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So, around December of last year, I was given a copy of Monster Hunter World. After spending a minor amount of time in it, I looked at the profiles, and...
I'll likely make an ability CRT another time. This is just going to cover the madhouse that is AP and Speed, in terms of the scaling and even some of the feats actually used to justify the ratings.
Like, for example, Barroth has this used to justify the fact they can take on a Rathian and defeat it... But, this is pure gameplay. It's not a cutscene, it's not a turfwar, it's not any real statement, it's an interaction between creatures not really balanced to fight eachother in a gameplay section. And, normally I wouldn't be so staunch on that, except this is contradicted in the exact mission where you hunt a Barroth, where you explicitly need to sneak past the Rathian without any conflict, but a Barroth is considered a completely viable fight. Not to even mention the fact you fight a Rathalos and Diablos back to back much later, the latter of which outright one-shots Barroth
And overall, there are a lot of instances where they say "should be comparible" to Rathalos or whathave you despite them being an Apex Monster. I get we don't necessarily see creatures getting into fights with eachother outside of World and Rise's Turf War system (which I'm going to be referencing a lot, thank you for that addition Capcom), but the baseline should be a Barroth, not the type of creatures that one-shot it, unless they have a solid reason to scale that high up.
This seems normal enough, but...
Here's an actual cutscene of a Kirin fighting an "Elder Dragon level monster", as they're called in this description
This is the definition of a curbstomp. Kirin attempts to impale Rajang with his horn, which seems to wound them, but it turns out they avoided it last second, and proceed
completely unimpeded to rip their horn off, the Kirin barely able to do so much as escape their grip in the process, and the Kirin's last ditch lightning attack of course does absolutely nothing. Granted, that last part is easily explained by the Rajang being incredibly resistant to lighting damage, but it still tells a pretty clear story. Couple that with the fact that Kirin is the only Elder Dragon you can fight in Low Rank, and it suggests they're nowhere near the level of Kushala (who can actually deal damage to Rajang, even if they are overwhelmed in a matchup of physical strength),
Granted, the separation between Low and High ranks are mostly game mechanics. After all, in 4U (which I've been playing recently on account of doing everything non-grindy that there is to do in World), you don't find a Kirin at all, and instead face off against Gore and Shagaru Magala, and they're 6-C because...
Because it seems legit, I guess?
Now, they do have some stuff that could suggest that level of power (they show up immediately after clear blue skies turn to a fierce storm suddenly while you're sailing in 4U, and they do have an ability to cloak the area in darkness, so you could argue this is their doing), but in terms of scaling, they just... Don't fight anything on that level, no.
In fact, in Sunbreak, here's them overpowering, but ultimately being damaged and knocked back by a High 8-C+ monster, and after you beat Gore Magala in 4U, you proceed onwards to fighting Rathalos and Zinogre, who are also in that ballpark.
Moving up, there's the High 6-A Elder Dragons, which are also equally as flimsy.
Zorah Magdaros' 6-B rating is fine... Kinda. It would explicitly kill them as a result of releasing all their bio energy at once, but they are old to the point that they're doing that as their last hurrah before dying , and even weakening them with the Magmacores doesn't really stop them so it's (probably) fine to leave alone, but for the High 6-A ratings...
At best, this seems like an extrapolation from the fact there are two Dalamadur corpses in the rotten vale, but... How does that relate to the level of bio-energy Zorah has? The Dalamadurs simply didn't resist Xeno'Jiiva's influence, while, on it's last legs, Zorah decided to spite them directly by completely blowing their territory to kingdom come before they die off. Maybe there's a guidebook statement I'm not aware of, and it's not like I haven't been surprised by guidebook data before (Xeno'Jiiva not actually having eyes for instance, and instead those being energy sensing organs), but there still should be some type of link on where that came from.
... Then again, it probably doesn't matter because the Dalamadur's High 6-A rating is questionable inofitself.
A big theme in Monster Hunter, at least from what I've seen, is that these Monsters are very old, very mysterious creatures. You hear stories passed down generation to generation in relation to these things, and sometimes, the characters outright tell you they just don't know anything, or only know stuff from these old stories. Xeno'Jiiva and Shara Ishvalda for example were straight up complete mysteries, outside of the former maybe being the dragon referenced in the tale of the five or at least somewhat related, and the latter being "The Old Everwyrm" with the power to destroy ecosystems with a song of madness. There's the same deal with Shagaru Magala in 4U, where all they know is a great calamity in the far gone past and the legend about heaven's wheel.
