Elemental Dual Blades question!

[Stormsong]

So, I want to play with elements (mostly raw builds up to this point with various weapons) and I want to try a new weapon. To solve both problems at once I'm going to learn DB, which I've never used before.

Are there any particular elements which won't see much play or should I make a DB for each of the 5 elements? Obviously, I've read the hunters' notes, but they don't always mention the finer details. And might cause one to go into a Vaal Hazak fight with dragon >_>, for example.

I'm not worried about "wasting" resources at all, I've got more of those than I know what to do with across the board. So, if 5 of is the answer, then 5 it is! I'm also not talking about status ailments. I specifically want to play with elements.

[Nine]

Not really. The lightning options for dual blades kind of suck compared to the other elements (low elemental and raw values), but when playing elemental there isn't really a good reason to not make a set for each element.

[JPM岩]

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

[Lu2]

Originally posted by JPM岩:

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

ice kulve r8 dual blades are very efective[try it against diabolos , odogaron or even kulve itself ]. some of r7 are also good for[non hidden] element build

[Stormsong]

So I finally have to get around to playing KT huh. Been avoiding it because I truly don't care for multiplayer on that scale but... eh. Fine, I guess. Off to YouTube and then KT.

Thanks everyone :)

[ColonelBaker]

Originally posted by JPM岩:

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

The Kulve weapons with built in Crit Element are not on PC yet - just console.

[Nine]

Originally posted by darkdaysahead:

Originally posted by JPM岩:

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

The Kulve weapons with built in Crit Element are not on PC yet - just console.

That would be why he said "when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve."

[Stormsong]

JPM, I wanted to thank you for giving me the last push I needed to do KT, this has been pretty fun!

[JPM岩]

Originally posted by Stormsong the Fallen:

JPM, I wanted to thank you for giving me the last push I needed to do KT, this has been pretty fun!

Aye o7, Kulve will give the strongest weps in game (with the exception of GS), but DBs and other weps will get even better Kulve weapons from AT Kulve. Also, Kulve's armor is really good, so it's worth grinding her for just that.

[Stationary Traveller]

You actually need 6 - the five elements plus a raw weapon (or even better a blast one). This is because some monsters like Nergigante have such poor elemental hitzones that you're better off with raw damage.
Concretely speaking, you'll be mostly farming elders and T2 monsters in the endgame + Anjanath for the gem. Now, these are their elemental weaknesses:

Fire = Kirin, Vaal
Ice = Lunastra, Kulve (unclothed), Diablos/Black Diablos, Odogaron
Water = Teostra, Uragaan, Anjanath, Lavasioth
Thunder = Kushala, Nerg (small weakness), Kulve (clothed), Bazel, Legiana
Dragon = Xeno, the whole Rath family, Uragaan

So even if we remove Xeno from the equation (you'll only farm him from time to time for some parts), you'll need at least 5 different weapons to be able to fight them properly.
Of course you can also choose to ignore elemental completely and only go with a raw weapon at the cost of significantly higher clear times, but when you have 15mins investigations you want to put all the chances on your side, right?

Originally posted by JPM岩:

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

It's debatable because many of the new Kjarr weapons have lower element (and consequently lower elemental cap) than the previous BiS weapon, so they won't be able to exploit elemental damage as much. I tried as a test to run the Taroth Ice glaive with 2p Rath+2p Behe against the Kjarr ice glaive on a metahemoth set and the old glaive was still beating the new one by about 10-20% on Kulve's head.
Same goes for CBs; some like the ice one are greate because of the insane base element, while others like the fire one doesn't really outshine the old options. I'm pretty sure it's the same thing with dual blades since elemental damage is really important for them.
Finally according to Phemeto less than half of the Kjarr gunner weapons are actually better than the ones we already have for elemental.

[Bodhsativa]

For an elemental weapon, you will want one of each element. The reason why is because to really do any relevan amount of damage you will need to be hitting the monster a lot, in their weak point with the right element. Elemental damage stacks differently. So yeah, you'll need one of each depending on what you're hunting and probably a blast weapon too.
Lightning is the least useful overall, basically useless unless you are hunting kulve when she is gold plated.

