New World Aeternum
Weapon Tier List
Updated 8.10.2024
Introduction
As you probably already know, there are no Classes in New World. Instead, each weapon type offers a different set of active and passive abilities that can be unlocked through gaining experience with the said weapon type. Also, each New World Weapon has its abilities split into two Weapon Mastery trees that offer different playstyles. Moreover, you can have two different weapons equipped and switch between them at will. All of the above results in almost unparalleled levels of freedom when it comes to building the fighting style of your character in New World: Aeternum. Despite this level of customization, there is a rather large disparity between weapons and their viability in combat, even if we consider what is "optimal" for each of them. This is why we have decided to share our years of experience with you, and what's a better way of sharing experiences than a Tier List? We will be considering both PvE and PvP to give you a comprehensive image of each weapon you can pick from in New World: Aethernum.
New World Weapon Ranking
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Fire Staff - This is the most versatile wepon in the game that excels in burst damage, has tons of AoE potential, leaves nasty DoTs, and offers escape or gap closing skill. Depending on your weapon tree it can excel in ranged or melee damage. If you want weapon for all types of content Fire staff it is. Inferno artifact is a powerhouse if you want to pick fights within 15m. Being an Intelligence-based weapon your base damage is insanely high, adding empowers form the weapon tree and Rune of Helios ultimate your damage is top notch.
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Sword and Shield - First of all it is the best tanking weapon in the game no question asked. With how much it sticks to your target, mobility and crowd control your skillset may offer, S&S is used in any weight class and mode. From Light Assasin builds to heavy CC disruptors in PVP. Using a shield you can block 100% of incoming damage costing you less stamina than dodging. Great passives that increase your armor at all times, empowers and rends there is a lot of customization to be done to fit your needs. Both ultimates are strong buffs for your teammates buffing either their damage or survivability.
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Life Staff - Due to the fact that there is simply no better weapon in the game in terms of healing we have to give this spot to Life Staff. Most of PvE activities enter another level when your group has a Life Staff healer, same goes to PvP. Sadly there is no good LS artifact so far but perks like Fortifying Sacred Ground and Refreshing Divine Embrace become so strong when used on the weapon, this decision already defines your playstyle.
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The A Tier
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Rapier - The weapon tree offers great possibilities both for offensive and defensive uses. Stacking bleeds and even detonating them with Bloody End passive is a DPS that is respected both in PvE and PvP. The same goes for amazing artifact The Finisher great passive that works on both weapons. Right tree defensives are unique in the game like Evade and Riposte you are becoming so hard to get grip of in PvP giving you great outplay potential. Combining both when you consequently stacking bleeds on an enemy and avoid damage with those right tree skills your enemy won't notice when his health bar disappeared while he tries to hit you.
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Spear - Stacking debuffs and using Crowd Control while you actively reduce your cooldowns is name of the game while using Spear. Great passives that help you with stamina management to stay within close range to escaping target. However, it suffer's from lack of gap-closing mechanic. It can be somewhat fixed by Skorpio which is an artifact that changes your Javeling ability so it pulls enemy hit like its name would suggest.
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Great Axe - The most known and liked weapon amongst the New World's community. For all those who enjoy Whirlwind, a spin-to-win type of gameplay that's also the way to go. Great Axe is a bigger brother of Hatchet focussed more towards groups of enemies, AoE damage and withstanding within big packs of enemies. Pulling enemies with Gravity well, then wiping them with Maelstorm and Detonate rune is the most iconic combo in this game. Sadly one of the balance changes coming with Aeternum will mostly hit GA's main way for building stacks for the right ultimate. Light attacks will be stripped of grit due to those changes which will be more than noticeable. Both Great Axe artifacts are great; The Abyss and Tempest Fury. The first one changes damage scaling from Strenght to Intelligence which opens doors to combining GA with all elemental weapons like Fire Staff. The second one is the epitome of Whirlwind gameplay as it solely focuses on this skill and brings tons of fun. The left tree ultimate will look way prettier now, and not only for small-scale builds.
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Greatsword - Who would not like to smack enemies with biggest blade in the game. That is enough of a reason to play this weapon for some players. However there is lot more to it than you would notice on first look. Being one of newer weapons in the game it brings unique stances system, letting you choose between agression and defence to your liking. Path of Onslaught brings huge damage, faster heavy attacks, empowers, crits and cooldown reduction for the cost of less defences. While Path of Defiance brings you more resistances, fortification, crowdcontrol, Guard Point which is blocking incoming damage while you charge your slow heavy attacks but most importantly uninterruptible status. Why is that? It is now only way to achieve what 300 constitution used to grant you. |
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Musket - Being hit from far away, with a nasty DoT, getting slowed by the same shot to be followed by more, while you try to crawl behind some cover. This is a scenario we all have been a part of in OPR matches. Great range, penetrating targets which allows it to hit multiple enemies with each shot. Insta reload with dodge once every 6s, haste on every dodge, stagger and crowd control. There is plenty to choose from to make your enemy suffer. Aim-lock mechanic coming with Aeternum will eliminate the need to aim your shots which was most likely what this weapon was balanced around and that sounds scary. The artifact is quite specific and is not seen often.
