Monster Hunter Wilds Hunting Horn Weapon Guide

In Monster Hunter Wilds, some weapons are straightforward to understand, such as the Great Sword, Dual Blades, Lance, and more. However, there’s an exception – the Hunting Horn. It serves both supportive and attacking roles, making it akin to equipping a bard with a hammer. In this game, the Hunting Horn remains indispensable for any hunting team.

Fortunately, despite its initial appearance and sound, the Hunting Horn isn’t as complex as it seems; you merely need some practice to get accustomed to it. Here’s a rundown of all the tunes this instrument can produce. Soon enough, you’ll be mastering it, blasting away at enemies, crushing skulls, and granting an abundance of buffs.

For the sake of clairty, we’re using Xbox button prompts for our explanations.

The Hunting Horn

The Hunting Horn could be likened to a member in an orchestra who abruptly expresses strong emotions. This instrument can manifest in various shapes, ranging from percussions like bongos and drums, to wind instruments such as tubas and flutes. Unlike other instruments that alternate between providing support and launching attacks, the Hunting Horn embodies both roles simultaneously. Here’s why:

In a conventional orchestra setup, different instruments play specific roles – some provide backing (support) while others take the lead (offense). However, the Hunting Horn transcends these roles by embodying both functions at once, making it unique and powerful in its own right. This duality is what sets the Hunting Horn apart from other orchestral instruments.

Playing Notes

As an enthusiast, I’d put it this way: When wielding the Hunting Horn, I create melodies by pressing attack buttons (Y, B, or the combo of Y+B). Each press results in a unique musical note, and my horn only possesses three distinct colors of notes. These tones define the repertoire of melodies I can play with this incredible instrument.

When you execute the attacks in sequence as Y, followed by B, and then Y + B, the Hunting Horn will emit notes in the following order: White, Red, and Yellow. These notes can be observed in the upper-left corner of your screen on the track.

In music, the sequence or arrangement of the notes played is crucial because only by playing them in the right sequence do we create a melody. For instance, if a melody includes two White keys and a Red key, you can’t play it as B-Y-B. Instead, to follow the correct order, you should play it as Y-Y-B.

Handily, the track doesn’t set a deadline for taking notes. This implies that if you choose to lay down your weapon or break a combo, you can always execute the required note-producing attack when needed.

Building A Melody

When you play a sequence of correct notes, it generates a Tune, which is subsequently saved for later use. Each Tune has a wide range of influences, each one distinctive to the Hunting Horn being utilized. These effects can encompass things like healing, reduced stamina drain, or ear protection.

At most, there can be three melodies stored in the system simultaneously. Once stored, these melodies will stay put until they are played or replaced with a newer one. Since only three melodies can be kept at once, if you create a new melody before playing the existing ones, it will overwrite the oldest one. Therefore, it’s essential to play your melodies in the order they were stored to prevent accidental replacement.

In this spot, the Hunting Horn truly excels. Not only do its melodies resonate personally, but they also reach any fellow hunters nearby. As a result, even during heated battles, you can simultaneously heal and boost the abilities of your teammates.

On any given track, only up to five distinct notes are stored at once; however, these can be part of various melodies. For instance, one melody might require three white notes and then a yellow note, while another could need two whites followed by two yellows. Interestingly, though six notes seem to be used in total, you can create this pattern with just four notes if the final two notes from the first melody (white and yellow) are also part of the start of the second one.

Special Performances

Every Hunting Horn possesses a Unique Performance, distinct from other tunes in terms of its storage and execution. Generally, it needs at least four notes to be stocked, and can be played by simultaneously pressing Y, B, and Right Trigger buttons. In total, there are three Unique Performances available:

Offset Melody – This acts as an Offset attack, letting you counter a monster during one of their powerful attacks while also dealing high damage.
Resounding Melody – This attacks an enemy multiple times, and deals extra damage at the end if the final hit piercing sound wave strikes.
Melody Of Life – This takes a few seconds to activate, leaving you open to attack, but restores a great amount of HP to you and your allies.

Instead of ordinary tunes, Special Performances cannot be replaced or edited. Therefore, it’s advisable to save them ahead of time and use them only when absolutely required.

Hunting Horn – Skills And Abilities

Now that you’re starting to grasp playing melodies on the Hunting Horn, it’s time for the fun part – performing! Don’t fret though; this part is a breeze compared to learning the tunes. Once you have your collection of melodies ready, playing them becomes as simple as pie.

Echo Bubbles

Echo Bubbles serve as a fresh feature for the Hunting Horn, enabling you to create up to three area-of-effect circles on the ground. These circles grant beneficial effects to any hunters within their boundaries. Each Echo Bubble operates consistently, but the specific benefits it provides are distinctive for each Hunting Horn. Here are the six distinct effects of Echo Bubbles:

1. Enhanced Attack Up (Water) – Increases attack power by a certain percentage.
2. Enhanced Defense Up (Fire) – Boosts defense by a specific amount.
3. Enhanced Critical Eye (Thunder) – Improves the chance of scoring critical hits.
4. Enhanced Affinity (Water, Fire, Thunder) – Increases the likelihood of procuring elemental or status effects.
5. Enhanced Speed Sharpening (Ice) – Reduces sharpening time by a certain percentage.
6. Enhanced Recovery Up (Earth) – Speeds up healing and recovery processes.

