Topic: Monster Hunter XX (Double Cross)

@meleebrawler Nice!

I am LOVING the new music in this game. And it's great they finally found a home for the rocketing knockback animation, seemingly orphaned in only the Blango, Rajang, and Astalos fights.

However, more and more Cross is convincing me that they should do away with gunner armor in future installments. Gunners are in the range of attacks just as much as the rest of us, and they can get one-shot much easier.

@Haru17 Hey, don't forget Grimclaw can cause ''reeling'' too, with his less-frequently employed charge.

That Gunner statement is just flat-out untrue. You have the range to strike all but the highest-flying monsters, and can do so in situations where Blademasters would have to either go Aerial or just wait. This also leads to easy breaks on parts that normally require constant mounting. AND depending on the weapon you use, you can play with multiple statuses or elements at once, whereas Blademasters are always stuck with one (two at the most with DBs, but they can't switch off unwanted element). You never worry about bouncing, sometimes not even part defence with Crag.

With all these advantages over melee, it only makes sense that you are punished more severely for mistakes. Gold Rathian's corkscrew flips for instance, are basically a non-issue for gunners since they typically attack outside of it's range. You just have to be better at recognizing the times to stop shooting and start moving, not reactively dodging, but preempting. It also doesn't hurt that Gen introduced a handful of longer-ranged ammo... heck, gunner-exclusive skills alone would justify the existence of gunner armor.

Plenty of monsters use it, it was just more noticeable with Astalos.

That is a World of Warcraft reason, and we do not accept those in the enlightened Monster Hunter following. I mean, with that kind of lethargic excuse for not even trying, I ought to just adapt that old Clinton quote about practicing "politics as the art of the possible" when it should be used to make the impossible, possible.

Seems that several of the renders have been updated:
-Female Hellblade LS
-Female Malfestion SnS (looks cool, definitely G rank)
-Male Glavenus Hammer (looks G rank)
-White Glavenus Prowler
-Male Hellblade IG (stream quality makes it look like candy corn)
-Male Mizutsune DB (G rank, one we've already seen)
Glavenus totally isn't the flagship of X/Generations. Nope, we've totally got four of 'em. Four vanilla Glavenus renders, that is- the GL and GS ones from Gen are still there. Considering they went out of the way to update 2/5 of the renders, I'm hoping the final demo build has 5/5 of them updated.

Is that really a surprise? Glavy is more or less the ''true'' flagship of Generations. He's on the boxart (Astalos is lucky to be on the back), has no specific rival unlike the others, and of course has a deviant. Plus, since expansions don't change the plots of originals, the flagships of the originals still remain the primary driving force (Tigrex in FU, Lagiacrus in 3U) compared to the expansion ones (Nargacuga and Brachydios are more or less just bonuses). Even in 4U, where Seregios has some plot significance, it's still Gore and his frenzy that is the catalyst and haunting you for the rest of the game.

About that Brave statement, that doesn't necessarily seem true. While a monster running to attack far-off allies can be an issue (mostly with gunners without proper Taunt support or running Sneak), a group can also more easily pin down a monster to aid in landing those Brave attacks to quickly fill and maintain the gauge. This is an important distinction from Adept; unlike that one, Brave doesn't necessarily need to be attacked to reap benefits, only attack consistently. Solo, you may have some trouble landing fair-commitment Brave moves against a monster focused on you. Seems to be pros and cons for Brave in either scenario.

I know- I'm just poking fun at the whole "4 flagships" aspect of the marketing when it's pretty clear Glav is the "real" one. And I just kinda want completely new renders for every weapon- 4U did it.

And that's also an interesting observation- I think the deciding factor will be exactly how much more powerful Brave attacks are in general.

Well, now we have SIX flagships!

Seriously though, it'll be interesting to see how that deviant Diablos is handled, since all prior deviants have been pretty much optional.

Also, just to be clear... when I say Brave attacks, I mean the ones done from the brave stance, which are designed to increase your gauge faster than normal moves. Nothing indicates that they're actually stronger, like the Great Sword's Brave overhead doesn't seem any different to a typical GS charge attack damage-wise, and the bowguns brave reload will probably only confer a boost in how much gauge you gain, unlike the Adept reload. Now, the new moves you get in Brave mode, on the other hand...

