How Does Antivirus Work in Monster Hunter Wilds?

Posted by By our-little-miss-is-home March 12, 2025 68 Views 5 Min Read
How Does Antivirus Work in Monster Hunter Wilds?

There are a few skills that reign supreme in Monster Hunter Wilds when it comes to maximizing damage output, and for crit-based loadouts, Antivirus is one of the mainstays. It’s a simple skill that’s easy to overlook if you don’t know what it does.

When making high-damage builds for weapons like the Long Sword, Antivirus can provide some much-needed crit chance, leaving plenty of space for other skills and decorations. Here’s a quick overview of how this skill works, and why you should use it in your builds.

A Monster's Icon On The Map & The Melding Pot On The Map

Related

How To Farm Decorations In Monster Hunter Wilds

Decorations are the ideal way to round out your builds late into Monster Hunter Wilds; here’s how to farm them.

How Does Antivirus Work in MH Wilds?

MH Wilds Antivirus Skill

Antivirus is an armor skill that’s specifically meant to counter the Frenzy effect in Monster Hunter Wilds. Players can get it by equipping the Level 1 Sane Jewels or by using specific armor pieces. It makes Frenzy easier to remove during its infection phase while also increasing the amount of Affinity players get upon successful removal.

Many endgame builds as of the game’s launch make heavy use of Antivirus thanks to the two-piece bonus of the Gore Magala set. This armor infects players with Frenzy every time they fight a large monster. This might seem like a problem at first, but with Antivirus 3, players get to enjoy some free critical hit chance just by fighting.

Antivirus is great for those who want to reach a 100 percent critical hit chance, but this alone won’t be enough to reach that point. Apart from having a weapon with enough Affinity, players will also need to scrounge up more Affinity from other sources. If you’re planning to create such a build, consider pairing the Gore set with Antivirus plus these following skills:

MH Wilds Affinity Skills

Skill

Description

Agitator

Increases attack power and Affinity when large monsters are enraged.

Antivirus

Makes Frenzy easier to remove and grants Affinity upon successful removal.

Affinity Sliding

Increases Affinity after sliding on terrain.

Critical Eye

Increases Affinity.

Critical Draw

Increases Affinity of Draw attacks.

Foray

Increases attack power and Affinity against monsters affected by abnormal status effects.

Latent Power

Increases Affinity and reduces stamina depletion upon meeting certain conditions (When players lose 130 HP or after 120 seconds have passed).

Maximum Might

Increases Affinity when stamina is full.

Tetrad Shot

Increases the Affinity of bowgun ammo/coatings from the fourth shot and attack of the fourth and sixth shots.

Weakness Exploit

Increases Affinity when attacking monster weakpoints. More bonus Affinity granted when attacking wounds.

How Good is Antivirus?

MH Wilds Slain Xu Wu

This armor skill sits squarely on top of the meta along with others like Weakness Exploit and Counterstrike for many weapons. It does require that players be afflicted with Frenzy, though this becomes negligible once you wear two pieces of the Gore Magala set.

Antivirus makes cleansing Frenzy easier, so unless players fail to attack a monster for some reason, they’ll never miss an opportunity to get a free 25% crit rate buff (base Frenzy Affinity bonus plus the Antivirus bonus).

Keep in mind that critical hits only increase your damage by 20%. You’ll need the Critical Boost skill to make this up to 40% stronger. Even so, this isn’t bad at all, especially when you’re using a weapon with negative Affinity, as Antivirus and Frenzy by themselves are enough to make even the most unwieldy of weapons reach positive Affinity.

Source link