How to Use Alchemy Style
Before this guide starts I want to give a big thank you to Blast for writing this and letting me post it here. It's a fantastic guide and I hope it can reach more people. Not back to the guide.
Table of Contents
Basic Mechanics
Alchemy Barrel
- Inside your inventory is the alchemy barrel, which should be at the very left of your inventory, scroll to it in order to use it.
- The barrel does not take space within your inventory, and will not be removed even if all available space within your inventory is full.
- Press Y to start shaking the barrel. hjg
- You can shake the barrel with your weapon unsheathed by evading once with B and pressing R+Y when the animation has ended. This goes for all weapons regardless of the evade being a backstep or aerial hop.
- Press X or A, depending on which item you want from the list at the right side, to achieve it from the barrel.
- The various items you can collect from the barrel depends on how many times you shake the barrel, which increase in usefulness the more times you consecutively shake the barrel.
- You can shake the barrel a maximum of 5 times, but the amount of times you can shake it depends on how many bars are filled in your alchemy gauge above your name.
Alchemy Gauge
- On the left side of the screen where your username status is, there is now a blank gauge that can be filled with individual green bars representing your alchemy bars which are used for the various alchemy items from the barrel.
- Alchemy bars will gradually fill over the length of the hunt.
- The rate at which the bars can fill can only be increased by the Alchemy Booster and having SP Mode activate while using alchemy style.
- The gauge can be filled at the max with 5 bars, at which point your alchemy bars will stop generating over time and you will start leaking your potential alchemy bar energy over time.
- After an individual alchemy item is taken from the barrel, the corresponding amount of bars that item required is removed from your overall gauge.
Core Gameplay
Alchemy Items
1 Shake
(X Button) Alchemy Food - Restores some of your maximum stamina, amount is equivalent to half a ration. Skips flexing animation during consumption. Maximum amount = 10. Giveable to other players
(A Button) Alchemy Whetstone - Sharpens your weapon. Gives 30% hunter art boost for 60 seconds (Item Use Up = 45% hunter art boost). Maximum amount = 8. Giveable to other players.
(A Button) Alchemy Shot - Exclusive to Light and Heavy Bowgun. Comes in 5 bullets for every individual shake. Same power as Normal Lvl 3 Shot (10 MV, does not include ricochet effect however). Gives a slight hunter art boost. Can also be rapid fired when using Light Bowgun. Maximum amount = 30. Giveable to other players.
(A Button) Alchemy Coating - Exclusive to Bows. Comes in 3 coatings for every individual shake. Gives a slight hunter art boost. Maximum Amount = 20. Giveable to other players
2 Shakes
(X Button) Alchemy Immunizer - Restores health over time for a limited amount of time. Skips flexing animation during consumption. Maximum amount = 10. Giveable to other players
(A Button) Alchemy Sonic Bomb - Has the same effect as normal sonic bombs, also makes all small monsters flee the area. When used, the player will have to wait 5 seconds before the item activates. Maximum amount = 3. NOT giveable to other players
3 Shakes
(X Button) Alchemy Earplugs - Gives a one-time immunity to a monster’s roar, breaks after roar. Blocks ALL roars including damage from hurting roars like Tigrex/Akantor/Ukanlos. Maximum amount = 3. Giveable to other players
(A Button) Alchemy Booster - When consumed, shaking the barrel is now much faster, alchemy gauge bars will also now fill 1.2x faster, and walking with the barrel out is faster as well. Does NOT stack when consumed consecutively, and will only bring the uptime back up to 5 minutes instead of extending it beyond the original time. Maximum amount = 1. NOT giveable to other players
4 Shakes
(X Button) Alchemy Slick - Can be combined with other specific alchemy items to duplicate them in the inventory. Amount duplicated depends on the items. Has 100% success rate unlike normal combinations even without any combination rate boosters. Can be affected by Mass Combiner hunter art however, as it still has only a numeric range of the duplication of items which will be maxed out by Mass Combiner.
