New World Spear Guide

Introduction

Welcome to our New World Spear Guide! For more on Spear’s Mastery Tree, Recommended Roles and more continue reading.

General information

The spear is a Two-handed weapon that deals thrust damage.  Its damage scales off Dexterity primarily and has a secondary stat of strength.   The skill trees of the spear have a strong selection of both Crowd control and debuff abilities.  The spear also boasts the longest range of all melee weapons, giving some advantage in close-range combat. 

For a complete list of changes for the Spear, you can check out our Spear change log.

Spear Mastery Trees

The Spears Mastery Tree is broken down into two skill trees, the Zoner and the Impaler

Zoner Mastery Tree

The active abilities in the Zoner tree all have built-in CC and are centered around range and zone control.

Cyclone is an AOE ability that deals 130% weapon damage, knocks back targets in the area, and applies a 3-second slow.  Once Cyclone is fully upgraded, it gains grit and the ability to regain 25 stamina for each target hit.  This pairs well with the key passive in the tree, Reserved Strength

The second passive ability is Javelin, a ranged projectile ability that staggers your target and deals 125% weapon damage.  When upgraded, Javelin also knocks down your target and can reduce its own cooldown by 50% if you land a headshot.  The final upgrade to Javelin increases the damage dealt by 2.5% by every Meter the projectile travels, up to 100%.  

Sweep is an AOE ability that knocks down all targets in the area and deals 75% weapon damage.  When upgraded, Sweep gains grit and a combo finisher called Coup de Grace that deals an extra 125% if activated.  

Passives

Most of the passives in the Zoner Tree are centered around stamina preservation and improving your heavy attack. Deadly Consistency gives 10% increased damage on consecutive heavy attacks on the same target.  Refreshing Reach reduces all spear cooldowns by 15%. Defensive Stance grants 15% fortify for 2 seconds with a successful heavy attack.  One of the most potent passives is Merciless Strength, which deals 25% more damage to knocked-down targets. Strong Conditioning and Invigorating Crits help you keep your stamina pool full to more consistently take advantage of Reserved Strength.  

Key Passive

The key passive in the Zoner Tree is Reserved Strength.  Reserved Strength grants 25% increased damage as long as your stamina bar is full.

Impaler Mastery Tree

The active abilities in the Impaler Tree are centered around applying DOTs and debuffs to your target.   

Perforate deals three quick attacks at 80% weapon damage and applies rend decreasing your targets ability to mitigate damage by 5% for 10 seconds.  The first upgrade to Perforate is Rupturing Strikes which increases the rend debuff applied to your enemy by 10% for each strike of perforate landed as long as the target is above 50% health.  The final staggers your target if you land all three hits.  

The next ability is Skewer allows you to rush forward dealing 125% weapon damage and applies a bleed that deals 20% weapon damage every one second for 10 seconds.  When upgraded, Skewer deals 20% increased damage against targets with full health and grants empower on critical hits increasing damage by 20% for 10 seconds. The bleed time also increases to 15 seconds from 10.   

The final ability is Vault kick which will “vault” you forward, dealing 75% of weapon damage and applying a stun for 1.5 seconds.   When upgraded, Vault Kick can reduce the cooldown of your other spear abilities by 30% and grant you empower, increasing your damage by 20% for five seconds as long as you land Vault Kick on an enemy below 50%.  It is also worth noting that Vault Kick is a taunt gem compatible skill.  

Passives

The passives in the Impaler Tree scale tree are centered around increased benefits from attacking enemies with debuffs and improving your light attack.  Refreshing Jabs decreases cooldowns for all spear abilities by 10% when you land the second attack in the spear’s light attack chain. Crippling Jabs applies a 30% slow on the last hit of your light attack chain to targets below 30% health.  Precise Jabs increase your crit chance in light attacks by 5%.  Exposed Wounds increase your Crit chance by 15% against targets with bleed applied to them.  Exacerbating Crits can help you take advantage of the increased crit chance as it extends the duration of all spear tree debuffs by 2 seconds on a critical strike.  