Of course, that's a lot of fancy talk about narratives, and while I'd love to do that, this is a CRT, so I'll cut to the chase and say that the narrator of this feat isn't reliable, and, considering the Dalamadur does way more than just twitching to kill you, and the world, and even the very mountain you fight them on, is entirely fine... Yeah, that's probably not a reliable statement to their power, but instead a story told about how terrifying the 440 meter long snake that can call meteors is.
Originally, this section was me looking at Fatalis' page and thinking "does he really scale to two variants up the totem pole when a variant can outright one-shot their own kind as in the case of Ebony Odogaron fighting regular Odogaron, should that really scale to every single Black Dragon when Alaetron is much easier to survive than normal Fatalis..."
But then I looked at the feat itself for a bit, and, not to sound like someone debating One Punch Man, but...
Are we even sure this is the moon?
Sure, initially that sounds strange, but consider the context. After the sun is completely concealed, it turns into something more akin to a black hole emitting a massive, swirling blue storm, and White Fatalis' while deal is calling down lighting upon their enemies, which is closely related to generating massive, dark clouds which just so happen to block out the sun. With that in consideration, what's more likely? The sun simply interacting weirdly with the supernatural ability to call a storm taken to it's extreme, or White Fatalis inexplicably having the ability to destroy the planet several times over with telekinetic power that can reach for thousands of kilometers (that he also never uses outside of this)
Maybe people will go for the latter, but do also consider the consistency element. While Black Dragons are generally regarded as threats to the world, that's mostly on account of them demonstrating the ability to wipe out countries or oceans with ease, drastically changing the ecosystem. Fatalis' introduction in World talks about how Elder Dragons are disappearing and weather anomalies are being caused by Fatalis' activities, along with the fact that legend says they burnt Schrade to the ground in a single night. There's also Dire Miralis, who supposedly boiled an ocean (not necessarily vaporized, mind you, as you end up fighting them in the so called "Tainted sea")
Supersonic, I don't have a problem with, it's mostly Massively Hypersonic+ and FTL+, for two different reasons.
Starting with MHS+... I'd love to post an excerpt of a faulty justification, but I genuinely can't find the feat cited for this. Click on any page, it's 100% circular scaling from being comparable to other monsters.
My best guess on what it's supposed to be is the fact Kirin and other monsters on that level can use lightning, and they can keep up with stuff that dodges that, but... That doesn't really occur?
Even Rajang, who outright stomps Kirin, never actually dodges lightning or move relative to it. In their turf war, all the bolts just miss, and in the ecology cutscene, Rajang wasn't able to react whatsoever and just tanked it.
Granted, it may be the fact The Hunter can dodge these attacks, but, there are a few hiccups with that as well. You can dismiss the fact you don't really dodge the lightning but pay attention to glowy sections on the ground, but... The lightning comes from the sky, well above any hunters, and they'd have far more distance to react to a bolt of lightning than what MHS+ would apply. Not to mention the fact it's hitscan, so the best you can argue is that they'd be able to logically react to it, which is at the absolute best, Hypersonic+, but more likely is just Supersonic inofitself.
FTL+, I actually think is incredibly lowballed. Valtrax scaling to it is iffy, since the "fastest monster" statement (if that even exists, also) is likely referring to his jet thrusters, which only really are at full capacity when they start flying (and that'd apply to his dive bomb attack, but the Hunter reacting to it runs into a similar problem as the Kirin lighting scaling)
But, in terms of the calc itself, it assumes that the meteors come from the sun, but... the sun doesn't have any solid metal in it, nor would it generate any in it's entire lifespan. Assuming it's literal (Which it may not be, but the description doesn't say it's from any particular legend or "it is said", just directly that it's a piece of a star), it would have had to come from outside the solar system. Not only that, but this is something you can genuinely perceive and dodge out of the way of, so here's an MFTL+ calc.
I'll likely make an ability CRT another time. This is just going to cover the madhouse that is AP and Speed, in terms of the scaling and even some of the feats actually used to justify the ratings.
