This impractical method of getting a 1-second capture time in Monster Hunter Wilds can make you the fastest hunter alive—on paper

Alma, the handler from Monster Hunter Wilds, closes her eyes and looks a little disappointed.

(Image credit: Capcom)

As Monster Hunter Wilds rises to some absolutely absurd popularity, and the game's most tryhard of tryhards get to grips with its armoury of systems, the playerbase has already shifted over from 'how do I hunt monsters?' to 'how do I hunt these monsters in the most stylish, braggadocious way possible?'

Among this secret society of elites who have more free time than I do are, naturally, speedrunners, who have made efforts to show everyone just how quickly they can kill a Ralathos or something—which is totally in the spirit of the guild's emphasis on conservation and responsible slaying. Alma's got my back.

However, some players have discovered a nifty little trick—as spotted by VG247, it turns out that you can kill a monster in under 2 seconds. Kinda, if you don't look at the actual process too hard.

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In case you're unfamiliar, let me break it down for you: Quests can either be started via Alma, the map, or by hitting a monster hard enough that Alma gives over and says 'okay, you clearly want to hunt this thing so I'll pretend like we were meant to slay it the whole time'. Told you she has my back.

However, as shown in the video below, poison damage doesn't trigger this incidental hunting state—meaning you can slowly, arduously poison a monster over the course of around 10 minutes while your Palico keeps it busy. Doing this isn't appreciably much different from just fighting the bloody thing—in fact, it's less efficient, especially if you're actually good at the game.

All you need to do is then wait until the monster's limping around (a sign that it's available for capturing) and slap it with your sleep status weapon of choice. Open the map, start a quest on the dozing monster, immediately put down a shock trap, and you'll have captured them in under two seconds. Technically.

Again, I should emphasise that there's no real benefit to doing this—you might be able to dodge Zenny penalties for fainting, but I'm not entirely sure there's much overlap between 'I'm struggling with this monster' and 'I can afford to mess around by slowly whittling its health down with poison damage'. It's mostly just for bragging rights and shitposting—though I have to wonder if time completion fraud is enough to get the Guild Knights sent after you in the game's lore.

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Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.