The Longsword’s simple to use kit and high burst damage potential give this weapon type much staying power, especially at Master Rank hunts. Many beginner players favor this weapon for its ease of use and simple moveset. Despite its simplicity, its moveset has high weakspot hit potential, fast recovery frames, as well as great range, and a Spirit Gauge mechanic that rewards consistent gameplay. While other weapons like the Greatsword, Charge Blade, and Hunting Horn have their own intricacies, Longswords strike a nice balance between speed and power. These builds capitalize on the Longsword’s strengths, especially on solo hunts when stuns or staggers are more difficult to pull off as the weapon lacks any stagger power. MH World meta is focused on high DPS builds, and these builds are optimized to be very viable for Master Rank quests, even up to Fatalis. Here are some weapons, armor, jewels, and decorations you can use.
Punishing Draw Build
This build utilizes the Punishing Draw skill, which states that draw attacks will stun monsters. Seeing as Longswords lack the ability to stun monsters reliably compared to Greatswords or Hammers, Punishing Draw aids solo players in aiming their Spirit Helmbreakers at weakspots. If playing on multiplayer, this build falls off as monster health and stun thresholds increase significantly for each player that joins a hunt. When played solo, this build is powerful in the right hands, as this gear belongs to the ultimate boss in Monster Hunter, the Fatalis. For weapon and armor pieces, you will want the following:
- Fatalis Zhuggespanon with Challenger Jewel+ 4 and Expert Jewel+ 4: A direct upgrade to the Fatalis Sickle, this weapon is the best Longsword in Iceborne, boasting the highest damage values for its class. Despite its -30 crit chance stat, the Expert Jewel helps counteract this effect.
- Frostfang Helmet β with Attack Jewel+ 4, Critical Jewel 2, and Attack Jewel 1: This helmet is vital as this provides the Punishing Draw skill. This decoration setup adds an extra bonus for damage.
- Dragonhide β with Attack Jewel +4 and 2 Flawless Protection Jewel 4: The Fatalis set has the powerful Inheritance skill that removes any secret skill requirements for getting extra set bonuses. The Flawless Protection decoration adds the Peak Performance and Divine Bless skills, meaning that you will receive a hefty damage bonus while also getting a 25% chance to negate 60% of damage dealt to you
- Dragonclaws β with Attack Jewel +1 and Flawless Protection Jewel +4: Fills in for the Inheritance and Transcendence set bonus. With the Transcendence set bonus, you will receive the True Razor Sharp or Spare Shot skills, along with a 100+ Health and Stamina boost, which keeps you in a fight longer as True Razor Sharp has a 70% chance to reduce sharpness loss
- Dragonbarbs β with Shaver Jewel 3: For this armor piece, slot in Shaver Jewel 3 for the Clutch Claw Boost skill, allowing you to wound monsters easily with light weapon attacks. For the other two Decoration slots, you may choose which decoration to slot based on your personal preference. For a recommendation, the Expert Jewel could be added to provide an extra crit chance to boost your build. If you are looking for a more defensive option, use the Brace Jewel for knockback resistance.
- Dragonfeet β with 2 Critical/Protection Jewel 4: Like the Flawless/Protection Jewel, having more Divine Blessing levels helps with survivability, especially in Master Rank hunts where monsters are more likely to one-shot you.
- Challenger Charm V: This charm provides a massive boost to the Agitator skill, granting a flat Attack and crit chance bonus against enraged monsters, which is likely to happen very often.
For mantles, take the Rocksteady Mantle+ and the Impact Mantle. The Rocksteady Mantle ensures that none of your attacks will be interrupted, as it provides knockback, hearing, tremor, and wind protection. The extra damage reduction is also a nice bonus. When staying on the offensive, the Impact Mantle augments your Punishing Draw skill, making stuns even easier to pull off.
True Dragonvein Awakening Build
If you’re looking for a build to use before fighting Fatalis, the True Dragonvein Awakening build is meta for much of Master rank. This skill converts some of your health into more damage but allows you to regain that health back by constantly attacking. This build aims to attack as often as possible, as the set bonus will keep your health high as long as you press the assault. It's a build that rewards a more aggressive playstyle with its fun loop of sacrificing health for damage, regen, and sacrificing again, adding an element of risk and reward to your playstyle.
