What is your preferred weapon?

The glaive, though difficult to wrap my head around (regarding the upgrades), is my weapon of choice. Using the pole vaulting maneuver to mount a monster is the most fun I've had yet in any monster hunter game.

Why not multi-choice :P

Because I said preferred weapon, not preferred weapons :P

I'm giving the Great sword a shot in 4U.

I've always considered it the hardest weapon to both learn and master, so I'm not sure how long I'm gonna stick with it, but it has served me really well so far. Landing a level 3 charge is so damn satisfying.

Heavy Bowgun all day. Although, this Heavy "Blowgun" sounds interesting.

@deathtrap: But I can't choose!

The Charge Blade is way too cool to pass up. Admittedly, I've only played the demo, but it's really fun to be all tactical with sword/board and then switch to the axe and wreck shit.

I dig them dual blades. I'm branching out into horn a bit for group play, but DB has been my weapon of choice since MH3U and now they changed up the attacks a bit. Which is awesome!

Lance for life. I was huge on the lance before but now being able to jump (somewhat)whenever I want and easily get those mount attacks off without relying on ledges is awesome. I love the new moves they added.

@bollard: Too bad! You must choose!

I'm not playing this game because I don't own a 3ds but I've always used a gunlance in every game since they were introduced. They're my absolute favorite weapon in the series; after that it would be hammers.

I'm a Switch axe man. It hits hard, its fast and it's got some awesome reach. Oh and the Sword form bypasses monsters armor so... yeah, that's kind of amazing. I figured out the Switch axe was for me when I kept getting beat down by Barroth in Tri but then the Switch Axe appeared in the blacksmiths shop, Barroth problem handled. When i'm playing one of the older games, I go for the Longsword or Greatsword though.

I can play any weapon except the Hunting horn. The attacks feel weird and inaccurate. Digging the new Charge blade and Insect Glaive, I see the potential for both and the Charge blade is wrecking all the solo (village) monsters with little effort.

Hammer. Nothing quite as satisfying as landing a triple pound to the face with the golf swing causing a KO.

I have always been a fan of sword and shield, and push come to shove long sword. But with the introduction of the Charge Blade I may be at risk of changing favorites once I get my hands on the game proper.

Heavy Bowgun Erry'day. Seriously it turns the game into this super suspenseful 3rd person shooter its great.

Gunlance. It is a gun AND a lance in one weapon!

Haven't played a ton yet (or much in the past), but I chose to start with Hunting Horn. I like the attacks it has, particularly how it can easily KO monsters, and I think buffs are pretty cool.

The longsword has reach and isn't absurdly slow, two things that I think are pretty great. That being said, I've also been using the heavy bowgun a lot recently and that's also really fun to use.

Insect Glaive and Great Sword.

I'm enjoying the new weapons as well. I can't decide between them - the Glaive seems really powerful, but really complicated due to needing to keep track of your buffs and where to aim the insect.

It's a tie between switch axe and lance. I used to like the lance more, but the changes they made to the switch axe make it an absolutely amazingly fun and powerful weapon. Both axe and sword mode are so satisfying, and either one can be your sole focus or you can mix between the two.

Charge Blade is the shit.

Woot team heavy bow gun. I'm new to monster hunting and had a fun time learning that you literally can't put on blademaster armor when you're ranged and vice versa so it was a little nippmy first time switching to HBG. I'm near the end of the 3 star missions and am still using the default heavy bow gun with no upgrades.

Charge sword was fun when I was a blademaster

I'm pretty impressed with the diversity of people's preferred weapons though (except for light bowgun, no love for those D:) which is a pretty good indication that they're interesting and unique enough to cater to different playing styles.

I still haven't bought 4u, but in 3u I was real big on the switch axe.

I like to pour hot swaxe all over my chest.

MH3U was my first game and i got it around Christmas. only sunk about 20 hours in and did long sword the whole way and loved it, but this time im trying the charge blade and its fun. Thinking about expanding my inventory this time around and making a variety of different weapons that way i can have different status effects with elements instead of only one weapon. the ranged weapons seem interesting to me but they are so damn expensive to be buying all that ammo before a hunt and then run out mid fight

Hammer most definetly. Once you get deep into using hammers, you can count the stun damage done to the monster and predict when it's going to get knocked out. It's very much like Street Fighter in that every hammer swing has a different stun damage amount and the game keeps tracks of it with an invisible counter. When you exceed the limit, KO! It's great to say to your buddies to get ready for an all-out attack when your next swing connects. A good hammer user is invaluable in every team.

It's also an adrenaline rush seeing a humongeous beast getting knocked out, there is no other weapon class like it.

I really like the insect glaive, pretty fast, has some nice combos, you can buff yourself and it's fairly easy to consistently mount monsters when you get the hang of the vaulting thing.

And I like Hunting Horn for MP because the buffs are very useful for everyone, i have a hard time consistently hitting monsters in the head with it to knock the out though.

I was primarily Charge Blade, but I've decided I really hate how slow the axe form is - I like being nimble. Going to have to try out the Insect Glaive - seems like it might be a nice compromise between speed and damage. Not a fan of Dual Blades - they get dull too fast.

@deathtrap: yeah, it's pretty nimble and the base dmg is nothing to scoff at, plus when you get the attack buff plus catalyst (red and white) your attacks get faster and most of them hit like 2 or 3 times in a single swing because all the spinning and shit the glaive does(and they get particularly spinny with the buffs).

