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Crafting and Gear

Monster Hunter Rise does not have a traditional leveling system. Your character's strength depends entirely on the weapons and armor you craft. Gathering materials and understanding the Smithy are the keys to surviving tougher hunts.

Gathering Materials​

You need two types of materials: environmental items and monster parts.

Environmental Items​

Ore, bones, bugs, and plants are scattered across every map.

  • Always mine mining outcrops and gather from bonepiles during your hunts.
  • You use these materials for basic weapon upgrades, consumable crafting (like Potions and Traps), and as supplementary materials.
  • The Argosy: Located in the Buddy Plaza, the Argosy allows you to passively farm plants, bugs, and fish while you hunt. Set this up early. To unlock your second and third submarines, you must complete specific "Cultural Exchange" sidequests provided by Rondine. Pay close attention to exactly which map and gathering node the requested items (e.g., Wisplanterns, Boatshells) spawn from.

Monster Parts​

Defeating monsters yields specific materials like scales, shells, and rare gems.

  • Carving vs. Capturing: When a monster dies, you carve it for materials. If you trap and tranquilize a weak monster, you capture it. Capturing usually yields more total rewards and often has different drop rates for specific rare items.
  • Part Breaks: Hitting specific monster parts (head, tail, wings) until they break grants bonus rewards at the end of the quest. If you need a Rathian Spike, you must focus damage on her back or tail.
  • Tail Severs: Most bladed weapons can sever monster tails. Once severed, you can carve the tail on the ground for an extra material.

The Smithy​

The Smithy is where you forge and upgrade your gear.

Weapon Trees​

Weapons upgrade along branching paths. You usually start with a basic Kamura or Ore weapon and branch out into specific monster lines.

  • You cannot jump straight to a powerful endgame weapon. You must craft the base weapon and upgrade it sequentially through the tree.
  • If a weapon path says "Rollback Available," you can downgrade the weapon to reclaim the monster parts and try a different path.

Armor Skills​

Armor does more than provide defense. Every piece of armor comes with innate skills.

  • Skills provide massive combat benefits, such as increasing your attack power, reducing stamina depletion, or granting earplugs to ignore monster roars.
  • Skills stack. Equipping multiple armor pieces with the "Attack Boost" skill increases its level and effectiveness.
  • Do not blindly equip a full set of armor from one monster just because it matches. The most powerful builds mix and match pieces from different monsters to stack specific, synergistic skills.

Armor Upgrades and Decorations​

As you progress into High Rank, you unlock new ways to customize your gear.

Armor Spheres​

Use Armor Spheres at the Smithy to increase the base defense of your armor pieces. You earn these spheres by completing Optional Subquests (accepted from Hinoa or Minoto). Always have five Optional Subquests active.

Decorations and Slots​

High Rank armor pieces feature Decoration Slots.

  • You forge Decorations at the Smithy using monster parts and Jewels (obtained as quest rewards).
  • Each Decoration grants one level of a specific skill.
  • Slots and Decorations come in three sizes (Level 1, 2, and 3). You cannot put a Level 2 Decoration into a Level 1 slot.
  • Decorations allow you to fine-tune your mixed armor sets, filling in missing skill levels to maximize your build's potential.

The Melding Pot Ecosystem​

Talismans (charms) are equipable items that grant innate armor skills and decoration slots. Unlike armor, they cannot be forged directly. They must be melded using surplus monster parts at the Market.

Early tiers like Moonbow Melding allow you to target specific, low-level skills. However, end-game optimization relies entirely on Wisp of Mystery and Rebirth melding, which produce completely randomized charms. Rebirth Melding allows you to recycle 20 unwanted Talismans into three new random ones.

To efficiently farm Melding Pot points, hunt late-game monsters like Thunder Serpent Narwa or endgame Anomaly targets. Be prepared for a long grind, as mathematically optimal "God Charms" require hundreds of melding iterations.