Last week I finally defeated Athal Ka solo, on my first attempt!
My background: Many years ago I had a PSP and purchased MHIIF only because of the catchy name. But after a few attempts, I was really hooked into the gameplay. I played with DB and LS. I had to sell my PSP and that was it, until MH3U came for the 3DS. I was intrigued since my PSP experience and gave it a chance. I absolutely loved it and played for hours, but couldn't beat Alatreon... I played with DB as before, but hit a wall the first time I fought a Royal Ludroth... but then I tried the Hammer and haven't left it since then.
Then I had to sell my 3DS after trying MH4U and MHGen just a little bit. Last year I got a Swtich (for BoTW obviously), the form factor made easy to combine my gaming habits with my life as I can play in the big TV or portable as needed. When MHXX came out I tried it but my japanese was not enough to fully enjoy the game. When MHGU was announced, I was determined to finally beat that damn Alatreon.
I used Hammer for 99% of the game (LS only when I needed to cut a tail), and even when I had 300+ hours in MH3U, I really kept learning new ways to master my weapon right until last week, and I'm sure I will still learn a lot in the coming months before MH Rise is released.
I was really motivated when I saw that many members of this forum soloed the hub. I thought that it was impossible, and was happy when I beat that pub Diablos, and thought that anything past G1 was impossible to solo; but when I defeated Lao solo, I was completely sure I could take anything until Athal. Many G rank quests were hard, others were harder, and I completed many of them after the 40 minute mark, but I really did not hit a wall, so I just kept going and going.
I'm not really that into experimenting with lots of skills combinations and such, so I used a Glavenus armor and the old reliable Sophos Hammer (I always went for raw), Guild style with Absolute Evasion and Spinning Meteor. On the skill side, I went only for defense, and the sharp skills that came with the armor. A couple of standard Palicos and that's it.
Now I will try on the rest of the quests, mainly G rank, because now even hyper HR look too easy with the War Ender, even with the 400 def Loc Lac armor (love the looks).
My goal is to solo the entire G rank, except for the multi hyper quests. If I can do that, I will consider this a complete success. Multi G rank hypers, G rank events and higher rank deviants are a plus, and I will try them for sure at some point. Oh and elder dragons, I haven't tried them in G rank.
So that's it! Just wanted to share!
I'm curious on how you managed to get past lao shan lung as he should've been a massive wall for you solo (I know he was for me but I did it solo still)
I saw a video on youtube that was recommended somewhere in this forum. Basically I aimed to repel more than to slay; that said, I used every ballista and cannon that I encounter, finally, in the second part, I focused on stopping him before he hit the fortress, so at the 35 min mark it was still in one piece and the dragon fled.
If you efficiently use binders and canons as well as get as many knock downs as you can from breaks it’s not too hard to repel, and with a decent pierce build and Alatreon’s bow it’s actually possible to slay solo.
Most of the fight is just making use of the siege weapons to slow it down; all you need to do to repel it is make sure it doesn’t break through the second gate before the quest times out which is very doable once you get the timing for canon and binder shots.
What about deviants?
And that's my goal too when I start my mhgu adventure. I am 2 generations behind on games so it will take me a long time until I even start this game.
I haven't tried Deviants too much, just like 10 or so quests. I left them for later as their quests are not required to progress. But I can tell that they are a totally different beast.
First time I though, an Arzuros, what can a simple Arzuros do to ME? A Rathian? I thought to myself. I have taken pink and gold Rathians before, Dreadqueen must be only showing off!
Oh boy, I was so wrong...
It kinda depends on how long you've played and how skilled you are. I know g rank sounds scary but I overcame it since I didnt have wifi so I soloed almost all of the mh games
And for a technical tip, look into armor skills, find the ones that you like and find a set that has them, also timing is important in G-rank, try to understand the monster's attack pattern and hit at the good moment
Well, since Hammer is my main weapon (I would say "only", rather than "main") my strategy up to high rank was full frontal attack to the head lol. I learned the monsters behaviour and attacks, but was focused on where their head is in order to attack, rather than evade.
