more granular classification now makes more sense.
Personally, i find the 5th gen issue with Elders is in the game's story progression.
I always like to look at how 4U treated Rust Kushala compared to how the 5th Gen treats Kushala. In 4U, it is treated as a dangerous threat that you spend a part of the campaign preparing defenses for all because it is predicted path is going to have it head through the town. In 5th Gen, Kushala just shows up and are easily dispatched by the hunter as a part of the main story.
IMO, Elders that aren't intrinsically tied to the main story should be used as post-game challenge content, like how in the old games you rarely meet any Elders outside of the single player boss and/or flagship monster during the course of the main story, other Elders are saved for after the main story is done or just relegated to Multiplayer Hub (which is more for gameplay focus than story focus so the narrative is played more loosely).
In terms of the elders, one of the key components that makes them feel repetitive is the fact that they keep coming back in several of the games
the gen 2 trio especially feels like they've been used way too much. I've fought every main series version of Kushala Daora (the base one) and it ranges to complete bullshit at worst, and mildly entertaining at best.
the reason Gog and Shara feel so awesome is because they are a 1 time thing/ exclusive to 1 point in 1 game, so it feels more important as a monster. They also had little to no buildup/prior knowledge even compared to other elders, which makes the initial shock value even greater
I hope we get a new MH game where there's only 1 elder dragon, but it's important, powerful, and shocking enough to not only be a memorable boss fight, but the initial impact to continue and remain unaffected after multiple rematches.
So what will fill the gap that elders leave in difficulty? I can think of rajang zinogre magnamalo and deviljho as replacements but they already feature in 5th gen quite extensively maybe a Lagiacrus variant?
I think the issue is that "Elder Dragon" is treated as a biological category rather than a tier of significance. You'd run into the same issue if you compared "Small Monsters" or "Endemic Life" to any single class of monster (Except Winged Wyvern).
I also see counting different versions of the same Elder Dragon a little unfair as most are just the same monster with bigger numbers & maybe new moves. You'd end up with a whole lot more monsters if you treated Low, High, & Master Rank versions of non-Elder Dragons as completely separate entries, balancing out the ratios somewhat
Personally, if I would say there's a problem with Elder Dragons, it would be that a lot are carried over with no in-story justification for them to be there. (Flagship monsters have the same problem) The Magala line should have had it's own side story for why it was in Elgato & the Elder Trio should have as well for Kamura. The reason Elder Dragons feel less special & overpopulated is become about half of them are just there as fanservice & to pad out the roster.
I don't see the issue you mention in your first paragraph, can you explain in more detail?
@@strateks9611 I completely forgot to get back to this, I'm sorry.
What I meant was that the lore treats Elder Dragons as mythical creatures that don't fit into any other category, while the games themselves treat "Elder Dragon" as a rank of monster. Outside of subspecies, Elder Dragons have nothing to do with each other & are only grouped together out of convenience. This leads to a bloated, disconnected category that only gets worse if you add in their alt versions
I love Elder Dragons, but I wish they would take the focus off them and put it more on the "Regular" monsters. I liked how in the 1st - 4th gen games, you would establish this kind of Rivalry with the flagship monster, like Tigrex, Lagiacrus, Zinogre, and Gore Magala, and that would be the focus for the majority of the Story. But it seems like in fifth gen everything is "Elder Dragon This!" or "Elder Dragon that!" it's like the comparison you made with Pokemon, there's an Elder Dragon for everything. I think what would help is if they limit the number of elder dragons in future games, maybe between like 4-6.
When the game that's centered entirely on Elder Dragons has a lot of Elder Dragons: 😨😨😨
I think the elder dragon explosion in 5th gen might be due to the new engine and how much this class in particular allows the devs to experiment with the combat without having to worry about biology and scientific explanations. The same thing happened in Frontier. And it's also a bit funny because monsters like seething bazelgeuse, regular and scorned magnamalo, violet mizutsune, raging brachydios and many other heavily experimental non elder dragon monsters also exist in this generation.
