New World Arcana Guide

Introduction

In New World, the Arcana profession is used to make magical weapons, potions, and more! In our New World Arcana guide we break down what the profession is, what things you can craft, and how to level it.

Arcana in New World

The arcana profession in New World allows players to craft magic weapons, potions, and tinctures. Magic Weapons can be crafted from Tier 1 up to tier 5. You can craft different rarities of weapons from common to legendary by using the Arcana profession. 

Various types of potions can be crafted using arcana. These items include health potions, mana potions, regeneration potions, focus potions, and encumbrance potions. Along with potions, you can also craft weapon coatings, tinctures, wards, and absorptions. You can also perform elemental Infusion which turns motes into stronger versions of that mote.   

In order to get started with arcana you simply need to gather some raw materials. Then, make your way over to an arcana station or campfire to begin crafting. Arcana at a campfire is limited to health potions, mana potions, blight tinctures, and corruption tinctures.

Arcana Stations

When planning out where to go to craft you should also be aware of the arcana station tier. Most items no longer require a certain Tier of Arcana station, though there are still some items that require an upgraded station to craft.

Once you have gathered the necessary raw material and have found a suitable place to craft, simply find the item on the list you want to craft and select the blue CRAFT button, or use the slider to craft multiple of the same item if you wish. 

Every time you craft an item at the arcana station you will be rewarded with Arcana crafting experience. The item you craft will determine the amount of crafting experience you are rewarded. As you gain experience in the arcana profession, you will also gain arcana levels. As you gain levels in arcana you will unlock higher-tier items that you can craft. 

TIP: When first starting out make sure you pay attention to the drop-down menus when crafting certain items. You will have the option to choose from various materials depending on the item you are crafting. Some items require specific ingredients and will not have the drop-down menus available. When the drop-down options are available make sure you are not utilizing your higher-tier resources if you are simply trying to level up your arcana skill.

Crafting with Rare Materials

Selecting rarer materials does not grant you additional crafting XP. If you utilize higher-tier materials when crafting weapons, you will adjust the gear score values up and have the possibility to craft a higher gear score item. Utilizing rarer materials for the consumables does not enhance your consumables. If you use higher-tier ingredients you will have a chance to craft additional items, but the quality of the item will not change. 

Worth noting here is that you can place your raw materials (works for all crafting not just arcana) in the storage in a settlement and still access those ingredients at the arcana station. You have to be in the same settlement that you have the items stored in, but you do not have to have them in your inventory. 

A quick note about the UI. You may notice that while crafting consumables there is a message that says “No bonus can be added to this item.” That area is reserved for crafting items that have attributes and perks. For example, if you use an Arcana station to craft a weapon you will be able to apply special resources that will cause your crafted item to have a specific perk, and you can craft using Azoth which will increase the chances of your item having attributes and gem slots. Because the consumables you craft with arcana do not have attributes or perks, you do not have those options available when crafting those items. 

Potions and their Effects

Health Potions – Use to instantly restore a portion of your health. The higher the tier the more health you gain on use. Using a health potion triggers a 30-second cool down before you can consume another health potion. 

Mana Potions – Use to instantly restore a portion of your mana. The higher the tier the more mana you gain on use. Using a mana potion triggers a 15-second cool down before you can consume another mana potion. 

Regeneration Potions – Use to restore both health and mana. Upon use, you will restore X% of health every 1 second and X% of mana per 1 second for 10 seconds. Using this potion triggers a 30-second cooldown before you can use another regeneration potion. You can use a health or mana potion after consuming a regeneration potion. 

Focus Potions – Use to restore a % of mana every 1 second for 60 seconds. The amount regenerated ranges based on the tier of the potion.

• Tier II – Restores .25% 
• Tier III – Restores .50% 
• Tier IV – Restores .75%
• Tier V – Restores 1.00%

Encumbrance Potions – Use to increase your encumbrance limit by a specified amount for a short duration. Tier 3 increases the limit by 50 for 120 seconds. Tier 4 increases the limit you can carry by 75 for 150 seconds. Finally, tier 5 by 100 for 180 seconds. You can not stack these potions. 

Weapon Coatings

You can also use the arcana profession to craft weapon coatings. There is a coating for each enemy type in the game which includes, beasts, lost, corrupted, ancients, and angry earth. 

You can craft tier II to tier V weapon coatings. You can apply the crafted coating to your currently drawn weapon. After doing so, you gain a % damage boost against whichever enemy type you crafted the coating for. You can only apply one coating to one weapon at a time, and coatings can stack with weapon traits. 