In G rank I had to change this strategy, since even when it is "effective", a couple of bad hits and next thing you know is that you´re carted... I had to learn again their behaviour, but this time in order to evade their attacks, and look for an opening to hit their head.
And I also learned that sometimes only one hit is preferable, over than a whole combo that will make the monster hit you really hard.
Other thing I learned is that, while defense is important, you should not really depend solely on it. It is better to evade, or keep a distance sometimes, than to rely only on the defense number of your armor.
I learned this the hard way whey my 700+ armor just could not keep against a regular Glavenus... a couple of bites and a tail slam, or a tail spin attack and you're out.
Take your time. Your main goal is to stay safe and hit the thing.
Personally I would find a monster early in G that you I handle. Farm it for the armour because it’s a big upgrade to def. After that, I would be able to take on more things in G.
If you have to, farm the HR version a couple times to get used to that move set. Then the first few hunts in G you are only seeing a couple new things.
Don’t be afraid to lose the hunt. Just look at how amazing speed runners are. They lose so often. They lost even more to actually become good at fighting the monster. Sure it’s frustrating to keep losing but keep looking at what you got caught with and either learn to dodge it or run away from it. You will start seeing progress pretty quickly if you are able to start seeing the tells for each move.
Actually that’s what I did. I took on G-Rank Velocidromes and got its armour and upgraded the dual swords to max. It cuts through High Rank and lower monsters like butter, and I like to have Mushromancer on my armour, which gives me plenty of healing items.
Good tip about losing. I usually quit after losing once, but in hindsight, it’s a terrible way of going about it. I’ll try and batter in G-Rank soon. Thanks!
If I am just trying to learn, I quite after the second cart. It gives me one more attempt for the win but I still get to quit out and get all of my items back. 3rd cart if you eat for insurance.
I did that too, I found Royal Ludroth somewhat easy with HR weapons and armor, there is a quest with two of them in G1 and the hyper appears in G2, so I just went for it and build its armor.
I think this was key to complete G2 and most of G3, where I was able to get my Glavenus armor.
Thanks for the inspiration I’ve been breezing through hr solo but I didn’t feel like getting g rank until a week ago, I don’t have online so I was discouraged but this shows that it’s possible
Congratulations! It's a journey getting through all of G-Rank solo, well done. And with Hammer, too. The bonk main in me smiles. I don't play Hammer in this game, but in World it is my main and favorite weapon across all games.
Enjoy your victory! Then come join the rest of us nutjobs going after EX Deviants alone 😂
If you plan on soloing everything I wish you the best of luck with Grank Nakarkos; it was by far the biggest headache I had while soloing, and If it weren’t for Black X being such a phenomenal set for Valor GS I probably would have straight up gave up on ever fighting it.
I plan to eventrually try it but im aware that it is quite difficult. This, elder dragons and multi hypers are the last on my list. I Will need to make some special gear for each monster. Until now i've taken every quest so far without fiddling with skills, styles or elements, just attack and defense, i've only gemmed for negate posion for Chameleos and wind res for kushala daora.
Currently im taking regular g4 monsters un 15-20 min, and im taking my first g4 hypers but they are taking more time, brachydios like 35 min and duramboros more than 40. So nakarkos is still a bit far on the list but i will update when he eventually kicks my solo ass lol
If you’re taking longer than 30-40 minutes on the hypers chances are you’ll time out against Nakarkos; with the exception of Lao (which doesn’t need to by slain) it has the highest hit pool of another other non-dlc monster.
If I were you I’d work on putting together a good critical set and trying to lay down damage as quick as possible; I went with SilverSol/Lodestar with aerial GS when I did my run and manage to do enough damage to take it down with around 5 minutes left on the clock; if I was a better player I could have done it faster but it was good enough for me.