Echo Bubble Effect	Description
Health Regeneration	Restores HP over time.
Stamina Regeneration	Restores stamina over time.
Evasion and Movement Speed Up	Increases the speed of dodges and general movement speed.
Attack and Affinity Up	Increases damage and critical hit chance.
Defense and Elemental Resistance Up	Increases defense and resistance to all elements.
Ailments/Blights Negated	Removes any Blights and Ailments upon entering, and prevents the accumulation while inside.

Besides their distinctive advantages, Echo Bubbles also offer two additional perks. One of these is the ability to swiftly play any three notes while the setup animation is running, which in turn helps you build melodies more rapidly.

As a game enthusiast, I’d like to share an exciting feature: whenever I execute an attack within the Echo Bubble, it reverberates at its core. This additional impact harms any monster residing inside the bubble. This principle extends to performances too, allowing me to inflict substantial damage with clever positioning.

After setting up three Echo Bubbles, it’s not possible to rearrange their locations. Instead, you must be patient and let one bubble finish before placing another one down.

Performance And Encore

The fundamental Hunting Horn moves involve playing stored melodies, which can be done as long as there’s at least one stored melody. Pressing RT initiates the performance of your stored melodies, but you can press a combination of Y+RT or B+RB to play a particular melody first.

During a Performance, you’ll play every stored Melody automatically, but you can skip this if you dodge. By perfectly timing your RT press as the next Melody is about to play, your Hunting Horn will flash red, allowing you to perform the Melody quicker and deal more damage.

After exhausting all your saved melodies, you have the option for an encore. To activate this, simply press RT after the melodies have been played. Not only does this enhance each melody played during that performance, but if you’ve previously restored health and reduced stamina, it could restore additional HP and extend the duration of the stamina reduction, further conserving your stamina.

Besides playing each stored melody, you can utilize Encore simply by pressing the Y + B buttons during a performance.

Directional Attacks

As a fan, I can’t stress enough the significance of skillfully utilizing directional attacks with the Hunting Horn. Although the standard strikes pack a punch, they have a tendency to immobilize you, making it challenging to swiftly construct a Melody.

If you push the left joystick forward and press Y at the same time, it will execute a Forward Smash rather than a regular swing, which also advances your position slightly. In contrast, moving the left joystick in any direction following a standard B attack will trigger a Flourish, a swift attack.

Initially, when you execute Y+B, it normally strikes from behind and pushes you back, causing slow yet significant damage known as an Overhead Smash. However, if you perform this action while moving forward, it transforms into a slower but higher-damage version of the Overhead Smash. Performing the same combination again results in a faster Follow-Up Overhead Smash.

Among these attacks, the one that packs the biggest punch is called Hilt Stab. You can execute it during a combo using any button combination while simultaneously moving the left stick backward and pressing the attack key. This move has a limited range, but it’s surprisingly swift compared to other Hunting Horn attacks. Although it dishes out relatively low damage, it allows you to accumulate notes rapidly without having to endure longer animations.

Reverb

The Focus attack on the Hunting Horn is referred to as Reverb. When you strike a Wound with it, it attaches a string to the monster and inflicts significant damage once the connection is complete. Notably, during its duration, you can perform up to five musical notes. This feature allows you to potentially accumulate a full set of Melodies or recharge your Special Performance.

If you sync your playing with the on-screen visuals, it’ll boost the initial impact damage from the Reverb attack.

Hunting Horn – Tips And Tricks

Time Your Performances

To make the most out of your melodies, it’s best to actively play them rather than letting them run on their own. You’ll notice that the Hunting Horn flashes red when you press the Perform button at the exact moment each new melody is played. This technique increases the damage dealt. This can be applied to every melody in your performance.

For both Hilt Stab and Echo Bubble, if you time pressing the Perform button right when their animations finish, you’ll leap swiftly into your attack, dealing more damage than typical.

Aim For The Head

The Hunting Horn might seem more about composing melodies, but don’t forget its raw power. This blunt weapon dishes out significant damage when it strikes a monster’s head. Moreover, hitting the head increases the chances of stunning the monster. So, stay up front and start swinging. The monster won’t stand a chance against your onslaught.

Overhead Smash is especially potent when it comes to stunning monsters with hits to the head.

Use Hilt Stab To Speed Up Combos

The Hilt Stab is amazing due to its lightning-quick speed. Even if it misses, it’s still effective because it delivers the required note immediately. What makes it even more exceptional is that it can be repeatedly utilized within a single combo without limit. After performing a Hilt Stab, you can follow it up with any other move, and the next one could also be a Hilt Stab again.

Stock Melodies Outside Of Combat

Melodies play a crucial role in the Hunting Horn, as they boost the performance of your whole squad. Yet, during intense battles, it might be challenging to select the ideal melody. But don’t worry, the Hunting Horn is forgiving.

In this game, producing a note doesn’t necessarily require that your attacks hit the monster directly. Instead, simply executing an attack will yield a note. This means that you can accumulate all three of your preferred Melodies and Special Performance before even entering a battle. So, feel free to come well-prepared!

2025-02-27 14:38