Read this Monster Hunter World: Iceborne guide to know the best & recommended armor skills for the melee weapon - Great Sword!!!
Table of Contents
Related Article On Great Sword
 How To Use | Best Builds |
| Best Skills | Endgame Tier List |
Great Sword Features & Overview
Heavy Weapon With High Damage
The Great Sword is a powerful heavy weapon that possesses the highest attack damage per hit in the game. It can easily bring down monsters due to the high amount of damage that it generates!
Tackle Allows You To Keep Attacking
The Great Sword also allows you to "tackle" monsters. This prevents you getting knocked back while performing the move, allowing you to use it as a bridge to your combo if you need to stop your attacks for any reason.
Recommended Skill List For Great Sword
| Skill | Recommendation Criteria |
|---|---|
| Attack Boost | Increases your attack power, allowing you to deal more damage per second |
| Weakness Exploit | Deal bonus damage and gain increased affinity when landing hits on monster weak spots |
| Focus | Increases your weapon gauge's fill rate, and decreases charge time for attacks |
| Handicraft | Elongates the weapon's sharpness gauge letting you sharpen less and prevents damage loss when blunt |
| Critical Boost | Increases the damage dealt by critical hits allowing you to deal more damage by aiming at weak spots |
| Quick Sheath | Increases the sheathing speed of your weapon |
| Punishing Draw | Adds a stun effect to draw attacks allowing you to bridge opening up a fight into an instant combo |
| Critical Draw | Increases the chance of dealing critical hits on draw attacks to give you an edge when beginning combat |
| Agitator | Increases your attack power when fighting monsters |
| Earplugs | Allows you to ignore monster roars and continue your combo when fighting monsters |
Best Great Sword Skills To Equip
Attack Boost
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Attack +3 |
| 2 | Attack +6 |
| 3 | Attack +9 and Affinity +5% |
| 4 | Attack +12 and Affinity +5% |
| 5 | Attack +15 and Affinity +5% |
Essential Skill For Any Weapon
In addition to raising the attack power of your weapon, this skill will also increase the affinity of the weapon at higher levels. This skill is a must have for all weapons as increasing damage dealt will always be useful against hunting monsters.
Weakness Exploit
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Attacks that hit weak spots have 15% increased affinity |
| 2 | Attacks that hit weak spots have 30% increased affinity |
| 3 | Attacks that hit weak spots have 50% increased affinity |
Allows Efficient Monster Hunting
The Weakness Exploit skill increases your affinity when landing hits on a monster's weak spot. This is a great skill to have as it allows you to possibly end hunts quickly as long as you are aiming for the weak spots.
Focus
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Increases gauge fill rate by 5% and reduces charge times by 5% |
| 2 | Increases gauge fill rate by 10% and reduces charge times by 10% |
| 3 | Increases gauge fill rate by 20% and reduces charge times by 15% |
Works Well With Charged Attacks
With this skill equipped, it lessens the time you need to wait for your weapon's gauge to be filled, and even the time it takes to perform a heavy hitting charged attack. With this skill, you will be able to amp up your damage output quickly!
Handicraft
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Weapon sharpness +10 |
| 2 | Weapon sharpness +20 |
| 3 | Weapon sharpness +30 |
| 4 | Weapon sharpness +40 |
| 5 | Weapon sharpness +50 |
Sharpen Less & Focus On Damaging the Monster
The Handicraft skill increases the sharpness of your weapon. This means that you will need to sharpen less often and focus on damaging the monster since it will take longer for your weapon to go blunt and become less effective.
Alternative Great Sword Skill List
Critical Boost
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Increases damage dealt by critical hits to 30% |
| 2 | Increases damage dealt by critical hits to 35% |
| 3 | Increases damage dealt by critical hits to 40% |
Use In Conjunction with Other Skills
This skill is best equipped when paired with other skills. Weakness Exploit and Critical Draw are some of the skills that will allow you to deal critical hits more often. When paired with Critical Boost, you can expect to see a huge jump in DPS.
Quick Sheath
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Slightly increases sheathing speed |
| 2 | Moderately increases sheathing speed |
| 3 | Greatly increases sheathing speed |
Increase In Weapon Efficiency
Since the Great Sword is a heavy weapon, it can be difficult to land some hits at times. With the Quick Sheath skill, you will be able to use your weapon faster allowing you to hunt monsters more efficiently.
Punishing Draw
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Adds a stun effect to draw attacks and slightly increases attack power |
Increase Weapon Versatility
This skill will slightly increase your damage and even add a stunning effect to your draw attacks. Please note that this skill is acquired by equipping Odogaron type armor, but it is very useful to have when using a Great Sword.
Critical Draw
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Draw attack affinity +30% |
| 2 | Draw attack affinity +60% |
| 3 | Draw attack affinity +100% |
Excellent Skill For Dealing Damage at the Start
This technique will greatly increase your affinity with draw attacks. When paired with other skills such as weakness exploit, you can deal huge amounts of damage at the start of the fight by hitting a monster's weak spots with your draw attacks!
Agitator
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | While active, grants attack +4 and increases affinity by 3% |
| 2 | While active, grants attack +8 and increases affinity by 6% |
| 3 | While active, grants attack +12 and increases affinity by 9% |
| 4 | While active, grants attack +16 and increases affinity by 12% |
| 5 | While active, grants attack +20 and increases affinity by 15% |
Match Enraged Monster's Damage
This skill is useful when a monster becomes enraged. You will be able to match their higher attack power with your own, while at the same time increasing your affinity rate in order to deal critical hits more often!
Earplugs
| Lvl | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Slightly reduces the effects of weak monster roars |
| 2 | Reduces the effects of weak monster roars |
| 3 | Nullifies weak monster roars |
| 4 | Nullifies weak monster roars and reduces the effects of strong monster roars |
| 5 | Nullifies weak and strong monster roars |
Negate Effects of Monster Roars
With Earplugs, you will be able to ignore the effects of the monster roar and attack or dodge away instead. It is also useful as the monster will not attack while it is roaring so use it to your advantage.
