u/riklaunim

I played a lot of HBG and Lance, and now, after doing a lot of Lance, I tried some HBG and Bows again, and it's a weird feeling - lots of poor hitzones... until tenderized, then most monsters start to melt (shoot spread 3 into Kadachi tenderized tail; or pierce 3 through it). On melee, the difference seems way smaller and not as essential - but also melee can't suddenly do a few times more damage than average, while ranged can (GS asterisk?). And sticky ammo became a thing mostly due to those hitzone values, clusters were a thing as well...

Velkhana without tenderizing on HBG seems a bit sad, apes - better go sticky, zinogres are also questionable, while melees at worst can run with mind's eye/ballistics to avoid some bounces on some monsters.

And then tenderize animation can be quite long for HBG with Wyvernheart vs Wyvernsnipe, which is still longer than Lance... and there are light weapons needing 2 attacks. And the skill ceiling is high for like the bow, allowing the DPS disparity to be even higher under certain conditions ;)

Also, does anyone use the special scope on HBG? Seems really hard to get benefits from it in real hunts when the monster isn't rolling on the floor crying ;) (yet best case scenario one HBG mod gives you +30%ish DPS increase)

Is it the curse of the clutch claw? How does it look in other games from the series (other than Wilds)?

Rarity 10 weapons have 10 augment slots, while rarity 12 only have 6 and require way later-tier upgrade materials. Health augment on rarity 10 is tempered Odogaron, and you can bring it to late MR challenge fights that unlock higher Guiding Lands levels :)

In the subject of Dodogaron - his weapons tend to have lots of affinity. Odogaron's Misery II lance has 35 affinity and is of the lowest rarity. Low 529 damage (230 raw), hidden 330 fire, and white sharpness. RBranchy lance is 690 (300 raw); FF Barioth is 635 + 540 ice. So the goal is to use extra augment slots and native affinity to limit WEX and crit eye skills needed to make a solid build with some bonus skills like earplugs or other situational skills (while also having 5 guard, guard up, crit boost, health boost, protective polish etc). The go-to low rarity lance would be Kulu (25% affinity but better raw).

Getting all 4 affinity augments (would take a lot of GL to get it) pushes the affinity to 60%, which then would be 100% with Safi set. But the fire damage is hidden, so it would need Free Element (or non-elemental-boost and some other set with WEX or Agitator). Safi, Namiele sets (+ true crit element) would be the way to go.

I ran some poke testing to check how behind Odogaron lance is vs more mainstream lances. Basic forward poke on the testing cart-monster (no combat skills, damage boost large food):

• Odogaron lance: 55
• Hornertaur lance (also 529 damage but purple sharpness): 58
• Kulu lance: 61 (rarity 10 with almost 600 damage and 25% affinity, hidden sleep)
• Pukey lance: 57 (+ poison procs; with poison duration up and 4 procs, it can be huge)
• Coral pukey lance (water): 70 (elemental damage is visible per hit vs status effects, which aren't)

Non-elemental-boost deco:

• Odogaron: 55 -> 57
• Kulu: 61 -> 64
• Hornertaur: 58 -> 60

Free element 3:

• Odogaron: 55 -> 63 (* will vary on monster fire hit zone values)
• Kulu: 61 -> wallbang enraged monster from sleep; "bonus points" for doing it to broken horn Kirin

So it looks like it likely has to be an elemental build with Kulu sleep lance as a backup for fire-resistant monsters. Without good fire damage, the DPS disparity vs top lances will be huge -_- (RIP Taroth Crest Claw).

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Another challenge would be Jagras and Pukey HBGs - spread 2, pierce 2 without recoil suppressor, and also rarity 10. Bonus close-range mod, more augments. Not a Glutton... but still a Jagras ;)

Few Lenovo Android tablets have DP-in options, allowing them to function as native displays for other devices - like, say, a miniPC or SFF with dGPU. The problem is - only a few models support this, and it doesn't look like a feature rising in popularity. Has anyone tried such a solution?

There are also video capture devices for Android, but then latency and resolution could be an issue. There are also "lapdocks" but those aren't functional on their own (display, keyboard, and touchpad in laptop form factor but without the laptop inside)

Started a fresh save for lance fun and trying to make some fun/utility set based on lowest rarity weapons and early/multiple weapon augments ;) Few HR hunts in ultrawide.

Lance is fun, but I do miss that DEATH AND DESTRUCTION of HBG :)