Affinity, also known as Critical Chance, in Monster Hunter World (MHW) is a weapon's chance to deal a bonus or a penalty to Damage on attacks. Some Weapons have innate Affinity, but it can also be increased with Skills and Equipment
For a more complete rundown on combat with Monsters, see Weapon Mechanics, Defense, and Elemental Resistances.
How Affinity Works
Affinity is determined by the Weapon and Skills that are being used, and is displayed as a percent value in the Attack Status portion of the Equipment Info screen. At 0% Affinity there is no chance for a bonus or penalty to damage. A positive Affinity value denotes the chance for an attack to "crit," which applies a bonus of 25% to Physical (Raw) Damage. A negative value, on the other hand, denotes the chance to "blunder," which applies a penalty of 25% to Physical Damage.
The bonus Damage applied by critical hits can be increased by the Critical Boost Skill.
The effect of Affinity is signaled by a flashy slash animation and a specific sound. Damage numbers will show a small star symbol under critical damage hits.
Please note that Affinity ONLY applies to Raw Damage under normal circumstances. You must have the Critical Element skill active for it to apply to Elemental Damage or the Critical Status Skill to apply it to Status Damage.
Increasing Weapon Affinity
The following Skills and Equipment increase your weapon Affinity. Note that with the Critical Draw skill you will always Crit on a draw attack.
- Affinity Booster is a Specialized Tool that creates an Affinity cloud for you and fellow hunters.
- Critical Eye increases Affinity at all times
- Affinity Sliding increases Affinity after sliding
- Attack Boost increases Affinity at levels 4-7
- Weakness Exploit increases Affinity when striking a Monster weak spot
- Agitator increases Affinity when a Large Monster becomes enraged
- Maximum Might increases Affinity when Stamina is full
- Latent Power increases Affinity after certain conditions are met
- Critical Boost increases damage of critical hits
- Critical Element and its stronger version True Critical Element allows Affinity to affect Elemental Damage
- Critical Status and its stronger version True Critical Status allows Affinity to affect Status Damage
- Affinity Augment increases the weapon's innate Affinity
Weapons with High Affinity
- Taroth Hammer "Thief" (35%)
- Taroth Pipe "Thief" (35%)
- Aloy's War Bow (30%)
- Azure Star Dragon Dance (30%)
- Garon Dharah (30%)
- Fate's Ember (30%)
- Hate's Undying Flame (25%)
- Odium (25%)
- Dancing Duval (25%)
- Coral Chordmaker (25%)
- Crushing Beak (25%)
The Equipment Info Screen showing a Weapon's innate Affinity
Striking a critical hit with a high-Affinity Weapon
AnonymousIs there anyone better with math than me who can translate affinity % into average damage? For example, a weapon has 1,000 attack rating, or deals 100 damage per basic swing, and has 20% affinity. Since affinity gives +25% damage when activated, if that happens 1/5 of the time, would that mean 20% affinity averages to 25% X 1/5 = 5% more damage?
- Anonymous
People rely on affinity way too much it’s honestly disgusting me personally don’t care about it
- Anonymous
ah yes affinity .. when you need it the most it never activates (looking at you tcs of great sword).
- Anonymous
hi, newcomer to monster hunter here.
someone please explain affinity like you're talking to a caveman
- Anonymous
a crit which deals 25% lesser damage? that makes no sense at all.
- Anonymous
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What happens if I, for whatever reason, run crit boost with negative affinity? More punishing 'blunders'?
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
is affinity static? as in if a weapon has -10% affinity, does that always remain on the weapon or will the magnitude decrease as i use that weapon more often?
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
So, let’s just say I have a -30% affinity weapon and level 3 maximum might (30% affinity boost when stamina is full) would that mean maximum might negates the negative crit chance when stamina is full? And if so, could you also add weakness exploit on top of that to create a positive crit chance?
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Azure Star "Dragon Dance" is a Longsword with 30% affinity.
