Why do I feel underpowered compared to my progression?

[Habanero]

So I just made it to the Rotten Vale and fought Radobaan. Took me about 90 min cause I would have to restart from the camp about 4x. I am using the Insect Glaive and currently have the Bone Rod III. I don't have the materials to make anything better. I feel like I am totally behind on gear and have to SoS to defeat anything. I don't feel like I skipped any content. What am I missing about game progression? Is this game not balanced, or am I not supposed to follow the storyline and to other stuff to get materials to gear up before my next mission? I would expect that the game wouldn't give you content that your character / gear isn't ready for.

[Popcorn]

First off is armor skills.
What skills are you using?
Any offensive skills?

Next is your ability to use your weapon.
From what you said "rod", meaning Insect Glaive, are you grabbing the extracts?
If yes, next question is: are you using aerial or ground techniques?

[Breastmilk is my staplefood]

Adding to the questions above^:

Where were you hitting Radobaan the most? You might be slowing your hunts down by not hitting the optimal spots. But at the same time you might not be aggressive enough, or you might be getting hit too much and spending more time healing since you mentioned you needed to restart from the camp 4x.

You should have ingredients to be able to craft demon and armordrugs to help boost your stats, as well try getting an offensive boost from eating before hunts.

You should have access to materials to upgrade Bone Rod III to Hard Bone Rod. All you need are Monster Bone L, Monster Bone M, and Boulder Bones. Boulder Bones can be received as a reward from certain low rank quests or searching bone piles in the wildspire wastes (20% and 30% with upsurge of bonepiles). Monster Bone M can be earned from certain 3 and 4 star quests, and are also carve rewards from Puklei, Barroth, Jyruatodus, and Tobi. Monster Bone L can be earned from 4, 5, and 6 star quests and hunting Anjanath, Radobaan, tzizi, Girros, Rathian, and Paiolumu (they are low percentage, but tzitzi and paolumu have the best chances).

[Frito-Ley Line]

Do this:

1) Get level 3 health boost asap. This is the single best survival/defensive skill in the game and makes an enormous difference. If you have defender gear you should already have access to it.

2) With glaive (this is assuming you already have IB), use L2+△+〇 (or whatever your equivalents are for xbox controller/kbm) to charge your kinsect before every fight. Until you're in MR and have access to the double boost glaives, try to charge your kinsect with regular field pickup slinger ammo (rocks, redpit fruits, moss, etc) since this charge effect gives you 50% extra uptime on your extracts

3) Get red and white extracts from the monster asap. If possible, try to save getting orange extract until your other two are about to expire, as getting the triple buff renews your uptime

4) Do ↑+〇, 〇, roll cancel, repeat, anytime you have an opening. The second circle input (tornado slash) is your best damage, and you want to get to it in your combo chain as quickly as you can. You can also do neutral+△ or neutral+〇 as your starter, and then go into tornado slash as your followup. Ideally you want to have the monster marked and your kinsect attacking it as well, but at the point in the game you're at this isn't something super essential to always do.

5) Stay out of the air unless you're able to safely vault into a diving wyvern (midair R2), you absolutely can't find any other way to dodge something, or are going for a mount with midair △. Pretend the helicopter move doesn't exist.

[FuyuNoSora]

As an Insect Glaive main - play aerial or ground as you want, don't listen to others about this. Everyone has their own style and likes, so they want other people also to play like that.

The damage output between aerial and ground is the same check it yourself in the training arena, but make sure to have for instance 0 affinity and to hit all the time for truthful results.

Unless you are into scripted speedruns, ground attacks won't beat air damage. The only way it can beat it by maybe 1% per minute is if you only use helicopter move and never use the Dive move. Ground also has the bonus of not using up the sharpness too fast. Aerial on the other hand can break parts easier and gives you great mobility, you can use the Diving attack on the fly.

Very important for aerial: always use the Aerial gem.

To do aerial helicopter right: every hit has to touch the monster, especially the last hit as it does the biggest damage > best to hit a weakspot of the monster (soft spot).

