New World: Aeternum News

New World's Winter Convergence Festival has begun, watch for yeti

The holiday season has begun in Amazon Games' MMORPG New World, bringing with it a layer of snow and bundles of presents. The Winter Convergence Festival begins today, December 16, and runs through January 11, which means there are seasonal quests, new resources to collect, and lost presents to deliver - all in exchange for rare loot that's now available in the Holiday Shop.

It's a time of "dichotomy and duality" in Aeternum, with two chilly entities making their presence known. The Winter Wanderer will grant special Winter Tokens for completing repeatable content around the island, which you can turn in at the Holiday Shop to get your hands on new armours, weapons, skins, furniture, and more. There are four Holiday Villages to visit as well, set up in Everfall, Monarch's Bluffs, Weaver's Fen, and Brightwood. You can meet the Winter Wanderer at these locations and accept special holiday quests.

Meanwhile, there's the Winter Warrior and his 'frigid folk' who are causing mayhem across the land by stealing presents. You can recover lost presents and return them to Holiday Huts that you'll find in the new villages, and earn more Winter Tokens in the process.

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Winter Convergence Festival - December Update

New World “Winter Convergence Festival” Update 1.2 downtime will begin for all regions at 4AM PT (12PM UTC) on December 16. Expected downtime is 3 hours.

Greetings, Adventurers!

The December Update including the Winter Convergence Festival has graduated from the Public Test Realm (PTR) and is releasing into the main New World game. This update includes a wintry limited time event packed with quests and special activities, alongside a swathe of balance changes, quality of life updates, and an overhaul to New World's end-game. You can find the full update notes on our releases section of the website, where all major updates will be shared.

The holiday of Winter Convergence has arrived in Aeternum! Marked by increased snowfall and Northern Lights in the sky, this is a time of dichotomy and duality as the Winter Wanderer and Winter Warrior come to the land. While within the settlements gifts are exchanged to mark the passing of the year, outside the safety of the walls a wintry war rages. To make it worse, the Winter Warrior and his Frigid Folk are causing mayhem throughout the land - attempting to spread the dreaded “Forever Winter”.

You can find the full list of Winter Convergence activities on our Winter Convergence Festival page.

As always, thanks for your support. We’ll see you in Aeternum!

New World MMO interview: "we've made mistakes by moving too fast"

New World's release was just over two months ago. It set an absurdly high concurrent player count in the process, with a peak of 913,000. However, the game's first weeks haven't been smooth sailing. Post-launch patches fixed some issues, but introduced several bugs and exploits to the game, requiring rapid intervention and downtime - and in some cases, emergency solutions like disabling trade and rolling back servers.

There has been a sharp decline in the game's active playerbase since launch, but as Amazon Games contend with these unforeseen issues and player feedback, the team is also focused on adding new content and expanding the MMO's world. The first major post-launch update, Into The Void, landed halfway through November, and there's plenty more planned for the coming months, including a New World winter festival.

Following the Into The Void update, we spoke to New World game director Scot Lane to find out more about the team's post-launch priorities, weathering the storm of bugs and exploits, and how Aeternum may change as New World establishes itself as one of the top MMOs around.

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New World's Water Mark scaling changes won't affect items you craft

New World developer Amazon Games recently revealed it would be "completely revamping" the MMORPG's High Water Mark system to improve how it functions and enhance the endgame experience for players. This rework will introduce an 'Expertise and Gypsum' system as a replacement for HWM, which will continue to govern the highest drops you can get per slot, but also determine gear effectiveness and add control over gear progression. Now, following a lot of fan feedback on this, Amazon has confirmed a few points that have prompted some rejoicing in Aeternum. Well, Reddit.

"In early 2022, when we start reducing the effectiveness of gear to your Expertise level, we will exempt the following items," New World dev Zin_Ramu explains in a forum post, listing "any item you craft, any item you earn from a quest, [and] any item you purchase from the faction shop" as the exemptions.

"When these changes are implemented, gear score scaling will only apply to items sold or traded after that patch," the dev goes on to explain. "So any items obtained prior to this patch will not be impacted or reduced in any way. When we thought about it more, reducing power for existing players is just unacceptable and something we will not do. We initially thought it being only temporary and giving a new path with to gain back that power with Gypsum would be acceptable, but it is now clear we were wrong."

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The best New World Void Gauntlet build for PvP and PvE

Looking for the best New World Void Gauntlet build? The Void Gauntlet is the first New World weapon to be introduced since the MMO game was released, and arrived as part of the Into The Void update.

The Void Gauntlet is a magic weapon that shoots ranged projectiles that deal - unsurprisingly - Void damage. It's not used exclusively as a ranged weapon, though, as it can also summon a Void Blade that performs melee attacks. Holding 'block' converts your health into mana over time. This may seem like a dangerous trade off, but crucially, several Void Gauntlet abilities provide healing to yourself and allies - making it the only other source of healing in the game aside from the Life Staff. Like the Life Staff, the Void Gauntlet's healing also scales based on your focus, making it the second weapon in the game to use the focus attribute.

The Void Gauntlet abilities are split into two skill trees: Annihilation and Decay. Annihilation is primarily used to deal significant damage, and Decay skills are focused on healing and debuffs. Both playstyles are viable in both PvP and PvE - we've put together the best Void Gauntlet builds for every situation below, including recommended perks and abilities shown using the New World Fans fansite's skill tree tool.

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