Alchemy Food - Can create 6-10
Alchemy Whetstone - Can create 6-8
Alchemy Shot - Can create 28-30
Alchemy Coating - Can create 18-20
Alchemy Immunizer - Can create 6-10
Alchemy Earplugs - Can create 2-3
(A Button) Alchemy Fireball - Launches a long-range projectile that can hit monsters from afar or in the air. Comes in 2 fireballs for every individual shake. Has 60 MV, but can be boosted by Bombardier skills. (For reference, a Large Barrel Bomb+ has 80 MV normally). Maximum amount = 3. NOT giveable to other players.
5 Shakes
(X Button) Alchemy Cheer - When used, the player will throw down a farcaster-like smoke that will raise the hunter art gauges of everyone in the current area of the player by 50% (Not as in half of your art gauge but by an overall art gain). Note that it does NOT give an actual hunter art over-time boost, but instead instantly raises the build-up for hunter arts. Maximum amount = 1. NOT giveable to other players
(A Button) Alchemy Remedy - A barrel that when used will be held by the player for 10 seconds, healing all players in the vicinity of the holder by a small amount of health and cures their status ailments. After 10 seconds, the barrel will explode in a large burst and heal everyone in a larger radius by a major amount and cure all status ailments. Maximum amount = 1. NOT giveable to other players
Personal Thoughts
Alchemy Food - Priority Rating 1/5, Overall Rating 1/5
It seems awesome to have instant access to a stamina item that doesn’t even require much time at all, but the simple fact is half a ration is just straight hot garbage, and you’ll find yourself needing to make multiple of them throughout a hunt if you plan on using them as a primary food source, which is a waste over other helpful alchemy items. I guess it can be used in a jiff if you need a quick stamina boost and have the points to spare since it is cheap, but really you can just use a well-done steak and have 4x the stamina boost compared to this double half-eaten sandwich.
Alchemy Whetstone - Priority Rating 2/5, Overall Rating 3/5
For a style that places some emphasis on SP Mode, this item isn’t actually half bad, as having the ability to both sharpen weapons and gain a slight art boost is pretty nifty, especially for a weapon that relies on arts heavily like the Switch Axe. Granted, it isn’t too large of a boost and you won’t always have the opportunity to upkeep the art boost, but for 1 point you’re getting some decent value out of it.
Alchemy Shot/Coating - Priority Rating 2/5, Overall Rating 2/5
I don’t use gunner very often so my opinion here isn’t as useful or strong, but I do see how Alchemy Shot can be useful for Light Bowgun since it has nifty low-cost arts, but sadly I don’t see the same being for the other two gunner weapons.
Alchemy Immunizer - Priority Rating 1/5, Overall Rating 2/5
On paper, this doesn’t seem bad at all. It’s a health regen after all, that’s pretty cool right!? Yeah, health regen is cool! Unless you’re outclassed entirely by SP Mode. SP Mode III gives health regen as well, it’s a pretty good regen at that too. Unlike Alchemy Immunizer, you can get it without having to use a specific amount of points that could’ve been used on another item. The health effect isn’t particularly strong either and it's only for a limited amount of time that’s hard to upkeep unlike SP Mode. Now, I’m not saying it's completely trash like Alchemy Food, but you’re just more or less better off using the points for more useful items rather than trying to constantly siphon them for a temporary health boost.
Alchemy Sonic Bomb - Priority Rating 1/5, Overall Rating 2/5
Same case, except it’s slightly worse than Immunizer. A free sonic bomb sounds nice but really it’s more like you’re getting a ghetto version of it from the dollar store. The fact it takes 5 seconds means the amount of situations you can viably use this in just unremarkably disappear. You have to either be a god, a corner guy who does literally nothing the entire hunt waiting for an opportunity, or just be lucky to use this correctly. I guess it’s cool that you can make the small monsters flee *cough bullshitfango cough* but in most hunts you’re not gonna find it such a pressing issue. It’s not cheap enough to even make it worth using so you’re better off using actual sonic bombs cause god knows you’re gonna try tempting fate by using this sucker on Bloodbath. On the plus side though, its pretty fucking funny to snipe all the remobra’s out of the sky with a mini screaming qurupeco.