Two passives in the skill tree stand alone but can greatly increase your DPS in certain situations.  Finishing Blows increase your damage by 15% against enemies with 30% health.  Unerring Precision gives you 20% increased damage against targets with active grit.  

Key Passive

The key passive in the Impaler Tree is Exploit Weakness which increases your damage by 10% per each debuff on an enemy up to 30%.   In group play, there will be no problem keeping Exploit Weakness at most stacks since most weapons have at least one debuff that they can apply to a target within their standard rotation.

Spear Recommended Roles & Abilities

The spear is primarily a DPS weapon and comes with one of the best DPS-oriented key passive ability in New World called Exploit Weakness. It also has a solid role in group play with Perforate that applies a 30% rend to targets and is relatively easy to keep active.   The spear also excels in PVP with its access to several CC abilities with good cooldown reduction. 

DPS

Active Abilities

• Skewer
• Perforate 
• Vault Kick

Passive Skills

• Precise Jabs
• Exacerbating Crits
• Exposed wounds 
• Finishing Blow
• Refreshing Jabs
• Aggressive Maneuvers 

Key Passive 

• Exploit Weakness

As DPS, your rotation is focused on keeping rend and 3 stacks of bleed on your target at all times.  Between Skewer and Vault kick, you should be able to keep empower on yourself at all times as well.  Distance and positioning are also important with Deadly Reach, which increases your crit chance by 10% against targets that are 3 meters away. Exposed Wounds also increases your crit chance by 15% against bleeding enemies.  Since the Spear comes with a built-in 5% crit chance, you should have no problem keeping your crit chance around 30% on your target at all times. This should allow you to proc Exacerbating Crits on your target, which extends spear-based debuffs on targets by 2 seconds.   Refreshing Jabs and Precise Jabs will help your light attacks simultaneously re-apply your buffs and reduce the cooldown of your next ability. 

Perforate is an extremely powerful group ability that will make every group have at least one spear user.   An important thing to remember is to reapply rend before the target drops below 50% health to get the full 30% rend, as it drops to 15% if applied on targets below 50% 

PVP

Active Abilities

• Perforate
• Vault Kick
• Skewer (or Sweep)

Passive Abilities

• Crippling Jabs
• Aggressive Maneuvers
• Unerring Precision
• Exacerbating Crits
• Exposed Wounds
• Finishing Blow
• Refreshing Jabs

Key Passive 

• Exploit Weakness

The name of the game in Spear PVP is Crowd Control.  Vault Kick and Perforate should be used to keep your target reeling and weakened to incoming damage.  Vault Kick also greatly reduces the cooldown of your other abilities, making it easier to chain attacks and maintain CC.  The only thing that should prevent you from doing this is if your enemy has active grit.   With Unerring Precision, your enemy’s greatest strength against you will become a weakness as it allows you to deal 20% more damage to targets with active Grit.  

The third active ability for PVP should be Skewer or Sweep.   If you’re having increased difficulty keeping your target stun/staggered, Sweep can make it easier to keep your opponent under the influence of CC.   By choosing Sweep,  you lose access to a significant amount of damage.  Skewer deals decent damage on its own and allows you to keep 3 stacks of bleed on a target and helps the user stay empowered.  If you don’t choose Skewer, you also lose out on Exposed Wounds, which increase your crit chance on bleeding targets by 15%.   

Exploit Weakness is the key passive of choice because of Reserved Strengths stamina dependency.  You will almost certainly be blocking or dodging in PVP with a melee weapon, often losing the benefit of Reserved Strength on counter attacks.

Recommended Weapon Pairings with the Spear

The Spear scales off of Dexterity, so pairing the Spear with another weapon that scales off Dexterity is recommended.  

