Monster Hunter Freedom Unite (PSP)

I've put more hours into this game than nearly any other I've ever played. It got to a point where I was using XLink Kai to connect to Japanese servers and play on maps that hadn't yet been released in the US for items that were never released in the US.

You haven't fought a Teostra until you've fought a JUMP Teostra!

I made some progress in the game, beat some easy quests. I've got a few questions though:

1. Monster carving - it seems that it makes a difference where I carve. If I carve a Popo near the head, I seem to be getting the tongue, whereas in other spots I am getting meat. Is my observation correct, or is it just a coincidence?
2. Weapons - is it better (cheaper) to upgrade the weapons, or rather create a higher level weapon from scratch?
3. Same question about armour - upgrade, or create from ingredients?
4. When equipping armour, do I get some bonus for wearing a complete set?

1) Spurious correlation, for the most part. When you get up to the big monsters, you'll sometimes chop off their tails, and you get different carves from that, but not for anything that remains in one piece. =) Note that for some bad guys, there are parts you can break (like Kut-ku's ear) that will affect the potential carves as well.

2 & 3) Kind of depends what you have on hand. There are a lot of cases where the "better" weapon isn't better in all situations (because of skills of elemental affinity), so sometimes creating a high-level weapon from scratch can keep you from having to lose and recreate something useful.

4) It's a bit complicated (in keeping with the MH theme), but yes. each piece of armor has a certain amount of skill points associated with it. When the number of skill points you have on your stuff passes certain thresholds, certain skills activate. You can see an early example of this in the Mamomufu set, which gives you all that good cold resistance stuff. Note that the is such a thing as negative points and hitting negative thresholds can have adverse effects!

It takes a little while to get the hang of, but after a while balancing what armor you equip to get the skills you want and avoiding disadvantages is one of the most rewarding parts of the game.

Another newbish question from me - please, help fellow hunters!

In the armoursmith's shop, when I want to create a piece of armour, some are listed in white, and some in pink. It seems that the pink ones are more 'advanced' - is this the only difference?

I have just recently defeated Yian Kut Ku (it wasn't easy, and I still haven't managed to beat him in the Training Hall) and Congalala. I have an almost complete Velociprey suit of armour, but I realised I could have started obtaining the Yian Kut Ku set (you can find its scales in Jungle area 9). Was going for Velociprey a bad move?

Don't worry MsbS, your Velociprey armor is fine. As others have said this game is about learning the attacks your enemies will use. Velociprey armor won't be as strong as the Kut Ku set, but soon you should start to recognize attack patterns of monsters. This will allow you to dodge more attacks and take advantage of openings. Your defense rating will matter less while the skills your armor has will have a greater focus.

Also, it sounds like you are about to start encountering the more serious monsters. I would wait a little while to change equipment until it seems like Velociprey armor just won't give you enough survivability against the stronger monsters.

Killing my first Kut Ku was pretty intense, but it is nowhere near the experience of taking down my first Rathalos. My first Rathalos kill is among one of the top moments I've had in gaming. You've got a long way to go in the game and it can be very rewarding.

MsbS wrote:

I made some progress in the game, beat some easy quests. I've got a few questions though:

1. Monster carving - it seems that it makes a difference where I carve. If I carve a Popo near the head, I seem to be getting the tongue, whereas in other spots I am getting meat. Is my observation correct, or is it just a coincidence?
2. Weapons - is it better (cheaper) to upgrade the weapons, or rather create a higher level weapon from scratch?
3. Same question about armour - upgrade, or create from ingredients?
4. When equipping armour, do I get some bonus for wearing a complete set?

1. As yeti noted, you'll get different carves off of a severed tail. If I recall correctly it doesn't make a real difference until you get to huge monsters like Lao-Shan Lung, which is big enough that you can jump on its back and carve it while it's still alive.

IMAGE(http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20091222040335/monsterhunter/images/thumb/d/dd/Laopicfrumunderneth.jpg/830px-Laopicfrumunderneth.jpg)

Yeah, he... doesn't like that. I believe that when you kill him the head, body and tail all have their own carve counts, so if you stop getting carves off one part you can move on to the next.

But anyway, for the time being you don't need to worry about that. A carve is a carve. If you break a monster's bodypart (for instance you can tear a Kut-Ku's crest if you keep hitting it) you'll sometimes get a rare monster piece as a quest reward, and some parts can only be obtained that way.