Story wise it would make sense for some elder dragons to be reclassified
Guanzorumu mafia!
nice video. i actually found this interesting since i havent heard anyone being tired of elders(i occasionaly browse the mh reddit)
You have some really interesting topics for videos and great reviews. Subbed.
6:48 I mean, you are kind of forgetting the fact that the playerbase, especially the English speaking playerbase, jumped up by a massive amount in generation 5. So there's also just way more people to be bitching about shit that's not a real problem.
And especially for World it made sense for there to be a lot of elder dragons because the whole game was about you investigating why all these elder dragons were all going to the on place all the time.
And if we compare World and Rise seperately the number looks way less extreme. Rise only really introducing a handful of new elders again and only bringing back a few which have been established as near universal staples on-par with the raths. (I am counting Narwa and Ibushi as a single one here btw, because those are too much of a package deal to not)
I personally think there's a few things that could be done to make elder dragons feel powerful against
1st off they should take a break in terms of getting lots of new members in 6th gen, I don't monde them coming back to beef out the roster just stop shoving more new ones everywhere for a bit
2. Bring back the repel mechanic from 2nd gen, it doesn't need to be a forced 7 hunt slug, just something that's possible to hunt them over a couple quests, as long as it's still possible to kill them in 1 go this is fine
3. Make the game harder at base line and bring hunter power down and that will be default make elders powerful and scary
4. Give them frontiers extreme blights to show that they are well above the average wyvern in thier elemental power, would also go a good way to helping the difficulty problem
To me it’s more along the lines of demystifying them to an extent. They might be extremely powerful monsters, but just like all the others, they’re still monsters. They’re all animals at the end of the day. And it makes sense for a classification as powerful and successful ecologically as elder dragons to be as numerous as they are.
I think some of them should have that fear and mysticism around it, such as the black dragons, but it’s alright if not actively good to learn more
The very thing that makes an Elder Dragon, well, an Elder Dragon, is being an outlier to anything seen in normal monsters, their mysticism, rarity and impact on the environment is what makes them, otherwise Magnamalo would be an elder too. They also serve a purpose to make monsters like rathalos seem more grounded, which is not so effective when you make Elders so common, Elders end up themselves not feeling special, which in turn just makes normal monsters look boring. Demystifying them damages the fantasy aspect of the game while also affecting the more grounded aspects of the game by literally just rationalizing and agglomerating them.
Either way, it's dumb to complain about this, MHW's ENTIRE story is literally built around elder dragons, I REALLY, REALLY doubt that wilds will have that many Elders. Rise barely introduced NEW Elders and just gave older ones a reskin. And with the new technology we have it's really simple to make Elders feel special again. Yk how Elders are classified? Just make them do what they're supposed to be doing to the environment, we have the technology to make it happen and it will truly level Elders to their old status as mystic creatures.
The fact that there are a lot of species, doesn’t mean that they’re not rare. The population of each elder is limited and probably hard to find in lore.
Ain't nobody talking about that to begin with. Not to mention that it literally doesn't matter if there's 2 Kirin left in lore, when you play the game you'll be able to slay infinite amounts of Kirin, so even if we considered this, it wouldn't matter.
No one is discussing how it affects the lore of the series, the problem is how the amount of Elders present in later games changes the perception people have on Elders.
An issue many elder dragons share is the sameness, the Gen 2 trio (Kushala Daora, Teostra and Chameleos) all share the same body type, and there have been thrown out till tedium. I even say Velkhana feels too much like a Kushala if it wasn´t for its moveset. That´s why I think Ceadeus and Dalamadur feel more memorable, because there aren´t just another Kushala clone, and why many didn´t like how Safi´Jiiva end looking just like an european dragon.
They should make elder dragons much more different to each other, or just show up much more less.
Honestly I don't mind Elder Dragons. I like a lot of the newly introduced ones in World and Iceborne.
However, I personally think that some variations to the quest design would be great: have more Elder Dragons have shortened (maybe even longer?) questimers like e.g. Fatalis - that fight is still incredibly frantic and difficult for me, even with full fati gear. I would also like repels to be a thing again, so that the hunter doesn't just kill every Elder the moment they fight it the first time. Maybe also alternative objectives for the intro quests of Elders like just having to survive for ten minutes while an Elder is around/raging, survey sudden damage to the environment/map or again just repelling it from a trading route.
