Editing Hunter guide (section)

=Essential knowledge=
===Spawn knowledge===
The best way of being effective in this game is to know the spawns by heart along with the monsters' behaviors, and it goes for any class, really. It seems tedious and difficult at first, but it is a Hunter's keystone as their AOE is very limited and their effectiveness relies on knowing what is happening next. The easiest way to learn a quest is to run it several times, remembering the most important waves first (e.g. iconic enemies positioning, dangerous enemies, large amounts of enemies), then filling the gaps with the minor ones.
It allows you to read what your partners' are intending to do once you are comfortable with the quest. You can assume that an experienced player going towards X direction means that he will deal with X enemies and leave the others to you. That is why following someone and attacking "his" monsters likely doesn't help and can be dangerous if nobody takes care of the remaining ones.

===Highest damage output===
Hunters have the highest potential of damage in the game, so you will be expected to take down the bigger HP/most annoying foes first. It is important not to focus on grunts if there are stronger monsters in the same wave as other party members will likely leave them to you.
During lower levels, it is worth equipping a high power Mag/eating all the Power Materials from your plan to do your part in party.

===Restricted area of effect===
Hunters suffer from a very poor AOE, that is why you're expected to deal with single target big HP monsters. Your best option for a spread out crowd is a Slicer-type weapon. It ignores manual evasion which is very convenient against fast moving foes and its wide angle can be abused with snap targeting.
On the other hand, packed monsters can be dealt with Sword/Partisan-type weapons. These can go up to 10 targets, meaning that you can actually deal with larger amounts than Rangers with Shot/Needle type weapons, although this is only (useless) theory because such big waves are rare.

===Precise positioning===
Dealing with separate enemies can quickly become overwhelming if they circle you. Positioning yourself correctly allows you to immediately take care of the annoying/dangerous things, while standing on the correct spot will make grunts group and offer you an easy combo kill. You want to avoid close combat from front, so it's best standing behind a monster as it spawns to be safe in case of early walk. Some situations require strict standing position/angle and using the floor's texture as a landmark can help.

===Combos and delays===
While doing close combat, delaying the 2nd/3rd attack is essential to avoid hit/knockdown during a combo. It is important to rely on delay to keep control of the situation. Some animations will leave you unsafe after your 3rd attack: you will want to use a 2 attacks-combo unless you are certain that your 3rd attack will kill.
You can feint an enemy to swing in the air, leaving his side/back safe for you. It is extremely useful against fast moving monsters such as Melqueek and Del-D, or a Delsaber that you want to hit in close combat.
Know your safe combos and which weapons are efficient against what. You will want to combo kill as much as possible since (fleshies) Hunters have a really poor crowd control. Challenge mode is a very good place to practice this theory.

===HP management===
Hunters tends to attack from a much closer distance than other classes. This means you are the main foes' lure.
You can rely on your Mag's invincibility trigger to reduce the risk: either know in advance [[fixed attack damage]] and exploit them, or use packed monsters and sacrifice your HP to drop under 10% in one Sword/Partisan swing. The later requires a solid accuracy and at least 4 targets in order to work (read: 10% HP Mag Trigger Exploit). You can use Monomate and Dimate (200HP/500HP respectively) to set up invincibility in Ultimate, it is far from being a useless tool.

Hunter's meta requires you to stand really close/against monsters at very low HP. That's why getting used to the previous points and making use of them is important. No risk, little reward; high risk, high reward. You will often be the leading person as you will be ahead of other players, meaning that you have to remember the spawns not to get any bad surprise. Use Gifoie/Twin Blaze to stop rushing enemies and Rabarta/Freeze trap/Arrest to control the crowd. With the correct gear and knowledge, you are the most efficient class in the game as you have the ability to spawn-kill almost any monster.
When you start practicing, it feels like a die and retry game. Worry not, dying is learning. Analyze what went wrong, how you could do better with another positioning/combo and try something else next time. That's pretty much how you improve at this game: questioning and practicing.