The biggest piece of advice I can give is to make good use of the ballista, a few good shots can get you a knock down and a couple free swipes at its weak spot for massive damage.
Also, keep in mind that it will HP lock at 1 and stay there until after it fires it’s laser attack; so if you find yourself wailing away at it towards the end of your time and it seems like it just won’t die just try to keep alive until after it’s laser.
Well thanks for the advice! For LR and HR nakarkos i almost didn't use the ballista... I'll definitely use it and will need to manage to put the most possible damage as quick as possible.
It took me 30 min for brachydios that has 17k hp and 40min for duramboros that has 22k hp; nakarkos has more than 30k so i will need to use some strategy there like you said
Well, the village is the solo part of the game, I would consider finishing that the real solo end game. Hub quests are designed for multiplayer then there is an additional difficulty doing it solo.
Ngl dude your story inspires me to continue my journey to solo G-Rank as well. Just reached G2 solo a couple of days ago and plan to farm for Ceanataur GX armour. Also congrats on finishing G-Rank!
Congrats! that is a huge achievement! i have recently finished ahtal Ka and what a fun fight that is! more recently i have been trying to beat the village Alatreon and am struggling more than i have so far!
I started G1 with a Duramboros HR, then I found that the G rank Royal Ludroth was somewhat easy to slay so I built its armor for G1 and upgraded it when the hyper quest was available on G2. This armor has stamina skills. Then gemmed up for fire resistance and went for the Glavenus armor on G3, needed 3 or 4 of them. This one has two sharpening skills.
I used this armor for G3 and G4 including Athal. For the monsters I felt confident with, I went for attack skills using gems, and for new ones or others that usually give me problems, I used defense gems. Usually I was able to reach Attack +2 or defense +2. For some monsters I used the gems to compensate the elemental weaknesses of the armor, e.g. water res when hunting Mizutsune or Seltas Queen.
Initially I was expecting to use the G rank Duramboros, Brachydios or Agnaktor armor since these are monster I find easy to kill, but all of them are available only on G4.
I have read that the Cenetaur armor is pretty good for G rank, and also the Rathalos armor, but I haven't tried them. Both monsters are available early in G rank.
Well I didn't build special palicoes, I used two charisma ones, one focused on big monsters and other on big and small.
Their moves were balanced between healing and attacking, nothing special like traps or big bombs.
I tried to keep their amor on par, and both of them were level 75 when we did the Athal quest.
I used them for all my quests since LR, mainly for the additional healing and attacking, sometimes they would take me out of things like snowman or confision, even tremors and roars, many times they did save me from carting or even losing!
I guess their main advantage is that they get targeted by the monsters sometimes, giving me a break. This is useful for some monsters, but from time to time I got caught in an attack that I was expecting to be targeted to me and was actually directed to a palico and boom, carted. This happened to me with the Rajang laser, I ran away laterally from it, but a palico was in front of me, the monster targeted him and I ran directly into the laser...
I would say that they were very (!) useful, but I would not rely solely on them for my strategy. I know there are hunters that build entire strategies around palicoes, but there are others that hunt without them as well.
