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You will start thinking about attaching gems to your armor and weapons in New World when you hit level 20 and beyond, and start picking up Tier 3 gear. These will likely have gem slots available. Gems are essential if you want to refine your build, and you will need them mostly for endgame PvP and PvE.

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New World has a robust crafting and harvesting system that means getting your hands on good gems will require skills in other areas. This guide covers every gem in New World, how to get them, and how to make the most of them on your weapons and armor.

Updated January 28, 2024, by Sean Murray: Looking for those New World gems? This guide will direct you where to place your pickaxe and how to maximize your mining adventure. We've also modernized this guide's formatting and given it more links to other helpful New World topics.

How To Find Gems In New World

New World Iron Ore

Gems are found in a few different ways. There are two key methods to getting lots of gems early on: increase your mining skill (and improve your mining luck) and farm the first expedition, the Amrine Temple.

  • Gems have a chance to drop when you mine any ore, that is, Iron, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Starmetal, and Orichalcum.
  • Farming the Amrine Temple Expedition is a great way to get lots of gems from around level 23 onwards. It's worth running through the dungeon at least a couple of times. This is a good method even if you're a higher level. It's easy to run.
  • Late-game expeditions like Lazarus and Genesis also have a chance of dropping higher-tier gems, like Brilliant and Pristine.
  • You can also find gems inside supply crates and elite chests on chest runs throughout Imperial Palace, Myrkgard, Siren, etc.

How To Get More Gems In New World

You can improve your mining luck by equipping a Miner's Charm, crafting a pickaxe with an increased luck chance, or consuming luck meals. Some early game mining luck food includes:

  • Roasted Potatoes - 1 x Peppercorn, 1 x Butter, 1 x Potato.
  • Herb-Roasted Potatoes - 1 x Cinnamon, 1 x Butter, 1 x Honey, 1 x Potato.

These provide mining luck buffs between 24-30 minutes. Head out on your Iron ore mining route, or your Silver ore mining route, and get hunting for gems.

Late-game nodes like Platinum also drop lots of gems, and it seems like the larger the deposit (physically on the screen) the more likely you are to get a gem to drop.

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Refining Your Gemstones

new world stonecutting

Before they can be attached to your gear, you need to refine the gems at the Stonecutting table. Thankfully, you can do this from level 0 in Stonecutting, although you will need a higher level to access higher-tier gems.

  • To craft a Cut gemstone you will need a single Raw Gemstone and a corresponding essence mote. This could be earth, fire, air, etc.
  • Motes are collected via certain plants available at level 50 harvesting, or via ore veins that require level 50 in mining. You might also stumble across a few rare creature spawns (like the Life Moth) or find motes inside Alchemy chests.
  • We have guides on how to find Life motes and Soul motes which can be upgraded at the Arcana table into Wisps, Essences, and Quintessences depending on the level of the gem.

There are four tiers of Gemstones in New World: Flawed Cut Gemstone (zero skill requirements), Cut Gemstone (50 skill), Cut Brilliant Gemstone (100 skill), and Cut Pristine Gemstone (150 skill).

How To Attach Gemstones In New World

Attaching Gemstones to your items is super easy. You just need to drag a Cut Gemstone onto the slot in your gear via your character inventory page.

However, some rules apply to weapon gems. If you can't attach a gem to a weapon, here's why.

  • If your weapon has a Void Chain attack, for example, you need to match it with the appropriate gem.
  • You cannot attach a Gem that does not meet the damage type currently on the weapon.
  • Keep these trait pairings in mind when purchasing weapons and gems.

Gem

Weapon Trait Pairing

Amber

If your weapon has a Nature trait, you can only attach an Amber gem. Scales with FOCUS.

Amethyst

If your weapon has a Void trait, you can only attach an Amethyst gem. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.

Aquamarine

If your weapon has an Ice trait, you can only attach an Aquamarine. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.

Ruby

If your weapon has a Fire trait, you can only attach a Ruby. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.

