CB mains, any tips for someone who couldn’t get into Charge Blade in World/Iceborne?

I love the concept of CB, a defensive weapon that charges power to unleash the devastating attacks on time.

So in World i did what i always do when i try new weapons, i built a decent CB and popped up a good YouTube guide (in this case Arrekz) and started to run low and high rank monsters to get a feel for it, then go from there.

For reference, i main Gunlance in Wilds, IG in World and GS in Rise, but i have also used hammer, sns and longsword in world. For the life of me i can’t figure out how should the CB be used. You have a shield, but you never use it because your guard points (a random shield thrown out at the end of a combo) are better.

This means that i have to time those combos to the monster animations but with longer timing instead or pressing R2 to guard. Especially compared to my GL this was half the dealbreaker. Perfect Guarding with GL is insane in Wilds because you can also extend the window by quick reloading so it is more forgiving.

The rest of the dealbreaker was about phial and mode management, but to be honest my guess is that this clicks somehow given the time? Yes in general you go axe on openings and sword on normal, but you also have to keep sword and shield charged with phials and be ready for that opening. Isnt that too perfect to do each time? Isnt micromanaging insane? Or do you sacrifice some bits of all those (perfectl guarding/phial management/sword or axe mode) to enjoy it?

And i thought getting the three extracts for my IG was dumb.

CB mains, is the flow of the weapon better in Wilds? Is it worth a second try? What is your experience with it now?