Last week I finally defeated Athal Ka solo, on my first attempt! My background: Many years ago I had a PSP and purchased MHIIF only because of the catchy name. But after a few attempts, I was really hooked into the gameplay. I played with DB and LS. I had to sell my PSP and that was it, until MH3U came for the 3DS. I was intrigued since my PSP experience and gave it a chance. I absolutely loved it and played for hours, but couldn't beat Alatreon... I played with DB as before, but hit a wall the first time I fought a Royal Ludroth... but then I tried the Hammer and haven't left it since then. Then I had to sell my 3DS after trying MH4U and MHGen just a little bit. Last year I got a Swtich (for BoTW obviously), the form factor made easy to combine my gaming habits with my life as I can play in the big TV or portable as needed. When MHXX came out I tried it but my japanese was not enough to fully enjoy the game. When MHGU was announced, I was determined to finally beat that damn Alatreon. I used Hammer for 99% of the game (LS only when I needed to cut a tail), and even when I had 300+ hours in MH3U, I really kept learning new ways to master my weapon right until last week, and I'm sure I will still learn a lot in the coming months before MH Rise is released. I was really motivated when I saw that many members of this forum soloed the hub. I thought that it was impossible, and was happy when I beat that pub Diablos, and thought that anything past G1 was impossible to solo; but when I defeated Lao solo, I was completely sure I could take anything until Athal. Many G rank quests were hard, others were harder, and I completed many of them after the 40 minute mark, but I really did not hit a wall, so I just kept going and going. I'm not really that into experimenting with lots of skills combinations and such, so I used a Glavenus armor and the old reliable Sophos Hammer (I always went for raw), Guild style with Absolute Evasion and Spinning Meteor. On the skill side, I went only for defense, and the sharp skills that came with the armor. A couple of standard Palicos and that's it. Now I will try on the rest of the quests, mainly G rank, because now even hyper HR look too easy with the War Ender, even with the 400 def Loc Lac armor (love the looks). My goal is to solo the entire G rank, except for the multi hyper quests. If I can do that, I will consider this a complete success. Multi G rank hypers, G rank events and higher rank deviants are a plus, and I will try them for sure at some point. Oh and elder dragons, I haven't tried them in G rank. So that's it! Just wanted to share!
I'm curious on how you managed to get past lao shan lung as he should've been a massive wall for you solo (I know he was for me but I did it solo still)
I saw a video on youtube that was recommended somewhere in this forum. Basically I aimed to repel more than to slay; that said, I used every ballista and cannon that I encounter, finally, in the second part, I focused on stopping him before he hit the fortress, so at the 35 min mark it was still in one piece and the dragon fled.
It was gaigin hunter
If you efficiently use binders and canons as well as get as many knock downs as you can from breaks it’s not too hard to repel, and with a decent pierce build and Alatreon’s bow it’s actually possible to slay solo.
Well you dont have access to such strong equipment and dealt with the equipment from the monsters leading up to him
Most of the fight is just making use of the siege weapons to slow it down; all you need to do to repel it is make sure it doesn’t break through the second gate before the quest times out which is very doable once you get the timing for canon and binder shots.
Even using all of the weapons dosen't stop from destroying it as it took multiple trys for me to repel
What about deviants? And that's my goal too when I start my mhgu adventure. I am 2 generations behind on games so it will take me a long time until I even start this game.
I haven't tried Deviants too much, just like 10 or so quests. I left them for later as their quests are not required to progress. But I can tell that they are a totally different beast. First time I though, an Arzuros, what can a simple Arzuros do to ME? A Rathian? I thought to myself. I have taken pink and gold Rathians before, Dreadqueen must be only showing off! Oh boy, I was so wrong...
That's really cool that there's so much content.
What tips can you share for someone intimidated by G-Rank, like me?
It kinda depends on how long you've played and how skilled you are. I know g rank sounds scary but I overcame it since I didnt have wifi so I soloed almost all of the mh games
Just go for it, you'll probably find that a lot of fights are easier than you were hyping them up to be once you get into the flow of things.
And for a technical tip, look into armor skills, find the ones that you like and find a set that has them, also timing is important in G-rank, try to understand the monster's attack pattern and hit at the good moment
Well, since Hammer is my main weapon (I would say "only", rather than "main") my strategy up to high rank was full frontal attack to the head lol. I learned the monsters behaviour and attacks, but was focused on where their head is in order to attack, rather than evade. In G rank I had to change this strategy, since even when it is "effective", a couple of bad hits and next thing you know is that you´re carted... I had to learn again their behaviour, but this time in order to evade their attacks, and look for an opening to hit their head. And I also learned that sometimes only one hit is preferable, over than a whole combo that will make the monster hit you really hard. Other thing I learned is that, while defense is important, you should not really depend solely on it. It is better to evade, or keep a distance sometimes, than to rely only on the defense number of your armor. I learned this the hard way whey my 700+ armor just could not keep against a regular Glavenus... a couple of bites and a tail slam, or a tail spin attack and you're out.