Alchemy Earplugs - Priority 3/5, Overall Rating 4/5
The first alchemy item on the list that’s actually pretty damn good, the Alchemy Earplugs give you a safe and reliable way to ignore roars which is really useful since in that time you can probably break out another alchemy item or get some more damage in. The thing is, it's actually more powerful than HG Earplugs since it even blocks damaging roars so if you get multiple you can really use them to their full potential. It is expensive of course but it's not bad for its cost at all.
Alchemy Booster - Priority 5/5, Overall Rating 3/5
When playing alchemy, it is essential to get this first no matter the hunt since it’s literally a free boost. 5 minutes is a pretty long time in a hunt and in that timespan you can get your useful items AND get another booster ready when the first booster runs out. The fact you shake faster also significantly makes gameplay feel less dull and makes it hella funny to shake that barrel consecutively. While there aren’t exactly any problems with the booster, I can’t exactly give it a 5/5 overall since it doesn’t do anything other than buff the gauge for other items, but it is an essential part of your gameplay so it’s still really good.
Alchemy Slick - Priority 3/5, Overall Rating 3/5
The usefulness of this one really depends on the length of the hunt, since in shorter hunts you’re sacrificing a ton of bars for an item that you’ll barely have the time to use. In longer hunts though, this is pretty damn good. The fact it has god-like duplication numbers means that once you slick something, you’ll often never have to shake for it again, unless you’re using earplugs since 3 probably won’t carry you the entire hunt. It also makes some of the aforementioned bad items way more useful since you’re going to have plenty of them. The only thing that’s a minor issue is that it's gonna probably gonna take a while to make use of this thing even in lengthier hunts, but when it's used you’re going to have a bounty of items at your disposal.
Alchemy Fireball - Priority 2/5, Overall Rating 3/5
Fireball is like the shining star of alchemy for many people, and unfortunately it's just not as good as it can be seen to be. Maybe it would have been better if Capcom realized a maximum of 3 fireballs is just outrageously low or made it just a bit cheaper, but the realistic situation is just that it’s a meme. While it's hella fun in hunts to do a portable artillery strike on flying monsters and bombard sleeping beauties with hurling ballies, the cost and execution of the fireball make it underwhelming at best. First off, the range is WAYYYYYY too extended and makes it hard to aim due to the fact its upward shooting angle just makes it prone to either just plain missing or hitting some poor unsuspecting bnahabras whose last moments were spent looking at the glorious emblem of the sun only to be engulfed in hellfire, all of that only to be a sacrifice to the solar god as your putrid fireball was on its way towards rathian’s unremarked face to be blown up. Well, you get my point. Secondly, the cost forces you to expend bars that could have been used to gather more useful items in exchange for a mediocre fireball that is not only hard to aim, but also not particularly strong. Also it will knock your teammates back to the bleachers in a football stadium online, so people aren’t gonna be exactly happy there about your shenanigans. No one will exactly judge you for using it, but you’re better off getting another item (reoccuring statement by the way lol)
Alchemy Cheer - Priority 3/5, Overall Rating 4/5
A 50% hunter art boost is massive even if it’s only instant so this can really be used effectively the more people you have and benefits you even more since you can further support everyone with SP Mode, even offsetting the added buildup of SP Mode arts. It even has an area-wide effect which means at any time you can give hunters in active combat an extra boost, which can be pretty useful. The only bad thing is that not all weapons/styles exactly rely on their arts heavily so sometimes you’re just giving them a niche boost. It also costs the entire gauge bar so you’re never gonna be able to upkeep this efficiently, but with spare points and lengthier hunts, this can be a really cool supporting item for everyone.
Alchemy Remedy - Priority 2/5, Overall Rating 2/5
I’m gonna be honest, it’s not exactly easy to use this one. Healing a boatload of health might seem great, but due to the amount of buildup needed and the requirement that everyone has to have missing health, it becomes tedious to find situations to use this since I’m betting a thousand dollars you’re not actively running into the battlefield to explode the barrel in time. Curing status ailments is really just a small side benefit since most of the time you can cure them within 5 seconds normally, unless you’re out of curing items in which case it's sort of nice. The biggest problem though is that this sucker costs the entire gauge meaning that you’re spending points on a one time healing item that’s hard to use. If you’re really feeling the need to spend your excess points, then go for it, because when all is said and done this thing’s not bad at it’s job at all.