I think some Elder Dragon quests should be more of an event that affects the world, especially since the new games seem to focus more on that aspect.
Tbh I was a little dissapointed when Rajang returned in iceborne and its ecology was centered around hunting and eating Kirin. Kirin in my head was supposed to be a powerful, almost untouchable spirit of lightning, so being regular prey of a big monkey felt wrong.
On further reflection though, it made more sense. The elders are flesh and blood (maybe a bit of magic too) at the end of the day. A kirin would still be devestating too nearly all non elders, but Rajangs lightining resistance makes sense as a match up. As I say to Tierzoo fans, there is also more then ecology than power rankings.
That whole ecology aspect of Rajang is not new tho, so it's not like it's now just happening that Elders are somehow being dethroned, we just can now see it, elder level monsters were always elder level monsters.
One big problem is how saturated endgame is with them, when the main stories usually have you hunting one or two personally.
For endgame, i want Elder dragons to have more equivalent, Non-elder dragons that are on the same level like Deviljho or Rajang.
I don't know how other people felt about it, but I loved the endgame of base Rise before they added more elder dragons. With there being only 2 elder dragons (and those 2 not really being that useful for their armor if I remember correctly) it felt like almost every monster was useful. Instead of it being all Elder Dragons and EDL monsters with the occasional regular monster's piece of gear.
I have a tank that's either going to be incredibly hot to you or ice cold. But It makes sense why so many elder dragons popped up, especially in worlds. The elder dragons are monsters that don't have an explanation for how they use their powers It's simply an animal they don't understand yet. And when you find a new continent, there's going to be a lot of new animals that you have no understanding of yet. I would say that future generations should take some of the monsters that were considered elder dragons and reclassify them with time. They would show that the guilds gaining knowledge as well as actually making progress in their studies. I do think there are a few that should stay as elder dragons like flagship elder dragons, final bosses, and the Kaiju ones but any elder dragon that's not introduced as a god of the environment they're in can and should be reclassified at some point
I just want more bug type monsters man
My only specific issue with EDs is that they've lost the gravitas of their presence in the 5th gen games and have become normal monsters. This is only in regard to the non-colossal EDs i.e. Teostra, Kushala.
The ones you can measure a length record for and fight in normal maps. It started specifically with Iceborne and they lost their presence fully in Rise and Sunbreak.
I started with the gen 2 games.
When you accepted an ED quest then the maps would be completely devoid of monsters except for maybe a Vespoid in some zones in certain maps. This was explained in lore as all the monsters fleeing the area as they do not want to be near EDs. A great depiction of this was made in the Legends of the Guild movie. The repel mechanic they had really made their fights personal. It was you versus one specific individual. You made a powerful creature go on the run and you were pinpointing their location in order to finally corner them. You could also "identify" them in a sense by the scars (part breaks) you left on them. Only Loa and Kirin didn't have repelling mechanic.
3rd gen was a really exclusive club for EDs.
All of them were a special occasion and it happened in arena maps. Only normal Ceadeus retained the old repel mechanic.
4th gen was somewhat odd.
While the repel victory condition was still there for the non-colossal EDs you would never see that individual again in a repeat quest. They sort of wanted you clear it one go.
Getting a repel is sort of a half failure.
With 5th Gen World did a great job in giving them presence at the start.
You saw affects their presence had like heat waves you see in the air if a Teostra or Lunastra was present.
Val Hazaak was the first standard ED in which non-ED monsters would be present alongside it, but that was its gimmick to show it could infect and absorb the Effluvium from them. That and the Effluvium does also make small monsters rabid as well. The repel mechanic is also gone unless it's a story beat.
Then Iceborne came. Sometimes small monsters could be present alongside all EDs but they could also appear alongside one other Large non-ED monster.
Rise then took away all their gravitas and they became normal monsters. Small monsters would be present and not run away from them, and they will also always appear with 2 other Large monsters.