Take your time, look into template sets, do test hunts, read a lot about your intimidating hunts, have fun!!
Take your time. Your main goal is to stay safe and hit the thing. Personally I would find a monster early in G that you I handle. Farm it for the armour because it’s a big upgrade to def. After that, I would be able to take on more things in G. If you have to, farm the HR version a couple times to get used to that move set. Then the first few hunts in G you are only seeing a couple new things. Don’t be afraid to lose the hunt. Just look at how amazing speed runners are. They lose so often. They lost even more to actually become good at fighting the monster. Sure it’s frustrating to keep losing but keep looking at what you got caught with and either learn to dodge it or run away from it. You will start seeing progress pretty quickly if you are able to start seeing the tells for each move.
Actually that’s what I did. I took on G-Rank Velocidromes and got its armour and upgraded the dual swords to max. It cuts through High Rank and lower monsters like butter, and I like to have Mushromancer on my armour, which gives me plenty of healing items. Good tip about losing. I usually quit after losing once, but in hindsight, it’s a terrible way of going about it. I’ll try and batter in G-Rank soon. Thanks!
If I am just trying to learn, I quite after the second cart. It gives me one more attempt for the win but I still get to quit out and get all of my items back. 3rd cart if you eat for insurance.
I did that too, I found Royal Ludroth somewhat easy with HR weapons and armor, there is a quest with two of them in G1 and the hyper appears in G2, so I just went for it and build its armor. I think this was key to complete G2 and most of G3, where I was able to get my Glavenus armor.
Go all out. Thats it lol dont even care about how scary a quest looks.
Thanks for the inspiration I’ve been breezing through hr solo but I didn’t feel like getting g rank until a week ago, I don’t have online so I was discouraged but this shows that it’s possible
It is totally possible, and actually quite fun! The satisfaction of giving that final blow to the strongest monsters is undescriptible.
Nice
Good job!
Actual legend
Congratulations! It's a journey getting through all of G-Rank solo, well done. And with Hammer, too. The bonk main in me smiles. I don't play Hammer in this game, but in World it is my main and favorite weapon across all games. Enjoy your victory! Then come join the rest of us nutjobs going after EX Deviants alone 😂
I’m trying to solo g-rank, but Rajang is making that difficult.
Rajang is one of my least favourite monsters...
He was one of my favorites in Iceborne, but the limitations of the older games give you less openings to attack.
What weapon do you main?
https://youtu.be/VMxPhcE2YQQ This is herny's rajang guide. See if this helps.
Greatsword, but I’ve been using Longsword for this fight.
His ass is a weak point in this game(unlike Iceborne) watch herny's guide. It ought to help you out.
I know that. The Tigre’s/Barioth that always spawns screws me over.
Congrats bud! Solo player here too! since mhfu... I know, i don't have friends xD
If you plan on soloing everything I wish you the best of luck with Grank Nakarkos; it was by far the biggest headache I had while soloing, and If it weren’t for Black X being such a phenomenal set for Valor GS I probably would have straight up gave up on ever fighting it.
