Long Sword
Low Rank

There are really only 1 reasonable weapon paths for Long Swords that stay reasonable from the entirety of Low rank all the way to High Rank, and that’s Tobi Kadachi’s Thunder Sword

The short answer for this guide is: Make the Tobi-Kadachi Long Sword, and upgrade them as soon as possible and you’ll steamroll the entire game.

Now for the long answer:

The Iron Katana you start with will be acceptable for the first missions. Try and hit a mining node for the two iron ore required to upgrade it to an Iron Katana 2 after your first real quest. You will use this for the first set of large monsters, including Great Jagras, and the Kulu Ya-Ku.

If you’re lucky, after your first hunt with the Kulu Ya-Ku you’ll have the required 1 Kulu-Ya Ku Beak, 2 Kulu Ya-Ku Hides, and 3 Kulu-Ya Ku Scales to upgrade your Iron Katana 2, into a First Dance 1. This is optional, as it is a dead end path, but will be a good bridge to the Tobi-Kadachi long sword. It’s recommended to take this upgrade.

If you don’t want to fight Kulu Ya-Ku until you get enough materials to upgrade, the Iron Katana 2 will be acceptable to take out your next target, the Pukei-Pukei but the First Dance 1 will be significantly easier.

After the Pukei-Pukei, you’ll want to complete your mandatory assignments of hunting a Barroth in Wild Spire Wastes. If you didn’t upgrade to a First Dance 1, you can upgrade to an Iron Katana 3 by mining Earth Crystals in Wildspire. This is significantly worse than the First Dance 1, so that’s the recommended route. The Iron Katana 3 does lead to one of the better end game weapons eventually, but that’s miles off at this point.

Then complete “Sinister Shadows of the Swamp” to hunt a Jyuratodus.

The Jyuratodus Path is pretty strong, but starts off weaker. The Jyura Shotel 1’s main weakness is it has significantly less green sharpness than the First Dance 1.

After defeating a single Jyuratodus, hopefully you have enough materials to make a Jyura Shotel 1 outright.

You’ll want to build a Bone Shotel by using 1 Monster Bone S,, and upgrade it to a Bone Shotel 2 by using 2 Monster Bone S. These are extremely common, and you should have dozens at this point.

Then, upgrade your Bone Shotel 2, into Jyura Shotel 1, by using 1 Jyuratodus Fin, 1 Jyuratodus Shell, 3 Jyuratodus Scales, and 1 Aqua sac.

All of these materials are farmed from Jyuratodus. Aqua sacs will most likely be the limiting factor here, they’re only available as rewards. Again, try and capture it if you can. Also, while you’re fighting Jyuratodus, make sure to kill and carve the Gajau, which are the catfish looking monsters around the area. You’ll need their parts for the second, and third upgrades to Jyura Shotel.

The Jyura Shotel 1 and First Dance 1 will be comparable. First Dance 1’s high sharpness is actually really useful in fights where you don’t have an opportunity to sharpen often. The Jyura Shotel will outperform it damage wise, but once it loses it’s green sharpness fights won’t be as easy. I consider this an optional upgrade, as the next Sword should be the main path for the entirety of low rank. Building the Jyura Shotel path is optional, but there will be a few parts in high rank where it’s superior to the Pulsar Shotel, but those are few and far between.

After beating Jyuratodus, you’ll have to fight a Tobi Kodachi. Conveniently, Tobi is weak against water elemental damage, so use the Jyura Shotel 1 if you have it.

After beating Tobi-Kadachi, make a second Bone Shotel 1 and Upgrade it to a Bone Shotel 2. Again, 3 Monster Bone S’ for the whole path. Now upgrade the Bone Shotel 2, to Pulsar Shotel 1 by using 1 Tobi-Kadachi Claw, 3 Tobi-Kadachi Scales, and 2 Tobi-Kadachi Pelts.

Our next hunts are Anjanath, and Zorah Magdaros, both of which are weakest to water. Anjanath is still quite weak to Thunder. The Pulsar Shotels have less raw damage, but 10% affinity, and much longer green sharpness. You should consider this the main path for Low Rank.

After defeating Zorah Magdoros, don’t worry, it’s a setpeice, and you can’t really lose, you’ll gain access to the Coral Highlands. You’ll be forced into an expedition to explore. Use this time to gather materials to upgrade your Pulsar Shotel.

Here, by mining in the Coral Highlands, you can get Coral Crystal.

Upgrade your Pulsar Shotel 1, into a Pulsar Shotel 2 by using 2 Tobi-Kadachi Electrodes, 3 Tobi-Kadachi Claws, 2 Electro Sac’s, and 3 Coral Crystals.

Try and get the 3 Coral Crystals in your first expedition into the Coral Highlands. This will make the next fights easier.

Continue progressing, until you’ve defeated Paolumu, then you’ll descend into the Rotten Vale. Then take out Rabobaan.

Continue progressing, and you’ll have to take out a Legania. Thankfully, our weapon is perfect against it since it’s weak to Thunder.

If you’re lucky, after your hunt, you’ll get two Monster Bone+ from Legania. Otherwise, you’ll have to farm any 5 star monster to get them. These include Legiana, Odogaron, Rathalos, and Diablos. Which conveniently, you have to fight anyways as part of standard story progression.

Your final upgrade for Low Rank is to upgrade your Pulsar Shotel 2, to Pulsar Shotel 3.