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The B Tier
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Hatchet - Weapon with great design, combining berserking and throwing hatchets fantasies that you can merge to have a weapon that is so potent both on melee and range. In PvE it is mostly straight up in the face dps machine with Defy Death ultimate you can build a glass cannon and still be able to get out from sticky situations which no other weapon offers. On the PvP side delay and netcode New World offered so far take a lot from this enjoyment as you will find yourself missing your target on point-blank range with melee attacks which destroys this fun. There are two great artifacts; Sin and Freya's Francisca. The first one is straight up doubling down on what hatchet tree offers and the second one is making a new mechanic that allows you to shorten, for example, Berserk cooldown with a throw to never stop running in the fun mode.
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Ice Gauntlet - Is sort of an unappreciated sibling of Fire Staff. It is not as versatile, as it lacks direct distance closer. However, it is the CC machine, which FS lacks vastly. Unique to IG elemental damage with almost every skill offering some kind of CC. First of all Ice Shower which has a unique type of crowd control, then other slows, roots, push backs and staggers. It allows you to hold your enemy in place and pour snowflakes on his head till he won't enjoy winter anymore. We would say it is more used in PvP than PvE, as it is mainly used for Ice Pylon in PvE. Deep Freeze is the second best option for off-hand damage increase and you can really surprise enemies with the amounts of damage you can lay on them when you learn how to keep debuff on them.
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Blunderbuss - One of the biggest burst damage in the game, works amazing as an off-hand weapon, especially with Pestilence artifact, it is a disease and damage powerhouse. Reloading every 2 shots can be a bit offputting, you definitely need to get used to its rhythm when used as main weapon. Still, it offers much despite damage nerf from light BB/IG meta days. You will find soon enough if it is your cup of tea when you try it. New auto-aim system may make this the most oppressive slow and debuff weapon in the game when all your shots will hit which is scary to think of. |
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The C Tier
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Warhammer - This hard-hitting two-handed weapon isn't looking that good anymore, as players learned its animations and due to how slow it is, dodging or escaping from its skills and attacks is not a challenge for most players. It is useful to debuff and CC clumps of monsters on dungeons as a tank, being able to refresh your skills and reapply taunt. Using it to debuff and stagger players on point in OPR is also fine however fighting with a swift assassin you will end up outmaneuvered and beaten. Spark of Mjölnir artifact offers just damage type change and the newest addition coming in New World: Aeternum, Trsna buff depending on hitting knocked down enemies seems such a narrow window to use it is disappointing. The only saving factor we can think of is the fact that most skills and heavy attacks have built-in Grit, which won't be so common status after changes to constitution threshold bonuses.
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Void Gauntlet - Looking at a weapon that is made for supporting and buffing it doesn't come so simple to spot where you benefit from it. Looking at Void Gauntlet as a main weapon we can see that it is not top of this tier list as straight burst damage is not what it can offer. Even talking about some Void Blade builds, it is rather out sustaining and stripping the enemy from his empowers and fortifying, debuffing with rend and that may let you change the rules of the fight so much you will end up victorious. Buffs to Void Blade with Aeternum toggle that exact thing, letting you choose when to use your Voidblade reducing its mana cost to basically nothing and its cooldown by 60%. It will nullify your downtime window which was a huge disadvantage previous to this change. Lifetaker which is the only artifact we have is doubling down on supporting nature of the weapon and it's the best offensive second for musket and sometimes bow players. |
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Bow - The performance of a bow is so dependent on the user it is immensely hard to place it in comparison to other weapons. A new aim lock mechanic may reduce the aiming part of the difficulty but there is still more to it. Boltcaster turns out to be an amazing artifact that enables bow players to build in true glass canon fashion and get a great single-target damage buff. We would leave it at saying it is a steep learning curve for playing bow however if you do learn how to play it there will be results that will put a smile on your face both PvE and especially PvP. Coming with Aeternum arrows will become a thing of the past and the bow will receive a 20% damage buff at all times instead. |
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The D Tier
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Flail - Unfortunately the newest weapon in New World isn't performing that well. It is hard to see the outright value of using it over anything else. Despite the fact, it has lots of buffs debuffs and CC(knockdown, slows, weaken, empower, life steal, fortify). Somehow it is still not enough to compete with straight damage of other weapons. Fighting in an arena or OPR it is hard to beat other players using Flail. However, if you look at the benefit your team is gaining from having a flail in a group it is huge overall, as its buffs are strong when you apply them to many players. Wars are the best spot for Flail, as you are buffing many people stacked on point. Especially with the new Flail artifact Power Stone, we are sure there will be use cases for it. |
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END NOTE
Remember that although we have tried to stay as neutral as possible when compiling this list, some biased opinions might still be involved. If your personal experience/opinion about certain New World Weapons varies from the one pictured on our list, don't hesitate to let us know. We will take another look into it and rethink our ranking, based on your suggestions.
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We are open to specific article and guide requests. If you have any ideas or suggestions please leave them in the comments below.
Pictures used in this article are the intellectual property of Amazon Games or their corresponding owners.
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