How good is Insect Glaive?

[Glengar Hawke]

I've heard a lot of people say it's a decent weapon but by comparison it's relatively bad, was wondering if someone could shed some light on this and explain the placement of the weapon among others, some points where it's really good, and it's weaknesses.

[Sifer2]

The bug has it's own stamina that runs out so the damage isn't constant forever. But you could do a blunt bug and tell it to hit the head. Or Sever bug and tell it to attack the tail, and it would contribute some. The main use though is the bug makes little clouds that explode with effects when hit. Like the Blast effect is popular since when you hit the clouds they go boom all over the monster it's pretty fun.

[Friends with Benedicts]

Bad

[Greendragon245]

A bit rusty on insect glaives but can't you upgrade the bugs stamina??

[DeFragged]

It's versatile. Totally versatile. Not the best damage but your speed of attack makes it good at applying Elemental damage (where quantity > quality) and statuses (we have weapons all over).

Your ability to attack from any distance and a versatile skillset means you can quickly adjust to various situations -
1) Your insect can cause damage even if you can't - when the monster is flying or fleeing. Just spam your insect attack on a monster while it's out of melee range to get a hundred extra damage or so. They can also trigger traps.
2) Besides the alternate melee attack to mark a monster's bodypart for your insect, you can fire 'pheromone pods' at range (with the glaive out, just 'aim' and fire like a slinger pod). These pheromone pods are super versatile - besides their main function, they too can trigger traps (boulders, etc.) and your insect's 'dust'. If you're using a blast-type kinsect, feel free to trigger explosions in the air!

You're agile. Jumps, air dashes, and mid-air direction changes means if you're not greedy you can dodge almost anything or pogo-jump on a monster's head to dodge its attacks.

Status/Elemental/Mount - This is the core of your IG's role; you have more reach than DBs, better maneuverability to get in and out of range, and the ability to jump at will. You're expected to do most of the mounting (or weaken the monster's mount resist for others) and inflict statuses as you fight.

Cons:
Flashy attacks - Like larger weapons, once you commit to an attack you're a sitting duck. Most glaive attacks are fast, but a fair few will lock you into the attack. This leads into the second point...

Sheathing - the IG is full of flashy animations. The foremost offender is literally the sheathe animation. If there's somewhere else you need to be RIGHT NOW it's already too late for you, so... don't get greedy.

Damage - It IS possible to put out a hundred damage a hit with the right build, but the IG user takes time to get there.

Buffs - The IG user needs to buff to reach their full potential. This can get tricky in a fight, so forward planning is essential. Or kinsect spamming.

- TL;DR: Fast but fancy, think a little bit ahead during a fight. Mounting master, and status dealer.

[Singrave]

OP, you'll love it if you try it. Believe me.

[Ragosta tin Dei]

It's high skill and there's keeping your buffs up. If you're really good it becomes overpowered because end game monsters become more managable when mounted, like Behemoth and to a lesser extent, Arch Tempered Teostra. The main problem with glaive is there's a very large gap between the really overpowered people, and the okay people.

[FadingCosmos]

Insect & Glavie is a wonderful weapon. Great mobility, quick attacks to proc ailments, able to vault into the air anywheres, flashly move sets, and all around just fun to play with imo.

[Piece o' Hans]

引用自 Greendragon245：

A bit rusty on insect glaives but can't you upgrade the bugs stamina??

Certain glaives give the kinsects a stamina boost, but aside from that stamina is dependent on the kinsect. Obviously higher tier kinsects tend to have more of it.

[Rogue]

Mediocre since you need to power up every few minutes by using the kinsect to "steal" power and other boosts which can be hassle as you need to aim at the appropriate body parts.

The vaulting attack does below average damage per second, only meant for mounting the monster. Like status ailments, mounting only happen 2 times usually...

[Xerain]

引用自 Idisdain：

Eh from what i can see/played of it thus far, think of the glaive as a ninja if you have ever played final fantasy 14. You yourself may not have the highest damage on the team. However if played right your dps averages out higher than most classes by enabling other classes to deal a ton of damage. Since your main priority in group play is to mount the monster and knock it to the ground. Enabling everyone to go unleash without worry or buy them time to heal/sharpen their weapons.

So the damage you lose in air should average out if you can consisently/constantly land your attacks and mount them. You are also nearly unkillable with your mobility, plus depending on the insect you can heal the team playing a more support focused dps role.

Also if you focus on stunning the target over dps, it allows your team to dps the target, without fear of you constantly interupting their ultimately higher damage swings/dps. Since your range is just insanely massive.

tl;dr your dps comes from the fact you let the team dps without worry by knocking monster down. Insect glaive has a large list of possible uses, and can be played in many forms not just standard dps.

As someoen who mained IG in 4U, I hav eto say, the problem with this reasoning is the mounting process actually drops DPS for the party as a whole in this game. Most areas of teh game have ledges or inclines, so if you really want to mount, other weapons can generally do it much easier than IG. With the hammer, I actualyl ahve teh problem of mounting the monster when I don't want to.

IMO IG has been refocused on the bug in this game. Having is spready healing powder to help your party memebers as they attack it, or spreading blast powder to help them break parts is now it's niche. Meanwhile, you're going to want to stay on the ground with your white + Red juice only, occasionally vaulting when you want to change you position while hopfulling keeping up DPS in the process.

I think IG would perform better if more people knew how to play it properly. But played properly it's basically not too much different than LS or DS, except you can support the party with your bug.

[Okami]

as good as you can be....

[SUKIĆ]

On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give it a solid 2. It's the worst weapon in the game imo. Having to collect buffs every couple minutes is such a buzzkiller and moveset, weapon mechanics are boring as well.

[Mally]

Insect Glaive for life especially thicc monsters like Diablos. Just stand at a Beta distance and pop that left click on your aim until his BAN HAMMER tail falls off then clap his cheeks.

[N8Mate]

The hardest fight ive had as an IG main is Xeno, but thats only because he is bulky af and moves erratically. Constantly getting knocked out of the air or stepped on.

[Zedrin]

If you want to get a range of comparisons for potential, look at TA runs.

Insect Glaive isn't at the top of the charts, but for Toestra for instance it still falls in the sub 3 minute mark, very close in times to the LS, Hammer, Switchaxe, and LBG.

Yeah it's technically in the bottom 3 or 4, but the difference between those immediately above it are narrow, and for those behind it are further.

For casual play you won't notice a difference, though, and if you like the mobility from jumps / survivability afforded from buffs then it's great for clearing quests.

(I hated glaive in 4U and Gen for being overused and seeing 'JE SUIS MONTE!' everywhere so MHW's finally given me a chance to get intimate with it.)