Charge Blade Builds, Best Skills & Armor

Monster Hunter Wilds offers 14 different weapons to choose from. Most of them deal heavy raw damage that is reliable against most monsters, while others, like the Charge Blade, deal massive elemental damage in short bursts. This transforming weapon offers heavy damage with every swing, and knowing how to play it can be challenging compared to weapons like the Longsword.

If you like using flashy weapons that deal heavy elemental damage, this guide is for you.

How to use the Charge Blade in Monster Hunter Wilds

The Charge Blade is one of the more complex melee weapons in Monster Hunter Wilds. Using the weapon effectively revolves around proper phial usage and management. One of the major things to note about the Charge Blade is that it is a transforming weapon that can switch from Sword mode to Axe mode at the press of a button, offering different attacks and effects.

The Sword mode is the generator mode used to build up your main gauge with Sword attacks. Consecutively attacking with regular hits and combo attacks will power up your main gauge, changing its color from white to yellow at first, then from yellow to red at max power. This energy should then be stored in the phials to save it up for later.

The Axe mode is the assault mode, unleashing all the built-up energy in powerful bursts of raw or elemental damage, depending on your weapon. These swings are your most powerful attacks that can tear through monster hide and destroy wounds in no time, especially if you have a high enough affinity. The damage numbers in Axe mode tend to be some of the highest in the game.

Now that you know how to use the Charge Blade’s different modes, you will need to know the best build for your Charge Blade.

Best Charge Blade builds in Monster Hunter Wilds

The best build for any Charge Blade user involves crafting certain weapons and armor with specific in-built skills that benefit your build and accessorizing them with Decorations that enhance your skills. Artian Weapons are your best bet since you can customize their attack, affinity, and element infusions, granting them custom stats, but certain monster-specific Charge Blades will work too.

Since Charge Blades are great with elemental damage, this build variation is perfect for launching explosive bursts with Elemental Discharge in your Axe mode.

If elemental attacks aren’t your thing, Monster Hunter Wilds has buffed the raw damage of Charge Blades, making for an excellent raw damage variation.

If you want to further test your build with different elemental weapons, knowing the best Charge Blades that complement your elemental build might be helpful.

Best weapons

Similar to other elemental-focused weapons like the Bow, the Charge Blade has excellent choices when it comes to each of the five main elements. Craft one of each of these five, keeping them handy for specific hunts when you learn monster weaknesses, allowing you to take them down much faster, especially with Critical Element and Weakness Exploit.

• Fire: Abaddonian Pweza
• Water: Valeroje-of-the-Waves
• Thunder: Astrapi Clairaxe
• Ice: Windthrash Tamebami
• Dragon: Guardian Abiding Gawain

For your main endgame Fire weapon, we recommend crafting the Abadonnian Pweza. This Nu Udra Charge Blade is crafted using the Apex Predator’s parts exclusively. Farm up a few Nu Udra Tentacles+, some Nu Udra Horns+, and the rare Nu Udra Flamegem with some Hunter Symbols.

The Water weapon you want is Valeroje-of-the-Waves, an Uth Duna weapon crafted using the Apex Predator’s parts. You will need some Uth Duna Tentacles+, Uth Duna Hides+, and the rare Uth Duna Watergem to craft this weapon. Farm the Tempered versions to get Hunter Symbols.

Astrapi Clairaxe is the perfect Thunder weapon for your Charge Blade build. This Rey Dau weapon is crafted using some Rey Dau Carapaces and Rey Dau Bolthorns, parts that are easy to acquire. Finish it up with the rare Rey Dau Boltgem and some Hunter Symbols to acquire this weapon.

The Windthrash Tamebami can be crafted using more common parts. Hunt some Hirabami to get access to their Hirabami Webbing+ parts, preferably Tempered Hirabami to get the lower-tier Hunter Symbols. After acquiring enough, get the rare Jin Dahaad Icegem to finish crafting the weapon.

Finally, for your Dragon weapon, you can’t go wrong with the Guardian Abiding Gawain, a weapon crafted using parts acquired from the flagship monster Arkveld. Defeat Tempered Arkveld to acquire Arkveld Calloushells, Arkveld Tails, the rare Arkveld Gem, and some Hunter Symbols.

If you still want to go with a Raw Charge Blade that is not an Artian weapon, the Hard Bone Strongarm is a great choice. The components are quite easy to gather as well, requiring the commonly found Monster Hardbones and Dragonbone Relics, followed by a Beast Gem.

Best armor

The right armor set pieces are what you need to survive and grant you the skills you need to make your build shine.

For the early stages of the game, crafting a High Rank set with components that are easy to acquire is the way to go, complete with its own skills. Our pick of choice is the Guardian Ebony Alpha Set for its great early-game set bonuses.

• Guardian Ebony Helm Alpha
• Guardian Ebony Mail Alpha
• Guardian Ebony Braces Alpha
• Guardian Ebony Coil Alpha
• Guardian Ebony Greaves Alpha

Crafting all five pieces of the set will grant you level five Burst, great for elemental builds, level three Divine Blessing, a powerful defensive bonus. The level three Earplugs and level three Bleeding Resistance are great utility skills to have until you upgrade your gear.

For your mid-game hunts, you will need to craft parts from a mix of different monster sets. These are the pieces you will want to ensure proper damage and defense scaling for your build.

• Guardian Ebony Helm Beta
• Guardian Rathalos Mail Beta
• Guardian Ebony Braces Beta
• Dahaad Shardcoil Beta
• Guardian Rathalos Greaves Beta

Keep the Guardian Ebony two piece set bonus from your early game build to maintain the Burst Boost skill. For the rest of your gear, equip the two pieces of Guardian Rathalos armor for the Weakness Exploit skill while acquiring the Scorcher set bonus for some additional Fire damage. Finally, pick up the Jin Dahaad armor piece for the last level of Weakness Exploit to round off the build.

For endgame armor, the build mentioned above should give you everything you need. Once you have crafted all the parts, it’s time to find the right Talismans.

Best talismans

Talismans are the final part of any build. These items are crafted to add bonus levels to existing skills or fill in for skills that you don’t have but are essential to your build. The best early game Talisman is the Blessing Charm, granting you a level three Divine Blessing for some clutch saves.

When you get to the mid game, you have various choices that can benefit your build. For elemental damage, you could go for the Chain Charm to gain access to more levels of the Burst skill. For faster part breaking, pick up the Chainblade Charm for Flayer and the Breaker Charm for Partbreaker.

Two more interesting options you could go for are the Mighty Charm for Maximum Might, giving you increased affinity, or the Phoenix Charm for Coalescence, granting you increased elemental damage.

Endgame Talismans usually slot in for your final bit of damage boost. Our choice would be the Exploiter Charm for more levels of Weakness Exploit if it isn’t maxed out already. With so many options to choose from, don’t be afraid to experiment with different Talismans to get the skills you need.