THE JOURNEY: Gettin' Jaggi With It

I’m back. I have slept only 4-5 hours each of the last couple of nights and it isn't because I have had a sudden onset of insomnia but rather I have been afflicted with Monster Hunter. I don’t have a ton of time to play during the day so I reserve a bit before I go to sleep at night to feed my new addiction. The first blog in this series earlier this week was all about my first hour or so with MH4U but now as a grizzled veteran of close to 7 hours I can definitively say that I have been missing out.

Do not let the fact that I have nearly 7 hours of playing time fool you; I am still only doing 2 star quests and find myself taking 35-45 minutes on every one of them just running around and mining ore, catching bugs, or picking up a ton of berries. I should have probably made more progress by now but I just cannot force myself to pass up items that I have no clue will be useful later or not. I haven’t dove into many of the armor forging aspect except to make an invincible hammer for my Palico that seemed pretty cheap and I have fed my Insect Glaive enough nectar to nearly hit lvl 2 but not quite. Everything that I just mentioned was completely foreign to me when this week started but now I feel like I have put a small crack into the impenetrable armor that is the Monster Hunter series.

Yesterday if you would have looked through my Quest List you would have seen a bunch of check-marks all the way down with the exception of 2 missions, Jaggi Alliance and The Stinking Seltas, I was scared to accept either of those because they were hunting quests and up to that point I have been perfectly content to just collect unique mushrooms or go fishing for some sushifish. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the hunting in the actual game even though I had played a small bit of the demo that was out that actually had you hunting a Great Jaggi. Was this going to be harder? Am I equipped enough to actually take down a monster in this game? I kept avoiding the inevitable and trying to find other things to do besides what the entire point of the game is.

Finally, this morning, I did it. I clicked on Jaggi Alliance and ventured forth, scared and unsure if I would survive what was ahead of me. The Guildmarm told me good luck and gave me some pointers as I transitioned into the wild to actually hunt a monster for the first time. Then I got embarrassingly lost. I had traversed this damn map twenty times already but as soon as the mission was to actually find a monster I froze and ran around the same 3-4 sections for almost 15 minutes. I’m an idiot.

Surely stumbling around like a drunken moron I wandered into a cut scene and there it was. A tutorial popped up that walked me through how to mount an enemy and stab it repeatedly by jamming on the X button to do extra damage and after that was over it was just me and the Jaggi (and my little cat dude, plus a bunch of small Jaggi’s, and some fly creatures). The real showdown though was between the monster and I; the fight was on. We both charged at each other. He bit in my direction and I mistakenly fired my bug into the side of a mountain, I focused the camera on him and took my first swing which missed horrifically, and then I ran to a ledge above him and tried a jumping attack but again missed by a pretty considerable distance. The Benny Hill music should have been playing the entire first 2 minutes of this fight because I’m not sure I would have even hit him if he would have been standing still.

Wait, it happened. After a couple of minutes of some of the worst gaming ineptitude since the late 80’s for me I made contact. After that it felt like something clicked. I strung together a really nice combo and eventually weakened the Jaggi who took off to another section but not before I missed twice with a paintball before hitting it as it ran away. I’m coming after you Jaggi. The fight lasted only eleven minutes and I never let my health drop below half because I was terrified that 8 dragons were going to crash down from the sky and obliterate me. That’s how Monster Hunter works, right?

After the killing blow had been struck and I had completed the sub-quest by total accident I had done it. I had killed my very first monster and it felt amazing. I know that the Great Jaggi is nothing and basically a tutorial monster but the sense of accomplishment that I got from dropping that fool like a bad habit made me realize what this game is all about. I loved the deep mechanics and the myriad of systems that I may or may not ever understand are there if I want to dive deeper but what will make me keep playing now is that desire to feel that same thing again. If taking down the first monster in the game makes me feel like the badass hunter that I am nowhere near yet then how will I feel when I actually defeat a huge hulking dragon after a dangerous battle.

I can safely say that I am now hooked on Monster Hunter. I am in no way an expert and there are so many things that I have no idea about just yet but I want to learn. I am also looking forward to any additions made to the game. This blog series will continue because I am loving every second of Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. Thanks for the advice and help that I have received here on the forums so far and after joining the group to play together I am looking forward to meeting up with a few Duders and stabbing some huge beasts until they fall over or just standing in front of “The Man” and dancing.

Haha, sounds like it was a pretty intense showdown for the first few minutes. One thing I'd recommend is to just go ahead and throw a paintball at the monsters right away. They last for probably a good ten minutes or so, and if the fight feels like it's going on for a little bit, you can eventually throw another one. But a lot of times just one will last you, and especially once you start fighting monsters multiple times and you really get their patterns down.

How are you doing with the insect part of the Insect Glaive? The toughest part for me is still being quick and accurate with aiming the bug, but I've noticed my improvement over the time I've spent, and that feels rewarding.

Also if you haven't already, I'd make it a priority to craft that Jaggi armor, so maybe talk to The Man and see what he's offering and what he needs. The defense aspect of armor alone really does make a huge difference when you start fighting some of the bigger, nastier monster. That's not even to mention the potential added skills from armors.

Hahahaha ah yes the memories of my first Jaggi battle all those years ago! Don't worry you still got plenty of those moments. Like when you fight a Kut Ku, a Kecha Wacha, Rathalos, a Ludroth (actually are Ludroth in 4? not sure), Gore, and a whole slew of other giant SOB's who will probably 2 shot kill you.