Weapon Coating Duration per Tier

• Tier II – 9% damage buff, lasts 25 minutes
• Tier III – 11% damage buff, lasts 30 minutes
• Tier IV – 13% damage buff, lasts 35 minutes 
• Tier V – 15% damage buff, lasts 40 minutes

Tinctures

Tinctures will remove certain afflictions and give you resistance to that affliction for a specified duration. There are two different types of tinctures, Blight Tinctures, and Corruption Tinctures. 

Consuming a blight or corruption tincture will fully remove the blight/corruption affliction. You will also gain resistance to that affliction for 5 minutes. 

• Tier II – Increases blight/corruption absorption by 25%
• Tier III – Increases blight/corruption absorption by 89%
• Tier IV – Increases blight/corruption absorption by 95%
• Tier V – Gain immunity to blight/corruption

Ward Potions

Ward potions are potions that when consumed will grant you increased damage absorption against one of the 5 enemy types: Ancients, Angry Earth, Beast, Corrupted, and Lost. They are only available from tier III to tier V.  You will receive your increased damage absorption for a specified duration after receiving damage from that enemy type a certain amount of times. 

• Tier III – Increase damage absorption by 5% for 20 seconds after receiving damage 5 times. 
• Tier IV – Increase damage absorption by 10% for 20 seconds after receiving damage 10 times. 
• Tier V – Increase damage absorption by 15% for 20 seconds after receiving damage 15 times. 

These can be very useful when running expeditions or farming a certain enemy type in the open world. 

These potions have a 120-second shared cooldown. 

Absorption Potions

Absorption potions are potions that when consumed will grant you increased damage absorption against one of the 5 elemental types: Arcane, Fire, Lightning, Nature, and Void. They are only available from tier III to tier V.  You will receive increased absorption by a specified percentage for a specified duration. These potions can not stack. Only one can be active at a time. These potions have a 120-second shared cooldown. 

• Tier III – Increase absorption for 9% for 30 seconds
• Tier IV – Increase absorption for 12% for 30 seconds
• Tier V – Increase absorption for 15% for 30 seconds

Elemental Infusion

Elemental infusion is the process of combining motes to make wisps, wisps to make essences, and essences to make Quintessence. 

Motes can be harvested in the open world. All mote locations can be found by utilizing our interactive map. There are 7 types of motes: Air, Soul, Life, Fire, Death, Earth, and Water As you craft higher tier items you may need to use a wisp, essence, or quintessence in the recipe vs the harvested mote. In order to do that you’ll have to be at an arcana station to combine the mote into the higher-tier ingredient. The following chart shows what’s needed to make each TIer.

• Elemental Wisps (Tier III) – 5 Motes
• Elemental Essences (Tier IV) – 4 Wisps
• Elemental Quintessence (Tier V) – 3 Essence

How and Where to Find Arcana Raw Materials

Arcana materials can be obtained in many different ways. If you’re looking to craft consumables then the necessary ingredients can be obtained solely through harvesting, but mining can prove beneficial for gathering motes as well. If you are looking to craft weapons then you will need to level your mining, skinning, logging, and harvesting to obtain the necessary materials. 

Obtaining most of the ingredients needed to craft magical weapons is straightforward. You will mine the appropriate ore, gather the appropriate wood or skin animals for leather, and gather the appropriate mote (more on motes below). You will then need to refine the ore, wood, and leather accordingly. 

Some of the weapons require you to obtain specific materials. For example, the Whisper From the Frozen Vale ice gauntlet requires Whisperwood, a tier III rare ingredient. Whisperwood is obtained by chopping down trees. It’s a rare drop that will depend on the tier of tree you are chopping down and your luck roll bonus. This same pattern applies to most of the rare ingredients needed to craft the weapons, including mining and skinning as well. You simply chop down a tree, mine a node, or skin an animal and you have a chance to obtain the rarer materials. 

Crafting Expedition Specific Items with Arcana

However, there are instances in which you will need to obtain an item like a Jade Collar. Jade Collars are items needed to craft the Dynasty Shipyard Replica magic weapons. The Jade collars can be obtained from drops from certain mobs or in elite chests. You can check our database for the specific drop locations for an item like this. 

Crafting Consumables

The materials needed to craft consumables consist of water, oil, and reagents. 

Water can be obtained in every settlement at the well. You can go to a freshwater source like a river or a pond and press the default key of “E” and gather as much water as you can hold. 

Oil is harvested from seeping stones. You must have at least 20 mining skill to harvest the seeping stone and obtain the oil. You can locate all of the seeping stone spawns by checking our interactive map, filtering by ore, and selecting seeping stone.