- Anonymous
I don't bother with affinity , it's s waste of slots. Just like divine protection, it has a chance of working. I go for absolute dmg, focusing on elemental dmg buffs or plain raw dmg depending on the monster.
So without having any skills that effect affinity, one commenter stated "Affinity is the representation of comfort, ease, and skill with your gear, weapons, and equipment. As you become more proficient in your gear, you learn to strike more accurately, finding means of leveraging your weapon against your foes with relative impunity. " Will I eventually start to gain more base affinity with a certain class of weapon the more I use it? Does the game keep track of this? Or will i just randomly find or be able to forge equipment with higher base affinity as I progress in the game, regardless of how much I've actually used weapons from that class?
- Anonymous
Affinity is probably the best possible name for 'Critical Strike Chance' with regards to maintaining immersion. Affinity is the representation of comfort, ease, and skill with your gear, weapons, and equipment. As you become more proficient in your gear, you learn to strike more accurately, finding means of leveraging your weapon against your foes with relative impunity. Some weapons, gear, or equipment would of course be easier to use than others, and some would be less than sufficient in certain cases. Which is why the 'brute' monsters are the ones that have negative affinity, and much higher strength than usual, they represent the aspects of the monster that had a 'brutal' intent, and are a bit less aerodynamic, well-weighted, etc. than the usual weapons, which is why there is a chance of doing less damage (or otherwise negatively affecting affinity in general). Think of it like this, you are wielding Gut's (Berserk) Greatsword, that would have negative affinity out the wazoo as it weighs about a ton, and is pretty much blunt. Whereas a rapier used by Gut's foil, a certain leader of the Band of the Hawks, would be primarily about leveraging it to create openings without relying on brute force. Affinity could also be thought of as the more 'perfect' use of your gear to find the hidden chinks in the armor of your opponent, and better utilizing the weapon to exploit them than usual (which is why it deals more damage). Critical Strike would just be so outlandish in this game, Affinity represents the 'immersion of stats' as opposed to simply stating the stats without any regard to reality. It'd be like having Pukei-Pukei begin dropping Fire-Resistant Gear (or having a Pukei-Pukei set all about Fire Resistance), it would shatter immersion.
- Anonymous
This is why I've grown aggravated with Japanese games. Affinity as a word has NOTHING to *****ing do with what affinity in the game does. It's *****ing crit chance. Is it hard to *****ing just say crit chance?
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Affinity is the chance to deal critical damage which is 125% or weak attack that does only 75% of you damage,
with 0 affinity: you will always deal 100% damage,
with 10% affinity: 10% of your attacks will deal 125% damage , 90% will do 100%
with -20% affinity: 20% of your attacks will deal only 75% damage. 80% will do 100%, no 125% damage
Tip: Affinity positive damage done can be increase from 25% to 40% with Critical Boost
Critical Eye +7 gives a static 30% affinity
Critical Draw gives bonus only to first hit when your weapon is not drawn
Affinity Augment gives 10% affinity
Maximum Affinity is 100% which means all attacks will be critical, any more is waste
- Anonymous
Thanks for this, now I know what tp Augment my Great Wyvern Jawblade with
- Anonymous
So that's it. Affinity is just your chance to do critical hits? All the explanations out there and that's all it is?? I've heard so many different things. Everybody wants to make it complicated. It's just a critical hit percentage.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
So, affinity is basically the chance for a critical hit? Ugh.. I hate when games give these things misleading names.... I thought this referred to your familiarity with the weapon, as that would make more sense with this name.
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
is it worth making gear with drops found or waiting till later in the game just unlocked the second location
- Anonymous
25 % of 25 is not 25 it is actually 6,25 so it would do 31,25 with crit or 19,25 with -25 %
- Anonymous
Now when you say while the opposite is -25% is that like saying, base attack is 25, crit would be 50 and then 0. Or would the bonus automatically apply on non crit attacks.
And for clarity, are crits the attacks with dots under the number?
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
is partbreaker affected by affinity?
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