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. 

Spear Mastery Trees

The Spear 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

Cyclone is an AOE ability that deals 165% weapon damage, knocks back targets in the area, has grit, and applies a 3-second slow. Once Cyclone is fully upgraded, it gains the ability to regain 25 stamina for each target hit and pushes back enemies. This pairs well with the key passive in the tree, Reserved Strength

Javelin

The second passive ability is Javelin, a ranged projectile ability that staggers your target and deals 80% 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

Sweep is an AOE ability that knocks down all targets in the area and deals 45% weapon damage. When upgraded, Sweep gains grit and a combo finisher called Coup de Grace. It deals an extra 150% weapon damage in the form of a heavy attack if activated.  

Passives

Reserved Strength is the Key passive in the Zoner Tree. This grants you 25% increased damage if your stamina is full. This passive goes against the Spears’s strengths in stamina regen and dodging to increase damage. Reserved Strength is typically not recommended for these reasons.

The rest of the passives in the Zoner Tree are centered around stamina preservation and improving your heavy attack. 

Impaler Mastery Tree

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

Perforate  

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. Finally, the last upgrade also allows Perforate to apply weaken decreasing your targets damage output by 10% for 5 seconds, stacking up to 3 times.

Skewer

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.   

Vault Kick

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 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.

The rest of the passives in the Impaler Tree scale tree are centered around increased benefits from attacking enemies with debuffs and improving your light attack.  

Spear Recommended Roles & Pairings

The spear is an excellent choice for both DPS in PvE and PvP play. 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 & Shield – The sword and shield scales primarily off of strength and secondarily off of dexterity. Pairing this with the shield can give you a ton of mobility and crowd control options, as well as, deal a ton of damage to your opponent.

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

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

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

Weapon Ability PerkDescriptionArmorWeaponCrafting Mods
Bleeding SweepSweep’s Coup De Grace now applies Bleed for X% of weapon damage for 8s.14%28%Steel Spear Charm
Sundering JavelinJavelin inflicts Rend to targets above 50% Health, reducing the target’s armor by X% for 10s.21%40%Starmetal Spear Charm
Leeching CycloneCyclone hits heal you for 65% of weapon damage (Max 3 targets).35%65%Orichalcum Spear Charm
Fortifying PerforatePerforate hits gain a stack of Fortify, increasing your armor by X% for 6s (Max 3 Stacks).10%25%Reinforced Steel Spear Charm
Enfeebling SkewerSkewer hits apply Weaken, reducing the target’s damage by X% for 8s.27%47%Reinforced Starmetal Spear Charm
Keen Vault KickVault Kick increases critical chance by X% for 7s.22%38%Reinforced 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. It’s also going to vary based on PvP vs PvE activities. You can check our quick reference guide for gems for a full list of gems and their effects.  

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.

  • Corrupted : Takes 20% MORE damage from Thrust attacks
  • Beast : Takes 20% MORE 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.