For those playing their first game in the series, Monster Hunter Wilds can be pretty daunting, with many unique systems that are hard to grasp at first. Veterans of the series will find a lot of familiar features in this franchise's newest entry, but anyone just starting may struggle. To learn the ways of a hunter, there are several early steps you can take to make your journey easier.

As a sequel to Monster Hunter World, Wilds has many similarities to one of the series' best-selling installments. MH World was my first Monster Hunter game, but even I have noticed that Wilds adds a lot more to the table than many players may expect. Even if you do research on past games before starting with Wilds, there is plenty of new content that may confuse you going into this new experience.

10 Train With Your Preferred Weapon

Choose A Tool And Learn Its Combos

The first big choice you have to make in Monster Hunter Wilds is what weapon you are going to use on hunts. There are 14 different weapons in the game, each with unique combos and move lists that vary in complexity. No matter what weapon you choose, you should take the time to learn about everything it can do.

Some of the easiest weapons to pick up first for beginners are the Longsword, Dual Blades, or Bow. Alternatively, you could also pick the Lance if you are looking for a more defensive weapon to start with.

Early after your first hunt during the game's opening section, you can enter the Training room at your interim camp. Take the time to look up every move available for your weapon, as well as how to unleash them against the training cart in this space. This will help you become familiar with a weapon you want to stick with, or at the very least compare weapons to help you decide on which one to wield.

9 Collect Every Material You Come Across

Gather Resources To Craft Important Items

As you continue to go on hunts, you'll realize that you need various materials to craft the vast variety of items in the game. Among Monster Hunter Wilds' many important features, item crafting is not one you'll encounter right away. However, you have recipes to craft items from the beginning of the game, giving you ways to build items that will make hunts easier.

Items can only be crafted with resources found in the world. Use your Slinger to collect distant materials, mine for resources, and harvest common ingredients in different environments to start crafting strong items. For example, you should always grab Honey as you travel through maps, as this material you come across naturally in the world is used to craft Potions that restore your health.

Everything you gather has some sort of use, especially monster parts you carve from a successful hunt. If it isn't too tedious, interact with every source of items you find, as you never know when you'll need the right materials for stronger item recipes.

8 Eat Before Going On Hunts

Have A Tasty Meal To Increase Stats

When you are about to embark on a hunt, you can eat food to raise your Health and Stamina before departing. Eating a meal helps max out your primary stats, allowing you to take more hits from a monster without getting carted. Additionally, more Stamina means more opportunities to perform attacks with your weapon, dodge incoming strikes, and do a variety of other actions.

One of the most common mistakes in Monster Hunter Wilds is forgetting to eat before a hunt. The lack of Health and Stamina buffs can be felt during important battles, so make sure you always use your portable BBQ Grill to prepare meals. You can choose a variety of different meal types that all boost Health and Stamina but also provide other buffs, such as:

• Increased Damage (Attack)
• Improved Damage Resistance (Defense)
• Increased Elemental Resistance (Defense)
• Reduced Stamina Depletion
• Negate Environmental Effects (Extreme Heat/Cold)

When out on a hunt, you can also grill Raw Meat for smaller Health and Stamina boosts by playing a unique mini-game. If you time your cooking perfectly, you'll cook a steak well enough to give you its max benefits when eaten. Mastering this mechanic can help you recover from losing meal effects after carting during a hunt, allowing you to get back into the fight.

7 Use Focus Mode To Target Monster Weaknesses

Create Wounds To Inflict Higher Damage

Focus Mode is a new combat mechanic in Monster Hunter Wilds where you enter a stance wielding any weapon. While in this stance, you can identify open wounds on a monster you've created through powerful attacks during a battle. These open wounds glow red, indicating weak points on a monster where you can strike to inflict more damage.

Focus Mode also allows you to aim your weapon attacks freely as you spin your character around. This makes it easier to block monster attacks or aim powerful moves, such as the Charge Blade's Super Amped Elemental Discharge (SAED).

Each weapon has a unique Focus Strike attack that can be used to target and destroy open wounds. Using Focus Strike from Focus Mode can help stagger monsters, giving you and your allies the perfect chance to deal extraordinary damage to the target of your hunt. By utilizing Focus Mode and Focus Strikes, you can speed up hunts, making the grinding process easier to farm important parts.

6 Prepare Loadouts For Quick Equipment Changes

Set Aside Your Preferred Builds To Access Them Fast

As you start crafting more weapons and armor from successful hunts, you'll quickly find your equipment cluttered with multiple gear pieces. This can make it a hassle to mix and match the gear you want before specific hunts, especially as you finely tune your collection of skills from the items you craft. Thankfully, you can create custom loadouts to already have a specific weapon and armor pairing set aside in advance.

