New World Tank Build

Welcome to The Tank Club: New World Tank Build for PvE content

This is a Tank Build designed for completing PvE content in the New World MMO as a Tank.

There are many ways to Tank in New World with a variety of gear, weapon and ability options. In this guide you’ll find information on ways to get into content and begin doing the end game Mutations and learn about what Best in Slot gear to look out for.

Join The Tank Club Discord for all of your New World Tank help and discussion.
For more details on Tanking see our New World Tank Guide.

Contents

Is It Worth Playing in 2022? | New World

New World Tank Build Attributes

300 STR 200 CON

For your attributes, the best option is to use 300 STR or more, combined with 2o0 CON.

300 STR gives you Grit which is really important, it prevents you from getting knocked back so you can hold your positions much better while using Light and Heavy Attacks. You need to be using Light and Heavy Attacks a lot as a Tank because it’s basically impossible to permanently block as a Tank in New World, so to maintain your Stamina you need to drop block for large portions of time during combat.

Grit is also very valuable since the most essential perk on your Sword is Refreshing Move which reduces your ability cooldowns from Light and Heavy Attacks, so you’ll want to make use of that, and your other weapons benefit greatly from you doing regular Light and Heavy Attacks also.

Getting 200 CON is very useful as it unlocks increased resistances and provides you with more Max Health. Increasing CON past 200 doesn’t really offer a huge benefit, you’ll gain increased health, but the Attribute bonuses aren’t as useful as the grit you get from 300 STR.

If you want to play a safer option, then go with 300 CON and 200 STR but this will not be as effective.

New World Tank Build Weapons

Best PvE Tank Weapon Combinations:

  • Sword & Shield + War Hammer
  • Sword & Shield + Great Axe
  • Sword & Shield + Hatchet
  • Other Weapons: Greatsword, Ice Gauntlet

The Sword & Shield is quite essential for PvE Tanking. It offers too many benefits to you as a Tank which assist you in damage reductions and other things. If you take the Leadership route it’s also offering increased group damage passively.

The War Hammer is a great utility weapon. You have Rend and Weaken alongside Crowd Control. It’s really hard to drop this weapon as it has so many benefits for your group and it’s a high damage Tank weapon also.

Great Axe is something you can use to stack enemies and help your group to burn down enemies faster. Ideally you only use this in situations with a lot of enemies so you can bunch them up for your damage dealers.

Hatchets are used by Tanks to introduce additional methods of AoE Taunting and damage which leads to improved aggro and threat. You would often use this weapon choice for doing additional DPS where possible.

Greatsword is commonly asked about as a Tank weapon. I personally don’t feel like it’s good enough to replace the Sword & Shield and you cannot use it WITH the Sword & Shield because they are too similar, and you would end up losing way too much utility by not having a War Hammer or Great Axe. I use this mostly when completing overland content as it is a good Tank/DPS hybrid weapon.

Finally, the Ice Gauntlet is an option for DPS Tanking but not a really common option unless you’re in a really organised group and using Light Armor.

Sword & Shield

Main-hand Weapon

Gem:

  • Cut Pristine Carnelian
  • Runeglass of Energizing Carnelian

Weapon Perks:

  • Refreshing Move
  • Bane: Ancients, Angry Earth, Corrupted or Lost
  • Thwarting Stikes (300+ STR)
  • Enchanted (under 300 STR)
  • Lifestealing

Defensive Setup

NW Sword Shield Skills

Offensive Setup

Sword & Shield Offensive

Reverse Stab

A stab attack that deals 175% weapon damage and staggers your target.

Cooldown: 20 seconds

Shield Bash

Deals 50% weapon damage, staggering and stunning foes in front of you for 2s.

This ability has grit. (Grit prevents you from being staggered by incoming attacks.)

Taunt Gem Compatible: If you have a Carnelian gem equipped in your sword, this ability inflicts taunt for 6.0s to all enemies hit. (Taunt causes monsters to focus only on you.)

