Kushala Daora

Kushala Daora is a wind type Elder Dragon. Its wind breath can freeze the hunter if it is in the Snowy Mountains. It can be found in Jungles, Snowy Mountains and the Town. A typical Kushala has silver-colored "skin" which is actually metal plates. Hunters usually fight their first Kushala in Elder Quests.

Like snakes, Kushala Daora "shed" their metallic coats when it becomes too rusted. Hunters can actually find rusted Kushala Daora skin in Area 8 of the Snowy Mountains, where it is also shown in the clip, "Kushala Daora Ecology". Rusted Kushala can be found in guild quests.



Facts

 * They are one of the most diversified dragons. With the ability to create a wind barrier around them, it can be difficult hunting them.
 * Get rid of this wind barrier by either poisoning/paralyzing/stunning/knocking it out, breaking its horn, or cutting his tail. Breaking the head crest and cutting the tail permanently prevents him from using the wind barrier until he is dead.
 * Throwing a Flash Bomb at it while it is in the air will make it fall to the ground for a few seconds before it gets up on its feet again.
 * The trick to making Kushala battles a breeze is to use equipment that gives you the skill called Dragon Wind Breaker, which is Wind Pressure +20. You will be totally immune to its wind aura. A full set of Chameleos armour will provide this skill.
 * Kushala Daora are very weak to both Dragon and Thunder elements, Dragon dealing more damage than Thunder. The best way to damage it is to attack its head with a Dragon element weapon.
 * At the 25 minute mark, if the hunter has inflicted enough damage to it, Kushala will flee like other Elder Dragons.
 * It is advised to stay at medium-close range of the Kushala Daora because if you are far away, and it does its charge attack it will be a lot harder to dodge, this is because of its ability to start charging slow, and then progress to a fast-Leaping sprint. Much like a Lunastra or Teostra.
 * Kushala Daora flies and attacks from the air more than any other Elder Dragon. Thus, it may be difficult to hit him, as he remains airborne for quite some time. He is airborne marginally more when enraged.
 * Normally, for first-timers, you will not be able to kill it in 1 single quest, mainly because of the lack of high end equipment and perhaps skill.
 * The good news is that all damage done to it will carry over next time you fight it and the broken parts will remain so, whether you failed or succeeded the previous mission.
 * Damage accumulation will be separated into Elder quests, Guild 1-star to 5-stars (aka Guild Low Rank quests), Guild 6-stars to 8 stars (aka Guild High Rank quests) and Guild G-Lvl 3 Stars. So if you fight Kushala in an Elder quest, don't expect the damage to carry into either the Guild Low or High Rank quests, and vice versa.
 * This principle applies to all Elder Dragon damage accumulation in the game.
 * A good first time weapon for all village Elder Dragons is Eternal Strife which can be obtained at Village 4 star quests, which coincidentally is the same level of quests in which you face your first Elder Dragon. It can be obtained by mining small ruststones from the volcanic gathering quest in 4 star village quests. They are most common on the volcanic summit.
 * When fighting a Kushala Daora, it will occasionally jump back, which afterwards it will growl giving you a chance to hit it. The only problem is that it jumps back considerably far, so if you are not working with other hunters, you may not get to it in time to hit it. If you are working with other hunters it might jump right at you and it will be much easier to hit.
 * Though this principle only goes for the normal Kushala Daora, not it's rusted counterpart. Often at times when it jumps back, it won't growl, and will attack directly.
 * If you are using a Lance you can charge directly through him, if you are lucky he will do his wind beam and he won't hurt you.
 * If Kushala is near flinching and it flies up in the air to attack you, you can hit its feet and if lucky you knock it out of the air,similar to a flash bomb but it will not be blind when it gets up.
 * Kushala Daora is much like Lunastra because they both control their powers with their horns
 * Some of Kushala Daora's attacks are similar to some attacks from Remobras, so they might be a good monster to practice for the real thing on.
 * For range weapons, most shots will not penetrate its wind barrier, use effect giving rounds/coatings (Poison for Example) However, shots will penetrate if you aim for the parts outside of the wind barrier. These parts are Head, both wings, and its tail. This also applies to Teostra and Lunastra's fire barrier.

=Trivia=
 * Kushala Daora is the flagship monster of Monster Hunter 2 and appears in the opening movie and cover of the box.
 * A Kushala Daora skin is found on top of the mountain in Area 8 of snowy mountains, which can be mined.
 * There is a downloaded Kushala quest and like all downloaded quests, you must kill it in that one single quest or it will be a failed quest due to timeout.