Monster Hunter World Iceborne Coral Pukei-Pukei guide
Cleaning house
I always thought the Pukei-Pukei was a monster that didn't live up to its potential, but Monster Hunter World Iceborne's Coral Pukei-Pukei only served to highlight just how dangerous it could have been even further. Its tail can eject gallons of water in a jet stream. This makes the Coral Pukei-Pukei different enough to warrant needing its own strategies to defeat it.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne Coral Pukei-Pukei guide
Our Monster Hunter World Iceborne Coral Pukei-Pukei guide will explain the strategies for defeating the Coral Pukei-Pukei, detail all of its weaknesses and resistances, and show the loot table for all the items you can get for defeating this beast.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne Coral Pukei-Pukei guide contents
- Coral Pukei-Pukei weaknesses and resistances
- How to hunt Coral Pukei-Pukei
- Avoiding Coral Pukei-Pukei's water attacks
- Coral Pukei-Pukei materials
Those new to hunting monsters, or if you just need to find a particular monster guide to get up to Hunter Rank 16 - needed to start the Iceborne expansion - should head over to our Monster Hunter World guide hub for a plethora of guides. Once you're ready to begin the expansion, you'll find a few hunters gathered near the gate in Astera.
Coral Pukei-Pukei weaknesses and resistances
The Coral Pukei-Pukei is water-based, so naturally you'd assume that water would be a key resistance. Fire and dragon are also quite heavily resisted by the water wyvern. What I don't think anyone expected was just how vulnerable to ice attacks this monster is. It also has a weakness to poison attacks, something the regular Pukei-Pukei has defences against. Other ailments aside from the super effective poison will have moderate effectiveness.
As for the biology of the Coral Pukei-Pukei, it seems especially vulnerable to bladed weapons, particularly to the tail. Since the tail is severable, you'll want to chop it off as soon as you can. Thanks to the Clutch Claw, both the wings and head are vulnerable when its flying, so you'll be able to break them for more parts. The torso may not be a weakness, but it is breakable.
How to hunt Coral Pukei-Pukei
While it's largely the same as hunting a regular poison based Pukei-Pukei, the Coral Pukei-Pukei uses water-based jets that come from its tail and its mouth. All the water-based attacks will inflict Waterblight, thus hampering your stamina recovery. Use either water resistances, or items like Nulberry and the Cleanser Booster to cure yourself if you are hit by a water attack.
Its melee based attacks are largely the same as those the regular Pukei-Pukei would use. The only real difference here is that they hit a little harder than even the Master Rank Pukei-Pukei. Find out more about the regular Pukei-Pukei's melee attacks in our Monster Hunter: World Pukei-Pukei guide.
Avoiding Coral Pukei-Pukei's water attacks
From the tail, Coral Pukei-Pukei can shoot a jet of water in various patterns. Its most common ways are in a vertical slice or a horizontal swipe, but there's one more that's prolonged. It begins by shooting the jet at the ground before beginning to swirl the jet. As it spirals around, the water jet and tail become a little more erratic. My advice here is either to back off and find cover, or expertly time a dodge past the stream and watch the tail swing around you. This latter strategy can enable you to get some free hits on the tail.
While severing its tail is the key to winning this fight as it cuts off most of its more dangerous water-based attacks, don't under-estimate the aqua jets and globs of water that come from its mouth. You can normally tell this is about to happen when the Coral Pukei-Pukei's head shakes around a little bit beforehand.
By far its most dangerous ranged attack is when it fires a jet of water, before sticking its tongue out to split the stream sideways. It's very hard to avoid this one when far away, so try to close the distance when possible.
There are a few other things to watch out for in this fight, so here are a few more tips:
- Severing the tail will shorten the range of the tail swipe attack.
- Sticking as close to the Coral Pukei-Pukei is essential as its close range attacks are nowhere near as potent. It may try to fire water from its tail or mouth, but these will be highly telegraphed by it shaking either its tail or head.
- Every monster in the Coral Highlands will at least have a go at attacking the Coral Pukei-Pukei. While no turf wars will happen, Tzitzi-Ya-Ku can blind it, and fireballs from the likes of Pink Rathian will usually cause the Coral Pukei-Pukei to fall over.
- While it can be a godsend to have another large monster attack the Coral Pukei-Pukei, keep a dung pod on hand to scare the other monsters away when it all gets too much.
- The blue sponges are full of water, which it will proceed to drink up by sticking its head into the ground. Use this as an opportunity to attack it.
Coral Pukei-Pukei materials
When you've beaten the Coral Pukei-Pukei, you'll be able to get a ton of different Coral Pukei-Pukei materials. These are all the brand new Master Rank items which are used to make tons of Master Rank gear. Below are all the items that you can get for breaking certain parts/defeating the Coral Pukei-Pukei:
| Item name | Rarity of materials carved | Carving notes | Rarity of materials gained as rewards | Reward notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coral Pukei-Pukei Cortex | **** | Break back | ***** | |
| Coral Pukei-Pukei Shard | **** | Dropped | **** | |
| Coral Pukei-Pukei Lash | *** | Break tail | N/A | |
| Coral Pukei-Pukei Fellwing | *** | Break wings | *** | |
| Large Coral Pukei-Pukei Sac | *** | Break head | *** | |
| Fey Wyvern Gem | * | * | ||
| Flood Sac | N/A | **** | ||
| Dragonvein Solidbone | ** | |||
| Heavy Dragonvein Bone | N/A | *** | ||
| Spiritvein Slogbone | N/A | *** | ||
| Fierce Dragonvein Bone | N/A | ***** | ||
| Hydrated Sac | N/A | **** | ||
| Smooth Icehide | N/A | **** | ||
| Tempered Torrent Sac | N/A | *** | ||
| Spiritvein Gem Shard | N/A | *** |
Monster Hunter World Iceborne guides
We have a whole host of other useful Monster Hunter World Iceborne guide pages for your convenience. Why not take a gander? If you want to check out the previous boss guide, head to the Banbaro guide. The game had split around here to include two more regional variants. You can find guide here for the Nightshade Paolumu. If you've beaten both of them though, the Barioth is the next main monster to defeat.
Monster Hunter World guide - Our guide hub for Monster Hunter World, including the basics, weapon and armour trees, and boss guides.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne guide - Our guide hub for the Iceborne expansion to Monster Hunter World, including new features, the new hub area, and more.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne armor - All the armor recipes and the best Monster Hunter World Iceborne builds.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne weapons - All the weapons in Iceborne and the recipes for each one.
Monster Hunter World Iceborne boss guide - A collection of boss guides for Monster Hunter World Iceborne, detailing strategies, weaknesses, and loot tables for each.