Can You Go Over 100% Affinity in Monster Hunter World? A Comprehensive Guide

Hey friend! Affinity is one of the most important yet confusing damage mechanics in Monster Hunter World. As a seasoned Monster Hunter, I know how much players like you want to maximize affinity for huge crits. So you‘re probably wondering – what happens if you go over 100% affinity?

I‘ll cover everything you need to know about affinity, including:

• Detailed explanations of affinity and critical hits
• The effects of exceeding 100% affinity
• Advanced affinity stacking builds and strategies
• Tips from my 500+ hours playing Monster Hunter World

Let‘s get started!

What Exactly is Affinity in Monster Hunter World?

Simply put, affinity determines your chance to land critical hits that deal extra damage. It‘s shown as a percentage ranging from -100% to 100%.

• Positive affinity gives you a chance to deal 25% extra damage on attacks
• Negative affinity gives you a chance to deal 25% less damage
• At 100% affinity, all your attacks will crit for big damage

For example, if a Great Sword has 30% affinity, roughly 3 out of 10 attacks will be critical hits. And with -50% affinity, 5 out of 10 attacks would be weaker.

Affinity starts at 0% for most weapons, but you can increase it through skills, armor, augments, and decorations.

Some key affinity boosting skills:

• Critical Eye – Directly increases affinity up to 40% at level 7
• Weakness Exploit – 30%/50% affinity when hitting weak spots
• Maximum Might – 30% affinity at max stamina
• Latent Power – 30%/50% affinity for 90-120 seconds after conditions met
• Agitator – 10% affinity when monster enraged

Stacking these skills is key to reaching the coveted 100% affinity milestone.

Here‘s What Happens at 100% Affinity

Reaching 100% affinity is a huge damage boost, ensuring every single attack you do will critically hit. This milestone takes your damage potential to the next level!

However, Monster Hunter World caps affinity at 100%. This means going over 100% affinity will not make your attacks crit more than 100% of the time.

For example, if you have 150% affinity, you‘ll still only crit on 100% of attacks rather than 150%. Affinity essentially stops stacking once you hit the cap.

Capcom likely implemented this limit to prevent affinity from becoming overpowered. Just imagine if you could reach 200% affinity and crit twice as often!

So while building for affinity is fantastic, don‘t worry about going too far past 100%, as the extra affinity will be wasted.

Example Affinity Stacking Sets and Strategies

To help you understand affinity stacking, here are two example builds that reach 100% affinity:

Critical Eye & Weakness Exploit Build

This straightforward build combines Critical Eye 7 (+35% affinity) with Weakness Exploit 2 (+50% affinity on weak spots) for an easy 100% affinity.

By targeting monster weak points, you‘ll crit every time with massive damage. This works well on Great Sword, Hammer, Switch Axe, and other raw damage weapons.

Maximum Might, Critical Eye & Agitator Build

This set mixes Maximum Might, Agitator, and Critical Eye for 100% affinity under optimal conditions.

When your stamina is full and the monster is enraged, you get +65% affinity total from skills. With the extra 35% from Critical Eye, it totals 100% affinity at peak moments!

The downside is managing your stamina and timing enrages. But this build offers huge damage when mastered.

Exceeding 100% Affinity – What Should You Do?

After reaching the 100% affinity cap, you have a few options:

• Reduce excess affinity skills – Drop extra Critical Eye, Maximum Might, etc. to make room for other damage skills
• Add supporting affinity skills – Add Critical Boost, Attack Boost, Peak Performance, etc. to amplify your crit damage
• Improve sharpness/element – Invest in Handicraft, Razor Sharp, Non-elemental Boost to further increase damage

For example. once you have 100% affinity, you could:

• Swap Critical Eye 7 for Critical Eye 4 to free up gear slots
• Add Critical Boost 3 to increase crit damage from 25% to 40%
• Use Handicraft 5 to boost from blue to white sharpness

This maintains 100% affinity while enhancing damage through other means.

Finding the right balance of affinity and supplemental skills is key to maximizing your builds! Don‘t worry about exceeding 100% affinity – make the most of it with supporting skills.

Tips for Managing Affinity from a Monster Hunter Veteran

With 500+ hours of playtime, I‘ve learned a few affinity management tips that might help you fellow hunters:

• Get to 100% affinity first – Max out affinity before other damage skills. More crits means bigger impact.
• Watch your stamina – Keep stamina high to benefit from Maximum Might‘s affinity.
• Augment strategically – Use augments to add 5% or 10% affinity on certain weapons.
• Target weak spots – Trigger Weakness Exploit‘s 50% affinity by consistently hitting wounded monster parts.
• Mind negative affinity – Counter negative affinity from weapons with Critical Eye before damage skills.
• Use Affinity Booster – This handy tool temporarily boosts affinity beyond 100% for big damage.
• Manage enrages – Try to engage monsters when enraged to capitalize on Agitator/Latent Power affinity buffs.

Follow these tips and you‘ll be critting constantly in no time! Let me know if you have any other affinity questions.

Conclusion – Affinity Stops Stacking at 100%

After all this, hopefully you have a solid understanding of affinity now. Let‘s recap:

• Affinity determines your critical hit chance, ranging from -100% to 100%
• At 100% affinity, all your attacks will critically hit
• There is no added benefit for exceeding 100% affinity
• You can stack skills like Critical Eye and Weakness Exploit to reach 100%
• After hitting 100%, switch to supporting skills like Critical Boost or Handicraft

So in summary – no, you cannot exceed 100% affinity in Monster Hunter World. But reaching 100% is still crucial, so build affinity aggressively and make use of it!

I hope this guide gives you some ideas on maximizing affinity in your MHW builds. Time to get out there and start landing huge crits! Let me know if you have any other questions.

Happy Hunting!