[D. Flame]

If you are constantly coptering around, then you feel weak, because you are. You are barely tickling the monster. Your best combo comes from standing on the ground. Coptering is for getting out of the way, going for a mount (IIRC), or attacking a flying monster you can't easily reach from the ground. Coptering was never meant to be your main attack pattern.

[FuyuNoSora]

Originally posted by D. Flame:

Coptering was never meant to be your main attack pattern.

Wrong, Capcom actually encourages to use the attack if you watch the "how to use" video for IG inbuild in the game.

[Suzaku]

Seeing some gameplay of how you fight could be useful. Without it, we can only make assumptions.

Do not listen to FuyuNoSora's "advice". You're killing your dps if you stay in the air. Aerial attacks should be limited for the purpose of mounting, movement, or harassing airborne targets.

[D. Flame]

Originally posted by FuyuNoSora:

Originally posted by D. Flame:

Coptering was never meant to be your main attack pattern.

Wrong, Capcom actually encourages to use the attack if you watch the "how to use" video for IG inbuild in the game.

That is just the marketing team. The same ones that say the horn is only a support weapon.

Even the "pokemon build" is stronger than coptering.

[Habanero]

Originally posted by Popcorn:

First off is armor skills.
What skills are you using?
Any offensive skills?

Next is your ability to use your weapon.
From what you said "rod", meaning Insect Glaive, are you grabbing the extracts?
If yes, next question is: are you using aerial or ground techniques?

Not sure what armor skills are. I just upgraded my armor as much as possible based on the mats I had.
Yes, I’m grabbing extracts.
I use ground techniques when it feels safe enough to do so, and aerial techniques when I have to get out of the way of a monsters attack.

[Habanero]

Originally posted by MegaMilk:

Adding to the questions above^:

Where were you hitting Radobaan the most? You might be slowing your hunts down by not hitting the optimal spots. But at the same time you might not be aggressive enough, or you might be getting hit too much and spending more time healing since you mentioned you needed to restart from the camp 4x.

You should have ingredients to be able to craft demon and armordrugs to help boost your stats, as well try getting an offensive boost from eating before hunts.

You should have access to materials to upgrade Bone Rod III to Hard Bone Rod. All you need are Monster Bone L, Monster Bone M, and Boulder Bones. Boulder Bones can be received as a reward from certain low rank quests or searching bone piles in the wildspire wastes (20% and 30% with upsurge of bonepiles). Monster Bone M can be earned from certain 3 and 4 star quests, and are also carve rewards from Puklei, Barroth, Jyruatodus, and Tobi. Monster Bone L can be earned from 4, 5, and 6 star quests and hunting Anjanath, Radobaan, tzizi, Girros, Rathian, and Paiolumu (they are low percentage, but tzitzi and paolumu have the best chances).

I have never seen demon or armor drugs in the game yet.
Yes I am getting meals before the hunt.
I don’t have Boulder Bone yet.
Am I supposed to farm the monsters you mentioned? I have only killed each monster once according to the quests I have been issued and then move on to the next quest.

[Habanero]

Originally posted by Frito-Ley Line:

Do this:

1) Get level 3 health boost asap. This is the single best survival/defensive skill in the game and makes an enormous difference. If you have defender gear you should already have access to it.

2) With glaive (this is assuming you already have IB), use L2+△+〇 (or whatever your equivalents are for xbox controller/kbm) to charge your kinsect before every fight. Until you're in MR and have access to the double boost glaives, try to charge your kinsect with regular field pickup slinger ammo (rocks, redpit fruits, moss, etc) since this charge effect gives you 50% extra uptime on your extracts

3) Get red and white extracts from the monster asap. If possible, try to save getting orange extract until your other two are about to expire, as getting the triple buff renews your uptime

4) Do ↑+〇, 〇, roll cancel, repeat, anytime you have an opening. The second circle input (tornado slash) is your best damage, and you want to get to it in your combo chain as quickly as you can. You can also do neutral+△ or neutral+〇 as your starter, and then go into tornado slash as your followup. Ideally you want to have the monster marked and your kinsect attacking it as well, but at the point in the game you're at this isn't something super essential to always do.