...Welp, what was I saying about unequal flagship treatment?
Today's Famitsu issue specifies that the other three flagships are getting Deviants-- unfortunately, the reddit post I found this out from seems to have been deleted (it had a link to a Japanese blog that's been pretty reliable, and I've seen some people- including Gaijinhunter -share parts of the info, so I have little reason to doubt its authenticity- I just didn't have it memorized).
I remember "Clairvoyant Mizutsune" and "BlueLightning Astalos"-- obviously Gammoth was in there, but as I said I don't have things memorized.

Alchemy style's schtick is gaining "orbs"-- they can then be spent on the barrel (which is part of your equipment menu a la wystones) to power up items. Examples given that a Reddit user translated:

"Quick Translation of the new items (didn't bother accurately translate item names):
Ration: increase max stamina, gives speed eating effect for other food.
Immunizer: regen HP over time, gives speed eating effect for other food.
Hunting Art whetstone: sharpens. You get more hunting art buildup for a duration.
Hunting Art shot/coating: for bowguns/bows respectively. You get more hunting art buildup when you hit something.
Sonic Bomb: Sonic effect that disrupts small monsters and certain large monsters (idk what the difference is here with regular sonic)
Earplugs: prevents 1 roar, same effect as 4U.
Fast shaking potion: shake barrels faster
Banana (jk. idk how to translate this): combine with certain other items to make more of that item. (Basically slickaxe, but probably works on different items)
Bazooka: Self-explanatory
Hunting Art ball: increase HA guage of nearby teammates by a certain amount.
Healing thing: heal HP and cure status of nearby teammates.

There'll be a new trailer on Capcom TV tomorrow (maybe tonight for the rest of us- GH hasn't tweeted anything about the time).
As for some rather stinky news... Congalala's back.
It also delves more into Deviant Diablos apparently, but that's comparatively "old news".
I'm refreshing Nintendo Everything (as they tend to update with scans) constantly.

Honestly I just wanted Astalos to have a Deviant...I mean the Deviant music is a remix of his theme, so...

...Wait, whut? o.o

Welp, I kinda feel like an idiot. Not that the info I posted was wrong, but it's that the next Famitsu doesn't come out until the 8th-- so we won't get scans until tomorrow noon-ish unless a bigger leak happens. So the new trailer will come out before then.

....lol, ok then. xD

Who's busy preparing their Redhelm sets for G-Rank and Brave experimentation?

These Deviants sound crazy. Names not final, of course (I'm glad the localization bellyaching hasn't surfaced over here yet). Alchemy sounds kinda neat but will almost certainly be reviled and shunned by sects of the fandom for not being about "Dee Pee Ahs".
-

If Shen doesn't show up this time I'm gonna-....no wait, never mind. Gonna wait until MH5 when we get a new director. (maybe 4/4U's again, I want him back, lol)

@Joeynator3000 Well, it already has a different director than X/Generations: Daisuke Ichihara.
Considering the fact that Generations' success surprised Capcom (it met its launch month quota two days after launch, and they've explicitly noted that Styles and Arts were meant to be one-offs for it and the amount of positive reception surprised them) along with the fact that a portion of the main team was working on Stories, I'd wager that Generation's director and part of the team behind it is definitely involved in MH5.

@Tsurii Yeah. Hopefully Gammoth ends up more memorable, because as is it's probably the least popular (and certainly least fun) of the Fated Four to fight.

Bleh...but....4U's story....the cutscenes...THE EPIC CUTSCENES!

@Joeynator3000 Nobody's saying those cutscenes won't be there- MH5 will almost certainly be more polished than Generations (and on the Switch-- thought we have that PS4 rumor with just enough credibility to not be outright discredited). I'm just saying that I'd wager Styles and Arts will be included. That would actually help out things going forward; since they'd part of the game from the start and not a bonus meant to be a one-off, they could better design monsters around them.

Well I know most of the new stuff in Generations will be in the next game like Arts/Styles, and even Deviants. But if the director is going to do that "monster appears and rawrs, name appears, cutscene over" thing, or "This monster appeared, get stronger and kill it because it's doing stuff."....Then yeah I'd like a new guy. xD