Best starter Sword and Shield builds in Monster Hunter Wilds

You might think that the roguish Dual Blades or the aerially advanced Insect Glaive are the most mobile weapons in Monster Hunter's entire arsenal, but I'm here to make the case for the series' secret agile king: the Sword and Shield. The best Sword and Shield builds in Monster Hunter Wilds are designed to help you stay in constant motion, delivering quick hitting combos that pay off with status build-ups, mounting monsters, and precision focus attacks, all without breaking your flow.

The Sword and Shield seems like a simple weapon at first, and compared to the complex combos you need to drill to take advantage of Monster Hunter's Charge Blade builds or Switch Axe builds, it really is an easy weapon to learn. But Sword and Shield is way more versatile than it seems—beyond its fast-hitting combos, there's the added wrinkle of blocking and countering monster attacks with the shield and the unique option of using items without holstering your blade. Sword and Shield is the only weapon in the whole Monster Hunter Wilds arsenal to let you do that.

In this guide I'll run through how to take advantage of the Sword and Shield's unique perks while also capitalizing on its multi-hit combos, then lay out the Low Rank Sword and Shield build progression I zeroed in on while making my way through Monster Hunter Wilds' campaign.

How to play Sword and Shield in Monster Hunter Wilds

Start your basic attack chains with Y, and finish with Y+B: A rapid tapping of Y+Y+Y+Y delivers the Sword and Shield's lowest commitment sequence of hits for steady but unspectacular damage.

• The great thing about this combo in Wilds: you can also tap a direction along with each Y hit to absolutely dance around monsters and keep landing blows.
• End this basic sequence by pressing Y+B to land the follow-up Spinning Reaper, then Y+B again to finish with the multi-hit Charged Chop.

Smack monsters in the face with the Forward + B, B, B combo to build up stun. This is a super easy sequence: just start with Forward+B for a shield bash and keep hitting B for a sequence that can help stun a monster. Not your highest damage, but very useful.

• As with the Y combo above, throw in a Y+B to end with a Charged Chop.

Use LT, Back + B and then Y to backstep into your best combo, Perfect Rush: Setting up this combo takes a bit of practice, but you'll be landing a beautiful sequence of hits in quick succession and closing the combo with a sick aerial finisher. Perfect Rush is the Sword and Shield's big attack. To start it, briefly hold LT + Back + B, hopping into a poised backstep. Keep holding B for a beat! When your character pulses red, tap Y (without letting go of B) to perform a Leaping Slash. If that lands, you're in business. You'll automatically enter into the Perfect Rush combo, which will trigger three more red-charged beats when you need to hit Y to continue the combo.

• After the final hit of the chain you'll launch into the air to follow up with a multi-hit plunging Y+B attack (usually my pick) or a shield bash with B, which can knock a monster off its feet.
• Perfect Rush has some risk: you can't dodge out of it, but between animations you can hold RT to transition into a block. Stop pressing Y to end the combo early, but with a slow recovery that leaves you vulnerable. You can end Perfect Rush early by pressing Y+B at the end of the chain to transition into a Charged Chop instead of jumping.
• Initiating Perfect Rush is flexible: you can start a backstep from any Sword and Shield combo with Back + B (no need to hold LT), or start it from a guard (hold RT).

One more versatile feature of the Sword and Shield that few other Monster Hunter Wilds weapons offer: you can perform Focus attacks in mid-air by holding LT. Aim on your way down and hit RT to nail a wound!

• When Focus attacking wounds, use B to deliver a powerful uppercut once you've lodged your sword in place. You can press Y instead of B to do a multi-hit downward stab instead, which is useful if you're near the top of the monster and will get in a lot of hits on the way down, but usually the uppercut is better, as it does big damage and staggers.

Press RT + Y and a direction for Sliding Swipe, a mobile attack and dodge baked into one. This is one of the slickest moves in your repertoire, useful for quickly getting close and landing a blow that you can chain into a combo with Y or dodging out of the way of an incoming attack. I regularly use Sliding Swipe to reposition around a monster as it turns so I can keep attacking the same spot (gotta sever those tails!).

Pressing RT to block just as a monster attacks will negate the damage with a Perfect Guard. As you're getting your feet under you in Wilds, spend more time dodging monster attacks than standing toe-to-toe with them and trying to block: mess up the timing and you're going to be eating some damage. But as you build confidence, the Sword and Shield can start to really shine.