2. What I've found is that it's generally cheaper and easier to upgrade weapons (building from scratch requires more rare monster parts) but there'll come a point where the upgrade tree makes a huge leap. At that point you won't have the parts to upgrade, and won't for some time to come, yet the weapon won't be strong enough to carry you to the next upgrade. Once you get deeper into the game you'll likely want to keep an arsenal of different weapons anyway. Even if they're all the same type, each monster has elemental strengths and weaknesses you'll want to exploit.

3. Same thing with the armor. Once you get deeper into the game money won't be that big an issue, as long as you remember to upgrade and tend your "garden" every time you return to town. Other than that, making velociprey armor doesn't have a big impact on your ability to make kut-ku armor because velociprey armor's made from velociprey parts and kut-ku armor's made from kut-ku parts.

4. Also as yeti noted, armor will give you special benefits (and penalties) but only when you cross a certain threshold. Usually each perk has one level at 10 points and another at 15 points (or -10 and -15, respectively). If you stick to a single type of armor it'll usually provide a set of benefits and a set of penalties. The trick is to mix and match armor pieces and decorations to activate the perks you want while avoiding the ones you don't. As far as the game's concerned, a -9 to Attack is exactly the same as a +9 to Attack, whereas a -10 Attack gives you Attack Down and a +10 gives you Attack Up. So let's have a look at your Velociprey Armor.

If you're wearing the full set it gives you +15 to Faint, which totally negates the effect. It also gives you +10 to your mix success rate, which increases your chance of a successful mix by 15%. It gives you +8 to SwordSharpener, which does nothing because it's only at 8: if you add some decorations or swap out a piece of armor to grant an additional 2 points in that skill, you'll be able to sharpen your weapon faster. Or if you manage to scrape together another 6 points in PsychicVision, you'll automatically see where your target monster is located every 10 minutes. But if you get another -2 points to Paralysis, it'll become easier for monsters to, well, paralyze you.

Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it. It's not essential at your current level.

As for item colors, that's just their rank. In the past they've used it to determine which items you could or couldn't import from one iteration of the game to the next but it seems really unlikely they're going to make another Monster Hunter Freedom Unite for the PSP at this point.

Thanks, guys - those were really useful answers.

I haven't made that much progress since (busy, busy) - got some more Veloci* drops, whacked a Conga or five. The game is now kinda stale (farming components and improving my skills), but I know there's a big 'bang' waiting (another badass lurking in the Desert). And even though Kut-Ku is the easiest of the bigger guys, slaying it still felt REAL GOOD.

Oh, and there is this 'Get 10 Special Shrooms' quest just after the Kut-Ku and Congalala hunts. I was there, picking up the mushrooms, waiting for the yellow eye icon to pop up, ready to roll aside before some Tigrex shreds me to pieces :-). I was very surprised when nothing surprised me and I completed the quest

If it's feeling stale, forge ahead! I can guarantee you'll quickly get to a point where it doesn't feel boring again. =)

MsbS wrote:

Thanks, guys - those were really useful answers.

I haven't made that much progress since (busy, busy) - got some more Veloci* drops, whacked a Conga or five. The game is now kinda stale (farming components and improving my skills), but I know there's a big 'bang' waiting (another badass lurking in the Desert). And even though Kut-Ku is the easiest of the bigger guys, slaying it still felt REAL GOOD.

Oh, and there is this 'Get 10 Special Shrooms' quest just after the Kut-Ku and Congalala hunts. I was there, picking up the mushrooms, waiting for the yellow eye icon to pop up, ready to roll aside before some Tigrex shreds me to pieces :-). I was very surprised when nothing surprised me and I completed the quest :D

I'm at a similar crossroad. I'm trying to trap my first monster and the Kut-Ku is my current choice to keep things interesting. I haven't done the Congalala hunt, but it's next on my TODO list.

Yeah, something to keep in mind MsbS. Generally once you've faced a new monster, it's added to that area's natural ecosystem. That means it just lives there, and can pop in uninvited. Keep an eye on the forecast!

