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The Rapier has been a bit of a fan favorite during the New World closed beta, ahead of the game's full release at the end of August. Seeing play mostly during some of the PVP wars that've taken place, the Rapier also excels at single-target PVP combat…for when you're hunting down those pesky players flagged for PVP.
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With extreme mobility, plenty of damage, and damage-over-time active skills, the Rapier is best suited for those who prefer not getting hit rather than trying to soak up damage. Here's our comprehensive guide to the best Rapier build, with weapon pairings, attributes, and gameplay tips.
Best Rapier Builds In New World
The Rapier is all about mobility, dealing damage, and dancing away from your opponent. Some of the best active skills here include Riposte, Evade, and Tondo, although Flourish and FInish and Fleche also have their uses. In truth, there are many ways to play with the Rapier. We'll go over some of the best weapon combinations for the Rapier here.
Rapier And Bow Build
We actually had this build down as one of our favorites at the start of the closed beta, based on the Alpha build and eveything that came before, and it turns out that, yes, this build is super strong.
You've got the extreme mobility of the Rapier paired with the ranged damage of the Bow. This build comes with more flexibility than the Musket, as you won't be slowing down to take shots often. It's really a fast-paced duelist PVP build. Here's a closer a look.
Best Masteries For The Rapier
The Rapier is all about evasion, dodging, and dealing damage with Bleed. Here are the best active skills for this build.
- Tondo – Applies bleed damage that stacks over time, up to three times. The And Again passive increases damage against a single target, which makes this even better for close-quarters one-on-one PVP.
- Tondo complements the Heavy Puncture passive well. This passive means extra hits against the target with bleed will extend their bleed. Very strong for denying your opponent heals and to stack ticking damage that can't be blocked.
- Evade – This active ability makes the Rapier so fun to play with. You can dance and skip all over, getting out of trouble, mostly. You will also receive a movement speed buff from the Allegro passive.
- Riposte – This is a great "Okay, let's slow down for a second" active ability. It places you into a defensive stance. If you're attacked during this short period, you'll instantly stun the enemy. You can then dance backwards with your bow, apply poison, or deal bleed damage. Very strong if you can land it.
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Best Masteries For The Bow
You can check out our more comprehensive Bow build right here, but we'll still cover the basics of the masteries that will complement the gameplay of the Rapier.
- Rapid Shot – This is a great active skill to activate right after a successful Rapier riposte. Jump back, hit the stunned enemy with three rapid shots, dealing extra damage and continuing the knockback with the third shot.
- Evade Shot – Evade Shot complements the extreme mobility of the Rapier and adds to how much you can dodge attacks.
- Poison Shot – Poison and Bleed stacking at the same time? Your enemy will be wondering what's hit them. The Skirmisher tree also comes with some useful debuff-buffing passives, like Battle Precision, which causes damage-over-time effects to last 20 percent longer.
For this build, you should spec almost entirely into Dexterity. Both the Rapier and Bow scale off Dex. Light armor is also preferred for the extra mobility, although you can experiment with medium armor for better survivability.
You can also use the Musket to great effect. Check out our Musket build guide to see how we paired the Rapier with the other ranged weapon in the game.
Rapier and Ice Gauntlet CC Duelist Build
The other popular build during the closed beta pairs the Rapier with the heavy CC of the Ice Gauntlet. Here's how it works: you dance around your enemy with the Rapier's mobility, and then dunk on your enemy with Ice Storm/Shower ability of the Ice Gauntlet. It's a pretty powerful combination. Here's the best masteries for the Ice Gauntlet when paired with the rapier.
Best Masteries For The Ice Gauntlet
- The three active skills in this build are: Ice Shower, Ice Pylon, and Ice Spikes. We've tried a few different combinations, and these seem to work very well.
- Ice Pylons can be placed and then pretty much forgotten about as you deal damage with the Rapier. If tiered up, the Pylon will cause your opponents to be slowed, making it easier to hit attacks.
- We've taken Ice Shower over Ice Storm for one simple reason: we prefer the root of the Shower over the general slow of the Storm. Both are tricky to hit, especially if you're facing off against an opponent who is also playing a duelist (high mobility) build.
- Lastly, an almost strange pick: Ice Spikes. You don't this too often, but we think it works super well with the high-mobility Rapier, leaving a trail of damaging/slowing spikes behind your player. It's almost a passive ability, if that makes sense. Once activated, you don't need to worry about it.
If you want, you can check out our more in-depth Ice Gauntlet build guide here.
You can also check out our other New World build guides below:
- New World: Best Tank Build
- New World: Best Bow Build
- New World: Best Spear Build
- New World: Best Musket Build
- New World: Best Support Healer Build
NEXT: New World Standard Edition Vs. Deluxe – Which Is Better?