I'd love to see something like Velkhana just freezing EVERYTHING around her by just walking around in Wilds, like what happens in World but taken to the "extreme", said extreme being what they're supposed to do to begin with.
I honestly don't get what ppl are complaining about, this is not like in pokemon where they feel obligated to put every existing mon in to the new game, some of the elder have not seen the light of day again since they debute. And in universe, this only shows the advancements of hunting since one of the main goal of the hunter guild is to safely keep track of and discover the existence of world threatening monsters such as the elder dragons. So it still make sense in game that we see more of them and less of bird wyvern.
I haven’t watched the whole video yet, but it feels like elder dragons have a similar problem to legendary pokemon - most of them are in every game since introduction, and with the growing numbers they take up more roster slots as time goes on (since they are so popular). A palkia caught in sw/sh doesn’t feel nearly as significant as catching one at Spear Pillar, and doesn’t feel quite as special now there’s 66 legendaries to catch across the series. Similarly, fighting gore Magala in a plot which doesn’t revolve around the frenzy, or Kushala Daora for the 50th time since dos removes the mystique these elders once had, and the once-rare or unusual becomes predictable and commonplace.
EDIT: you covered it! Glad I wasn’t alone in thinking of this comparison!
New to the series, Currently only played MHW and have only just gotten to the End game of the original game so the first 6 dragons are what I've faced.
My issue with the Elder Dragons I've seen from that game is that you have 5 of them thrown at you in the end. The narration from the game wasn't even telling you to hunt them but the commander telling others to hunt them only for you to be the one to go after them all. After Nergigante, I would've preferred you only be tasked with finding one and then the task of hunting the others be unlocked under special conditions:
The Huntsman hunting the Flaming Chimera like Elder Dragon would've been better if you ran into him and "competed" in hunting it down with him (though I know... this game didn't have AI hunters but giving scripted hunts like with Pickle would've been nice. Imagine the Huntsman helping you in the fight by setting up explosives or hoping onto its back to distract it as though another player were doing it).
For the Ancient Forest Tornado Dragon, end up finding a wounded ally, maybe the other A-list hunter's handler you've met at the beginning of the game. She doesn't appear on the map but has a green dot above her head as a clue that someone is nearby and when you do find her, she asks you to look for her Hunter, and after looking for clues, you find him facing off against the wind dragon inside the giant tree leading up to the Wyvern nest only for both of you to be thrown outside the tree through the hole and sent to another zone entirely, where the battle ends up ensuing (continuing considering he was already fighting it).
You and your handler were tasked with the Undead Dragon so looking for it would've been your task for the story mission. No real complaints honestly other than making fighting it optional as it is doing as it's supposed to and remaining in its habitat. (to which, honestly they all were so -1 for the narrative from the commander on forcing you to face the dragons that aren't disturbing the peace)
Then after all that, you face the last boss who is a giant laser shooting infant. Nothing to hate about that fight. It was the longest of the elder dragon fights but was also not as difficult as it could've been. Still haven't fainted against him but I can see where the challenge is if you don't start with the hands to knock him off balance.
As for the overpopulation of Elder Dragons, area specific ones makes sense, especially if the narrative is reasonable like Nergigante being an Elder Dragon that eats Elder Dragons, finding one of the biggest land walkers alive to be heading for his final resting place as the main plot of the entire story. What isn't good is cramming in as many legendaries into a game just so people can play your game more to "collect all 10,000!"
To add on to the Multi-Mission Elder Dragon Sieges, I think they should make the four mission four phases.
I watched the video where he mentions the Bug that was originally underwhelming before stunning him with the second phase as it showed why it got the name "Walking Fortress." But for something like world, it should be a decision to continue the hunt in a new area with new mechanics due to its desperation making it pull up a new bag of tricks and revealing trump cards that has given it's classification as a threat among all others, an apex predator like no other.
