Monster Hunter Wilds: Tips and tricks to know before starting your adventure

Monster Hunter: Wilds is here, and it comes with many new features meant to make the game easier. However, Monster Hunter: Wilds guides are still important, regardless if you're a newcomer or a veteran, as there are some mechanics that aren't perfectly explained, that go beyond the (fairly easy) campaign, which you can finish in less than 15 hours.
Here, I have picked 10 tips and tricks I would have liked to have known before starting my adventure in Monster Hunter: Wilds.

1. During the campaign, take time to stop and improve you equipment

Monster Hunter: Wilds' main campaign is designed to be linear: the game will always tell you what to do and where to go, and the difficulty for the monsters is quite low, especially if you're a veteran. Then, after you see the credits and are asked to explore the areas and take missions as you please, you may find a sharp change in difficulty.

That is why we recommend you not to blast through the campaign (which is what I did). After a few battles, stop for a while, do some Optional Quests, and explore the world. That way you will gather more materials to upgrade your equipment.

You will find that most of the weapons and armour you forged during the campaign, which are low rank, will not be very useful after you reach a high rank. However, we do encourage you to get used to visiting Gemma the Smithy after every few battles to create new equipment, even if it makes the main missions a tad too easy...

2. Use the extra space for Secondary Weapons

One of the most important changes in Wilds is the option to carry a secondary weapon on your Seikret. You can change it anytime you mount on your feathered friend, pressing right on the D-pad. And for me, that was a game changer.

Monster Hunter players usually main a single weapon type for the whole game, the one they feel more comfortable with. Trying different weapons was discouraging before, when you could only carry one to each battle, and you naturally don't want to take that risk. Now thanks to the extra space, we encourage you to carry your preferred weapon as primary, and a weapon you don't like as much as secondary.

Another choice is to carry two weapons of the same type with different skills and elemental damages, but our tip is that you try and use all of the 14 weapon classes in the game. For example, I've almost always used Switch Axe since the Wii days, but now, I always carry a different weapon with me, and I force myself to use it every battle - even if sometimes only for a few minutes - which has made the game... more fun.

3. Use Auto-crafting to have potions automatically

With the new use of the hook for gathering resources from distance, even from the Seikret (using the left trigger to aim with the slinger), it is much easier to loot natural resources like herbs or mushrooms. If you want to make the experience even more streamlined, you can use the Auto-crafting tool.

Open the menu, then Crafting List. You will see all recipes you know, and a toggle to activate Auto-crafting on/off. This means that, while you are gathering resources, if you have enough it will automatically turn into the object. The most common use is Herb: every time you grab one, it will turn into Potion, but other formulas are:

• Mega Potion: Potion and Honey


• Antidote: Antidote Herb


• Catalyst: Honey and Bitterbug


• Herbal Medicine: Antidote and Blue Mushroom

4. Use Focus Strikes on the wounds of the Monsters

The new Focus Mode is the main new gameplay gimmick. It helps you aim your attacks and also highlights the wounds: you will clearly see them glowing red. If you then use Focus Strike (R1/RB, even bow and bowguns) on the wound, it will deal massive damage and stun the monster, making it fall and giving you time to strike hard. However, it will also destroy the wound and that part of the monster's body will become a scar, meaning it will not bleed again.

Our tip is to frequently use Focus Mode to detect wounds (not all of them are easily visible on the monsters) and use the Focus Strike to deal a lot of damage.

5. Understanding the new three moves in the game

Monster Hunter: Wilds has introduced three new moves, although not all of them apply to the same weapons. The most obvious one is the Sneak Attack, which is a big novelty for the game: if you approach the monster from behind, without it seeing you, a prompt will appear on screen allowing you to deal a massive blow and sometimes stunning it.

The other two moves are Power Clash and Offset Attacks. Both are basically counter attacks: Power Clash (also known as Perfect Guard) happens when you guard right at the moment a monster attack is going to hit. This is only possibly to do with weapons capable of guarding (using R button). Those are Great Sword, Sword and Shield, Lance, Gunlance, Charge Blade, and Heavy Bowgun.

Offset moves are riskier, as they require you to launch an attack at the same time as you are going to get hit by the monster. The weapons that are discovered to be able to use these attacks are hammer, switch axe, great sword, heavy bowgun, and hunting horn. Each one has a different, specific combo capable of doing these attacks, that will work as a parry.

6. Don't forget to eat before hunting

Food is always a big part of Monster Hunter. It is a pity that the Calicos no longer run a cantina where you order food. Instead, you need to use the BBQ Menu in your tent (both Base Camps and Temporary Camps). However, you can also use the Portable BBQ in your bag, which is something that you automatically carry with you all the time.

You have unlimited main ingredients: Meat, Fish, and Vegetables, increasing Attack, Endurance and Health. You can add other ingredients for extra skills, as well as "finishing touches", like Honey, which are the only ingredients to come from your pouch.

One last thing to note: while you always carry the Portable BBQ and other certain items with unlimited uses, you can activate and deactivate in the Bag menu, by pressing X/B on the icon. It is a way to reduce the list of items while hunting, getting rid of icons you don't normally use, like the Capture Net, the Binoculars, the Mantles... Make sure you don't miss that one: making food is a must in this game.

7. Remember to take the supply items!

With the new dynamic of the game, a semi-open world, the traditional "red and blue chests" from where to take supplies from the camp from earlier games is gone. Instead, mission supplies (mostly Meds and Rations) are accessed while riding the Seikret. Use left on the D-Pad to access the supply menu, don't forget that you have them!

Also, Alma will frequently tell you by voice when new supplies are added, which happens during the hunts, as well as every time you die and are "carted" back to the camp.

8. Use traps and barrels

Traps are rarely talked about nor explained during the game, largely because there are no capture missions after the postgame. However, your Calico uses traps all the time, and you can use them too.

There are two types of traps. You set them on the ground, and the monsters trips them. In capture missions -which are rare - you have to use Tranq Bombs to capture them, but you can use traps in hunt missions to deal massive damage without risks... or using Large Bomb Barrels and place next to the monster head (you can blow it with Smaller, yellow barrel bombs, throwing knives, or direct hits with your weapon).

There are two types of traps: Shock Trap requires Trap Tool and Thunderbug. Pitfall Trap requires Trap Tool and Net. You can create a Net with Ivy and Spider web. You can only buy a Trap Tool, it costs 100z at the shop.

9. Check the Monster Field Guide often

Every time you fight a new Monster, the field guide will be updated. You can find it on the Pause menu, separating Large and Small monsters, as well as fishes and endemic life. Here, you will find interesting information, including how many monsters of that species you have hunted or captured.

Aside from other mostly useless but cool data like the size of the beasts and unlockable titles after you hunt 20-50 monsters of each kind, you can see useful information like Weak points, Recommended Elemental Attacks, Efective Status Effects, and Materials and the frequency they appear, separated between Low and High rank when you finish the game.

10. The greatest challenge comes after the credits roll

The game's main story mode is shockingly short for a Monster Hunter, or a JRPG for that matter. If you move quickly, you will likely finish it in 12-15 hours. However, the real game begins after. You only progress through 3 Chapters before reaching the credits, but there are several more chapters (as well as story beats and monsters) after that. And, of course, you unlock High Rank armour, which is the main reason to repeat monsters over and over again.

To be frank, while the game is certainly great, the main story was a bit of a let down. However, I had much more fun once the game simply asks you to do missions by free will and increase your Hunter's Rank. You will find tougher battles, you will enjoy exploring the locales more without following a single path, and even some surprises... So, our final and most important tip is... keep playing after the credits roll!