Cooldown: 25 seconds

Defender’s Resolve

For 8s, reduce the incoming base damage from attackers by 30%.

This ability has grit. (Grit prevents you from being staggered by incoming attacks.)

Taunt Gem Compatible: If you have a Carnelian gem equipped in your sword, this ability inflicts taunt for 8s taunt to all enemies within 8m. (Taunt causes monsters to focus only on you.)

Cooldown: 45 seconds

Sword and Shield is an excellent weapon choice for Tanking in New World and should be your main hand weapon of choice. You have access to two taunts plus a lot of defensive benefits. If you go with the Defensive option, you will benefit yourself more and that’s the best option when new to Tanking or doing content with random groups.

With the Offensive setup you are gaining the Leadership buff which is giving your group 10% increased damage which is the best option if you have a good group as you’ll passively buff group DPS.

The way you utilise these weapon abilities is by activating Defender’s Resolve for a taunt on all nearby enemies. You can then use Shield Bash after a few seconds delay to pick up taunt on any missed enemies, refresh your taunt timer or to knock back the enemy. Once you do that you then use Reverse Stab combined with the important Tactician passive will reduce all other sword cooldowns by 25% meaning your Defenders Resolve and Shield Bash should both become available to use again much quicker.

Generally, you should be Light Attack weaving with a Sword as you’ll benefit from the Refreshing Move perk and in edition, you’ll do more damage with Thwarting Strikes or Enchanted. Using an Energizing Runeglass Gem provides you with some Stamina gain every 3 seconds, but a normal Pristine Carnelian is also a great option.

You should aim to always have Refreshing Move on your Sword, using a Bane perk will give you a nice increase in damage and then Enchanted for under 300 STR and Thwarting Strikes for over 300 STR. Other good perks you can use if needed include Lifestealing which is nice for newer Tank especially.

Using Shield Rush instead of Shield Bash is also another option as it will generate more Threat and give you a really good when used with Fortifying Shield Rush perk.

Named Sword of Interest

Warhammer

Off-hand Weapon

Gem:

  • Cut Pristine Carnelian
  • Runeglass of Leeching Carnelian

Weapon Perks:

  • Bane: Ancients, Angry Earth, Corrupted or Lost
  • Trenchant Strikes
  • Sundering Shockwave (If you don’t have it on gear)
  • Keen, Vicious or Keenly Empowered
War Hammer

Armor Breaker

A powerful swing that penetrates 35% of the target’s armor and deals 140% weapon damage.

Cooldown: 12 seconds

Wrecking Ball

Strike the ground with your war hammer, dealing 130% weapon damage and knocking down your target.

This ability has grit. (Grit prevents you from being staggered by incoming attacks.)

Cooldown: 15 seconds

Shockwave

Slam your war hammer into the ground, causing a 3m radius earthquake that deals 80% weapon damage, staggering and stunning all impacted targets for 2s.

This ability has grit. (Grit prevents you from being staggered by incoming attacks.)

Taunt Gem Compatible: If you have a Carnelian gem equipped in your war hammer, this ability inflicts taunt for 6s to all enemies hit. (Taunt causes monsters to focus only on you.)

Cooldown: 20 seconds

If you have a group member using a Spear, then you won’t need to use the Armor Breaker ability because Rend will be covered so use Mighty Gavel instead.

Using a War Hammer for the Off Hand Weapon is extremely useful. You are able to provide a number of enemy debuffs which reduce the damage they do and increase the damage they receive combined with the crowd control you get from the War Hammer makes it an extremely useful Tank weapon which also does good DPS.

When using a War Hammer, you’ll have grit from your passives and Heavy Attacking provides you with a lot of benefits including reducing your cooldowns and doing additional damage and this is why using the Trenchant Strikes perk is really good.

Using a Leeching Runeglass Gem can be nice for some additional incoming healing once every 2 seconds, but a regular Cut Pristine Carnelian is also still very good.

