As a series that has been ongoing for over 20 years, Monster Hunter has seen its share of shake-ups. Particularly, Monster Hunter Rise sought to add more variety to the 14 weapon types via switch skills; alternate movesets that could be swapped out to give each weapon new ways to play.
Rise’s expansion, Sunbreak, improves switch skills by providing each weapon with more of them, while also introducing the ability to change switch skills during a fight via switch skill swap. These new abilities are sometimes only small buffs, but some of them completely change the way certain weapons can be played.
7 Spinning Bludgeon: Charge
The ‘spinning bludgeon’ is a move that has been in the Hammer’s arsenal for a long time. Only accessible when the Hammer is fully charged, it is one of the weapons’ stronger moves, but risked a long recovery animation if players couldn’t time its final hit properly, which is especially bad against Monster Hunter's newer, faster monsters. Due to this, it often didn’t get any use.
This switch skill arguably replaces the spinning bludgeon entirely. While it deals less damage than a properly executed spinning bludgeon, it allows the Hammer to begin a new charge during the attack, allowing for another full charge attack once it ends. By manipulating the Hammer’s charge mechanics, players can now unload full charge after full charge, changing the Hammer’s playstyle considerably, yet rewarding players with big damage potential.
6 Twin Blade Combo
The Sword and Shield also posesses a series staple that Sunbreak has sought to update. Previously, the basic sequence of attacks on the weapon included a slower move that had stun properties. However, players often skipped th sequence because it led to less damage overall over the course of a hunt.
Twin blade combo replaces this move with a 2-hit strike that might not deal any stun damage, but is much faster. This allows players who previously had to shorten their combo to avoid the slower attack an extra 2 hits in their combo. Since the Sword and Shield is a weapon type that benefits heavily from more hits, this ends up being a flat increase to the weapon’s damage potential.
5 Stake Thrust
While the Bow is one of Monster Hunter’s dedicated ranged weapons, it always had a weak melee attack in its moveset. This attack has received some extra utility over the years but was still purely used to occasionally cut off tails, as arrows can’t deal any severing damage.
Stake thrust allows fans to replace this attack with something much better for general use. Instead of slashing with an arrow, stake thrust implants a stake in a monster that can be hit to deal additional damage. While players must get within melee range to plant the stake (which is usually bad for ranged weapons), the passive increase in damage it provides is a noticeable improvement to the niche use of the move it replaces.
4 Kinsect Slash
Insect Glaive is Monster Hunter’s premier aerial-focused weapon. Even after Rise gave every weapon more aerial capabilities via the wirebugs, Insect Glaive remained the only weapon that could truly live in the air. However, it has always required a certain amount of downtime in order to collect the kinsect extracts that unlock the weapon's true strength.
Much to the joy of Insect Glaive players, kinsect slash reduces the need for any downtime whatsoever. It replaces the best tool the weapon has for staying airborne, but still offers some air time of its own. Most importantly, it allows players to gather extracts while attacking in the air. Gathering a red extract will cut the move’s air time short, but it’s still an invaluable new option for keeping the Insect Glaive powered up and flying high.
3 Crouching Fire
Despite being a series famous for its huge swords and creative melee weapons, some of the most powerful strategies in Monster Hunter come from its ranged weapons. In the older games, Heavy Bowgun had access to ‘siege mode’, which forced it to be stationary in exchange for ludicrous firing speeds. While this ability was missing from World and Rise, Sunbreak brings it back in the form of crouching fire.
Just as in its previous incarnation, crouching fire allows the Heavy Bowgun to ramp up its firing rate while sacrificing mobility. The one change to this is the addition of a heat gauge that will punish players for overuse of the ability. While this is a slight nerf to its previous strength, the ability is still sure to be behind some speedy kills. However, the high risk means that Monster Hunter beginners might find the move harder to use effectively.
2 Surge Slash Combo
Anyone who started playing Monster Hunter after the series’ second entry may not know this, but the Great Sword wasn’t always centered around powerful charge attacks. Originally, while the hits were still powerful, it relied on a series of comboed swings instead of fewer, stronger charged swings.
Surge slash pays homage to this old playstyle, giving the greatsword a series of fast, weaker strikes instead of its initial charge. This not only gives players the option for more mobility on a rather slow weapon but increases the effectiveness of elemental damage and status effects on a weapon that previously couldn’t use them with much effectiveness. Plus, it can still lead to higher-level charged attacks.
1 Erupting Cannon
The wyrmstake cannon is a move added to the Gunlance’s arsenal in Monster Hunter World, making it a rather new addition. It offered Gunlance another damage option and another resource to maintain, but if used in certain situations, was extremely slow to activate, possibly giving the monster time to move out of the way entirely.
Gunlance users will be more than happy then, for the option to swap it out for erupting cannon. This new move is much faster and combos into more of the weapon’s moveset, while also providing a temporary buff to melee damage. While wyrmstake still has some utility, erupting cannon effectively replaces it in most scenarios, and noticeably speeds up a weapon that was begging for more speed in order to keep up with Sunbreak’s much stronger monsters.
Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak is out now for Nintendo Switch and PC.