Monster Hunter Now tips and tricks for beginners

polygon.com:

If you’re new to the Monster Hunter franchise or a seasoned veteran,Monster Hunter Now is full of new features that may be confusing to grasp.

Niantic’s augmented reality take on the monster hunting franchise has you roaming around (in real life) to find monsters to hunt and materials to make new gear out of. As you upgrade your gear, you’ll be able to take down stronger monsters and then upgrade your gear even more.

Below, we list some tips and tricks that we wish we knew starting out to help get you up to speed.

Each piece of armor has its own set of perks, skills that you get from upgrading your gear to certain tiers. Rather than completing an armor set and wearing a matching outfit, you should pick armor pieces based on skills that match your playstyle. For example, if you find yourself getting tossed around by monsters often, you may want to equip and upgrade the Jagras Helm, which gives you Firm Foothold, a skill that reduces knockback the more you level it up.

If you’re tired of taking out Kulu-Ya-Ku and Jagras, don’t worry — more monsters will unlock as you progress. You’ll be stuck with the same handful of beasts for a while, but just keep taking down monsters and collecting materials to complete your quests and you’ll see a larger variety of enemies in no time.

When it comes to fighting larger monsters, having an elemental advantage can make a significant difference, especially at higher difficulties; we hit a brick wall during the five-star Rathian encounter in the story, which we able to eventually clear with enough paralysis weapon upgrades. Our recommendation is, once you have settled on your weapon type of choice, is to have a variety of elements at the ready, and to upgrade them up as much as your armor