SP Mode
- SP Mode is a powered-up state a hunter can enter in which they can gain certain benefits depending on their style and how powerful the SP Mode is.
- There are multiple ways to enter SP Mode, but it's mostly through designating hunter arts as SP Arts, which will throw all hunters in the area into SP Mode when used at the cost of having the buildup for the hunter art be increased.
- Normally all styles can only designate 1 hunter art as an SP Art, even those with multiple arts like guild and striker, but Alchemy is able to designate all 3 hunter arts as SP Arts or just more than one.
- The amount of time hunters are thrown into SP Mode depends on how large the buildup was for the SP Art that threw them into it, but generally the larger the buildup the more time is granted in SP Mode.
- Palicoes/Prowlers can also throw hunters into SP Mode with certain moves, but both them and non-alchemy style hunters cannot upgrade their SP Mode.
- SP Mode can be upgraded by exclusive means of Alchemy Style depending on how many times an item is taken out of the barrel and how many bars were spent on the item. The more bars used, the better chances of upgrading SP Mode. SP Mode can be upgraded to levels II, III, and IV, with each individual level upping the required bars needed to get them.
- Upgrading SP Mode grants more overall benefits to all hunters when initiated. These benefits depend on the level of SP Mode currently achieved. The benefits are the following:
SP Mode I - Gives benefits to individual hunters depending on their hunting style.
Guild - Consume items faster, place down traps faster, and place down bombs faster.
Striker - Hunter arts will now automatically fill slowly over time, even without needing to attack the monster.
Aerial - Stamina will now automatically recover from the moment you vault instead of after the vault.
Adept - Extends the Adept iframes, allowing for an even larger window to adept evade/guard.
Valor - All moves will gain more valor energy for the gauge by 10%.
Alchemy - Boosts the speed at which the alchemy gauge fills by 10%.
Prowler - Decreases the amount of gauge used for individual moves.
SP Mode II - Includes the benefits of SP Mode I and gives a decrease of maximum stamina depletion. This does not mean overall stamina depletion, but instead just the rate at which the maximum stamina is taken away.
SP Mode III - Includes the benefits of SP Mode I and SP Mode II and gives an increased health over time regen.
SP Mode IV - Includes the benefits of SP Mode I, SP Mode II, SP Mode III and gives a 1.05x partbreaker bonus, which is half the boost of what the Partbreaker skill gives. Does stack with Partbreaker.
- Once you have achieved the next level of SP Mode through achieving enough items from the barrel, you will receive a notification on your screen that you have gained access to SP Mark II/III/IV. The upgraded SP Mode will activate whenever the next time you use your SP Art.
Weapon Utilization
- This will cover the alchemy styles of each weapon with guild style as a starting basis.
DISCLAIMER: Please note these are just SUMMARIES, not a basis on the entire style itself, this is just how the style performs in comparison to other styles and the main basic functions on the style itself. If you really wish to get in-depth knowledge on a particular weapon’s alchemy style, please refer to other detailed guides on the weapons themselves.
Greatsword
- Loses strong charge
- Loses the ability to do the A button swipe after every move EXCEPT after beginning your combo with a swipe, in which case you will gain the ability to do a strong swipe after a normal swipe.
Overall Rating - 5/10
Alchemy GS honestly isn’t exactly bad, it's just entirely outdone by striker since that natural art boost outshines any amount of barrel usage you can pull off, since using the barrel sacrifices opportunities for you to pull off those crucial draw charges. It’s fine if you really want to support your team by sacrificing some of your ha gauge, but striker just outdoes it in the dps aspect.
Longsword
- All X attacks perform your basic combo
- The A button becomes your fade slash.
- You can only fade slash to the left inside a combo.
- Loses the fade slash to spirit combo.
- Loses the ability to add in normal attacks during a spirit combo.
