Affinity Explained (Monster Hunter Wilds Critical Hit Chance)

By the end of this beginner's guide, you'll understand what Affinity is and how it works!

When you first start crafting and upgrading your Weapons, the main ones you'll see are Attack, Affinity, and Element.

Attack and Element are pretty straightforward, basically indicating how much raw damage you do and the elemental damage it inflicts (Fire, Water, etc).

Affinity refers to a weapon's crit chance, the higher its % the more likely you will crit.

In Monster Hunter Wilds, a critical hit causes +25% weapon damage per hit.

So in the example below, the Scylla Fist I (with settings to Display Without Coeffient) has 120 Attack.

It has a 20% chance to deal a critical hit, and when it does, it will deal an additional 30 damage for a total of 150 damage.

Negative Affinity represents a chance for your weapon to do less damage.

So rather than dealing an additional +25% damage, it will instead, deal 25% less damage.

The Dosha Faithbreaker II offers 180 damage but it has 5% chance to deal 135 damage.

There may be cases where this tradeoff is worth it as Negative Affinity items can often have higher raw damage as a trade-off. Ultimately it's up to you and the playstyle you want to achieve - just remember the more often you hit, the more likely you are to proc, so low Negative Affinity may be better suited for slower weapons that hit slower but harder.

Want to maximize the Affinity or its effectiveness in your Build? Here are some skills that will boost it:

• Affinity Sliding - Increases your affinity temporarily when sliding on terrain.
• Agitator - Increases attack power and affinity when large monsters become enraged.
• Antivirus - Once infected, makes it easier to overcome the Frenzy and increases affinity if cured.
• Critical Boost - Increases the damage of critical hits.
• Critical Draw - Increases affinity when performing draw attacks (not effective while riding).
• Foray - Increases attack power and affinity against large monsters affected by Poison or Paralysis.
• Latent Power - Temporarily increases affinity and reduces stamina depletion when certain conditions are met.
• Maximum Might - Increases affinity if stamina is kept full for a period of time.
• Tetrad Shot - Increases affinity of bowgun ammo/coatings from the fourth shot and attack of the fourth and sixth shots.
• Weakness Exploit - Increases the affinity of attacks that exploit a monster's weak points and wounds.