First Monster Hunter game. Can someone explain armor defence in this game? I have about 12 hours in, my gear is like 14 armor. Been Trying to take out the Diabolus. Is 14 way too low? Do I need to be farming more to level my armor? What should I have? Im been trying to upgrade fairly sparingly to use on better items later in the game. So maybe Im super low?

Seem any charge forward being hit by horns is death. Game is so unresponsive due to animations, terrible item menus that this is getting really obnoxious.

@john1912: Yes, 14 is much too low for Diablos. My experience was that Diablos was the first real hurdle for people. I'm no expert, so I don't know all the numbers, but I'm guessing your issue is that you haven't upgraded your armor at all. I think you'll be fine with pretty much any decent set (as in not leather or jagras or something like that) as long as you upgrade it to max level.

Also, do you mean 14 defense on each piece or in total? Either is bad, but if you're talking about pieces then you're probably set on the pieces already, just need upgrades.

You should have at least 100 or more armor by that point. His mandatory fight comes nearly at the end of low rank content, and right now I have like 300 barely into high rank. Also don't be afraid to upgrade lower tier armor. Low rank armor spheres are practically worthless for upgrading high rank armor.

Remember there are all kinds of ways to improve your survivability beyond armor though. Remember to always eat food before going on a mission. You can get up to 50 extra hp and and an armor bonus if you need it. There are like a half dozen different potions that give a temporary armor buff. There are mantles that reduce or negate damage. Your Palico has a gadget that gives various buffs. Etc.

You have a lot of options. Make use of them.

I used the large armor shards or w/e to upgrade all armor items to 14 defense. Started with the mail armor, and upgraded to the next to heavy armor mis matched sets with specific item bonuses. IDK the AI is weird and simple. Fight, rage, and flee. But its just felt like they throw me into an arena with a foam bat, and said here! Kill this car thats trying to run you over. Its just oh! I have a three second window to run over and awkwardly swing at the car....Opps it ran me over while I swing at the air because it moved 2 feet, and there is no forward movement tracking.

Ok, thanks 100...Will work towards that. A lot of various upgrades, and I dont feel like the game gives good feedback on what I need. It just says you need Hunter level 5 for this quest? Im at 8 I think. Everything is such a damage sponge its hard to tell whats making a difference. I had been mainly trying to upgrade my weapon items, and wasnt going too deep on the armor to save on later upgrades when better armor was available.

Pro-tip: You can use screamer pods that drop from the flying enemies outside of his den to force him out of the ground when he goes under and give you some free hits.

You might also consider playing around with some different weapons if you're really having trouble hitting him. I kinda found that fight super easy with the Insect Glaive.

Technically you don't NEED any armor, since the goal is to not get hit, but if you're new you will get hit, so you'll want to do what you can to mitigate the damage. Btw, I recommend looking for armor that gives the Divine Blessing skill. At max it will randomly halve the damage you take.

At first I thought you meant 14 total defense, not 14 per piece of gear and I thought you were running around naked. Still, 14 per piece is too low, even without upgrading armor pieces with armor spheres, you should be forging new gear from more recent monsters that are giving you 20+ armor. Do bounties to get armor spheres, they refresh every time you do a quest. Do investigations to farm for more monster pieces to craft the gear you need.

EDIT: I just realized you said you're 12 hours in. Do you need to be killing Diablos for a quest or you just wanting to do it for fun? Just because you see a monster doesn't mean you have to kill it. If you haven't been told to kill, say, an Anjanath for a story quest, it's definitely too early to be going after Diablos, unless you're a real stud at MonHun.

In general, my advice would be not to try and tackle any big monster that isn't part of your current quest. You get significantly more monster materials as quest rewards.

Also, my armor is in the 35-40 range and I still haven't gotten a quest to hunt a Diablos, so I'd say it's definitely too early for you.

Spend less time upgrading the lower tier sets and more time crafting new sets! If you're still using chain armour and you're fighting Diablos your gonna have a rough time. Pick a set with bigger numbers, Anjanath for example and craft the whole thing. You'll end up with bigger numbers and better skills.

@john1912: I'm about 35 hours in and have gear that's hovering at 150 total defense I don't have any desire to deal with Diablalos anytime soon. Like another commenter said, seeing a monster in the wild doesn't necessarily mean you have to fight them.

14 defense per piece? That's way too low. Before you upgrade any armor, I would suggest crafting a higher quality set, the Rathalos set for example and upgrade only if you still have trouble. Learn Diablos's weaknesses and abuse them, use traps, make sure your Palico is properly equipped (I'm talking about the tool it uses), always eat before hunting, if one type of weapon doesn't work then try something else, pick up the grimalkyne on the field (Palico dude who is not your Palico), have potions and honey on you on top of the mega potions, make sure the items in your item bar are in the right order, edit your radial menu and so on.

Just running at a monster and trying to smack it is not gonna work later on.

@john1912: Like others have said, you are probably trying to fight Diablos a bit too early, even if you have the Quest to do it. Knock out some Optionals and get caught up on those and craft a higher quality armor set from farming a specific monster, or better yet, try to upgrade Armors as you just naturally get the Monster Parts from killing them that have useful skills to you. I haven't found a need as of yet to not have a mixed Armor. But as a side note, Diablos is no joke either. I'm almost done with the High Rank story, and a low rank Diablos (much less a high rank Diablos or Black Diablos) has given me more trouble than even the Elder Dragons. It's something about his massive hitbox that I can't seem to dodge (and that he seems to turn on me everytime I activate Dragon Piercer) and his constant roars and stuns that he attacks before you can move. And even with around 300 Armor, his hits, with around 165 health (+15 from Armor, and +50 from Food) still often take down my health 60-75% per hit, so any two hits without healing are death. Although I do have to wonder if a lot of my specific issues with Diablos are weapon based and the fact that I'm new to Monster Hunter as well, but I've had a lot less problems with pretty much every other Monster in the game, so just know you aren't alone.

Diablos was probably my least favourite monster in low rank to fight. We started his story quest as soon as it came up and he basically one shot killed me as soon as I can into contact with him. It was his charge and that damn dig attack that caught me out.

We beat him the second time (2 player) but it was tough going. Similarly to you, I hadnt upgrade my armour, but had been crafting new low rank ones. I picked one of the better ones and upgraded it as far as I could. That helped a bit for mistakes, but to be honest he hit hard whatever and what got me through was learning his tells, getting the hell out of dodge when he starts digging, and keeping health topped up whenever hit (plus that vitality cloak whenever possible). He's a toughie, but go up against him enough and you'll kill him soon enough

This happened to me when I tried to hunt Kirin, aka the storm unicorn. Before that guy, I didn't have a problem with anything else, so it was pretty surprising. I tried and I tried but got fucked up every time. Up to that point, I only used Long Swords. Then I thought "looks like close range is a bust so I might have to switch to something ranged." Forged the Legiana Heavy Bowgun and even though I didn't fully understand how the special ammo worked, I killed it the first try.

So I would say weapon types matter.

@whatshisface: Every weapon can deal with every type of enemy (I beat Kirin with a close range weapon btw), but certain weapons will have an advantage over others. Having a backup weapon that can handle those situations that your main struggles with is never a bad idea.

@zeik: I'm not saying that the weapon in itself is the issue. It's me using that weapon. I just couldn't react fast enough to the constant lightning strikes and him hopping around all over the place. And I bet some people will have this kind of problem at some point.