In order to obtain a specific reagent, you will need to harvest essences that are found in Aeternum. You can harvest essences in 2 different ways, harvesting, and mining. Bear in mind that you will need 30 harvesting to harvest most essences and 50 mining to harvest the essences that come from stones. 

Different Types of Arcana Motes

• Air
• Death
• Earth
• Fire 
• Life
• Spirit
• Water

You can locate all the essences by utilizing our interactive map. Harvesting these essences is where you will obtain motes as well. Motes are utilized in almost every arcana recipe so make sure you are gathering these essences as you travel through Aeternum. 

An example of the essences needed would be crafting a Tier III Focus potion. This potion is going to need 1 tier 3 water reagent, any tier spirit reagent, and water. 

In order to obtain the necessary ingredients, you would need to go harvest a water essence and obtain a rivercress leaf or water motes. The water motes would have to be transformed into tier 2 water wisp via elemental infusion that was discussed earlier in the guide. You could also harvest freezing lodestone that would be obtained by mining a springstone. Any one of these would be considered a tier 3 water reagent and could be used in this recipe. 

You would also need to obtain a spirit reagent of any tier. (Please note: If you choose to use a high-tier reagent here it will give you an increased chance to craft additional items. It is recommended that the higher tier reagents be saved for the higher tier potions) In order to obtain a spirit reagent simply harvest a spirit essence to get the necessary ingredient. 

You then just need water and you would be able to craft the focus potion. 

You can also obtain arcana crafting materials by looting alchemy crates and stockpiles.

Health and Mana Potion Ingredients Chart

Mana and Health potions both require certain Reagents to craft called Spirit Reagents. Below is the list of all the different Spirit Reagents in New World.

New World Spirit Reagent Chart

Spirit Reagent	Tier of Item
Bumbleblossum	II
Soul More	II
Shellbed Cap	II
Soulsprout Stem	II
Tubecap	II
Soulwisp	III
Soulsprout Leaf	III
Crystalline Lodestone	III
Soulsprout Flower	IV
Soul Essence	IV
Soulwyrm Tongue	V
Dragon Fish Jaw	V
Soul Quintessence	V

Mana Potions

Mana Potions require a Magical and Air Reagent as well as one of the Spirit Reagant. It is important to note that the Tier of the Magical Reagent does not matter when crafting potions.

New World Magical Reagent Chart

Magical Reagent	Item Tier
Briar Buds	I
Bumble Blossom	II
Suncreeper Tendril	II
Tanglewisp	II
SoulSprout Stem	II
Mushroom Fins	III
Frogfish Tail	III
Crystalline Lodestone	III
Snail Slime	III
Paddlefish Gills	III
Catfish Whiskers	III
Soulsprout Leaf	III
Soulsprout Flower	IV
Soulwyrm Tongue	V
Dragon Fish Jaw	V

New World Air Reagent Chart

Reagent	Tier
Air Reagent	II
Twistcap Spiral	II
Air Mote	II
Shockbulb Stem	II
Suncreeper Tendril	II
Air Wisp	III
Shockbulb Leaf	III
Shocking Lodestone	III
Air Essence	IV
Shockbulb Flower	IV
Lightning Beetle	V
Air Quintessence	V

Health Potions

New World Health Potions require a Medicinal Reagent and an Earth Reagent along with a Spirit Reagant.

New World Medicinal Reagent Chart

Medicinal Reagent	Tier of Item
Hyssop	I
Bulrush Cob	I
Sporebloom Fruit	II
Glowing Mushroom Cap	II
Gillflower Gills	II
Platecap Flesh	II
Lifebloom Stem	II
Halibut Viscera	III
Gleaming Lodestone	III
Sculpin Scales	III
Lifebloom Leaf	III
Lifebloom Flower	IV
Azoth Water	V
Lifemoth Eyes	V
Poison Sac	V

New World Earth Reagents Chart

Earth Reagents	Tier of Item
Petalcap	II
Earth Mote	II
Earthspine Stem	II
Earth Wisp	III
Earthspine Leaf	III
Loamy Lodestone	III
Earth Essence	IV
Earthspine Flower	IV
Earthshell Tail	V
Earth Quintessence	V

How to Level Arcana

The information contained here about leveling arcana is assuming that you will gather all your resources yourself and that you are focusing solely on leveling up your arcana to max level. However, you do have the option of purchasing the resources from the trading post in order to speed up your arcana leveling in New World. 

In order to efficiently level arcana you’re going to want to stick with health and mana potions. The weapons and other consumables will provide more experience per item crafted, but the amount of time spent to obtain the raw materials outweighs that of health and mana potions.. Also bear in mind that both of these potions will be in high demand so you will always have the option to sell them to make additional coin as you level your arcana. 