As you go into combat make sure to use Shockwave soon after initiating combat as it will taunt and increase your threat on enemies along with staggering enemies and inflicting weaken. Heavy Attack in-between using abilities with your War Hammer. Cast Armor Breaker to apply Rend on the enemies and then Wrecking Ball is good to pin down enemies to stop them running off or to stop them hitting your group members.

Having a Bane perk is extremely useful for a War Hammer for the additional damage and Trenchant Strikes gives a lot of additional damage to Heavy Attacks which you should be doing since you have Grit active. If you don’t have any gear pieces with Sundering Shockwave, then use this perk on your War Hammer as you’ll gain AoE Rend when doing Shockwave making that ability even more powerful.

Named War Hammer of Interest

Great Axe

Off-hand Weapon

Gem:

  • Pristine Carnelian

Weapon Perks:

  • Bane: Ancients, Angry Earth, Corrupted or Lost
  • Thwarting Strikes
  • Any
GREAT AXE

Reap

Extend your axe 5m, pulling foes to you and dealing 70% weapon damage and staggering struck foes.

Taunt Gem Compatible: If you have a Carnelian gem equipped in your great axe, this ability inflicts taunt for 4s when it hits. (Taunt causes monsters to focus only on you.)

Cooldown: 18 seconds

Maelstrom

Perform a fast, spinning attack that pulls targets within a 2.5m radius closer to you. Deals 100% weapon damage.

Cooldown: 20 seconds

Gravity Well

An upward swing dealing 99% weapon damage and projecting a powerful tear in reality that creates a vortex up to 10m away. The vortex pulls foes within 4m to its centre and roots them for 1s. Foes within the vortex have their movement speed is reduced by 60% due to the intense gravity. The collapsing vortex ends after 3s with a damaging burst dealing 125% weapon damage.

Cooldown: 30 seconds

The Great Axe is fantastic when used in situations with multiple enemies, mostly add pulls. It offers huge amounts of crowd control to stack up enemies which allows your group to do a lot more AoE DPS.

Named Great Axe of Interest

Hatchet

Off-hand Weapon

Gem:

  • Pristine Carnelian

Weapon Perks:

  • Bane: Ancients, Angry Earth, Corrupted or Lost
  • Thwarting Strikes / Enchanted
  • Keenly Empowered
  • Refreshing Torrent
Hatchet

Berserk

Enter a berserk mode that increases all attack damage by 20% for 12s. (Cooldown for this ability will not start until the mode ends.)

Taunt Gem Compatible: If you have a Carnelian gem equipped in your hatchet, this ability inflicts taunt for 8s to all enemies within 8m. (Taunt causes monsters to focus only on you.)

Cooldown: 18 seconds

Raging Torrent

Perform 4 fast attacks, each dealing 90% weapon damage.

Cooldown: 15 seconds

Infected Throw

Leap into the air and throw a hatchet that deals 120% weapon damage.
This attack inflicts 30% disease and 10% weaken to your target for 10s.

(Disease reduces target’s incoming healing efficiency.)
(Weaken reduces target’s outgoing damage.)

Cooldown: 15 seconds

Named Hatchets of Interest

New World Tank Build Armor

For your gear you want to run Heavy Armor to achieve a Heavy Equip Load.
When you are experienced and have an organised group, using Light or Medium is also an option for advanced Tanking for score pushing.

The equipment perks you should use depend on what weapon you are using; you should try to utilise the best ones for each weapon type, and you only need one of each specific weapon perk since they don’t stack.

You are going to need more than one set of gear to be able to perform optimally as a Tank.
You need Ward gear which gives you reduced damage against a certain enemy type. You’ll need at least 4 sets of armor, each one with one of four Wards – Ancient Ward, Angry Earth Ward, Corrupted Ward and Lost Ward.

