“Dawn of the Death Star” is one of two new MHW event quests featuring the mighty Alatreon. It’s joined by The Evening Star, an almost identical mission with one lethal difference. Longtime players will know this is pretty unique. That’s fitting, too, because Alatreon is a unique monster. Rather than rely on one elemental damage type, or throw in a status effect for good measure, Alatreon is the master of all elements besides water. You need to contend with fire, ice, dragon, and thunder attacks. But they don’t necessarily come at you in the same order! That’s where the different event quests come in. Find out how and the best ways to contend with either mission in our guide to The Evening Star event quest in MHW!
To kick things off, we should explain how the quests actually appear. Because you won’t see both of them in your mission log whenever you boot up the game each day. Instead, you must first beat the Special Assignment “Blazing Black Twilight.” Doing so will unlock both The Evening Star and Dawn of the Death Star… but not simultaneously. Every Monster Hunter player will instead be randomly assigned a cycle during the period when Alatreon is available. That cycle flips every 24 hours at reset, making the next mission appear in your assignments.
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Put simply: if you log in and see The Evening Star, then the next day you will have Dawn of the Death Star, and so on. Though there’s nothing stopping you from joining other players’ missions! SOS flares and multiplayer matching will work the same as always. Keep in mind that you can read our full Alatreon guide for tips and details, too.
Once you’re actually in the mission, you need to fight that damn dragon. Alatreon is tough. It’s very tough. MHW players have likened it to Behemoth from the base game as one of the hardest monsters of its era. It’s an Elder Dragon, too, meaning traps won’t work on it. You need to knock it out the old fashioned way.
Well… Sort of. Alatreon has a special mechanical called Escaton Judgment. This super-powerful shockwave is enough to wipe entire teams twice over. Its unavoidable using the Superman Dive move. Alatreon cancels out Farcasters, too. You will take damage from Escaton Judgment. The trick is reducing said damage enough so that it doesn’t wipe you out in one shot.
That’s where the different event quest names come into play. The only way to stop Alatreon from carting everyone is to deal enough elemental damage to it before it casts its shockwave. Except the Elder Dragon is unique in MHW, in that it switches between three elemental modes during the course of battle. These are Fire Mode, Dragon Mode, and Ice Mode. And each mode is weak to different damage types. Fire takes more damage from ice, ice takes more damage from fire, and dragon is also susceptible to dragon. It sounds tricky, but there’s a set order to the modes Alatreon busts out!
Said order is determined by the event quest. In Blazing Black Twilight, Alatreon always starts by using fire, switches to the dragon element, casts Escaton Judgment, and finally ices up. The opposite is true for Dawn of the Death Star; during this event quest, Alatreon goes from ice, to dragon, to Escaton, to fire.
The trick is to begin the fight with the right element to reduce the damage of Escaton Judgment as quickly as possible. You can switch into something more appropriate (and restock healing items) if you die. Barring that, you can use dragon or thunder damage to break his horns during Dragon Mode. But we don’t really recommend that… While elements besides ice and fire are applicable during the entire fight, they do much less damage than the opposing color during those modes. In this mission, try to break the horns with fire.
This will keep Alatreon from switching modes again — until it reenters Dragon Mode again — dramatically simplifying the fight. Weapons with natural partbreaker (e.g. Switch Axe, Gunlance, Charge Blade, etc.) are also very helpful. Once Alatreon enters Dragon Mode a second time, you need to break the second horn to buy yourself yet another ice phase.
Once you get the pattern down, or break those pesky horns, you should be home free. Alatreon is terrifying with its uncommon tactics. But its basic attacks are also quite telegraphed. As long as you’re doing the damage necessary to survive Escaton Judgment, seasoned hunters should have no trouble taking it down. Happy hunting!