Elder Dragons lost the mythical status the moment they were treated like everyother slay quest be readily avaible. As dumb as it sounded Elder dragons were capable of being repelled if not enough damage was done to kille them and retain the damage done to them in the next quest where they can most likely be slain, course if you're properly geared you can kill them outright. But the quest were only 30 minutes long. This gave those quest and subsequently the elder dragons the feeling of true unnatural diasaster urgency.
In my opinion, i would like to see more members added to other category’s such as fanged beasts, carapaceons and etc because outside of flying wyverns the elder dragons I’m pretty sure are second place for most members in it’s category. And to me this dampens their mystical property’s simply due to the amount of elders we have.
Another would also be taking a break from elder dragon and elder teir flagships because we had them back to back to back. We had valstrax, then nergi, then velkhana, then we had magnamalo who was elder teir and then now we have melzeno. I think a non-elder dragon or elder dragon teir monster flag ship is very much needed more than ever to strike a balance.
Oh wow their on top of elders…DAM!
So you want the flagship to be weaker that’s kinda boring.
@@justinsaunders110 well, I’m finding it kinda boring that we got five elder teir monsters in a row. Not saying their bad it’s just that i would like to break the mold a bit.
But if you fancy having the next flagship that powerful then thats all good and perfectly fine.
I think Elder Dragons won’t be as numerous in number as in World. Worlds story is directly about the Elder Dragons as a classification themselves and the elder crossing. It makes sense to see so many elders considering we are following them at the time when they are all migrating. I feel they may tone it back in Wilds.
Elder crossing was the hunters just giving a reason why there in the new world, its not actually a crossing. Its a term not a thing
I'd say, while yes, the Elder Dragon classification can be seen as bloated, I believe it still works because of how "often" some of these dragons show up. Lao Shan Lung only appeared in the first couple generations, and only returned for a final hurrah in GU, most of the dragons in the new world stayed in the new world. Ceadeus, Goldbeard, and the Mohrans stayed in the 3rd gen and the first half of the 4th gen. Shah and regular Dalamadur stays in 4U and so on so forth. Because some of these are exclusive to certain games, with some of them only having canonically one of their species that end up being wiped out for the time being. Only a few of these Elder Dragons end up appearing more than once, usually being the trio originating in gen 2, Kirin, and only recently, Shagaru Magala, due to the appearance in 4U, GU, and Sunbreak, and Fatalis, due to appearances in gen 1, 2, 4, and Iceborne. So while the total amount that exist is technically "bloated," it shouldn't really matter unless more than half of these dragons show up in one game.
Does anyone know the song that plays in the background at 15:30?
Scarlet Feast, Malzeno's theme from Sunbreak.
@@TheMonarchofDragons thanks 🙏
Personally, I wouldn't count the subspecies, because even if they have their own identities, for me there is only Fatalis, for example.
I still don't get why Nergigante is an Elder Dragon, like compared to other Elders like Kirin, Amatsu, Ibushi, Narwa, Nakarkos or Gogmazios, what does Nergigante do? Like the classification of Elder Dragon is supposed to be for the unique, mysterious and powerful monsters but Nergigante just feels mundane, I didn't play World just to be clear but Nergigante feels like it could've been a normal class of monster, same with ones like Namielle, Vaal Hazak, Velkhana, and Malzeno and also maybe Kulve Taroth too.
Like take Akantor and Unkanlos they're not Elder Dragons despite having specialized arenas, they're Flying Wyverns (despite not having wings or any means to fly, tbh they should probably be reclassified as Brute Wyverns)
Edit: Xeno'jiva should've been classified as a ??? class like Gore Magala.
Elder Dragon is a size fits all category essentially: if it can't be placed into any other category via lineage, has a huge effect on the ecosystem and its monsters, and has an air of power/mystery then it is an Elder. With Nergigante in particular, though he has no elemental or weather capabilities, his sheer strength and brutality alone is enough to make him a reliable menace to Elder Dragons. Combine that with his healing factor and he can reliably beat down and pursue Elders, taking their punishment and dishing it back tenfold. The game explains that he has a diet mainly consisting of Elder Dragons; though that is due to the huge amounts of Bioenergy they contain, and his rampage across the Elder's Recess is causing Elders like Teostra and Kushala to move out. The Official Complete Works Book goes into further detail on his first discovery, explaining that he was sighted during the first and second fleets expedition to the New World, chasing down a Kushala and Teostra respectively. It isn't until the events of the game that he is properly documented and classified. Same thing goes with Kulve Taroth: who appeared when the first fleet washed up on the New World, but hadn't been seen since.