You may want to have a set of armor put into a loadout to use against a specific monster in Monster Hunter Wilds. For example, if you know a monster is weak to Fire damage, have an armor loadout ready that gives you multiple instances of the Fire Attack skill to increase your elemental damage.

Having a loadout extends beyond weapons and armor though, as you can set a loadout to include items from your pouch as well. This gives you a way to restock on Potions, Traps, Rations, or other important resources you would use for auto-crafting during a hunt. Organizing your inventory before every hunt will help you access important tools faster, such as your Whetstone for sharpening or Potions to recover health.

5 Retreat When You Get Overwhelmed

Avoid Getting Carted When It Could Be Avoided

Sometimes during a hunt, you'll find yourself in situations where you desperately need to drink a Potion or sharpen your weapon in the face of a monster's assault. Try to retreat to recover and escape from monster attacks for a short time if this happens. While you only have a limited time to complete a hunt, quickly taking a breather during an intense fight will help you reset your character to get back into the fight.

One of the best new ways to retreat in Monster Hunter Wilds is to call your Seikret mount to you. This fast, reptilian mount will lead you away from danger using fast movements, allowing you to get some distance on an aggressive monster. Once you have retreated, recover your health, apply buffs, sharpen your weapon, and do everything you need to do to face a monster again before it can recover.

4 Create Pop-Up Camps For Easy Travel

Build Small Bases Out In The Wild

The nearly open world of Monster Hunter Wilds creates a much larger map than nearly any other game in the series before it. As a result, it can be hard to resupply during longer explorations or specific hunts that take you to far-off locations. One of the game's systems allows you to build a Pop-Up camp where you can switch equipment or access items from your item box to resupply important resources.

Pop-Up camps can be placed anywhere you want them, but they can be destroyed by strong enough monsters. Be careful not to lead a dangerous monster back to your Pop-Up camp, as that will likely lead to its swift destruction.

Pop-Up camps also serve as fast travel waypoints, so a well-placed one can help you instantly go where you need to be. For example, you can place a Pop-Up camp near the location of a monster you're trying to hunt so you can reach it fast. The many uses of Pop-Up camps make them worth using often, especially as you discover more places on your map to explore.

3 Don't Be Afraid To Call For Help

Friendly Hunters Will Help You Take Down Monsters

Another built-in system in Monster Hunter Wilds is the S.O.S. Flare, a beacon you can shoot into the sky to call upon other hunters for help. If you are playing online, this could summon other players, but there are even more options available for this feature. Within Wilds, you can summon NPC Hunters to aid you in a hunt, giving your character much-needed allies against the game's toughest foes.

While monsters do get more health if more hunters are involved, calling upon NPC Hunters can alleviate the pressure of solo hunts somewhat. Having a monster focus on a different target other than yourself will make hunts easier. Since NPC Hunters are a new feature to Monster Hunter Wilds, there are more ways than ever to help beginners who are struggling to take down the chaotic monsters they encounter.

2 Interact With Vast Environments

Give Yourself Advantages Through Varied Ecology

The living environments you explore have tons of hidden features you can use to gain an advantage during a hunt. For example, you can interact with unique frogs that activate a paralysis field when kicked, stunning monsters you lure into their space. Many of the creatures of the world have unique interactions, from Vigorwasps giving you health to some flying insects causing a flash of light that knocks down flying opponents.

Certain monsters will also get into dangerous Turff Wars between each other if they venture into each other's territory. During a hunt, you can use this unique environmental interaction to your advantage by leading rival monsters to each other.

Some parts of the environment allow you to also swing to the upper levels of a map or create hazardous traps for monsters you face. You can drop a large collection of rocks on a monster standing underneath them to deal great damage or immobilize your foe. There are many different environmental interactions you can explore, so it's worth figuring out what certain landscapes have to offer surrounding different hunts.

1 Start Hunting With One Or More Friends

Grind Together Rather Than Apart

The best advice I can give new players to the Monster Hunter series is to have one or more friends you in your journey. Monster Hunter Wilds has combat that is difficult to master and a lot of grinding to grow stronger as you play. Both of these processes are much easier to handle when you have multiple people ing you for the same experiences.

Having a Monster Hunter veteran show you the ropes is also a great way to learn how to play, as they will likely be a great help during difficult hunts. Having multiple people makes it easier to communicate during a hunt, allowing you and your friends to team up on monsters for unforgettable moments.

Having friends with you will also help reduce the grind, as you can get done with hunts faster with multiple players​​​​​​. This will give beginners more chances to gain monster parts needed to help them grow, allowing them to go through Monster Hunter Wilds at their own pace for their first Monster Hunter experience.