JJ is right, get your first real armor set crafted as soon as you can! The Jaggi set is where we all started for a reason! There will be plenty of chances to make new gear coming up too!

@jjweatherman:

I was the most graceful hunter ever for those first couple minutes.

I am struggling with the insect part... I'm able to hit something maybe 10 percent of the time that I try but I have taken more to just slashing at enemies and not worrying about the insect which leads me to think that I may change weapons pretty soon, but I'm not sure what to try next.

I am working on the Jaggi armor right now. I'm hoping to be able to craft all that is available to me before I move on to bigger monsters.

I'm not even sure what any of the things are that you mentioned but I can assure you that I am terrified of all of them, haha... and that's hard to believe with how much of a master hunter I am now.

Is there a way to grind the Great Jaggi? I don't really have all of the materials needed yet to craft the set.

All these Monster Hunter posts are making me want to give the series another try. Don't have a New 3DS or a Circle Pad Pro though so not sure how playable it will be.

I'm using an original 3DS XL and it's playable, I was planning to get a New 3DS but I can't find one locally. There is a thing where once you see the monster you can tap an icon on the touchscreen and from then on you can press L and it will immediately turn you and center you with the monster in front of you. It's super helpful and makes it easy to control with the limited camera control you have without a designated button. So I still highly recommend it.

You just repeat the quest over and over again until you get all the materials you need.

Thanks a bunch. I didn't know that quests were repeatable. I hadn't tried to click on an already completed one yet but now that I know that I will probably make EVEN less progress now and I'm perfectly fine with that.

I did the same thing at first, but as I grew more comfortable with the controls it became more and more natural gathering nectar. Just run up on those monsters and get right up in their grill before you let the bug go. I personally don't use the marker thing, as recommended in the Gaijin Hunter videos. It can be tough before you get some speed boosts to your bug, but you'll get the hang of it. Though I can also see not having a second stick making it a little harder to keep the monster in view the way you'd like to. Definitely brach out to other weapons if the insect glaive isn't doing it for you. I dove into the long sword for a little bit and the way you charge that thing up and start swinging like crazy is actually pretty freaking fun and definitely requires less precision.

@jjweatherman: I'll use the Insect Glaive a little bit more tonight to try to get more precise with it... though I may eventually switch to something else until I can get a new 3DS.

There's a few that I've been wanting to try anyway so I'll probably talk about how awful I am with 90 percent of those in the next entry, haha; thanks for the advice though, it's greatly appreciated.

Glad to see the game has gotten its hooks into you.

@jbg4: It's easy to miss, so you might have do so too, but if you go back to the 1 star missions there are weapon tutorials for every weapon in the game. Those at least get you started when trying different weapons.

@corevi: It is playable without either but I would at least recommend getting a circle pad pro if you can, it makes controlling the camera MUCH easier.

@jbg4 I don't know if you know this yet but just encase you don't here is a tip from a Fellow Glaive user: The Insect Glaive has a mounting attack which is going to be your best friend for as long as you use that weapon. Just hit R+B and this will shoot you up into the air then try to hit the monster while you are falling. I recommend trying to get the red+white essence buff first before trying to mount because this essence contamination will make your air attack strike twice which is important as it always takes two mid-air hits to knock down a monster the first time.

You can also mark specific parts of a monster by shooting out pheromone with the R button. When you hit a monster with pheromone the part hit will glow a different color based on the type of essence you will get from this part. In addition your Kinsect will always try to head towards the marked spot kinda like a heat seeking missile.

One final tip is when feeding your Kinsect nectar try to increase speed as much as you can. The faster your Kinsect can move the faster you can get your essence buffs which will vastly improve your performance when fighting monsters.

Regarding the insect glaive: General consensus is to just max speed until GRank, and then there is a very specific, optimal feeding guide you can go grab.

The Kinsect stuff was an interesting concept of customizing your weapon, but if you leave it up to Monster Hunter folk, they'll min-max you with the best of 'em.

Reminds me of Diablo 3. Sure, you COULD use all these other skills and runes, but as of this patch, you're gonna want to use so and so specific build to max out your dps.

@lanechanger: I was thinking the exact same thing the other day. It reminds me of that stuff too.

@mmmslash: Keep this advice coming. I really appreciate every bit of it. While I'm having a blast discovering some things on my own there wouldn't be any way to know what you've told me. Thanks!

@starvinggamer: I'm in deep man. I'm in deep.

I totally missed that. I checked it out this morning and plan to do a couple today just to see how a few of the other weapons work. Thanks

There are so many small intricacies to using the Insect Glaive that it almost seems like a terrible weapon for a beginner but then when I look at the guides for some of the others I think "Nope, this one is just fine" haha... there are some insanely deep systems in this game that I haven't even scratched the surface of yet.

Thanks so much for the tips though. They've all been incredibly useful.

@jbg4: Honestly I think the Insect Glaive is one of the better weapons for beginners to use. It might be a little complicated to upgrade but it's a really easy weapon to use. The mounting attack can be pretty OP at times as it can completely shut down some monsters like Kecha Wacha and is invaluable when it comes to fighting the larger monsters, not to mention you can use it to avoid attacks and position yourself behind or in front of the monster depending on where you want to attack.

If you ever need tips for using any weapons I recommend watching this guy's videos. He was extremely helpful when I was just starting out in MH3U. He also has some great basic videos that will help you understand the basics of Monster Hunter.

I should have a little easier time aiming with the Insect Glaive now because I finally found a New 3DS XL and bought it... YAY!!!!