The Congalala was my first real roadblock. I ended up pulling out all the stops to defeat him the first time. I'd trap him in a pit, drop as many bombs as I could (usually large barrel bombs triggered by one of the smaller ones with a fuse), and blow his ass up.

Unless you're a purist, feel free to abuse the wikis and faqs on Congalala. He has many annoying attacks and is quite fast for his size. If you think he's hard at first, wait until he gets enraged. I'd say Kut-Ku was my first challenging fight, and Congalala was my first difficult fight.

Funny enough, I found Congalala easier than Kut-Ku. I use SnS, so I applied a Hit-and-Run tactic. I would use the jumping slice, then (if facing his back or side), slice again and run/roll away.

I did not really use any traps for Kut-Ku or Congalala, but I guess I will try to beat them again with a different weapon, just to get some practice. Or maybe practice using the barrells or bombs - I'm pretty terrible at throwing, it seems.

BTW - I found my Felyne compadre really useful during those fights. Even though he did blow me up a few times with his misaimed barrels, he also kept the beast occupied so that I could use a Potion or slay some distracting raptors or vespoids.

Progress update: I just killed a Gendrome, and I need to come back to the Velocidrome hunt to get some Velociprey drops for the last piece of armour - Vp Leggings. Maybe I'll manage to snatch a Vd Head too, so I can update my sword (if I can find some striped skin).

I used Longsword through most of Freedom so my attacks were slower and I couldn't block (in Tri I switched to Lance and love it).

You don't actually throw bombs, you place them at your feet. No aiming required. The aiming part comes in when you decide to set them off by throwing something at them.

Gratz on your first Gendrome.

I found Congalala hard because of his giant amount of health. I would get all impatient and try to get an extra slash in every time and....well, you know how it goes.

I've been fighting the urge to buy this game. I even was thinking about plugging in my PS2 to play the original game.

Also MsbS it sounds like you may be getting ready to start exploring new weapons. SnS is the most mobile weapon but the rewards to using other weapons can outweigh the mobility of the SnS.

Gimpy_Butzke wrote:

Also MsbS it sounds like you may be getting ready to start exploring new weapons. SnS is the most mobile weapon but the rewards to using other weapons can outweigh the mobility of the SnS.

Yeah, I think so too. SnS is great because of its sheer speed, but I don't really use its blocking potential (mostly because it's quite poor, to be honest).
My plan is to go to the Training Hall and practice slaying Kut-Ku and Congalala with various weapons. I'll try to improve in Longsword, Hammer, and one of the ranged weapons (Light Bowgun, most probably). This will take me a few hours, but seems worth it, for the extra versatility.

If you do pick up the Longsword, check out the Eager Cleaver/Devil Slicer line. They made it harder to get in Unite but it's still extremely powerful given the level at which it becomes available. For my long-range needs I usually rely on a bow, but sometimes I like to bring out Daora's Delphinidae. This is entirely because it looks like a giant revolver, especially when you fit it with a long barrel.

Bowguns are very flexible in that you can swap out different types of ammo on the fly, but you can't carry nearly enough special rounds for a full hunt and they do very little damage using their infinite basic shot. You usually have to head out with your inventory full of bullets and remake all of them every time you return to town. It's very rewarding to knock out a Fatalis's eye with a cluster shot to the face, but unless you have a few friends with big swords he's still going to eat you.

The bow doesn't do much more damage but its power is based on coatings (which are simple to use and not THAT critical), and charging. Bows with a penetrating shot can actually hit larger targets multiple times as they pass through the entire body. They don't get the first-person aiming mode of bowguns and their arrows do have an arc, but they do have a little red aim line.

LobsterMobster wrote:

The bow doesn't do much more damage but its power is based on coatings (which are simple to use and not THAT critical), and charging. Bows with a penetrating shot can actually hit larger targets multiple times as they pass through the entire body. They don't get the first-person aiming mode of bowguns and their arrows do have an arc, but they do have a little red aim line.

Also, you can run around while charging them, which makes them a pretty dodgy weapon. Light Bowgun is good too. I've always found the heavy to be too slow for me to get used to.

OK, so I started doing the Battle Trainings (Kut-Ku and Congalala are available). It took me about 10 tries to beat Kut-Ku with the weapon I felt most comfortable with (i.e. SnS). After those failures I decided to change my mindset - patiently wait for an opening, evade and roll a lot and only do quick attack and run away. Basically, in most caseswhere I failed, he would trample or tailwhip me when I was attacking it. I decided to go for one slice per attack only. This worked, although beating the bugger took me over 12 minutes.
For Greatsword I only needed about 5 attempts to find out that the best strategy is to run around the arena with the sword sheathed, and do the triangle unsheath/attack only when Kut-Ku is vulnerable. Then, roll to the side, sheath the sword, and keep moving.
Then I tried the hammer, and only needed 3 attempts - guess I am more familiar with Kut-Ku's attack patterns. This, plus charge attack gave me a big advantage. Although I ran out of Whetstones and lost one level of sharpness before I defeated it (the last 3 or 4 blows were with a slightly blunt hammer (however silly this might sound ).

Now, for the Lance and Bowgun, and then - on to Congalala!

You all are going to convince me to get this game, even though I absolutely hated Tri on Wii. I keep thinking to myself "sounds like they're having fun, maybe this'll be a good commute game".

If you didn't like Tri on the Wii I seriously doubt you'll like it for PSP. Did you play with the Classic Controller on Wii?

Yep, still have that controller, even though my Wii hasn't even been powered on in nearly a year. That's really what keeps me from buying it, sounds like everyone is having fun, but my experience with Tri still holds me back. I'll wait and see how the Vita MH game turns out.

I hate to be a wet blanket, but these games never really change. They just get bigger. I don't think the portable game based on Tri is going to do anything for you, if it even happens. I'd just pine for something else. Gravity Daze looks awesome!

I love love love MH, but I have to say that it's a pretty bad commute game. You can use the time to plink away at small missions, or grind for materials, but the big wyvern fights are not improved by being interrupted, and I've been eaten by a Tigrex multiple times due to poorly-timed potholes.

But I mean, maybe we can cure you! What didn't you like about Tri? We'll tell you how you were doing it wrong.

Blind_Evil was actually spot on. What I didn't like about Tri was the core of what MH is about - repetition to grind reagents for items, and repetition to learn patterns to beat the really tough enemies. It's the worst parts of an MMO all lumped into one single package. I originally thought I'd like it because I really love the * Souls games (Demon's Souls being one of my few Platinum trophy games), but those games managed to give the sense of reward and accomplishment without requiring literally days of grinding.

Here's a perfect example - Roasting meat over a spit. I understand the added strategy of having items that give you temporary buffs, I understand the and even enjoy the farming for their reagents as part of the game, but I cannot stand the sitting there for 15 seconds while silly music plays watching my dude turn a spit. It was such a pointless waste of time, it should be as simple as loading items into a menu and having them instantly combine, but it's drawn out. Everything I've read from people who enjoy the games say this is part of the appeal, and it just doesn't appeal to me.

That said, it's good fun reading about how much fun you all are having with it.

I think this is also partly about your mindset. I hate the repetition of the same action. And I hate fighting the same monster over and over again to farm or grind (Liquid Slimes - I'm looking at you!). But Monster Hunter works different for me - (almost) every weapon feels very unique. And thus, fighting a big baddie with a different weapon is also a different experience.

Yes, you will repeat the same fight many times to learn the monster behaviour. But your reaction to this behaviour will be different, depending on the weapon that you are using. This was not very apparent to me in the Tutorial missions - the Giadrome was fairly simple and it was enough to just hack it 3 to 5 times, be it with Dual Swords, Lance, Long Sword, or Hunting Horn. No huge difference here. But then I got access to Arena fights with monsters where it's only you vs the beast, with no distractions (which works both ways - nothing will distract the monster, so if you need to patch up or hone your blade, you need to time it well!). And just as I described above - Great Sword required a very different approach than Sword'n'Shield. And different than Hammer.

So, there is enough variety to keep me playing. Although I'm not very patient usually - I have clocked in about 26 hours into this game. Normally, I would have grown weary by now. Hell, I would have beaten 3 modern console games in this time But somehow, with MH, it's different. There is a huge learning curve, but at the same time you can see the progress. First, the monster massacres you. A few failures later you manage to barely defeat it. Then, after a few more tries, you defeat it with barely any scratches on you.

But I have to fully agree with you on one thing - the tediousness of some actions, like BBQing meat. It could have been much faster. It't the same for cooking in the kitchen - you hear some music, you see your felynes dancing the same dance every time, then you watch your character eating, then you see the effect. It takes about 10 seconds, while it could be done in 2. Also, some Farm actions could be streamlined. You need to approach the mushroom tree, the rock, then each field individually, each bush - it just takes too long. Not to mention the fishing - I time it well probably 95% of the times, so why not make it faster?

EDIT: Oh, and Monster Hunter games are now real cheap on PSN, so giving it a test drive will only set you back like half of one lunch

MsbS wrote:

I think this is also partly about your mindset. I hate the repetition of the same action. And I hate fighting the same monster over and over again to farm or grind.

I feel the same. People often come at MH expecting a Diablo or MMO loot-driven type of game, but the reward for me has always been the combat, the rush of victory after struggling for a while. Upgrading my gear and looking cool was a nice addition, but I never did it just for the sake of doing it, like I would in WoW. I did it so I could make it to the next boss, because the hunting experience was so amazing, not because I wanted that Lagiacrus spear.

Damnit, now I want to play Tri again. MsbS, go buy a Wii and let's hunt.

Blind_Evil wrote:

Damnit, now I want to play Tri again. MsbS, go buy a Wii and let's hunt.

I do have a Wii, but I haven't played it in like half a year When we moved to the new apartment 3 years ago, I got rid of the TV, and got an overhead projector instead. And I almost stopped playing 'large' console games, as it's too much bother to roll down the screen, turn all that stuff on, etc. It's just no good for short gaming sessions. And on weekends when I could play some more in the morning (while the missus is still asleep), it's too darn' bright because my window blinds suck!

I do most of my gaming on handhelds - DS, and now a PSP (which I got about a month ago). I turn on my Wii basically only when some friends pop up, for some goofing around in Wii Sports, Wii Fit, or Boom Blox.

Some people like Harvest Moon, some people don't. Takes all types.

If you do jump back into Tri let me know and I'll be your lancer. I didn't dig as deep into Tri as I'd intended, partially due to other games coming out and partially because it's actually rather underwhelming after playing Freedom Unite. It's much prettier, sure, but you don't get three games' worth of accumulated monsters to hunt and items to make. It actually feels a little limited in scope. However I cannot overstate how much of an improvement Cha-Cha is over the stupid Felynes, and when I say "I didn't dig as deep" I mean "I completed the entire storyline, plus some of the other upper-level challenges, plus a monster so big you need to kill it with a friggin ship, but I haven't wrung it totally dry."

Oh, and for those considering it: WiiSpeak is terrible. It is worse quality than a drive-through loudspeaker.

Anyway, while you're learning the lance, it's one of the most simple and stationary weapons which is why I like it (and forgive me if any of this is incorrect since I learned most of it in Tri and they may have changed things). Basically, you hide behind your shield until the monster gives you an opening. If it's standing over you, use your high attack. If it's on the ground, use your low attack. If you need to move quickly, either to approach a monster or to run out of an area, use your charge move. Always keep an eye on your stamina as if it hits zero the monster will break your guard, and (at least in Tri) you can still sidestep to extract yourself from a losing situation.

You might want to start learning good habits for multiplayer right off the bat. Try to position yourself around the front of the monster (longsword/greatsword users will want the sides and back, you can't sever tails anyway, and it's your job to hold the monster's attention). Learn precision, because people get very angry when you plow into them with a sloppy charge. Also learn how to get yourself out of bad situations quickly, because if a fellow hunter hits your shield with a stray greatsword swing it'll take off a GIANT chunk of your stamina (and it's really hard to teach other hunters to, y'know... not do that).

MsbS wrote:

Good comments

These are all the reasons I thought I'd like it. Again, this is very much Demon's/Dark Souls is about, differences in approach depending on what you have chosen to use as your weapon. And again, that's where I think Demon's/Dark Souls did a much better job, in that they allow you to get right into the interesting bits (Is it more effective to fight this boss with Sword + Board? Should I wear heavy armor? etc.) and they drop all the tedious jobs. But I'm still enticed by the fact that MH really is, in the end, about the battle and becoming a better hunter through skill rather than just high stat equipment. This is why I keep reading the thread, and now I'll have to go check just how low the prices are on PSN.

EDIT: Still $20 on PSN.