Regular Wyverns
A lot of monsters in High 8-C, while I am fine with the rating (Not a lot of stuff should be weaker than a Barroth, for example), I have a bit of an issue with how much Lagiacrus' feat is thrown around in that tree.Like, for example, Barroth has this used to justify the fact they can take on a Rathian and defeat it... But, this is pure gameplay. It's not a cutscene, it's not a turfwar, it's not any real statement, it's an interaction between creatures not really balanced to fight eachother in a gameplay section. And, normally I wouldn't be so staunch on that, except this is contradicted in the exact mission where you hunt a Barroth, where you explicitly need to sneak past the Rathian without any conflict, but a Barroth is considered a completely viable fight. Not to even mention the fact you fight a Rathalos and Diablos back to back much later, the latter of which outright one-shots Barroth
And overall, there are a lot of instances where they say "should be comparible" to Rathalos or whathave you despite them being an Apex Monster. I get we don't necessarily see creatures getting into fights with eachother outside of World and Rise's Turf War system (which I'm going to be referencing a lot, thank you for that addition Capcom), but the baseline should be a Barroth, not the type of creatures that one-shot it, unless they have a solid reason to scale that high up.
Elder Dragons
I think the best place to start here is with the supposed lowest part of the totem pole, Kirin.This seems normal enough, but...
Here's an actual cutscene of a Kirin fighting an "Elder Dragon level monster", as they're called in this description
This is the definition of a curbstomp. Kirin attempts to impale Rajang with his horn, which seems to wound them, but it turns out they avoided it last second, and proceed
completely unimpeded to rip their horn off, the Kirin barely able to do so much as escape their grip in the process, and the Kirin's last ditch lightning attack of course does absolutely nothing. Granted, that last part is easily explained by the Rajang being incredibly resistant to lighting damage, but it still tells a pretty clear story. Couple that with the fact that Kirin is the only Elder Dragon you can fight in Low Rank, and it suggests they're nowhere near the level of Kushala (who can actually deal damage to Rajang, even if they are overwhelmed in a matchup of physical strength),
Granted, the separation between Low and High ranks are mostly game mechanics. After all, in 4U (which I've been playing recently on account of doing everything non-grindy that there is to do in World), you don't find a Kirin at all, and instead face off against Gore and Shagaru Magala, and they're 6-C because...
Because it seems legit, I guess?
Now, they do have some stuff that could suggest that level of power (they show up immediately after clear blue skies turn to a fierce storm suddenly while you're sailing in 4U, and they do have an ability to cloak the area in darkness, so you could argue this is their doing), but in terms of scaling, they just... Don't fight anything on that level, no.
In fact, in Sunbreak, here's them overpowering, but ultimately being damaged and knocked back by a High 8-C+ monster, and after you beat Gore Magala in 4U, you proceed onwards to fighting Rathalos and Zinogre, who are also in that ballpark.
Moving up, there's the High 6-A Elder Dragons, which are also equally as flimsy.
Zorah Magdaros' 6-B rating is fine... Kinda. It would explicitly kill them as a result of releasing all their bio energy at once, but they are old to the point that they're doing that as their last hurrah before dying , and even weakening them with the Magmacores doesn't really stop them so it's (probably) fine to leave alone, but for the High 6-A ratings...
Where is this stated?
At best, this seems like an extrapolation from the fact there are two Dalamadur corpses in the rotten vale, but... How does that relate to the level of bio-energy Zorah has? The Dalamadurs simply didn't resist Xeno'Jiiva's influence, while, on it's last legs, Zorah decided to spite them directly by completely blowing their territory to kingdom come before they die off. Maybe there's a guidebook statement I'm not aware of, and it's not like I haven't been surprised by guidebook data before (Xeno'Jiiva not actually having eyes for instance, and instead those being energy sensing organs), but there still should be some type of link on where that came from.
... Then again, it probably doesn't matter because the Dalamadur's High 6-A rating is questionable inofitself.
More specifically, the in-game description this is pulled from.
If you read that closely, you'll realize that the citation for the feat is legitimately just a fairy tale, and the writers of this excerpt didn't even know the thing existed to begin with until they showed up on their doorstep, and the Shah quote of "Capable of shaking the world in fire" sounds like it's on the same beat.
A big theme in Monster Hunter, at least from what I've seen, is that these Monsters are very old, very mysterious creatures. You hear stories passed down generation to generation in relation to these things, and sometimes, the characters outright tell you they just don't know anything, or only know stuff from these old stories. Xeno'Jiiva and Shara Ishvalda for example were straight up complete mysteries, outside of the former maybe being the dragon referenced in the tale of the five or at least somewhat related, and the latter being "The Old Everwyrm" with the power to destroy ecosystems with a song of madness. There's the same deal with Shagaru Magala in 4U, where all they know is a great calamity in the far gone past and the legend about heaven's wheel.