Sapphire

If your weapon has an Arcane trait, you can only attach a Sapphire. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.

Topaz

If your weapon has a Lightning trait, you can only attach a Topaz. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.

Gemstones will be destroyed if you try and replace them with another stone. You cannot take a gemstone off an item when you have attached it.

Every Type Of Gemstone In New World And What They're Good For

Gems New World

There are a variety of different Gemstones in New World, and they all have different uses. This could be changing weapon damage to a different type, adding extra perks, or providing a taunt. We have added the corresponding weapon scaling damage to each of these gems.

Gems apply a different effect on armor and weapons, so make sure you're reading the tooltip correctly to get the best use out of the gem.

We've included the different traits of the gems below.

  • Carnelian Gems - These can either be Taunt gems or Calm gems. Taunt is ideal for tanks as it will apply to certain skills with the Great Axe and Sword. You will need these gems if you want to be a successful tank. Applied to armor will cause "Calm", which is useful for Supports.
  • Amber - Changes some of your weapon damage to the Nature variant. Alternatively, can be used to reduce incoming Nature damage on your armor. Scales with FOCUS.
  • Amethyst - Changes some of your weapon damage to Void, or provides damage resistance against Void damage on your armor. Scales with INTELLIGENCE.
  • Aquamarine - Adds Ice damage to your weapon or Ice damage resistance to armor. INTELLIGENCE.
  • Diamond - When placed on a weapon, it increases your damage and healing while at full health. On armor, it provides physical damage absorption and Elemental damage resistance.
  • Emerald - Increased damage against opponents with low health (less than 30 percent), or provides Thrust damage resistance on armor.
  • Jasper - Increased damage after you receive three hits in a row, or when placed on armor, increased Strike damage resistance.
  • Malachite - Improves your damage against enemies impacted by CC (this is great on the War Hammer, by the way), and on armor, reduces incoming Elemental damage and increases physical resistance.
  • Moonstone - Increases damage when you are below 30 percent health, or reduces incoming Slash damage.
  • Onyx - Increases damage against enemies at full health, or increases physical damage resistance.
  • Opal - Increases damage when you have a low stamina bar, or increases Elemental damage absorption.
  • Ruby - Some of your weapon damage is converted to Fire or increases Fire damage absorption when used on armor. INTELLIGENCE.
  • Sapphire - Some of your weapon damage is converted to Arcane, or provides increased resistance against incoming Arcane damage. INTELLIGENCE.
  • Topaz - Converts some of your weapon damage to Lighting, or increases damage resistance against Lightning damage. INTELLIGENCE.

You will need these gems to refine your builds. Different builds will require different gems. For example, Diamonds are necessary in a healer's Life Staff and Void Gauntlet, and ward gems are required for endgame mutated expeditions.

Best Gems For Expeditions

New World Expeditions

Endgame expeditions, the Mutated versions of the base expeditions, require specific Gem sets to be BiS. Here's a quick look at the gems you need for the different types of damage/mobs/specific Expeditions.

  • Typically, for the base-level Expeditions (Tempest, Lazarus, Barnacle, Genesis, etc.) you should use Cut Pristine Onyx gems in your armor to increase your Physical defense stat. Overall, you're looking for a good and balanced split between Elemental and Physical defense. You can check this stat at the bottom left of your character screen.
  • As you move into my complex and heavy-hitting Endgame mutated expeditions, you will need to start matching your armor to the elemental damage presence. Amethyst protects against Void damage, Amber protects against Nature, Aquamarine protects against Ice, and Ruby protects against Fire. For this to be economically viable, you will require different sets of armor for different expeditions. Better get working on that set.
  • In terms of weapon gems, this again depends on your build, but typically you will want to match the weapon damage to that of the elemental weakness of your enemy. You guessed it - you will require different weapon sets, too.
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New World: Complete Guide And Walkthrough
This guide hub for New World includes links to the best builds in the game, the best weapons, and other general news and updates.