When it comes to Amulets, you’ll also need a few different options.
When you go into mutated Expeditions, they have certain damage bonuses to the enemy which you can build resistance against by using one of the following perks on your amulet: Flame, Frozen, Nature or Void Ward which reduce your incoming damage from those specific elements by a large amount.

Armor Perks

  • STR & CON – Use gear with either of those Attributes, you’ll just need to adjust Attributes/Food to accommodate the values you get from gear.
  • Ward – You always want a Ward perk on your gear, but it depends on content:
    • Angry Earth Ward – Genesis, Barnacles (Last Boss)
    • Ancient Ward – Lazarus, Starstone & Ennead (1st & Last Boss)
    • Corrupted Ward – Dynasty, Tempest, Depths & Ennead (After 1st/Before Last)
    • Lost Ward – Amrine & Barnacles (Before Last)
  • Refreshing – This is important to use, if possible, to reduce ability cooldowns.
  • When using a Sword and Shield use these perks:
    1. Accelerated Defender’s Resolve
    2. Diminishing Shield Bash
    3. Contagious Reverse Stab
  • When using a War Hammer use these perks:
    1. Sundering Shockwave (adds rend to this ability)
    2. Empowering Armor Breaker
    3. Penetrating Wrecking Ball
  • When using a Great Axe use these perks:
    1. Enfeebling Maelstrom (adds weaken to this ability)
    2. Insatiable Gravity Well
    3. Crippling Reap
  • Other useful gear perks: Elemental Aversion, Physical Aversion, Invigorated – not best in slot but still useful.
  • Sturdy Energy – Only use this on a gear piece if you don’t have this on your Shield.

Tank Gear of Interest

Check out these articles for good named Tank Gear you can use:

Armor Gems

  • General, overland & base Expedition – Cut Pristine Onyx
  • Mutated Expedition – You can use Opal gems as general cover for Mutations or Diamond/Malachite for a mixture of absorption, but this won’t be as strong as using the specific absorption type gems such as:
    • Amethyst vs Void Mutations
    • Amber vs Nature Mutations
    • Aquamarine vs Ice Mutations
    • Ruby vs Fire Mutations
  • Ideally, you’ll socket 3-4 of the specific element gems depending on which Mutation you’re doing.
  • Runeglass of Punishing Onyx – you can use this Runeglass with any gem, but it will provide additional DPS with each one increasing melee damage by 1%.

Tower Shield Perks

  • Sturdy – Essential perk on your shield
  • Refreshing – Really useful to have
  • Sturdy Energy – You can use this on your shield or one gear slot
  • Ward – You always want a Ward perk on your gear, but it depends on content:
    • Angry Earth Ward – Genesis, Barnacles (Last Boss)
    • Ancient Ward – Lazarus, Starstone & Ennead (1st & Last Boss)
    • Corrupted Ward – Dynasty, Tempest, Depths & Ennead (After 1st/Before Last)
    • Lost Ward – Amrine & Barnacles (Before Last)
  • Shield Ward – Flame, Frozen, Nature or Void Ward which reduce your incoming damage from those specific elements.
  • Fortifying Shield Rush – Great option if you use Shield Rush.

Tower Shields of Interest

Amulet Perks

  • Health – Vital perk
  • Protection Perk – These are the same as Shield Wards which include Flame, Frozen, Nature and Void Ward which reduce your incoming damage from those specific elements by a large amount and it’s an easy way to boost element absorption for mutations.
  • Refreshing
  • Other useful perks: Divine – boosts your incoming healing and Fortified works especially well when used with Shield Rush with the Fortifying Shield Rush perk.

Ring Perks

  • Hearty – vital for more Max Stamina
  • Leeching – really nice for health returned
  • Refreshing – reduced cooldowns always useful
  • Enfeebling – if you want to go a bit more defensive
  • Damage Perk – damage perk such as Slash Damage if you want more DPS

Earring Perks

  • Refreshing Toast – This is the most useful perk so you can use potions more often.
  • Refreshing
  • Other perks: Regenerating, Purifying Toast, Nimble or Healthy Toast.

