This is a guide to the Defense Stat in Monster Hunter World (MHW) Iceborne. Read on to learn about the Defense Stat, what damage does it reduce, and how to increase it.

What is the Defense Stat

Reduces Damage Taken

Defense is directly linked to the damage you take against monsters. The higher your defense, the less damage you take from enemy attacks. Raising defense comes naturally due to the need of crafting higher ranked gear so this is one of the least priority skill you need to look at.

How to Increase Defense

Increase Via Equipping Armor

Armor is the primary way of raising your character's defense. The higher the rarity, the higher defense they can give. Armor can also be updgraded to increase the amount of defense it gives.

Augmenting Armor

Endgame Armor can also be augmented. This removes the armor's current level limit, allowing the player to increase it's level even further.

Increase Via Items

Items such as Armorskins can increase your defense temporarily. There are also items that provide passive bonuses such as the armortalon. When in need of more defense, items are your best bet at increasing it for the current hunt.

Increase Via Food (Felyne Cantene)

The Cantene can offer stat bonuses to aid hunters in their mission. When the monster is dealing high damage to the player, it is susggested that the player eat a meal that increases their defense by a large amount.

How Much Defense Should I Aim to Have?

1000 Is a Great Target

Naturally Leveled endgame Iceborne Armor will be able to reach the high 900s. Augmenting your whole armor should allow you to break the 1000 Armor cap, with health boost and canteen meels, this amount of Defense should be enough for you to survive all attacks once.

Aim For Other Defense Skills Once 1000 Is Hit

Skills like Divine Blessing and Guts are great skills to aim for in order to increase your survivability at this point. Further raising your defense at the late stages of the game will prove futile with monsters still being able to kill you in 2 hits no matter how much defense you slot in. The 1000 Defense is enough to make you survive any attack from full health to avoid those OHKO moments.

MHW Related Links

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Beginner's Guide | How to Play MHW

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