Like any Cutter line sword, the pull and time doing a full combo leaves you vulnerable to counter attacks from large groups. The knockback also pushes most free targets away from the 2nd ghost strike in every swing. Its best used on enemies trapped into corners where both primary and secondary strikes have a chance to hit, or large knockback resistant targets like Lumbers. For things you can't kill in one full combo, do 2 or 3 strikes and give your self a chance to reposition or shield. Overall though, cutters damage output is horrid unless you can land all 10 strikes.

Its also good know that the last strike of a combo on all swords will interrupt a monster.... this doesn't work well on the cutters due to the time it takes to swing 5 times, and low odds of hitting something on the 4th and 5th swing.

If you have the Dark Thorn Blade, you will never need the Hunting Blade.

There is no such thing as properly using the Hunting Blade. Its rapid hits knock the enemy out of your own combo range, and will not stagger the foe for the duration of the combo anyway. It basically renders itself useless by design: you can't combo the target and if even if you somehow did, the target would counterattack before you ever got to the finisher, interrupting the combo anyway.

(And please don't take the Spur. It triggers the enemy's auto-dodge reactions, earning you nothing but a swift bite on the butt from Tier 3's Wolvers. The "fast" swords in this game are all hazardous to the wielder's health.)

The Hunting Blade and Catalyzer, when combined, have just one blind spot: Mecha Knights. They can easily block gunfire in Tier 2 and up, and they are highly resistant to Piercing damage. (That's okay, using the Hunting Blade on them would just get you killed horribly.)

"As for the hunting blade I cannot really go back to choosing another weapon, too much time and energy."

This is a sunk-cost fallacy. A bad investment does not stop being bad just because you've stuck with it for a long time. Sometimes you just have to cut your losses.

It really is a bad weapon. Most people with the Cutter series just want the Dread Venom Striker so they can use it to poison the Royal Jelly boss (which is very important to stop his regeneration)... and absolutely nothing else.

It really is an unwieldly, dangerous weapon to use with little to no advantage over others.

As for the Catalyzer...

Notice that the Catalyzer charges very quickly in comparison to other guns, and the charged shots remain in orbit around the target for a long time (estimated to be 20-40 seconds). You can stack several charged shots on the same target, and then detonate them all with a single regular shot. The splash damage will clobber that target and also probably a few other enemies nearby, flinging them all about. The explosions originate from the actual orbiting pellets, and thus you can predict which way the monster will be fling: if there are several pellets to the right of the monster, it'll be flung to the left when they blow.

You will want to use your Dark Thorn Blade as your primary weapon, and then switch to the Catalyzer only against targets that Piercing won't hurt. That's Slimes and Constructs. With a party, try to stack your charges on targets that your teammates are not focusing on-- or they might destroy it before you can set them off.

Slimes are simple-minded and easy to hit, as are all Constructs except Mecha Knights. If you see Mecha Knights, you'll have a hell of a time hurting them because they will block your gunfire and resist your sword swings. Try to get your teammates to handle them for you-- though in the final wave of a battle arena, this might not be an option. You can, at least, stall them for your teammates (Mecha Knights can't move or attack while they're stuck in their blocking animation). Or you can help whittle away at them with your sword anyway (the third combo hit can make some foes stagger-- if it staggers the Mecha Knights, you're still helping the team.)

A gun works perfectly fine against Mecha Knights. Triggering a shield gives you time to do other stuff like run away or charge an attack. It takes a while before they can shield again. If you have the timing down, you can fire shots while the shield is up and they will hit the Mecha Knight when it drops its shield.

Cutter line is fine if you realize you're most likely not going to get the full swing combo in. 2-3 swings then shield bump/block/dodge whatever attack is coming, then 2-3 swings and repeat. The charge is weak and leaves you too vulnerable for too long - I never use it. A big plus to cutter is that there's almost no delay after a swing - you can shield/dodge instantly between almost any swing (the final one has a slight delay, but much less than a heavier sword). When you learn monster patterns, you learn to weave around them, and the cutter line can work just fine.

i have a lvl10 WHB + 5 other 5star lvl10 swords... there is no such thing as 'no going back', you play this game long enough and you'll end up having all the swords/shields/guns... you coulda made a BTB and it would suck against slimes/constructs, a Levi that sends monsters flying into teammates, a DA that becomes dangerous when used NOT as a ranged weapons, ect. ect. ect...

you cannot survive on one sword in this game

"A gun works perfectly fine against Mecha Knights. Triggering a shield gives you time to do other stuff like run away or charge an attack. It takes a while before they can shield again. If you have the timing down, you can fire shots while the shield is up and they will hit the Mecha Knight when it drops its shield."

Most guns can do this, but not the Catalyzer. We are talking about using the Catlyzer. Its effectiveness is dependent on your ability to stack charged shots quickly onto one target, which is not possible if the Mecha Knight blocks every other shot (At best you're shooting Shieldbait shot, Charged shot, Shieldbait shot, Charged shot). Plus, a blocking Mechaknight will lag behind the others, meaning you will not be able to stack your charged shots onto the same guy when his allies march past him and into your line of fire.

At that point, your options are either using the weaksauce normal shots... or just using your sword, resistances be damned. Either it takes four times as long to kill them with your sword, or it takes a WHOLE LOT LONGER than that with the Catalyzer.

"get SOME use out of your cutter recipes."

Don't do that. That's the Sunk-Cost Fallacy all over again.

The cutter lines excel against fiends in regular use. Otherwise, it is mostly a bomber/gunner's sword. I use a Dread Venom Striker because I'm a bomber, it hits things quickly,

Using a cutter in other situations requires a bit of change in your gameplay. Start your combo when you are 4-6 squares away from the enemy. This will make it so that when you actually approach the enemy, you can quickly execute your final strike that causes knockdown. Then, you start up a full combo, and knock down the enemy again if it's still alive. The cutter can induce knockdown on enemies that usually attack back before sword swings finish, like Gremlins.

Using the cutter requires a change in mindset. Most swords drastically slow your speed, except for Flourish-type weapons, so you may need to learn when you can approach an enemy, then slash the other way when they attack, then come back for the knockdown. Cutter is one of the only swords which can be easily used without using shield at all, if you want to have a bit of fun.

Any of the Flourish type swords deal with Greavers much, much better though. Fiends are weak to piercing damage, after all. As are Beasts, which makes the Hunting Blade somewhat redundant.

Basically, the only safe way to use a Cutter in most situations is to swing 2-3 times and shield. In that time, you can swing 1 or 2 hits of a regular 3-swing sword for equivalent or better damage. 1 Heavy sword swing beats all the other safe options, and hits a much wider arc to boot. The medium and heavy blades also come with special damage types. Until there's a Cutter-like variant that deals part or all Piercing, Elemental or Shadow damage, then it will always (always, always, always) be a sub-optimal choice.

Actually, I that suggests a very simple fix that might not only make the Cutter an effective weapon, but perhaps an actually desirable one:

We have Swords that do Normal/Elemental and Normal/Shadow damage, but if you want a Piercing sword your only options are pure Piercing damage. Perhaps the Cutter line, or at least the Hunting Blade branch should do Normal/Piercing damage instead of having a UV-like bonus? It'd better fulfill it's original purpose as a good weapon to use on Beasts, be additionally effective on Fiends as well, and have the additional bonus of getting half-decent damage on targets that resist Piercing in much the same way you can still effectively use Brandishs and Sealed Swords on targets that resist your chosen variety of special damage.