• Bow – The bow scales off of Dexterity, making this a great ranged choice to pair with the Spear. With this combination you can kite enemies well while shooting them with the bow, and if they get in range you will have your spear to punish them. 
• Rapier – The rapier scales primarily off of Dexterity and secondarily off of Intelligence, making this a good pairing with the spear because both weapons will benefit from pushing your attributes points into the Dexterity attribute. The rapier does very high single target damage, and can provide you with some mobility while using the spear.
• Sword and Shield – The sword scales solely from strength, making this a great pairing with the Spear. This will add a set of taunt abilities as well as either blocking defense or AOE damage depending which tree you go down.
• War Hammer – The war hammer scales solely off of strength making this a great pairing with the Spear. The war hammer is also a strong pairing with the Spear when tanking in New World due to the amount of crowd control and taunts that it provides.
• Great Axe – The great axe scales solely from strength, making this a good pairing with the spear. The great axe deals quite a lot of damage, and provides some mobility that the spear is lacking. The great axe also provides you with additional movement speed with the Blood Lust passive making this a great choice to track down enemies, Gravity Well them, knock them down with your spear, and finish them off. 

You can reference our builds section for specific Spear pairings and builds that other players in the community are using. 

How to Level the Spear in New World

As with all weapons, AoE is your friend when it comes to getting those quick levels. Sweep will be your main AoE ability followed up with Cyclone. The problem with Cyclone however, is that will knock back pushing monsters out of AoE. Ideally you would only use Cyclone while doing the AoE grind solo. While with a party you will want to use Sweep and then use your light attack. For locations check out our Weapon Leveling Location guide. 

Spear Perks

Every Weapon Ability in New World has a corresponding Perk that can be found on armor and weapons. Most of the perks scale in power with the Gear Score of the item they are on. It’s important to note that you can only benefit from one instance of a weapon ability perk at a time. You can obtain the weapon perks randomly from drops or you can craft gear with the specific perk on it. You can enhance your chance at obtaining a specific perk by utilizing mods. Additionally you can enhance your chance at obtaining your perk with the right stats by using the timeless shards.

It is recommended that you apply the specific weapon perks to your armor because these perks can be applied to either the weapon the perks pertain to or any piece of armor. There are other perks, such as, enchanted and vicious that can only be applied to weapons. So, your perk slots for your weapons should be reserved for the perks that can only be applied to weapons. 

The Ability perks for the Spear in New World are as follows:

| Ability Perk Name    | Crafting Mod Item                 |
| Enfeebling Skewer    | Reinforced Starmetal Spear Charm  |
| Fortifying Perforate | Reinforced Steel Spear Charm      |
| Keen Vault Kick      | Reinforced Orichalcum Spear Charm |
| Bleeding Sweep       | Steel Spear Charm                 |
| Sundering Javelin    | Starmetal Spear Charm             |
| Leeching Cyclone     | Orichalcum Spear Charm            |

Recommended Spear Gems

The type of gem you  will want to slot into your Spear is heavily dependent upon your build and what you’re trying to accomplish. If you are running as a DPS you might prefer a gem for damage to those thrust is weak against. This will depend on what your second weapon is, for example you wouldn’t take a Ruby if you are using a fire staff as secondary. (You can check our quick reference guide for gems for a full list of gems and their effects).  

The Opal is a universally recommended choice due to the uptime of the damage increase you’ll receive.

Enemy types the Spear is strong/weak against

With a Spear the damage type you will be dealing is Thrust. Our Damage Type vs Mob Types Quick Chart guide as a complete breakdown for every weapon.  Corrupted and Beasts will be the monsters most affected by this and is ideal to use against them. Angry Earth and The Lost are resistant to Thrust. 

• Corrupted : Takes 20% MORE damage from Thrust attacks
• Beast : Takes 20% MORE damage from Thrust attacks
• Angry Earth:  Takes 15% LESS damage from Thrust attacks
• The Lost:  Takes 15% LESS damage from Thrust attacks

New World Spear Guide Conclusion

That Concludes our New World Spear Guide. For more on where to level your Spear, check out our Weapon Leveling Locations.