In terms of the others to make it short:
Kulve - First sighting as already mentioned; manages and/or has a role in the Caverns Of El Dorado thanks to magnetism powers over gold.
Vaal Hazaak - Manages the Effluvium levels in the Vale (bacteria responsible for decomposition), and in the rare instances when a Vaal moves out of the Vale massively alters the ecosystem. This is mainly shown with the Blackveil variant, who carries the Effluvia into the Ancient Forest thanks to the spores growing on it, causing a temporary take over while it is still there.
Velkhana - Elder Dragon that existed only in fairy tales up until Iceborne, supercooled water allows it tremendous control over the cold.
Namielle - Able to cause floods in the generally dry, high altitude Coral Highlands.
Malzeno - A weird case considering Primordial's existence and the emphasis on story rather than anything ecological. But we know in the lore that Malzeo drove back Gaismagorm back when it was first trying to surface, and it is clearly a powerful enough force that the Qurio form a symbiosis with the species, and are determined to have that back when we encounter the Primordial in Sunbreak.
Aka and Uka are weird in that they have vestigial wing structures located in their front legs, which tie them directly to pseudo-flying wyverns like Nargacuga and Tigrex, hence why they are classified as such and not Elder Dragons (despite being Elder Level). And in regards to Xeno ehhhh perhaps, but I have to think on how Xeno grows due to the influx of Bioenergy from Elders within the Everstream, and is the one manipulating the Elder Crossing in the first place. Many of its development notes have the idea basis to be a "Emperor Of Elders", and even if it was a ??? in our first encounter, the report by the Guild immediately afterwards, and its direct evolution into Safi'jiiva in Iceborne places it into an Elder Dragon. Whereas with Gore a recent lore note in Sunbreak claims another reason for its ??? status could be that it has genetic material owing to other monsters, making it a weird hodgepodge that while has a lineage, can't directly be put into one category because it is all jumbled up.
I say all this in mind knowing that I'm not really that big of an ecology or lore nerd with the series. I'm not one to obsess over it, and honestly think that some things within the series just aren't worth it to think too hard on, especially when it comes to certain aspects of the world. Ultimately this comment here is to just divulge some info from the games and books the best I can since you seemed confused about classifications (which is understandable). If you need any more info or people to ask: I do recommend following BannedLagiacrus on Twitter, as well as getting yourself copies of "The Official Complete Works" Monster Hunter World book, or any of the other Monster Hunter Illustrations. Banned is a reputable source who spends a lot of time digging through in-game information and books, translating various lore details people may not know, and the books are your best source for getting both in-universe information, concept art, and statements from the developers. Hope this helps!
twitter.com/BannedDino
www.barnesandnoble.com/w/monster-hunter-viz-media/1137330342
www.amazon.com/Monster-Hunter-Illustrations-2-Capcom/dp/1772940860
@@TheMonarchofDragons I mean I don't think any of the Elder Dragons should be reclassed or anything, what's done is done, I just mean in a meta sense some of the Elder Dragons don't give off the same feeling as other Elder Dragons and they feel more arbitrary, and we've seen Elder Dragon tier monsters before that aren't classed as Elder Dragons like Akantor and Ukanlos, Deviljho, Shen Gaoren, Ahtal-Kha, Bazelgeus, all deviants and rare species like Molten Tigrex and Abyssal Lagiacrus, even Magnamalo will turf war with Elder Dragons in Rise and I believe mostly ends in draws so it feels like (specifically in World) the developers just made the powerful endgame monsters Elder Dragons to make them feel special rather than because they *needed* to be Elder Dragons, like more of a "tell don't show" kind of Elder Dragon
Monster Hunter Frontier went out of its way to interpret Elder Dragons as unstoppable godlike monsters that’s capable of destruction on a scale that’s world ending especially when you fight them and made them feel special and all powerful, but to be fair Frontier went over the top on alot of monsters. I will admit they don’t feel as special anymore due to that oversaturation.