• You can follow a Perfect Guard with Y to deliver a basic counterattack, B to start a B combo, Back + B to backstep into Perfect Rush or Forward + B to do a shield bash (phew, so many options!).
• Guarding multiple times builds up an invisible guard meter that will let you initiate a Power Clash—rapidly tap a button to overpower a monster and knock it on its ass. Non-perfect guards will also build up this meter, but you'll take some chip damage when hit.

Finally, remember that you can use items without putting away your weapon—just hold RT and then X to chow down on a well-done steak or whatever you have in hand. (Though honestly, in Wilds you're likely better off whistling for your Seikret to use an item while taking advantage of its extra mobility).

Best Sword and Shield builds for Low Rank

This build progression first focuses on improved monster mounting from your jump attacks, before switching to more crit-focused damage output on weak points and wounds towards the end of Low Rank.

• First weapon: Quematrice Cuchillo I

One of the first monsters you'll kill in Wilds is the Quematrice, a large chicken that puts up about as much of a fight as a small chicken. With its parts you can fashion a Sword and Shield with 5% affinity (crit) and 100 Fire damage, significantly increasing your damage output over the Expedition blade. While not every monster you fight is weak against Fire, several early beasts are, making it an effective starter.

• First armour set: Quematrice Helm, Braces and Greaves, Chatacabra Mail, Leather Belt

Get ready to slay a whole bunch of chickens, because you're going to want three pieces of Quematrice armor in addition to its weapon. The Quematrice Helm, Braces and Greaves will give you three ranks of Flinch Free—helpful for preventing your combos from being interrupted by minor monster attacks—but more importantly you'll activate the Scaling Prowess group skill, making it easier to mount and wound monsters. With your jump attacks, you'll be doing a lot of that. Chatacabra Mail is a good starting point, offering you Speed Eating for faster item consumption.

Your belt is a bit of a free pick: I recommend the Leather Belt for Botanist, helpful for stockpiling herbs, but if you find yourself getting hit a lot, throw on either Hope Coil for 30% shorter stun duration.

• Second weapon: Barina Dague I

Shortly after you fight the Quematrice you'll take down the arachnid monster Lala Barina, and that'll set you up to build the Sword and Shield that will carry you through the rest of Low Rank: the Barina Dague I. This bumps you up to 10% affinity and swaps the Fire element for Paralysis, which is a beautiful pairing with the SnS's quick strikes. After you fight your second spider, Nerscylla, you'll get the parts needed to upgrade to the Barina Dague II for a bit more damage, and this weapon will easily carry you through the rest of the campaign. And into High Rank, where you can keep upgrading it.

As a situational alternative, I'd also recommend crafting the Balahara Blade I, which deals Water damage—an element that two of the apex predators in Wilds just so happen to be weak to. It also offers 10% affinity, so it's a decent all-rounder. It's also metal as hell.

• Second armour set: Ingot Helm and Coil, Hirabami Mail, Vambraces, Greaves, Blessing Charm talisman

A bit over halfway through Low Rank you'll run into the Hirabami, another monster whose armor offers the Scaling Prowess group skill. That makes it an easy upgrade from Quematrice's stuff: We'll swap to the Hirabami Mail, Vampraces, and Greaves for the group skill and pick up three tiers of Evade Window, providing more i-frames on your dodge. Meanwhile, the Ingot Helm and Coil will provide 30% damage reduction when Divine Blessing activates, and you can up that to 50% with a Blessing Charm talisman.

• Third armour set: Ajarkan Mail and Greaves, G. Rathalos Helm and Vambraces, Rey Sandcoil, Blessing Charm talisman

As we close out low rank, we can make one more armor upgrade to improve our raw damage output, though it does mean giving up the Scaling Prowess perk. With Ajarkan Mail and Greaves you'll get two points of Parkbreaker, increasing your part damage by 20% and raising your Focus attack damage too. The G. Rathalos Helm and Vambraces will stack an extra 10% affinity on your weak point hits, while the Rey Sandcoil's Constitution skill will set you up with a bit more stamina.

Optionally, swap to the Guardian Ebony Coil instead for Burst to give your combos some extra punch as long as you keep the hits coming.