New World Rapier Build 2024 - PvE & PvP

In this New World Rapier Build 2024 & Weapon Guide, we’ll be talking about the Rapier in both PvE and PvP. It scales with both dexterity and intelligence, though dexterity has a bigger impact. You can build around either stat, but the Rapier has a high skill floor, so if you master it, you can really excel, especially in PvP.

New World Aeternum Bow Build Information

Scaling Stats: Dexterity (90%), Intelligence (65%)
Damage Type: Thrust
Light Attack: 100%
Light Middle Swipes: 66%
Heavy Attack: 133%
Taunt Gem Compatible: Yes
Best Dexterity Weapon Pairings: Musket, Spear, Bow
Best Intelligence Weapon Pairings: Ice Gauntlet, Fire Staff

New World Rapier Build 2024 – Overview and Strategy

To start this New World Rapier Build 2024; the Rapier in New World: Aeternum performs a four-hit combo that consists of a thrust, followed by two slashes, and another thrust. All these attacks deal thrust damage, even though the middle ones might look like slashes. Nearly every attack from this weapon class deals thrust damage, but Flourish and Finish and Tondo deal slash damage. Mastering this combo is a key part of playing a Rapier build because the two middle hits have very short range, almost like the Hatchet, so you need to be right up close to land all the hits. Hitting these attacks is important, as some passives boost their damage, while others reduce cooldowns when you land them.

Positioning and timing your combo between abilities is crucial for success with the Rapier. Ideally, you want to use an ability, pull off the combo, then repeat the pattern. You can break out of the combo in a pinch if things go wrong with other abilities, and you should. A big part of Rapier gameplay is reactive—learning when to stay in the fight and when to reposition while keeping up your combos is key to mastering this weapon.

New World Aeternum Rapier Pros:

High Single-Target Damage
High mobility and evasion
Good debuffs
Excellent for 1v1 PvPs

New World Aeternum Rapier Cons:

Very limited AoE skills
Glass cannon
Small hitboxes
Requires high skill to use properly

Rapier Build Blood Skill Tree

Looking at the Blood skill tree first in this New World Rapier Build 2024, it’s all about bleeds—applying bleed damage, consuming bleeds for instant damage, and extending bleeds. This weapon works well if you like damage over time, especially against tough enemies like bosses, elites, or even other players.

Flurry

The first ability here is Flurry. It is a rapid, five-hit ability that deals more damage than normal attacks. It hits quickly but is a longer channel ability. You can cancel it anytime by dodging or using another ability so chaining combos with it gets easy. It also grants you grit while executing the ability, making you unstaggerable. Progressing this skill line allows you to reduce its cooldown when you successfully land hits, inflict bleed on enemies, and extend the debuff’s duration.

Flourish and Finish

Next is Flourish and Finish, an interesting ability that starts with a quick horizontal slash called Flourish with a larger hitbox, knocking enemies back. Then, you can quickly follow up by a lunging attack called Finish, which consumes any active bleeds to deal significant thrust damage. The more bleeds you have on the target, the more damage it does, making it a powerful ability when timed right. The capstone increases the damage from the consumed bleeds, further boosting its power. Use this after you’ve stacked one or two bleeds. Progressing this skill line grants you grit which makes you unstaggerable, replenishing your stamina by 20 if you land a successful hit, and reducing this skill’s cooldown by 3.5% for each tick of Tondo’s bleed damage. This means ideally you’d use this skill before Tondo.

Tondo

Tondo is an ability where you make a slash dealing Slash Damage that reaches 5m and applies a bleed debuff to anything in front of you. It deals both initial damage and damage over time, and has a pretty generous hitbox, making it easy to land. Unlike most Rapier abilities that are more thrust-focused with narrow hitboxes, Tondo is straightforward and reliable. It’s great to open with, setting up the bleed early on. Its bleed debuff is also unique in that it deals 10% of your weapon damage for 10s. It can also stack thrice, which resets the 10s duration of the debuff. Progressing this skill line allows you to reduce its cooldown and increase its attack potency.

The capstone for this skill tree, Bloody End, boosts the attack potency of Finish by consuming the stacks of bleed inflicted on enemies. It doesn’t seem to affect the other skills, making Momentum a much better option.

