Charge Blade question

[ShivaX]

So I've been floating from weapon to weapon.
Greatsword. I get it. It's solid, and ironically has some of the best avoidance moves.
Switch Axe. I mostly get it, though it's tricky with stuff that has giant pointy elbows or huge attacks.
Insect Glaive. I basically always dust it off for anything that flies too much.

Charge Blade. Now this was my main weapon in World and I did pretty well with it. But here, I'm struggling. Mostly on doing any damage of note.

I can charge my phails without even thinking about it most times, but then using the things never really works out. Damage is pretty terrible outside of UAE. And usually terrible with it because anything that moves is probably dodging it and then hitting me while I recover from it.

What's the bread and butter mid-fight go to for this thing? AED does almost nothing most of the time and often leaves me open to getting smacked in the face unless I guard point the attack. I was using Axe-Hopper just to have something to do a lot of the time. Every weapon I've played any amount I've done okay with, but with Charge Blade running out of time is a real threat on anything that's overly mobile or if there are two or more monsters to kill.

I tend towards the charged sword over the buzzsaw for what it's worth. Buzzsaw is decent enough, but the openings for it are pretty tight and it's not really my preference.

Do I just slam UED's all over the place and hope they land? Axe-hopper and hope I don't get whipped out of the air into UED/AED? Buzzsaw all the things? Any tips or ideas are welcome, provided they don't require some specific gear setup (still messing around in HR atm, so I'm far from having perfect gear, I can maybe get 2 skills filled out).

[Feastables]

Are you using SAED at all? I don't see any mentions of that in your post.

[ShivaX]

Yes, but now it's called UED, because reasons.

In my head it's still SAED, but I figured I'd use the terms the game uses.

[Feastables]

I didn't know that but I guess that makes sense.

I mean I personally use Counter-Peak Performance over Axe Hopper. Makes getting phials a breeze and if I use it at the right moment against the right monster attack, I could be in a good position to SAED. Axe Hopper is great but unless you switch scrolls a lot, there's no mixing that with CPP.

That's just me but I've been a Charge Blade main since MH4U and it's my favorite weapon.

[ShivaX]

CPP is the better skill, but my issue just tends to be:
I fill my phails and then... can't really do much with it because everything that uses them is usually too slow/inflexible to really do anything with them.

I was mostly experimenting with using Axe Hopper just to have another thing to use my phails on.

[Kawalorn]

If I have phials to waste I usually start spamming the Air Dash Silkbind. Decent damage with the phial explosion and leaves you safe from most things.

Since you can use it in any direction it's great for those monsters that land behind you after you block their attacks, like Seregios.

[ShivaX]

Don't think I have access to Air Dash yet.

I just have the first 3 skill binds.

Currently a perfect UED's damage is... not much better than a fully charged first swing from a Greatsword. Which is infinitely easier to land with a lot less commitment.

Air Dash sounds like it would fill the role I've been trying to use Axe Hopper for.

Maybe I just need to get all the way into Sunbreak before CB becomes worth much, but that feels like bad design, so I assume I'm missing something obvious.

[Clail]

I know people tend to get hung up on landing SAED's, but going into axe mode for element discharge 1 and 2 is quick and decent damage until you can get an opening for a full discharge. Hell a good chunk of a time they'll score a knock down or stagger that you can immediately SAED the remaining phials into.

[Valentine (Lunaticus)]

Air Dash is basically the middle of the ground in damage/speed/safety for CB. It's phial explosion controls absolutely suck ass with directional control type 2, but you can control whether the explosion moves you forward or backwards by doing it immediately, or delaying it a bit.

As you've already experienced, in many situations/match ups, you just don't really get to use UED or AED without taking a hit in return thanks to the ridiculous end lag. You can try switching more between axe and sword mode, at least until you get Air Dash. That sort of playstyle probably greatly benefits from Rapid Morph, but I think that also makes the Triangle+R2 guard point have a much shorter timing for the guard, so it comes with that as a negative.

Also you could try using Morphing Advance. I've never used it so I don't know if this works as a solution or not, but it's worth trying at least. You could also just play sword mode until you do get those openings for the big hits.

Sawblade style does work great as well... at least when you have Ready Stance, but you probably don't have access to that either.

Honestly, the biggest difficulty of this weapon is doing your best to restrict yourself from going for those juicy UEDs and AEDs, and doing something else that doesn't get you hit instead.

[Ccrack]

if you dont have openings to use super discharges then you want to be in buzzsaw mode as much as possible.

peronally i prefer using impact files so i can fish for nockouts aiming for the head with the little discharge, but it really depends on the monster your fighting. its quite a flexible weapon so theres no single way you need to use it. some mobs are simply too fast to hit with discharge or dont are too agressive to buzzsaw, some mobs are easy to do counterattacks on while others do multihits and make that impossible