Overall Rating - 7/10
All of Longsword’s arts are pretty excellent, so you’re able to fully abuse Alchemy’s art boosting capabilities. The controls are simple as heck so it's not too hard to learn, though it might be hard to get used to it if you are a consistent longsword user yourself and will have to get used to the oversimplified combo.
Sword and Shield
- Loses Shield Bash, replaced with the Spin Attack
- Loses Backstep and Backswing
- Unlike all other weapons, it can pull out the barrel at any time without need to evade first.
Overall Rating - 10/10
Oh come on, its Sword and Shield for crying out loud, it's obviously gonna be hella good. The combo simplification means you’re more free around other players without bashing them into the air. Being the SnS, you’re free to use your barrel at any time without needing to evade first unlike any other weapon, not to mention all of SNS’s arts are fucking fantastic, allowing you to play the ultimate support role and benefit yourself with the alchemy items NOT TO MENTION YOU CAN USE THOSE ALCHEMY ITEMS AT ANY TIME TOO. SnS’s arts aren’t too build up heavy too so unlike other weapons you can fully utilize SP mode here. Truly, this is THE weapon you want to use with alchemy when you want to fully abuse the utility of alchemy.
Dual Blades
- Loses Slingshot
- Inside Archdemon Mode, your combo now ends in a Hurricane Slash
- The rate at which the demon gauge is depleted by is reduced a bit, as well as with demon dashes.
Overall Rating - 2/10
With Dual Blade’s arts being really good, you would think it would shine a bit in alchemy style, but they really hindered it here. The loss of the Slingshot is HUGE, as you no longer have a reliable gapcloser besides the less effective Forward X attack. Not only that, but now while in Archdemon Mode your combo ending in a Hurricane Slash is horrible as that is just a poor man’s Devil’s Dance. It could’ve rivaled striker if it had kept the good moves, but it is a severely weaker striker now. While you do keep Archdemon Mode, it's better just to have Striker’s exclusion of it for better moves in Demon Mode than keeping it considering it's greatly hindered here.
Hammer
- Loses the ability to combo after the three hit combo
- Loses the Lvl 3 Spinning Charge Attack, all Lvl 3 attacks automatically become the stationary Lvl 3 charge attack.
Overall Rating - 7/10
Control-wise this is pretty similar to guild, which of course is good considering that's the best style. While it does suck to lose the ability to combo after three hits, the good news is that finally capcom has listened to our prayers and ousted the terrible Lvl 3 charge spin attack, GOOD RIDDANCE cause imo that is a worthwhile trade anyday. While Hammer’s arts aren’t spectacular, the mere fact you basically get an identical guild style with three arts makes it quite fine on its own. Whether you want to use guild over it is up to you, but their attributes are fairly similar enough.
Hunting Horn
- Loses Flourish
- Loses the Backward Slam outside of a combo, must be done after the forward slam.
Rating - 3/10
Losing both Flourish and the Backward Slam kinda blows, since it basically forces you to lengthen out your combo without any way to take small shortcuts while also not being able to perform sick dunks with the backward slam. The main reason alchemy hh really sucks though is the fact it’s just not made for it. Using the barrel, upkeeping songs, and maintaining dps is a nightmare for most players and forces you to sacrifice one aspect to try and hopefully juggle the other two. It strains your playstyle no matter what path you take so it’s just naturally a bad pairing compared to the freedom of other styles.
Lance
- Loses Counter
- Loses Swipe
- Loses Turn-Around Finisher inside of the Charge
- Gains the ability to do a guard advance with R+A instead of R+X, slightly easier to pull off after side steps
- Guard Poke can now be chained into the standard three hit combo
Rating - 4/10
This is really poor man’s striker, since it retains the third long poke and normal 50 MV of the charge finisher. Not only that, but losing the counter stings quite a bit as well, though the swipe and turn-around finisher aren’t as large of losses. While Lance’s arts are good, Striker’s flat out boost is, again, superior rather than trying to get an upkeep with alchemy items (Although alchemy whetstone does pair pretty nicely with Lance). Something to note however is that lance has a lot of evade potential with back/side steps so I guess you can use this if you want to play Striker Lance without the charge finisher playstyle.