The reasoning behind crafting both health and mana vs focusing on one or the other is the speed at which you can gather the necessary materials. You will be able to have a wider range of materials that will be viable to help you level, and the spirit reagents that are necessary overlap between both potions in the later levels. 

The materials needed to craft weapons can also be used to help you level up other crafting professions. However, if you are not interested in leveling up those professions or simply want to help rush to max arcana then feel free to utilize crafting weapons to help you level up as well as they can help speed up the process of leveling by quite a bit. For this particular guide we are going to focus on utilizing potions to level. 

XP gain/Potion Tier Crafted

• Level 0-1 Weak health/mana potion
• Level 1-50 Common health/mana potion
• Level 50-100 Strong health/mana potion
• Level 100-150 Powerful health/mana potion
• Level 150-200 Infused health/mana potion

QUICK NOTE – medicinal reagents are health potions and magical ones are for mana potions. Earth motes are associated with health and Air Motes are used for mana

Weak Potions (Tier 1)

• Medicinal / Magical Reagents
• Weak Alkahest

Common Potions (Tier II)

• Medicinal / Magical Reagents
• Common Alkahest

Strong Potions (Tier III)

• Medicinal / Magical Reagents
• Earth / Air Reagent
• Strong Alkahest

Powerful Potions (Tier IV)

• Medicinal / Magical Reagent
• Earth / Air Reagent
• Spirit Reagent
• Powerful Alkahest

Infused Potions (Tier V)

• Medicinal / Magical Reagent
• Earth / Air Reagent
• Spirit Reagent
• Infused Alkahest

As you can see above the crafting for these potions follow a clear pattern. It’s important to keep in mind this information as you gather so you can be prepared with proper materials at the later stages of crafting. The Medicinal, Magical, Earth, Air, and Spirit reagents can be of any tier. So you can go gather the lower tier of those reagents and use them all the way through tier 5 crafting. Also important to note is the water. You will need water for every stage of crafting so make sure you gather water often and in large quantities. 

First Craft Bonus

You get a “First Craft” double XP bonus for each unique item you craft. Be sure to utilize this when possible as you level your Arcana! Just make sure that the item is around the same price as the recommended item in the Arcana Leveling Guide down below.

Using Scraps to Level

You can utilize scraps from a perfect salvage to quickly level any applicable trade skill. This is a great way to obtain a boost to your trade skill experience. To learn all about perfect salvages and how to use scraps you can check out our Perfect Salvage Guide.

Level 0-1

To reach level 1 in arcana you will need to gain 108 arcana experience. In order to reach that you will need to craft 12 weak health or mana potions or a combination of both and 12 weak alkahest.

6xp X 12 potions = 72 arcana experience

3xp X 12 alkahests = 36 arcana experience

Total experience = 108 arcana experience

You need to find a water source and gather 12 water and 24 hyssops for the weak alkahest and either 17 briar buds or 17 bulrush cobs for the potions. 

Hyssop derives from gathering herbs, briar buds come from briars, and bulrush cobs come from bulrush. You can find all the herb locations by utilizing our interactive map, and can find bulrush and briars are very common near bodies of water. These materials are very common and will be very easy to find. 

Make sure you are harvesting everything you can in the beginning. You will need to get your harvesting up to level 30 for the later levels of arcana so that you can begin to gather the essences as your primary source of materials. There is also no level requirement to harvest fungus so you can get some materials needed prior to hitting level 30 in harvesting. 

Level 1 – 50

In order to reach level 50 in arcana you will need a total of 11,887 additional arcana experience (11,995 – 108 experience already earned). So you will need to craft a total of 270 common potions and 271 alkahests to achieve this. 

24xp X 270 potions = 6,480 arcana experience

20xp X 271 alkahests = 5,420 arcana experience

Total experience = 11,900 arcana experience

You will need to gather 1,080 Hyssop and 271 water for the alkahest and for the potions you need a total of 270 medicinal/magical reagents for the potions. 

Gathering the necessary materials is fairly easy as most of them can be obtained from fungus. You can utilize our interactive map and filter by fungus and start gathering. A glowing Mushroom cap can drop from any fungus gathered so you can gather whatever fungus you would like and still obtain the necessary materials. 

However, Windsward or Brightwood are both optimal choices to gather your fungus because Windsward has an abundance of Fronded Petalcaps which drop Petalcaps that can be used as an earth reagent in health potions for your leveling, and Brightwood has an abundance of Slimy Twistcaps that drop Twistcap Spirals that can be used as air reagents in your mana potions for your leveling.