I don't think it's fair to include Risen version to the count. They're just basically the same elders, just improved. You don't include all anomaly version of regular monsters to the count, do you? Also since in World, some MR monsters replace their HR version, it doesn't feel like we have too much elder dragons. Basically Ruiner is just MR Nergigante, or Blackveiled is just MR Vaal Hazak.
To be fair, the Elder Dragon bloat might be helped if 19 of them weren't snakes, whales, octopus, and whatever the fuck gaismagorm is. Like, just classifying those differently would help a ton
I’m fine with the increase in elders, though maybe slow it down a little, as long as they are unique. Now, obviously they should be unique, but what i mean is, well, we have never really gotten another kirin have we? Besides oroshi, kirin is still very unique and stands out a lot even though its one of the *original* elders. So, make more like it, not the fight, that can go to hell, but basically we should have a mix of dragons, weird dragons, and not dragons.
Dragons is obvious, i mean elder *dragon* , but they should still have unique abilities.
Weird dragons as in say, the serpents, or unique skeleton use like what valstrax does with the gore skeleton or snake dragons like dalamadur, or the morhans with whale bodies, not just more upright dragons like kushala or teo.
Then, not dragons, also self-explanatory, but there has been a significant decrease of elder dragons that aren’t dragons. Theres really only two that count: yama tsukami and nakarkos, both squids and clearly not dragons or even cephalopod-shaped dragons, so basically elders that clearly are not dragons but are still classified as so because of some factor of their biology or power. It is a damn shame that we only have two of this concept of an elder dragon and definitely need more, they make for great final boss material if capcom decides to not go the athal-ka or standard elder route.
I don’t think Elder Dragons were ruined, perhaps demystified but that is not neccesary a bad thing. Lore-wise i don't anything was ruined, the fact that they're so important to the ecosystem made them just as mystical as old-games, not so mysterious. It's like when we discover for the 1st time what the real Kraken look like, the myth is killed.....But the fear and respect of such a powerful animal remain. Although the way EDs were portrayed in questlines is MUCH more insulting, there's not the panic or urgent feel related to it. No event, no difference with other powerful monsters.
my problem with elder dragon is the fact that Kirin is one
Behemoth and Leshen don't really count I think. Those are non-canon and exist as crossover collaboration events.
as a bow main who just got started with rise i absolutely DESPISE kushala and teostra because their gimmicks literally punish you for maining ranged weapons
Maybe not introduce so many Elder Dragons in Wilds. Come up with just a few then bring the classics that sort of blend with the new ones and the biomes of the new game. Even as a way to re-introduce monsters who have only ever been in one game prior.
Big dragon go boom
7:56 okay so people are literally just complaining because they don't actually know what Elder Dragons are lol. this isn't a "too many elder dragons" issue, this is a "explain the lore better" issue
why is Terumi from Blazblue dicussing elder dragons???
Welcome to the Monarchy, that's just the way things work around here lol.
He needs something to do after cf
I feel that after mh4 they became too common, in older titles Elder dragons where rare, mostly endgame content.
Idk I don’t play mh for the lore so what a monster is defined as doesn’t really matter to me. They could have called fatalis from iceborne a bird wyvern and it wouldn’t have affected my enjoyment of the fight at all, I would of been like oh I can capture him since it’s not an elder dragon.
too many of these new elder dragons are just kushala re-skins.
Velkana its the best best song best everything
Eldar Crossing was a term not a event......
Gen 3, gen4 are the best gens
Meh, you are just adding variants to bloat the count
So true :3
Elders should stick to postgame
They're the worst part of the game... which doesn't make them bad necessarily. But they are an inferior experience to the early and mid game when most of your tools and options still work because the monsters don't have "muh human intelligence".
😂 eldar dragons in worlds are jokes compared to previous games. Completely staged jokes