Monster Hunter: World Guides
Progression, combat mechanics, and weapon knowledge for Monster Hunter: World and Iceborne.
General
Getting Started in Monster Hunter: World
Monster Hunter: World has no traditional character level that directly raises attack and defense. Progress comes from equipment access, permanent facility unlocks, and knowledge that carries from one weapon or monster to the next.
Monster Hunter: World Combat Mechanics
Monster Hunter: World calculates damage from the weapon, the chosen attack, the part struck, and the current combat state. This reference defines those systems and their relationships using the final Iceborne balance rules.
Weapons
Great Sword Guide
Great Sword converts long openings into a small number of high-motion-value severing hits. Its defensive tools are a sharpness-consuming guard and Tackle, which absorbs knockback without making the hunter invulnerable.
Long Sword Guide
The Long Sword is a severing weapon whose Spirit Gauge funds Spirit Blade attacks while white, yellow, and red Spirit level values multiply raw damage. Its defense comes from movement and counters rather than a guard.
Sword and Shield Guide
Sword and Shield combines fast severing attacks, blunt shield attacks, a weak emergency guard, and item or slinger use while drawn. Iceborne's Perfect Rush gives it a high-raw committed route without removing its element-oriented fast attacks.
Dual Blades Guide
Dual Blades exchange reach and guard capability for rapid severing hits, sustained element or status application, and stamina-driven movement. Their two resources are stamina in Demon Mode and the stored Demon Gauge used by Archdemon Mode.
Hammer Guide
Hammer is a mobile blunt weapon whose head hits build stun and whose charged attacks convert movement time into different releases. Power Charge is a persistent weapon state, not another charge level.
Hunting Horn Guide
Hunting Horn is a long-reaching blunt weapon whose attacks also write notes. Queued melodies become effects only through Performance, and repeated performance can upgrade them through Encore.
Lance Guide
Lance links precise severing thrusts with guarded movement and counters. Its defense is a resource system: guard strength, stamina, knockback, chip damage, and the legal response after a block all determine whether an attack was actually converted into offense.
Gunlance Guide
Gunlance combines severing lance attacks, a strong shield, and fixed-damage shelling. Shell type and level define a separate damage subsystem, so a skill can be essential to one Gunlance route and irrelevant to another.
Switch Axe Guide
Switch Axe alternates a mobile, long-reaching axe with a sword that spends Switch Gauge and applies the weapon's phial. Its independent offensive states are Power Axe Mode and Amped State.
Charge Blade Guide
Charge Blade converts sword energy into phials, then spends them on shield state, axe attacks, and discharge. Impact and Power Element phials use different formulas, so the weapon has no single unconditional offensive priority.
Insect Glaive Guide
Insect Glaive combines a severing glaive with an independently statted Kinsect. Monster-part extracts change the glaive move set and damage, while slinger-fed Kinsect Charge changes the insect's stamina and damage systems.
Light Bowgun Guide
Light Bowgun is defined by its ammunition table, magazine sizes, recoil, reload, and Rapid Fire entries. The weapon name alone does not identify its damage model; the primary ammunition must be selected first.
Heavy Bowgun Guide
Heavy Bowgun trades mobility for larger magazines, strong ammunition profiles, optional shield mods, and one of two rechargeable special-ammo systems. Its primary ammunition and mod breakpoints define the build before generic attack skills do.
Bow Guide
Bow converts stamina into repeated charged shot and Power Shot levels. Its raw MV, arrow count, element modifier, coating modifier, and shot hitzone are separate factors, making element and stamina economy central to most builds.