Gunlance
- Loses the ability to perform charged shots
- Loses the ability to perform the upswing inside of a combo
- Wyvern’s Fire now is way faster but deals half the damage, cooldown from WF is only 1 minute now though
Rating - 5/10
As a GL main, this one really bugs me. The Upswing is probably the most critical move gl has, and to lose that means you lose a lot of your potential dps because you can no longer sneak in fast thrusts over time which really can feel unusual for consistent gl players. This style seems more geared for people who want to play gl with the more aggressively tweaked Wyvern Fires, but that’s a move you can’t maintain through a hunt. Losing charged shots isn’t too big of a deal imo since you probably won’t be able to get them as consistently as before without upswings, but either way they were still trash before, HAHA YOU WANNA THROW HANDS YOU WIDE GL SCUM. Besides those losses though the gl’s more basic moves stay intact and you still can perform the upswing from stationary, so this is probably best for people that aren’t used to gl and just want to test it out or if you’re actually wanting to utilize shitty long with the WF.
Switch Axe
- All X attacks have been reconfigured to perform axe attacks and A attacks have been reconfigured to perform sword attacks, which also can be performed after another with certain moves.
- If you press the opposite mode’s button but are not able to directly chain into a morph attack, you will instead perform another attack with the current mode you are in that is able to morph into the opposite mode.
- If the switch axe gauge is currently in reload mode and you are in the middle of a combo in axe mode, you can press R to do a mini energy charge motion that will automatically reload your switch axe with 50% gauge and automatically transform into sword mode into a sweep that can then be continued into a combo, all without the need to do a stationary reload.
Rating - 10/10
This is tied for probably the best alchemy style with SNS, and really it just depends if you want to be more offensive with sa or more supportive with sns. Either way, they are the to-go weapons for when you have your alchemical shenanigans. Switch Axe honestly has really great synergistic arts that benefit heavily from alchemy’s art boosters, something to note though is that you probably won’t be using SP mode much at all due to the fact none of SA’s arts want to take on SP mode’s added buildup since they all want to charge as fast as possible.
Charge Blade
(Sword Mode)
- Loses Shield Thrust (X+A now performs automatic yellow shield charge)
- Loses the ability to directly go into Axe Elemental 1 from a shield phial charge
- All charge attacks with A now are automatically performed, meaning you no longer have to hold down the button to perform the charge attack
(Axe Mode)
- Loses the ability to do an upward strike after Elemental 2, replaced with the downward slam after Elemental 2
- Loses the ability to do the Ultra Amped Elemental Discharge, only the Super Amped Elemental Discharge will be performed with the inputs.
Rating - 6/10
There’s a lot of good and bad exchanges here and they’re mostly quality of life changes that make you not have to be as attentive as you normally have to be. Losing the shield thrust and the phial charge into Elemental 1 combo lessens your aggressive options a bit, though the upward strike doesn’t matter too much, but automatic charge attacks are...sort of neat, I guess. It's just that if you’ve gotten used to regular CB you probably know how to time your charges anyways, but quality of life, right? But that’s besides the point. Because they did something I can only thank capgod for doing, and that’s getting rid of the ultra. This may not mean much to really experienced CB players who can pull out when needed, but unlike the charges, actually pulling off your SAED’s can be a real pain in the ass consistently, especially when you’re not focused or just plain forgetful so this really helps out to casualize gameplay. This is definitely a style meant to just ease gameplay, making it nice for new players and cool to take a break with from other styles, though it's not exactly meant to compete on the same level with the other weapons since striker really does its job way better and CB’s niche arts don’t exactly benefit from alchemy, except Ripper Shield.
Insect Glaive
- Loses the ability to do backflips
- Loses the ability to charge your kinsect
- Loses the ability to mark while in the air
- Combos have changed to where they now will eventually end with certain individual inputs having different actions
Rating - 6/10
Well, losing those first three maybe made like 2 people cry, the rest never gave a crap about them anyways. However, losing endless combos stings for a weapon that has long, extending, and lingering ending animations which are hurtful for such a combo-heavy weapon itself. However, that third art slot can make up for it in the right circumstances, as IG has some interesting synergistic arts that were never properly utilized because of the big problem of striker sucking the fattest of actual fucking cocks. Seriously, for once striker was actually hella outclassed by alchemy in this guide, and I’m proud of it. Goes to show how shitty striker IG is huh. Anyways, guild does of course get the better of it thanks to the endless combo access and general lack of need for the third art slot in a usual dps environment. However, in general play, I do highly recommend trying out the cool arts that IG has with this, it can really be fun and you’re not missing the end of the world or anything with the animations.