Rapier Build Grace Skill Tree

Moving on to the Grace skill tree in this New World Rapier Build 2024, this one is all about skilled gameplay. It features a counterattack, a dodge, and a mobility ability that deals good damage, works for closing gaps, and can help escape from enemies.

Fleche

First is Fleche, a fantastic mobility ability that shines in PvP. It works as a great gap closer to catch up to enemies or escape if you’re being overwhelmed. Progressing this skill line, lets you reduce the skill’s cooldown by 80% by finishing a target with Fleche, allowing you to use it again after just a few seconds. This makes it an excellent finisher in both PvE and PvP. Fleche also has a wide hitbox, so you can dash through multiple weakened enemies, kill them, and reset the cooldown. It’s versatile and powerful, allowing you to use it repeatedly in quick succession if timed right.

Evade

Next is Evade, which is one of the best abilities in this tree. It lets you dodge in any direction with a very short cooldown, and it doesn’t consume stamina. Paired with a light build, you can dodge, use Evade, then dodge again, making you incredibly hard to hit. As you upgrade it, your light attacks reduce the cooldown further, so you can use it even more often. A skilled player can use this to become nearly untouchable. The trick to mastering Evade is remapping your keys. Mapping it to a button you can easily access makes it much easier to dodge while maintaining movement. Progressing this skill line allows you to reduce its cooldown with light attacks and grants you haste if you successfully evade an attack using this skill.

Riposte

The last one is Riposte, which is highly skill-based because it requires you to anticipate enemy attacks. This can be tricky if you’re unfamiliar with your opponents’ attack patterns, especially in PvP against a smart player. Riposte allows you to enter a defensive stance for 1s to block an attack and then stun the attacker with a counter. Once upgraded, it also grants a brief window of invulnerability and reduces the cooldowns of your other abilities. It’s easier to pull off against early-game enemies since they tend to be aggressive, but using it effectively against experienced players takes practice. Newer players might spam attacks, making it easier to counter, while more skilled players will be harder to predict. Learning when to use Riposte is key. Progressing this skill line grants you empower and reduces your other Rapier ability’s cooldowns when successfully counterattacking.

The capstone for this skill tree, Momentum, grants you a 30% increase in damage to your light or heavy attack after you use a Rapier ability for 3s. In my opinion, this is good if you don’t plan on using Flourish and Finish.

New World Rapier Builds 2024

Solo PvE Rapier Build – New World Aeternum

Group PvE Rapier Build – New World Aeternum

Solo & Group PvP Rapier Build – New World Aeternum

New World Aeternum Hatchet Build – Weapons & Armor

New World: Aeternum Rapier Builds pairs well with any other dexterity-scaling weapon or even an intelligence-based weapon. A popular PvP combo is the Ice Gauntlet and Rapier, which provides AOE and crowd control (CC) from the Ice Gauntlet combined with the Rapier’s strong mobility. The Rapier excels at quick movement and dodging, but its biggest drawback is its very short range. You need to get close to deal damage, and if your opponent has good mobility, it can be tough to land hits.

Other solid pairings for the Rapier include the Musket or Spear. The Spear can help cover the Rapier’s range weakness, allowing you to fight at a distance until the enemy closes in. Once they get close, you can switch to the Rapier for close-range combat, using abilities like Evade to dodge around. You can then swap back to the Spear if the enemy tries to keep their distance again. Alternatively, you could use a ranged weapon to soften up targets before closing in with Fleche for melee combat.

While you can pair the Rapier with various weapons, you’ll mostly want to stick to dexterity or intelligence builds. As mentioned, the Ice Gauntlet is a great choice in PvP due to abilities like Entombed, which provides protection, and Ice Storm, an AOE attack. The common strategy is to throw down Ice Storm, protect yourself with Entombed if outnumbered, then pop out and use the Rapier to dash through enemies with Fleche, landing quick hits, and finish them off. This cycle of freezing and dashing works very well in PvP.

As for the armor, using the Rapier with Light Armor maximizes your mobility and grants you a 15% damage boost as a bonus, making you nimble and painful at the same time.

That wraps up our Rapier weapon guide. We’ve got more weapon guides including Musket, Spear, Bow, and Hatchet on the way, so keep an eye out for those If you have any questions about the weapons or the game, feel free to check out the wiki. What weapons are you planning to use at the New World launch? What build are you going for? Let us know in the comments!