[Stormsong]

Originally posted by Moonmadness:

You actually need 6 - the five elements plus a raw weapon (or even better a blast one). This is because some monsters like Nergigante have such poor elemental hitzones that you're better off with raw damage.
Concretely speaking, you'll be mostly farming elders and T2 monsters in the endgame + Anjanath for the gem. Now, these are their elemental weaknesses:

Fire = Kirin, Vaal
Ice = Lunastra, Kulve (unclothed), Diablos/Black Diablos, Odogaron
Water = Teostra, Uragaan, Anjanath, Lavasioth
Thunder = Kushala, Nerg (small weakness), Kulve (clothed), Bazel, Legiana
Dragon = Xeno, the whole Rath family, Uragaan

So even if we remove Xeno from the equation (you'll only farm him from time to time for some parts), you'll need at least 5 different weapons to be able to fight them properly.
Of course you can also choose to ignore elemental completely and only go with a raw weapon at the cost of significantly higher clear times, but when you have 15mins investigations you want to put all the chances on your side, right?

Originally posted by JPM岩:

Kulve would more than likely give the best elemental Dual Blades (I dont know what exactly makes good Dual Blades), but I do know that when we finally get Arch Tempered Kulve, the weapons she gives are hands down the meta elemental weapons due to the built in Crit Element weapons.

It's debatable because many of the new Kjarr weapons have lower element (and consequently lower elemental cap) than the previous BiS weapon, so they won't be able to exploit elemental damage as much. I tried as a test to run the Taroth Ice glaive with 2p Rath+2p Behe against the Kjarr ice glaive on a metahemoth set and the old glaive was still beating the new one by about 10-20% on Kulve's head.
Same goes for CBs; some like the ice one are greate because of the insane base element, while others like the fire one doesn't really outshine the old options. I'm pretty sure it's the same thing with dual blades since elemental damage is really important for them.
Finally according to Phemeto less than half of the Kjarr gunner weapons are actually better than the ones we already have for elemental.

This organizes things quite neatly while I'm mulling this over. Thank you very much!

[Goilveig]

Originally posted by Moonmadness:

Fire = Kirin, Vaal
Ice = Lunastra, Kulve (unclothed), Diablos/Black Diablos, Odogaron
Water = Teostra, Uragaan, Anjanath, Lavasioth
Thunder = Kushala, Nerg (small weakness), Kulve (clothed), Bazel, Legiana
Dragon = Xeno, the whole Rath family, Uragaan

One note - running ice or water weapons on Lavasioth make his armor harden faster, which ultimately results in lower DPS (particularly if you don't have Mind's Eye). I actually recommend running fire, because that melts his armor and allows your attacks (and your teammate's attacks, in MP) to land.

[Lu2]

Originally posted by Bodhsativa:

For an elemental weapon, you will want one of each element. The reason why is because to really do any relevan amount of damage you will need to be hitting the monster a lot, in their weak point with the right element. Elemental damage stacks differently. So yeah, you'll need one of each depending on what you're hunting and probably a blast weapon too.
Lightning is the least useful overall, basically useless unless you are hunting kulve when she is gold plated.

thunder master bang seems to efective against nergi,rathalos ,bazel etc
also legiana doesnt like thunder

[Bodhsativa]

Originally posted by Lu2:

Originally posted by Bodhsativa:

For an elemental weapon, you will want one of each element. The reason why is because to really do any relevan amount of damage you will need to be hitting the monster a lot, in their weak point with the right element. Elemental damage stacks differently. So yeah, you'll need one of each depending on what you're hunting and probably a blast weapon too.
Lightning is the least useful overall, basically useless unless you are hunting kulve when she is gold plated.

thunder master bang seems to efective against nergi,rathalos ,bazel etc
also legiana doesnt like thunder

They don't like thunder, but you'll do more damage taking another weapon with white sharpness and master's touch. Even raw and blast with a few procs will often do more. Master bang just doesn't cut it compared to the DPS of other weapons anymore.
Blast is great against nerg to get rid of spikes, also the shield bash helps a lot more with raw.
Dragon is better against rathalos and poison for legiana in terms of DPS. Even dragon against bazel would be better just because the master bang has fallen so far behind...

[Gluth]

I'm dual blades main and use only few elements: ice, fire (very rarely), thunder (for KT only) and dragon (for most of them). In most cases I pick from two: ice or dragon, monsters which would require any other element has second weakness for those two or are weak anyway and speeding up the fight is not worth having those many sets of weapons (which does not stopped me from having all dualblades trees maxed out).

But I do keep armor sets for most of the end-game monsters (like AT Kiring, *stra, or Behemot), with related menu and poach items. This has bigger impact on the fight than the selection between two star or three star elements weakness.