New World Tank Build Heartrune

There are a few great Heartrunes to use with your Tank build for PvE.

Generally, the Brutal Grasping Vines is the best in slot Heartrune but mostly for add pulls since it offers group utility and benefits.

When you reach bosses the Stalwart or Greater Stoneform Heartrunes are very useful.

Read more: Best PvE Tank Heartrunes

Grasping Vines Heartrune

Brutal Heartrune of Grasping Vines

Summon vines around you that deal 100% heartrune damage and root enemies within a 4m radius for 3s.

250 Base Damage
10.0% Critical Hit Chance
1.30 Critical Damage Multiplier
30.0 Block Stamina Damage
5.0 Stagger Damage

Enfeebling Vines: Inflicts Weaken on successful hits, reducing the target’s damage by 20% for 8s.
Rending Vines: Inflicts Rend on successful hits, reducing the target’s damage absorption by 20% for 5s but also reducing your stamina regeneration by 50% for 5s.

Stoneform Heartrune

Stalwart Heartrune of Stoneform

Harden yourself with layers of stone, cleansing all crowd control debuffs and granting immunity to both stagger and crowd control debuffs for 5s.

150 Base Damage
10.0% Critical Hit Chance
1.30 Critical Damage Multiplier
50.0 Block Stamina Damage
5.0 Stagger Damage

Fortifying Form: Damage absorption is increased by 10% while active.
Mending Form: Heal for 75% heartrune damage per second while active but outgoing damage is reduced by 20%.

New World Tank Build Consumables

To maximise your ability as a Tank you’ll want to use a range of consumables that give you a number of different boosts.

Most of the consumables benefit your damage, even as a newer Tank you should at least be using the Minor house Trophies since that’s 9% more damage to a certain enemy type depending on the Expedition and they are very cheap to buy.

Using Weapon Coating and Honing Stones are also good damage increases and pretty cheap options even when using lower graded items, it’s still extra damage.

With potions you should have Health Potions, Regeneration Potions and Ward Potions all slotted as you can use them all at the same time since they do not share a cooldown.

Incense is also good to use, Oakflesh Balm and Gemstone Dust are less important and it’s good to carry a few to use if they are needed but this is not always the case. See more about New World Damage Absorption

Food

Use whichever food is relevant to your individual needs based upon your gear and attribute distribution. Make sure to reach 300 STR and 200 CON.

Potion

Use Ward potions in Mutated expeditions especially on bosses to help you deal with the incoming damage. You can also use both Health potions and Regeneration potions with them as they all run on seperate cooldowns.

Weapon Coating

Infused Ancient Coating
Infused Angry Earth Coating
Infused Corrupted Coating
Infused Lost Coating

When you enter an expedition, you should use the relevant coating that applies to the enemy type of each expedition. You should always use a weapon coating since its basically free additional damage. Make sure to apply the coating to each weapon, and even if you can’t craft or afford to buy Infused coatings, using lower ranked ones is still extremely useful.

Honing Stone

Use a Honing Stone at the start of any expedition to give you increased damage throughout. There is no reason not to use one even as a Tank since its easy additional extra damage and even if you can’t afford to buy or craft the powerful version, using any Honing Stone is worth it for the additional damage.

Trophy

You can place 1 of each trophy per house and you can own 3 houses.

Use either Ancients, Angry Earth, Corrupted or Lost trophies depending on the enemy type in the Expedition you are doing. There is no reason not to use trophies to boost your damage because it’s free damage, even just using the Minor trophies is worth it because that is 9% increased damage and they are extremely cheap to buy.

Incense

Incense is a good way to increase your overall resistance to everything so use them to assist you with reducing incoming damage.

Oakflesh Balm

When you are dealing with physical damage, using Oakflesh Balm can be used to give you increase absorption to physical damage types.

Gemstone Dust

When you are dealing with elemental damage, using Gemstone Dust can be used to give you increase absorption to elemental damage types.