Elemental Damage in Monster Hunter Wilds, Explained

Everything you need to know about Elemental damage in Monster Hunter Wilds, benefits of Elemental builds, best weapons, and more.

In Monster Hunter games, there are two forms of damage types — Elemental and Raw. Both damage types have their specific use cases, advantages, and weaknesses. The Raw damage type is most effective for melee weapons, especially those that have high single-hit DPS, but low agility, such as Great Sword, Hammer, Switch Axe, etc. Whereas Elemental damage is mostly effective in ranged and fast weapons, such as Bow, Dual Blades, Charge Blade, Sword and Shield, etc. Raw damage is effective at toppling monsters but doesn’t have any bonus multiplier without Critical Hits. However, when it comes to Elemental damage, it’s a bit complicated.

If you’re using an Elemental build or weapon, your goal is to try and counteract a Monster’s own elemental ability. While this might sound quite simple, it’s not so. Here’s everything you need to know about Elemental damage in Monster Hunter Wilds.

What Is Elemental Damage in Monster Hunter Wilds?

Elemental damage essentially comprises all damage that’s done purely in the Elemental form, i.e., from Fire, Water, Ice, Thunder, and Dragon. Do note that Elements are different from Statuses. Both Elements and Statuses can inflict Blights. However, the nature of said Blights differs between both affinities. In the case of Elemental Blights, the damage persists for a long duration and can be stacked. Whereas in the case of Statuses, the Blight inflicted stays active for a shorter duration or deals damage in short bursts. Statuses can be used to deal active or passive damage. Whereas Elements only deal passive damage, while also applying a damage modifier.

Here’s a list of all the Elements and Statuses in Monster Hunter:

Elements

• Fireblight (Fire)
• Waterblight (Water)
• Iceblight (Ice)
• Thunderblight (Thunder)
• Dragonblight (Dragon)

Statuses

• Poison
• Sleep
• Paralysis
• Stun
• Blastblight (Blast)
• Bleeding (Bleed)
• Effluvium (Not available in base Monster Hunter Wilds)

Benefits of Elemental Damage

The biggest perk of Elemental damage is they apply a bonus damage buff with every attack. However, this only works as long as you’re using the Element that is a weakness to the Monster you’re hunting. For instance, Arkveld, the flagship Monster of MH Wilds, is weak to Dragon Element. As such, if you use a weapon with Dragon Elemental, you can basically deal bonus damage on top of your base DPS. Although you can technically figure out the Elemental weaknesses of certain Monsters simply by looking at their attacks, it’s always best to check the Field Guide for that.

In general, the Elemental affinity follows the following pattern:

• Fireblight works against Ice Element
• Iceblight and Wateblight work against Fire Element
• Thunderblight works against Water Element
• Iceblight works against Thunder Element
• Dragonblight works against Dragon Element

Certain Monsters exclusively take Elemental damage, for instance, Alatreon. However, Monster Hunter Wilds doesn’t feature any such Monster in its base game roster.

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