5) Stay out of the air unless you're able to safely vault into a diving wyvern (midair R2), you absolutely can't find any other way to dodge something, or are going for a mount with midair △. Pretend the helicopter move doesn't exist.

Where is the level 3 health boost located?
I dont know if I have defender gear, but I want to be able to play the game without it I think.
Hm, didn’t know there was an option to “charge” my kinsect. How does that work exactly?

[D. Flame]

Originally posted by Habanero:

Originally posted by MegaMilk:

Adding to the questions above^:

Where were you hitting Radobaan the most? You might be slowing your hunts down by not hitting the optimal spots. But at the same time you might not be aggressive enough, or you might be getting hit too much and spending more time healing since you mentioned you needed to restart from the camp 4x.

You should have ingredients to be able to craft demon and armordrugs to help boost your stats, as well try getting an offensive boost from eating before hunts.

You should have access to materials to upgrade Bone Rod III to Hard Bone Rod. All you need are Monster Bone L, Monster Bone M, and Boulder Bones. Boulder Bones can be received as a reward from certain low rank quests or searching bone piles in the wildspire wastes (20% and 30% with upsurge of bonepiles). Monster Bone M can be earned from certain 3 and 4 star quests, and are also carve rewards from Puklei, Barroth, Jyruatodus, and Tobi. Monster Bone L can be earned from 4, 5, and 6 star quests and hunting Anjanath, Radobaan, tzizi, Girros, Rathian, and Paiolumu (they are low percentage, but tzitzi and paolumu have the best chances).

I have never seen demon or armor drugs in the game yet.
Yes I am getting meals before the hunt.
I don’t have Boulder Bone yet.
Am I supposed to farm the monsters you mentioned? I have only killed each monster once according to the quests I have been issued and then move on to the next quest.

Investigations, expeditions, optional quests, etc. Also, just because you are a quest to hunt Monster X, it doesn't mean you can't also be collecting bone and mining ore that you pass on the way.

The game expects you to do more than just hunt the target monster.

[Bobucles]

Monster quests usually give enough materials for a piece of gear or so. It takes multiple hunts to get a complete set. Fighting monsters many times is a core concept of the entire series. You learn new things, do the fights better, and other dopamine things.

Crafting and upgrading gear is essential. The defense rating increases your total effective health against damage; melee classes get a full health bar with every 80 defense. That's why the guardian armor is so good, it quadruples your health first thing.

Core HP goes up to 100+50+50 = 200 HP. The first +50 is from canteen and items, and is lost after dying. The max potion gives a guaranteed +50HP and is fairly cheap to craft, so try to keep a few handy. The other +15/+30/+50 is from putting points into health boost.

For early game skills, health boost 1/2/3 and stun resist 3 are very useful. Fortify is king, if you're gonna cart may as well get the most of it.

[Habanero]

Originally posted by Suzaku:

Seeing some gameplay of how you fight could be useful. Without it, we can only make assumptions.

Do not listen to FuyuNoSora's "advice". You're killing your dps if you stay in the air. Aerial attacks should be limited for the purpose of mounting, movement, or harassing airborne targets.

I’m sure my technique is lacking, but it really feels like I am totally under geared for where I am at in the quest line. I basically get 2 shot by monster attacks and it takes nearly the entire timer for me to kill something if I am successful. I feel like the quest progression pushes me to more difficult content without giving me the material rewards necessary for me to upgrade in order to keep pace with the increasing difficulty of the monsters. I don’t expect it to be easy, I just expect it to be fair.

[Bobucles]

One-shotting your way through the campaign is hard mode. It is doable, but for experts.
The more casual difficulty includes talking around town, exploring the maps, doing the side quests, and unlocking more useful items. Plan to do a couple side missions for every main mission, the extra materials and money go a long way.