Monster Hunter Wilds has brought a ton of new features along for the latest entry in the series. While both the Wounds System and Power Clash mechanics are vital for combat, equally exciting is the addition of a Day/Night cycle, complete with weather events. Naturally, there is also a Rest feature to let you change the time of day—but it comes with some cryptically important limitations. Understanding your way around this will be crucial when you’re trying to hunt specific monsters.
Time-of-day terms, explained
The option to change the time of day can be accessed while using a tent (base camp and pop-up campsite both work) or the Portable BBQ Grill. In either case, it’s listed within the BBQ Menu. At the cost of 500 Guild Points, you can switch to a specific day cycle as well as a specific “season” or environment. That might seem like a high point requirement, but it will be chump change once you get into the swing of things.
The choices for time are pretty self-explanatory, but here is a rundown of what each environment choice means in case you breezed through the story:
- No Change: Maintains the current environment
- Plenty: Lively and more dense with both endemic life and smaller monsters
- Fallow: Barren, fewer resources, and more aggressive monsters
- Inclemency: A location-specific weather event that often includes the appearance of an Apex Monster
I do want to point out that the Rest option isn’t available until you’ve unlocked High Rank hunts at the beginning of the fourth chapter. You can see it as a reward for beating the first half of the story campaign.
How to fix Rest when it’s not working
Unfortunately, there are some cases where this handy feature becomes unavailable to you. If the option for Rest is greyed out, along with a somewhat vague “cannot use at current mission progression status” text, you’ll have some troubleshooting to do. The most likely culprit is that you’re partway through chapter five. This chapter is all about the weather in each region going crazy and has the environments locked to specific states. Yes, as weird as it seems, you’re introduced to this feature for only a few quests before having it temporarily locked away. Either way, reaching the final quest in chapter five will restore the Rest option.
That should fix the problem for good, although you might see this restriction again even after completing chapter five. One possible reason is that you’re in a Link Party with someone who hasn’t progressed as far as you have. Leaving the party and resetting the game should do the trick. Another solution that’s reportedly helped some is talking to a Support Desk Palico at one of the base camps. Claiming any leftover content or completing your Limited Bounties could set things right again. Otherwise, your best bet is to reset the game or try to play in offline mode.
Whether you’re on the hunt for specific endemic life or vying for another go at an area’s Apex, rest is a great shortcut. Just try not to use up all your guild points doing it!