Great Sword Build

[Nemesis]

I'm looking for some tips and insights in what armor, weapon, and skills I should work for in creating a strong build. I could look at YT, but I seek a general consensus among the GS community on the must-haves. Thanks it advance!

[Jarsix]

Not a GS user, but Flinch Free and Charge Up are must haves for them. Guard and Guard Up can be used as well to block better, The Weak Point exploiter skill is great to run for GS since you want to hit huge blows on the weak spots on all monsters.

[SyntiliteQ]

depends heavaly on your playstyle, normaly I woud go for raw dmg cause I can dodge pretty well, you cant go wrong with crit of any kind like weakness exploit Iam running a Arkweld Alpha helm and beta rest with a artian Dragon GS so yea, the gore magala Beta set is also really nice if played that one for around 50h now and I fell in love with it, just try some stuff out ^^

[Lynsis]

https://youtu.be/RxnKXJujGjA

[Navi]

Focus & offensive guard & counter strike to if you can afford it are gs bread & butter rest can put what ya want max agitator,wex etc

[SushiJaguar]

A bog-standard GS build will incorporate Focus 3, Evade Extender 1 or 2, Guard Up (for perfect guarding anything out of a slash), Agitator and a bit of Weakness Exploit or Crit Boost.

Substitute Focus for Critical Draw if you want to do the OG hunter's style of unsheathing into a Charge Slash and then sheathing again, and sub WEX/CB for Critical Element/Status if you want to dabble in the newly-buffed elemental and status values.

[Strega]

Follow RageGaming for Greatsword Builds, his stuff is always right. He maths it out and shows proof of the big numbers

[Willist]

The general consensus here is default look at youtube haha rip.
I prefer fishing for offsets because its cool so i eat ♥♥♥♥ alot and prioritize these skills
1. Divine blessing
2.Focus
3.speed eating, Recovery Up, Free Meal ( usually make one of these my charm)
4.Offensive Guard
5.Coalescence or Blight Resistance when (catching non-offsetable attacks)

[nicken chugger]

Originally posted by Nemesis:

I'm looking for some tips and insights in what armor, weapon, and skills I should work for in creating a strong build. I could look at YT, but I seek a general consensus among the GS community on the must-haves. Thanks it advance!

I used GS a lot during progression, but idk what part of the game you are at so I'll do a short info dump.
For early game, pick a weapon with the crit draw skill built in. I found the iron tree buster sword to be a fantastic option. Use armor with the quick sheath skill (e.g. low rank alloy and balahara).
Once you make some progress into high rank, you get options for armor with affinity skills. Get a set with weakness exploit 5 using armor from the chatacabra or G. rathalos sets. You could consider using a different weapon and using a decoration for 1 point of crit draw to cover the chance of missing a crit. Max might is also good for building affinity.
The options for greatswords with built in focus aren't that great, so I would suggest playing without it until you can use decorations to slot in focus 3.

The nerscylla greatsword is by far my favorite. It has great sharpness, good affinity, sleep status (best status for GS, and you get ~2 procs per hunt), and built in offensive guard which gives a big damage bonus after a perfect guard. The rathian greatsword is also good for its similar stats and poison status. Once you reach endgame, you could consider gore magala for highest base affinity or arkveld for built in focus, but I stuck with nerscylla. Artian weapons are technically ideal but require grinding and luck.
I slot focus 3 into the lvl 3 slot, crit boost 2 into the lvl 2 slot, and finish offensive guard with the lvl 1 slot.

Endgame armor sets kinda depend on your decorations.
If you don't have good decorations, use the arkveld set since it comes with weakness exploit. Boots also come with some free points of quick sheath. Slot in max might decorations to reach near 100% affinity. If you roll or guard a lot, you could use 2 pieces of the G. fulgar anjanath set to improve max might uptime.
Guardian arkveld armor also has that health recovery set bonus, so you could mix 2 pieces of it into your set. It doesn't come with as many points of weakness exploit though. The flayer skill is bugged at the moment, so don't use more than 2 points.
The set bonus for 2 pieces of gore magala armor is great for finishing off affinity, but it will mean having to clear frenzy during every hunt. Use it if you can still build weakness exploit 5 alongside it.
One of the ideal mixed sets for damage is jin beta helmet/gloves/boots and gore alpha chest/coil. It doesn't come with any weakness exploit, so you would need the level 2 exploiter charm and 3 decorations to use it properly.

[Velacroix]

All wrong so far.

Tackle, offset, TCS shortcuts are the winners in Wilds.

Full focus is mandatory.

Earplugs and evade extender are encouraged for uptime and positioning.

Flayer and decimator makes divine blessing completely obsolete.

Counterstrike and maximum might are exceptional for GS, the former procs off tackle trades.

[Jethro]

Originally posted by Jarsix:

Not a GS user, but Flinch Free and Charge Up are must haves for them. Guard and Guard Up can be used as well to block better, The Weak Point exploiter skill is great to run for GS since you want to hit huge blows on the weak spots on all monsters.

Not a GS user myself but why use FF when you can Tackle through everything?
Why Guard Up? There's 3(?) attacks you can't guard through.

It's pretty much the same for all. Get crit up then crit boost. Everything else is personal prefference.
Maybe get Divine Blessing so you can tackle more and spend less time healing.

[Coth]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wQjsfk208s7LoyMYDBHZ2gs0JFQPLXw5-qAAyd91pyE/edit?usp=sharing

Docks with all the info you need. From progression sets to absolute meta.