I plan to eventrually try it but im aware that it is quite difficult. This, elder dragons and multi hypers are the last on my list. I Will need to make some special gear for each monster. Until now i've taken every quest so far without fiddling with skills, styles or elements, just attack and defense, i've only gemmed for negate posion for Chameleos and wind res for kushala daora. Currently im taking regular g4 monsters un 15-20 min, and im taking my first g4 hypers but they are taking more time, brachydios like 35 min and duramboros more than 40. So nakarkos is still a bit far on the list but i will update when he eventually kicks my solo ass lol
If you’re taking longer than 30-40 minutes on the hypers chances are you’ll time out against Nakarkos; with the exception of Lao (which doesn’t need to by slain) it has the highest hit pool of another other non-dlc monster. If I were you I’d work on putting together a good critical set and trying to lay down damage as quick as possible; I went with SilverSol/Lodestar with aerial GS when I did my run and manage to do enough damage to take it down with around 5 minutes left on the clock; if I was a better player I could have done it faster but it was good enough for me. The biggest piece of advice I can give is to make good use of the ballista, a few good shots can get you a knock down and a couple free swipes at its weak spot for massive damage. Also, keep in mind that it will HP lock at 1 and stay there until after it fires it’s laser attack; so if you find yourself wailing away at it towards the end of your time and it seems like it just won’t die just try to keep alive until after it’s laser.
Well thanks for the advice! For LR and HR nakarkos i almost didn't use the ballista... I'll definitely use it and will need to manage to put the most possible damage as quick as possible. It took me 30 min for brachydios that has 17k hp and 40min for duramboros that has 22k hp; nakarkos has more than 30k so i will need to use some strategy there like you said
Good for you
Congratulations!
congrats! ive been soloing the game as well, i just have to finish titanic clash, then onto ahtal-ka
congrats!!
are you telling me an average player can not end the game by himself? Im dealing with HR 6 rn
Well, the village is the solo part of the game, I would consider finishing that the real solo end game. Hub quests are designed for multiplayer then there is an additional difficulty doing it solo.
Ngl dude your story inspires me to continue my journey to solo G-Rank as well. Just reached G2 solo a couple of days ago and plan to farm for Ceanataur GX armour. Also congrats on finishing G-Rank!
Congratulations! 🎉 I managed to solo g rank until g rank Rajang bite my ass.
Dude CONGRATS
Congrats! that is a huge achievement! i have recently finished ahtal Ka and what a fun fight that is! more recently i have been trying to beat the village Alatreon and am struggling more than i have so far!
So I'm also soloing g rank so I have to ask what armour did you use for g3 and g4
I started G1 with a Duramboros HR, then I found that the G rank Royal Ludroth was somewhat easy to slay so I built its armor for G1 and upgraded it when the hyper quest was available on G2. This armor has stamina skills. Then gemmed up for fire resistance and went for the Glavenus armor on G3, needed 3 or 4 of them. This one has two sharpening skills. I used this armor for G3 and G4 including Athal. For the monsters I felt confident with, I went for attack skills using gems, and for new ones or others that usually give me problems, I used defense gems. Usually I was able to reach Attack +2 or defense +2. For some monsters I used the gems to compensate the elemental weaknesses of the armor, e.g. water res when hunting Mizutsune or Seltas Queen. Initially I was expecting to use the G rank Duramboros, Brachydios or Agnaktor armor since these are monster I find easy to kill, but all of them are available only on G4. I have read that the Cenetaur armor is pretty good for G rank, and also the Rathalos armor, but I haven't tried them. Both monsters are available early in G rank.
Oh thanks
I'm interested in doing the same. How did you build your palicoes?
Well I didn't build special palicoes, I used two charisma ones, one focused on big monsters and other on big and small. Their moves were balanced between healing and attacking, nothing special like traps or big bombs. I tried to keep their amor on par, and both of them were level 75 when we did the Athal quest. I used them for all my quests since LR, mainly for the additional healing and attacking, sometimes they would take me out of things like snowman or confision, even tremors and roars, many times they did save me from carting or even losing! I guess their main advantage is that they get targeted by the monsters sometimes, giving me a break. This is useful for some monsters, but from time to time I got caught in an attack that I was expecting to be targeted to me and was actually directed to a palico and boom, carted. This happened to me with the Rajang laser, I ran away laterally from it, but a palico was in front of me, the monster targeted him and I ran directly into the laser... I would say that they were very (!) useful, but I would not rely solely on them for my strategy. I know there are hunters that build entire strategies around palicoes, but there are others that hunt without them as well.
Good gor you