Light Bowgun
- Reload Speed will automatically be reduced by 1 tier when using this style.
- Backsteps/Sidesteps can only be performed 2 at a time maximum.
Rating - 7/10
That’s a pretty shallow list of downsides, isn’t it? Reload Speed doesn’t matter too much when you’re full housing consistently, and unless you’re the realest of nitpicks out here you’re not going to cry over the third backstep. Striker still outperforms it because the flat art boost is still better even than alchemy’s options, but really, it's only barely. Even though the striker boost is better, alchemy does have good and reliable options to help it stay at least confidently behind striker’s boost, also quite helps that alchemy shots are rapid fired. This is honestly a GOAT supportive style that honestly I hope more people see because it does its job so well.
Heavy Bowgun
- No Siege Mode
- Reload Speed automatically goes up by 1 tier when using this style.
Rating - 3/10
Ok, I find this fucking hilarious as hell. This is basically a better striker style because hbg doesn’t care about its art boosts at all, and the reload speed is actually good paired with non-siege. Of course, valor hbg exists so unless your name is adept you’re automatically shunned by the hard meta gang, but ignore that. Neither striker nor alchemy are exactly even good, but I just find it hilarious how they literally just made alchemy hbg just straight up better than striker hbg to the point no one can even try to argue, while at least striker ig probably has like 2 hardcore fans at the most compared to 0 attorneys over here. Heavy Bowgun is naturally a hella shitty pairing with alchemy because try supporting your teammates with your heavy ass bowgun in the way, while having no siege just rubs more salt into the wound. Just use alchemy lbg, honestly. Just know this hilarious concept exists.
Bow
- Loses the Power Shot
- Loses the ability to do a Lvl 3 Charge Shot from Backstep into Backward Evade, now the shot will be a Lvl 1 charge and will have to be charged manually
- Applies coatings faster than any other style
Rating - 4/10
Uhh, I mean it’s kinda ok? Again, it's in a situation similar to hbg where it actually is better than striker because it doesn’t have the need for arts, not as hard though of course, but someone out there’s probably mad about that Lvl 3 charge shot, maybe. But again, both of them aren’t exactly good either. Losing the Power Shot is a huge blow that doesn’t justify the three art slots nearly enough, which in the first place bow’s arts aren’t exactly the best. I guess you can go somewhat supportive, but again alchemy lbg just outclasses it. At least it’s in a better boat than hbg, since this one’s at least, somewhat, definitely usable.
Well I think that covers everything I’ve got to note! Alchemy Style is incredibly fun and very useful for all the people hunting with it, but unfortunately it's overlooked as a result of the flashy new valor style stealing the spotlight of GU and the naturally complex nature of alchemy that drives the simplistic minded people of the game to valor style in the first place. However, for the people that do decide to learn the ways of alchemy, they will have an incredibly underutilized and underappreciated style that they will find the most fun in Monster Hunter with...probably! I’m just joking, but I hope this semi-formal guide helps you discover the fun of alchemy. I’m Blast, the creator of this guide, and if you ever have questions, concerns, or criticism to add please DM me at Fury#5564 on discord. I would love to hear everyone’s opinions and voices, because that’s what fellow hunters do! Anyways, I hope you have fun, and happy hunting!
- Blast
Changelog
V1.0 - Added the unsheathed evade barrel tip
V1.1 - Corrected Alchemy Cheer’s radius misconception, added Weapon Utilization section
V1.2 - Added Table of Contents, tweaked certain sections
V1.3 - Tweaked some evaluations in the Weapon Utilization (GS & HH get entirely new evaluations, while CB and IG only get new ratings) and gave Alchemy Slick new rating
