Long Sword High Rank and Endgame Builds for Monster Hunter Wilds

Welcome to our Monster Hunter Wilds build guide for the Long Sword in both High Rank as well as endgame. Listed below you will find the best builds for the Long Sword both for progressing through the earlier stages of High Rank as well as the best builds for Long Sword at endgame.

To skip straight to the endgame builds, click the button below!

Title Update 4, released on December 19th, is the final major update, featuring the fearsome Gogmazios siege. This brings in upgraded Artian weapons that have a significant impact on ideal builds, alongside new armor sets and the ability to transcend armor - providing better decoration slots. Due to all of this, there's a significant shake up from previously recommended endgame sets.

A quick breakdown of Long Sword changes on this page as of the title update are as follows:

• A new section focused on the Gogmazios Artian Weapon upgrade path and ideal skills to pick up has been added. This provides information on best practices for reinforcements, and skills to aim for.
• The ideal endgame set has seen significant changes. With the benefits of transcending paired with Gogmazios Artian weapons providing a skill, the options are significantly increased.
• Talismans remain the chase goal for your endgame gearsets - with rank 7 and 8 having access to skill combinations that, if lucky, can outperform craftable options.

Artian Weapons are the strongest weapons available at the endgame and are worth the investment if you're willing to grind out the ideal rolls. Especially with the addition of Gogmazios upgrades, you're looking to have a fully complete set using a strong Rarity 8 Dimensius, and transition it to the upgraded version after.

Your options on what primary attribute are any element option if you're countering a specific monster, though Paralysis or Blast are universal options if you want something open for use against any monster type. Aim to use Attack base parts to craft the weapon, and then ideally you're looking for the following reinforcements:

• Sharpness Boost +30
• Attack Boost +5
• Attack Boost +5
• Attack Boost +5
• Attack Boost +5

These can shift around some depending on which base parts you used, and it's not the end of the world if you end up with a mix. Aim to avoid Element reinforcements if possible.

For the 3 decoration slots, there are a few options available to Artian weapons due to the extra flexibility provided by 3-slots. Some key picks are:

• Critical Boost III recommended - Long Sword loves Affinity, and this just makes it better.
• Master's Touch recommended - most efficient Sharpness option when paired with our high Affinity builds.
• Critical Boost II - can slot into the third to max out the skill.
• Razor Sharp III / Handicraft I - alternative to Master's Touch if you're looking for a more consistent cadence to your Sharpness management.
• Mind's Eye III - this is a bit more complicated. This effectively makes your damage much more consistent if you're not good at hitting weak hitzones. This makes your maximum potential slightly lower, but drastically improves your room for error. Very efficient if you can fit it in.

After defeating Gogmazios, you'll receive Tarred Devices, which can be used by Gemma to reinforce the previous Artian Weapon, Dimensius, into a much stronger version. When upgraded, your previous Long Sword will have its Element or Status maintained, but gain additional bonuses to either Attack, Affinity, or Element depending on the devices used. You should be using three Attack infusions. It will also gain one random Set Bonus Skill and one random Group Skill from a pool, and allow you to reinforce the the 5 bonuses it rolls. Reinforcements and Skills can be rerolled for additional materials.

Your goal is to acquire both Gore Magala's Tyranny and Lord's Soul, but the priority is always the set bonus skill first to match your armor set. Your ideal reinforcements are two Attack EX, two Attack III, and one Sharpness EX. You can only ever have two of any level of a given reinforcement per attribute though, so if you roll a combination of extra Sharpness or Affinity, these can sometimes be worth keeping.

Due to the nature of acquiring your ideal Artian weapon, and how much armor sets now rely on this random roll, it may be difficult to assemble the endgame set provided on this page. Due to that, below is a list of skills to prioritize while working toward the complete setup:

Armor Skills:

• Gore Magala's Tyranny - 2-piece
• Quick Sheathe - Level 3
• Antivirus - Level 3 (With the Gore set bonus)
• Agitator - Level 5
• Weakness Exploit - Level 5
• Lord's Soul - 3-piece
• Maximum Might - Level 3
• Counterstrike - Level 3
• Burst - Level 1
• Flayer - Level 1
• Adrenaline Rush - Level 1-5
• Coalescence - Level 1-3

Weapon Skills:

• Critical Boost - Level 5
• Master's Touch - Level 3
• Elemental Attack - Level 3 (Depending on Element)
• Attack Boost - Level 1-5
• Critical Eye - Level 1-5

The absolute strongest options involve using element counters on specific monsters (especially on Rank 9 hunts), as these come at no cost to raw power on Artian weapons. You still want to aim for the same all-attack infusions, though having a Long Sword of each element available for match-ups is your ultimate goal. Below are some drop-down lists of monsters countered by each element:

• Fire - Click for Match-ups

  • Blangonga
  • Congalala
  • Doshaguma
  • Gore Magala
  • Gypceros
  • Hirabami
  • Jin Dahaad
  • Lala Barina
  • Lagiacrus
  • Nerscylla
  • Gogmazios (Solid)
• Water - Click for Match-ups