This requires 2 Monster Bone+, 2 Tobi Kadachi Electrodes, 2 Tobi-Kadachi Membranes, and 2 Warped Bones. The Warped bones can be gathered from bone piles in the Rotten Vale.

Take out the remaining Monsters of Low Rank, and you’ll be able to take on Zohr Magara.

After beating the Zohr Magara setpeice, and killing a deceptively strong Pukei-Pukei, you’ll gain access to High Rank quests. Congratulations, the baby gloves are coming off.

High Rank

Our immediate goal in High Rank is a weapon upgrade to compensate for the increased health of monsters, with a long term goal of bringing our sharpness to the next level.

At the start of High Rank, you’ll be able to free-hunt Tobi-Kadachi in the Ancient Forest. If you can’t find Tobi-Kadachi in expedition mode, check for investigation quests. I had to do expedition quests until I unlocked an optional quest to hunt Tobi-Kadachi.

You’ll want to upgrade your Pulsar Shotel 3, to Kadachi Fang 1 as soon as possible.

It requires 3 Tobi-Kadachi Claw+, 4 Tobi-Kadachi Scale+, 3 Tobi-Kadachi Pelt+, and 3 Dragonvein Crystals. Dragonvein Crystals can be found in Wildspire Wastes, and Coral Highlands in High Rank. Look for red mining nodes, and you’ll get them from there.

Thankfully, the Kadachi Fang 1 actually brings us up to natural Blue Sharpness. It’s small, but will be extremely useful as we won’t bounce as often against high rank monsters. It also gains a gem slot, which you can socket with whatever you want, or more likely, just whatever you have

You can continue progressing in the main story, but to upgrade again,, you’ll need 2 majestic horns from Diablos. Kadachi Claw 1 will be adequate, but to break it’s horns to get the 2 Majestic Horns will be suffering. Hunting Diablos online here will be a great option. If you’re having trouble breaking it’s horns, you can use Mega Barrel bombs while it’s sleeping. Then capture it to try and up your chances. It won’t be easy.

If you find the Kadachi Claw 1 inadequate for Diablos, you can build the Jyuratodus or Legania weapons. Progress through the story until you get the ability to hunt a Pink Rathian. Use your Kadachi Claw 1 to take it down. From here, upgrade from Jyura Shotel 1, to 2, to 3, then to Dipterus 1 and 2. I don’t recommend this, as the damage output increase will be marginal.

The Legania path will be better suited to Diablos and has better end game applications, but it requires rare materials. You can farm plates in Low Rank, but they also drop in High Rank. Legania is fodder for your Kadachi Claw 1. You should be able to free hunt him from the start of High Rank.

Upgrade your Kadachi Fang 1, to a Kadachi Fang 2, by using 2 Majestic Horns, Tobi-Kadachi Elecrode+, 4 Tobi-Kadachi Claw+, and 3 Thunder Sac.

Upgrading here will tide you over until you finally face off against Nergigante. Thankfully, he’s also weak to Thunder.

Nergigante is the big boy we’ve been buiilding up to for pretty much the whole game. After your hunt, if you’re lucky you’ll have gotten 2 Nergigante Talons to upgrade your Kadachi Fang 2, to a Kadachi Fang 3.

After Nergigante, you’ll be required to do quests in the Ancient Forest, Wildspire Wastes, and Rotten Vale until you get enough research points to get the next set of Elder Dragons. I would recommend farming Barroth in Wildspire Wastes, and Radobaan in Rotten Vale until you complete the research. Both of these monsters are easy to kill, and will help progress the research level when you complete a hunt. Radobaan can be killed in about 7 minutes with the weapons you’re using, and has a pretty reasonable drop rate of Wyvern Gems. I got two in the time it took for me to complete the Rotten Vale research.

After you get the Wyvern Gem, use it, and the 2 Nergigante Talons, 4 Tobi-Kadachi Electrode+, 6 Tobi-Kadachi Claw+, to upgrade from Kadachi Fang 2, to Kadachi Fang 3.

Now, you have an end game weapon, that’s more than capable of beating the rest of the game. This thing will trash Nergigante and Kushala Daora, but won’t be as good against the remaining Elder Dragons. If you’re struggling with them, you can farm Nergigante for his armor and weapon.

For Teostra, you can build the Jyuratodus Path, or Legania Path. Legania’s final weapon, will be way better, but requires Kushala Daora claws and a Gem, so the Jyuratodus Path is much easier to complete for comparable damage output. The Legania path will also be reasonable against Vaal Hazak.

If you want a good general person weapon, just build the Nergigante Long Sword by going through the sequence of: Iron Katana 1, Iron Katana 2, Iron Katana 3, Iron Grace 1, Iron Grace 2, Iron Grace 3, Iron Gospel, then finally the Nergal Reaver, and eventually the Extermination’s Edge. The Iron Katana path only uses ores, so it should be easy to make if you’ve been diligent about hitting Mining Nodes, then it’s just a matter of getting the Negigante, and Xeno’Jiva materials.

Obviously, if you’re feeling up to it and you want to min/max you can build one element Long Sword for each monster, but that requires a significant amount of farming for marginal returns.

Legiana's Long sword is a good option for ice elemental damage as it has natural white sharpness.
Most late game monsters are immune to Fire damage, so the rathalos, and anjanath longswrords suck against everything that isn't Kirin. Kirin is also moderately weak to Dragon, so you should probably use Exterminations Edge instead with it's high elderseal.

End Game Weapons

End Card Spiel
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