I think it's the best weapon for solo play.

I've favored Dual Blades as my go-to weapon in MH3U for its mobility and fluid combos. I've also been primarily using the Charge Blade in single player in MH4U and it has served well.

It would probably be HH if I wasn't always solo, so Hammers.

Initially tried out Long Sword cause Katanas are cool, then I ended up really clicking with it, so I've stuck with it ever since.

I thought I was getting bored and frustrated with the game until I tried the insect glaive. That thing is seriously fun. It's like if the long-sword had better mobility and you could vault with it. I'm also having trouble figuring out how to upgrade it though. I'm sure I can google it and find out.

Well I haven't played 4 yet but. GREAT SWORDS FOR LIFE. BIG DAMAGE. MANY SKULLCRUSHES. TENSE GAMEPLAY.

I fully endorse this enthusiasm towards GREAT SWORDS.

That has been my main since MHFU, followed by Hammers and SnS.

Thought that I was going to main Insect Glaive until I gave SnS another shot. It makes me feel nimble and the attacks don't seem have any superfluous animation to them so I just keep swingin'

Dual Blades. I understand I'm never going to be doing the most damage on a team, but I subscribe to the Jeff Gerstmann school of "hit shit a lot real fast." I love the quickness of running in, cutting stuff up and rolling away.

Long sword most of the time, unless I need a hammer. Gotta get those tails

I'm a greatsword kind of guy. It's slow as hell but every hit is the most damn satisfying thing in the world.

The first weapons that I ever enjoyed using were the dual blades in MH3U. Eventually I made the transition to main the longsword in my time with the majority MH3U. Near the end of my time with that one I dabbled with the switch axe as well. I decided to switch things up and give the new weapons a shot in MH4U.

I don't think I can ever stop using the charge blade. I was not at all expecting them to be as fun, versatile, and empowering as they are. The moves you can use in blade mode feel great to use. The charging mechanic works great when used well. The ability to buff charge your shield to have the blocking power of the lance feels insane. The fully charged attack with the axe where you just unload on a monster feels way better than the other weapons that I've used previously.

The thing that definitely kept me hooked on the weapon are the times when I used the fully charged axe attack on a sleeping monster and they just die before being able to do anything.

Recently I learned about guard points in the transition from sword to axe, and axe to sword. Now I have something new to attempt to master.

From my experience the only downside to the charge blade that I can feel having used other weapons is that the sheathe time feels a bit long, so finding the time to sheathe and use items can be a bit trickier.

Hammer bros for life, launching friends into the air with the hammer is just too funny. Also the meaty feeling of just bashing the living shit out of monsters with a hammer is immensely satisfying

Having played for about 25 hours now I still love Charge Blade. Especially with Auto-Guard. I'm just ripping through monsters. The biggest breakthrough for me was understanding the real rotation for CB of charging up, powering the shield, charging up again, and unleashing the Ultra Burst on a monster's face. Especially with impact phials, it's almost always a KO or at least knocks them over. It's super fun.

Now all I have to do is wrap my brain around using guard points.

Glad to see that Gore Magala continues the trend of cover-monsters that Gunlance trivializes the shit out of.

For me monster hunter IS the great sword. The weight, the slam, when you crack the head and they bow, when you charge up and they swing right into range. None of the other weapons give me the same feeling. Also it's incredibly mobile and allows you to really understand a monster before committing to a swing.

So I have like 160 monsters hunted with the gunlance, stuck with it from villager star 2 to star 10 and just now decided to switch to the charged blade after having watched how fun it looked from the gaijin hunter video aaaand damn, I've been missing out, I see why it's so popular! The charging/powering up loop and the switching back and forth for auto guard points is fun and satisfying, especially feels awesome if you're combo'ing in sword mode and you bust out the axe switch guard point when you see the tell for an attack coming up. The buffed up shield being equal to lance guarding power gave me a better transition to ease into this new weapon but I'm not even blocking as much anymore as the evades feel SO much better over gunlance. The massive combo'ing potential took some getting used to though as there was like one major combo that I needed to keep in mind for GL but once you get it down it is so satisfying.

My personal favorite is the Light bowgun.

It gives decent maneuverability, has decent versatility and I usually tend to prefer the look of the gunner armours. While the damage isn't that great, the rapid fire function can flatten a monster in a matter of minutes (especially if you use one that can rapid fire the monster's weakest element). Plus the gunner weapons are quite good for targeting specific monster parts (if you want to break the head to get rarer items, this is really handy), but it can't really sever tails, some Bowguns can use "Slicing S", but I've hadn't much success with that type of ammo (also I don't have that many LBGs that can use that ammo type)

That said; I do enjoy using the Charge Blade, but I've been using the Light Bowgun for the longest (because the Charge Blade was introduced in MH4), so it's an old favorite and my go to weapon.

I started the game last night and am currently going through all the weapons, so far hammer has been my favorite. Fast and meaty. Was told sword and shield would be the best for a newbie, but I wasn't feeling them too much.

Why so few lance users? You can do a jump attack leading to a mount with it in 4. Also become invincible with the best shield in the game. You should really give it a try.

Hammer. I like those KOs. I'm too scared to try any of the new weapons (since Freedom Unite)

Go between Insect glaive and charge blade atm, with long sword and dual swords also being upgraded.

Edit: I would go switch axe because I love them, but I just finished MH3U with a switch axe only run and was burnt out on that amazing weapon