- Safi Crest Crown ɑ with Expert Jewel+ 4 and two Expert Jewel 1: Expert Jewels provide points in the Critical Eye skill, which grants extra crit chance. This setup overall provides a 30% affinity boost
- Safi Crested Chest ɑ with Challenger Jewel+ 4 and Challenger Jewel 2: The Challenger Jewels boost the Agitator build, boosting damage against enraged monsters.
- Safi Crested Vambraces ɑ with Resistor/Expert Jewel 4 and two Challenger Jewel 2: Resistor grants Blight Resistance, which is vital to surviving Master rank as monsters will frequently apply different elemental blights like fire, water, thunder, ice, and dragon blights.
- Safi Crested Belt ɑ with Furor Jewel+ 4 and Protection Jewel 1: The Furor Jewel gives the Resentment, giving an attack bonus whenever red health is present in the health bar. Considering that the True Dragonvein Awakening leaves behind red health on activation that can be recovered, they synergize with each other well. Meanwhile, the Protection Jewel boosts the Divine Blessing buff, which is mandatory for any build regardless of class. When monster damage values are elevated thanks to the Master rank difficulty, Divine Blessing makes a big difference.
- Safi Crested Boots ɑ with Furor Jewel+ 4, Furor Jewel 2, and Expert Jewel 1: This setup continues to augment the already pre-existing decorations.
- Razor Sharp Charm: Gives the Razor Sharp skill that halves sharpness loss per hit. Very useful for staying in the fight longer before resharpening your weapon.
For mantles, take the Rocksteady+ Mantle and Temporal Mantle. Like the previous build, Rocksteady helps you maintain your Dragonvein Awakening uptime as you attack uninterrupted. The Temporal Mantle will automatically evade any attack that hits you, which allows you to focus more on building up your Spirit gauge and Dragonvein uptime.
Soul of the Dragoon Elemental Damage Build
Exploiting a monster’s elemental weaknesses goes a long way in completing a hunt quickly. With the Drachen armor set and a Kjarr weapon of your choice element, this build takes full advantage of the MHW element system. For this build, the set bonus that enables this is the Soul of the Dragoon skill, which boosts elemental damage by 50% whenever the player does a jump attack. Upon wearing three pieces, this adds the Master’s Touch skill, which reduces weapon sharpness loss on critical hit. With this gear set, you can deal very significant elemental damage and take full advantage of a monster’s elemental weakness. Note that the defenses for this armor are quite low, so consider this as a glass canon build.
- Kjarr Sword Fire: This weapon has the highest elemental damage out of all other weapons in its category. Pair this with the Longsword’s fast jump attack animation, and this weapon deletes monsters if its element type matches the monster’s weakness.
- Drachen Armet ɑ with any elemental damage Jewel 1 and Coalescence Jewel 1: Blaze Jewel boosts your overall fire damage. Coalescence is used for gaining extra elemental damage after recovering from a blight.
- Drachen Mail ɑ with any elemental damage Jewel 1
- Drachen Vambraces ɑ with two Tenderizer Jewel 2: Tenderizer is vital for dealing massive damage when hitting weakspots. The crit chance bonus on wounded parts, stacked with your elemental damage, melts monsters with ease.
- Drachen Coil ɑ with Tenderizer Jewel 2
- Drachen Greaves ɑ with Critical Jewel 2: The percentage for crit damage improves your ability to deal massive burst damage when hitting weakspots.
- Attack Charm V: As the meta for MHW currently is dealing as much DPS as possible, it makes sense to add a lvl 5 Attack Boost to optimize your damage output.
For mantles, take the Glider Mantle+ and the Rocksteady Mantle+. Glider Mantle increases your air time and allows for a longer monster mount duration. Since this revolves around doing jump attacks, having some control in the air helps. The Rocksteady Mantle makes up for the squishiness of the Drachen armor as it provides a 30% damage reduction bonus.
Longsword Mains Unite
Monster Hunter World has seen a resurgence of fans, both veterans and newbies. Out of all the weapon classes, the Longsword is an attractive weapon for beginners as it has a solid yet high damaging moveset. Longswords, to this day, still remain as a valuable addition for teams, as much of the content in Monster Hunter World lies in the Master rank quests. With these builds, you can challenge some of the hardest bosses in the game with ease.