  • Ajarakan
  • Guardian Ebony Odogaron
  • Gravios
  • Nu Udra
  • Quematrice
  • Rompopolo
• Thunder - Click for Match-ups

  • Balahara
  • Chatacabra
  • Hirabami
  • Mizutsune
  • Seregios
  • Uth Duna
  • Omega Planetes
• Ice - Click for Match-ups

  • Guardian Fulgur Anjanath
  • Rey Dau
  • Xu Wu
  • Yian Kut-Ku
• Dragon - Click for Match-ups

  • Arkveld
  • Guardian Doshaguma
  • Guardian Rathalos
  • Rathalos
  • Rathian
  • Zoh Shia
  • Gogmazios (Liquid / Gaseous)

Added as a bonus update during Title Update 2, hunts against monsters that are 9 star and above can now also reward appraisable talismans. These can come with skill and decoration slots otherwise unobtainable from the smithy, and should you be lucky enough, can push your build to the next level. Rolling a perfect talisman is an extremely big time investment, so sometimes it's best to just look out for options that are good enough. Big ticket skills to look out for are:

• Attack Boost
• Master's Touch
• Critical Eye
• Razor Sharp
• Handicraft

Acquiring any of these skills - especially alongside a weapon decoration slot - outpaces any other option available to craft. If you can't get hold of these though, generally a Counter Charm III, Challenger Charm III or Exploiter Charm II will suffice, depending on preference. Remember that when you slot in a talisman that provides weapon skills, you may need to adjust your decorations to still provide desirable armor skills.

Traditionally the most powerful armor sets available in Monster Hunter, in Wilds the Gamma sets are being released with each Title Update. These grant access to the Lord's Soul 3-set bonus - a powerful additional cheat death effect - while coming with a slightly higher budget for strong skills. The sets currently released are:

• Rey Dau - this set focuses on Latent Power, which while a generally less appealing skill comes on very efficient pieces. With the advent of Title Update 4, it's become a less appealing method of access to Lord's Soul however.
• Uth Duna - this set features Peak Performance prominently, which is generally very difficult to optimize. Despite that, the Legs allow for some interesting build opportunities, and can be used as a way to access Quick Sheathe easily.
• Nu Udra - this set features Burst and Resentment, which aren't typically skills Long Sword stacks. However, the Chest in particular is a powerful piece utilized in endgame builds.
• Jin Dahaad - this set features Agitator and Foray, and while it's very efficient, with the release of Gogmazios it isn't used in ideal endgame sets.

After reaching Hunter Rank 50, you unlock access to the majority of endgame monsters, and will slowly unlock more event quests as you progress up to 100. Currently we have a curated primary endgame build, and any variant builds included in the tabs below.

The first set you should aim to be crafting as you begin your journey into High Rank is a mixture of pieces to keep access to Quick Sheathe while grabbing as much offense and comfort as possible to farm hunter ranks efficiently.

As your access to decorations will still be quite limited, while appealing it's not worth the time to go out of your way to farm them as the ones you're on the look out far can be crafted with melding points quite early on. Once you gain access to some of these decorations though, it opens up room to start pivoting to more offensive pieces without relying on the Alloy Set to fill out gaps.

Note - until Sheathe Charm is at level 2, use Alloy Coil α in your Legs slot.

This set will be more than sufficient to farm up some hunter ranks and progress through the chapters to unlock more difficult enemies. You have an option between either Wyvern Blade Verde or Rey Tonitrus II as they both use Rathian parts, though the extra Affinity on the Poison Long Sword alongside status build-up being quite fast for the weapon type makes it the recommended option.

Your priority hunts are Rathian and Ajarakan early to craft both your weapon to bring it up to blue sharpness, and to level your Sheathe Charm to level 2, allowing you to shift away from Alloy Coil α as early as possible. The 2-piece Guardian Ebony Set brings 2 points in Burst and a slight bump in power (though the main benefit comes from the first point), and the Arkveld set also heals when you pop wounds, adding a good amount of comfort on top.

• Quick Sheathe - Level 3
• Burst - Level 2
• Flayer - Level 2
• Critical Status - Level 2
• Poison Duration Up - Level 1
• Blight Resistance - Level 1
• Bleeding Resistance - Level 1
• Flinch Free - Level 1
• Guardian's Pulse - 3-piece
• Ebony Odogaron's Power - 2-piece
• Guardian Arkveld's Vitality - 2-piece

As you progress through High Rank and unlock stronger monsters, we can start to to form a build closer to the final endgame sets and cutting Low Rank armor pieces. This comes in two stages, with the first being available as you reach 6 star hunts opening up more Alpha and Beta sets, and the second with access to Gore Magala at 40+.

We've separated these two stages into the tabs below depending on what gear you currently have access to: