u/MexicanWraith791

If you don't mind, I'd like to share my experiences and thoughts in my personal quest to master the Hunting Horn. Maybe through sharing what happens during this period of time, I could gain further insight from you in order to become a better HH player. This may be a long read, so bear with me.

After practicing with the HH for a couple of days, spending time in the training zone and hunting a few of the easier monsters, I decided to give it a go against some of the ones I struggle with the most.

It all began with some tempered apex monsters, as there are a few that give me trouble when I'm not using my main (SnS), mostly Arkveld, since I'm not really used to dodging most of its attacks; normally, I would just usually perfect guard or slide slash out of the way. Now, the first hunt went way better than I originally anticipated, and I gave Arkveld a good beating . To see if it was a fluke, I decided to try a couple more times, happily reaching the same results. Between staggers and knockouts, everything was a breeze for the most part.

Now filled with a newfound sense of bravado, I decided to throw myself to the wolves and see how I would fare against a regular Omega to test my performance under greater pressure. It was both a humbling but kind of inspiring experience for me.

Now, I must be honest; I don't think I'm a great player, even with my main, but I believe I am competent enough to see myself through the hunt. So there I was, kind of expecting to get demolished, barely even landing a couple of recitals before carting and all that, but oh boy, was I wrong.

I started the hunt; the first part was alright. Alessa managed to grab Omega's attention, which gave me the opening to go ham, bonking and playing songs. It ended sort of sooner than I thought it would. Omega moved into the second area, and here began an uphill battle for me. Feeling a bit cocky from my earlier performance, I lingered way closer to Omega than I should have. Getting greedy, I failed to dodge one flamethrower blast, which took almost half of my HP. That drove me into panic mode, and I started panic-rolling as I would do when playing some soulslike, making one huge mistake after another. I got way too far from Omega, which prompted it to ram itself at full speed to me, sending me back to camp in the cart.

I was a bit disheartened; I won't lie to you, but I decided to push through and see how it would go from there. I switched my strategy; instead of overwhelming Omega with constant attacks, I adopted more of a hit-and-run plan, using regular attacks to queue my melodies and placing bubbles while playing Echo Waves when the opportunity arose. After those adjustments, the fight went more favorably, and Omega moved to the third area.

The fight from here went more or less the same, and I even managed to get one knockout before the DPS check, of which I got rid rather quickly thanks to a Morbol that paralyzed Nercylla. That allowed me to spam Echo Waves and Resounding Melodies. That marked the beginning of the last phase of the fight, the moment I dreaded the most.

Omega descended to the pit, and I followed right behind. I got a mount just after reaching the bottom. Then I began desperately spamming Echo Waves to make the most of the knockout. Right after getting back up, Omega started targeting me. Somehow, I managed to keep up for a bit until Alessa relieved me, but then came the MIRV spamming. After taking a few hits that almost sent me back to camp, I found that my best chances of dodging them were using the speed boost from Self Improvement to walk a couple of steps and then dodge. That left me comfortably placed and with enough stamina to dodge the next barrage. After going through the same for a couple of minutes that felt like an eternity, a huge opening arose. When Omega was on its last legs, I managed to land a super pound that sent it to the ground. Once again, I began spamming Echo Waves as best as I could until one of them finished the fight.

My hands were shaking with excitement; never in my wildest dreams did I think I would manage to get past the second area, let alone beat Omega with a weapon I've just started using not even a week ago. Most of all, I'm really surprised by the destructive power of the Hunting Horn in this game. If anything, this encourages me to try my best and keep practicing. Today is the day I found that the kind of "support" that the HH brings to hunts is by wrecking the monsters' faces.

TL;DR: I went mad with power, decided to face the lesser version of my nemesis, and got humbled real quick, but after starting to play more cautiously, I managed to defeat it.

Btw, this is a build from r/MonsterHunterMeta I took as a base to learn HH, I still have 3 lvl 1 armor slots free, do you have any advice on what comfort skills I could run here?

P.D. Lancer brothers, your call has not fallen on deaf ears, I know there's not many of you and maybe we all need a stalwart wall on the team. I vow to get into your ranks and learn your ways once I master the Horn.