Of course, that's a lot of fancy talk about narratives, and while I'd love to do that, this is a CRT, so I'll cut to the chase and say that the narrator of this feat isn't reliable, and, considering the Dalamadur does way more than just twitching to kill you, and the world, and even the very mountain you fight them on, is entirely fine... Yeah, that's probably not a reliable statement to their power, but instead a story told about how terrifying the 440 meter long snake that can call meteors is.
Black Dragons
The technical term is supposedly "Dangerous First-class monsters" but this is cooler soOriginally, this section was me looking at Fatalis' page and thinking "does he really scale to two variants up the totem pole when a variant can outright one-shot their own kind as in the case of Ebony Odogaron fighting regular Odogaron, should that really scale to every single Black Dragon when Alaetron is much easier to survive than normal Fatalis..."
But then I looked at the feat itself for a bit, and, not to sound like someone debating One Punch Man, but...
Are we even sure this is the moon?
Sure, initially that sounds strange, but consider the context. After the sun is completely concealed, it turns into something more akin to a black hole emitting a massive, swirling blue storm, and White Fatalis' while deal is calling down lighting upon their enemies, which is closely related to generating massive, dark clouds which just so happen to block out the sun. With that in consideration, what's more likely? The sun simply interacting weirdly with the supernatural ability to call a storm taken to it's extreme, or White Fatalis inexplicably having the ability to destroy the planet several times over with telekinetic power that can reach for thousands of kilometers (that he also never uses outside of this)
Maybe people will go for the latter, but do also consider the consistency element. While Black Dragons are generally regarded as threats to the world, that's mostly on account of them demonstrating the ability to wipe out countries or oceans with ease, drastically changing the ecosystem. Fatalis' introduction in World talks about how Elder Dragons are disappearing and weather anomalies are being caused by Fatalis' activities, along with the fact that legend says they burnt Schrade to the ground in a single night. There's also Dire Miralis, who supposedly boiled an ocean (not necessarily vaporized, mind you, as you end up fighting them in the so called "Tainted sea")
Oh lord I haven't even brought up speed yet
Yeah that's another wack thingSupersonic, I don't have a problem with, it's mostly Massively Hypersonic+ and FTL+, for two different reasons.
Starting with MHS+... I'd love to post an excerpt of a faulty justification, but I genuinely can't find the feat cited for this. Click on any page, it's 100% circular scaling from being comparable to other monsters.
My best guess on what it's supposed to be is the fact Kirin and other monsters on that level can use lightning, and they can keep up with stuff that dodges that, but... That doesn't really occur?
Even Rajang, who outright stomps Kirin, never actually dodges lightning or move relative to it. In their turf war, all the bolts just miss, and in the ecology cutscene, Rajang wasn't able to react whatsoever and just tanked it.
Granted, it may be the fact The Hunter can dodge these attacks, but, there are a few hiccups with that as well. You can dismiss the fact you don't really dodge the lightning but pay attention to glowy sections on the ground, but... The lightning comes from the sky, well above any hunters, and they'd have far more distance to react to a bolt of lightning than what MHS+ would apply. Not to mention the fact it's hitscan, so the best you can argue is that they'd be able to logically react to it, which is at the absolute best, Hypersonic+, but more likely is just Supersonic inofitself.
FTL+, I actually think is incredibly lowballed. Valtrax scaling to it is iffy, since the "fastest monster" statement (if that even exists, also) is likely referring to his jet thrusters, which only really are at full capacity when they start flying (and that'd apply to his dive bomb attack, but the Hunter reacting to it runs into a similar problem as the Kirin lighting scaling)
But, in terms of the calc itself, it assumes that the meteors come from the sun, but... the sun doesn't have any solid metal in it, nor would it generate any in it's entire lifespan. Assuming it's literal (Which it may not be, but the description doesn't say it's from any particular legend or "it is said", just directly that it's a piece of a star), it would have had to come from outside the solar system. Not only that, but this is something you can genuinely perceive and dodge out of the way of, so here's an MFTL+ calc.
Conclusion
Less monsters should scale to Apex monsters like Rathalos, but this doesn't really change their AP, just specific values. Kirin should be Low 7-B for generating a storm around it, and Gore Magala should be rated similarly (If not lower, since their storm feat is a bit iffy and they are fought alongside apex monsters), High 6-A and 5-A should be removed in favor of just 6-B, while MHS+ should be downgraded to Supersonic, and FTL+ should be MFTL+
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