Do not be concerned with over-gathering fungus because many of the items you gather can be utilized in later stages of leveling. See the above materials chart for the specific items needed for each tier. 

Once you have the necessary materials you’re going to need to find either a Tier 2 arcana station or a Tier 2 camp and craft the necessary amount of potions to reach level 50.

Level 50-100

In order to reach level 100, you will need a total of 130,377 additional arcana crafting experiences (142,385 – 12,008 experience already earned). This means you will need to craft a total of 776 potions and 777 alkahest to reach level 100.

126xp X 776 potions = 97,776 arcana experience

42xp X 777 alkahests = 32,634 arcana experience

Total experience = 130,410 arcana experience

You will need to gather a total of 4,656 hyssops and 777 water for the alkahest while needing 776 medicinal/magical reagents and 776 earth/air reagents for the mana/health potions.

You can gain some of the ingredients via fishing for your reagents, but we are going to stick with harvesting as fishing will only slow the process. If you have fished prior to leveling arcana some of the materials you have obtained could be used here. You can reference the above materials chart for the specific items needed. 

Due to the materials needed, some of the best places to harvest would be Windsward, Everfall, and Monarch’s Bluff. All 3 of these territories have an abundance of the essences you will need to obtain. These include both your medicinal and magical reagents, as well as your earth and air reagents. You can also continue gathering fungus!

If you took the tip in the previous leveling section regarding the type of fungus to gather you should already have quite a lot of the earth and air reagents already gathered at this point. 

Once you have the necessary materials you’re going to need to find either a Tier 3 arcana station or a Tier 3 camp and craft the necessary amount of potions to reach level 100.

Level 100-150

In order to reach level 150, you will need a total of 863,202 additional arcana crafting experiences (1,005,620 – 142,418 experiences already earned). This means you will need to craft a total of 911 strong potions and alkahest to reach level 150.

840xp X 911 potions =  765,240 arcana experience

108xp X 911 alkahests = 98,388 arcana experience

Total experience = 863,628 arcana experience

You will need to gather a total of 7,288 hyssops and 911 water for the alkahest while needing 911 medicinal/magical reagents, 911 earth/air reagents, and 911 spirit reagents for the potions. 

It’s going to take some time to gather all of these as this is the point it starts to really slow down. You should be able to use the gathering route you’ve already been using previously to gather all the materials for this tier. It is just going to take a little bit longer as the total required items are more than the previous tier. 

Once you have acquired the materials you’ll need to find a tier IV camp or a tier IV arcana station and craft the required number of potions to reach level 150.

Level 150-200

In order to reach level 200 you will need a total of 4,116,586 additional arcana crafting experience (5,122,740 – 1,006,154 experience already earned). This means you will need to craft a total of 1,492 potions and alkahests to reach level 200.

2,520xp X 1,492 potions = 3,759,840 arcana experience

240xp X 1,492 alkahests = 358,080 arcana experience

Total experience = 4,117,920 arcana experience

You will need to gather a total of 14,920 hyssop, 1,492 water, and 1,492 azoth water for the alkahests while needing 1,492 medicinal/magical reagents, 1,492 earth/air reagents, and 1,492 spirit reagents for the potions. 

The best way to obtain the necessary azoth water is from Azoth Springs. Reekwater is littered with Azoth Springs, so it is going to be your best bet for obtaining the necessary needed to craft your tier 5 potions. Azoth Water is used in any tier 5 consumable craft due to the infused alkahest.

Bear in mind that Reekwater is an end game zone. If you reach this point in your crafting journey and are not leveled enough to go into the zone you may have to recruit help from a friend or buy the resources from the market. Azoth Springs can be found in some of the lower level zones but in much less density so it would take quite some time to gather all the necessary materials. 

The remaining ingredients are ones you’ve already been gathering up to this point, so fall back on those routes to gather what is needed for your crafts. Once you have acquired the materials you’ll need to find a Tier V camp or a Tier V arcana station and craft the required number of potions to reach level 200.

Arcana Gear

To Craft Max-level Arcana Weapons in New World, you must first obtain the Arcana gear. The Concocter’s Gear can be looted from the appropriate boss OR be purchased from the auction house. Below is a list of each piece of crafting gear and where you can find it in the open world:

Arcana Armor	How to Obtain it
Concocter’s Hat	Baines
Concocter’s Coat	Prince Goroto
Concocter’s Gloves	Entropy
Concocter’s Pants	The Siren’s Dog
Concocter’s Shoes	Cael

You can also craft them from a pattern located in Tier III Arcana Aptitude box. You will also need an Earring with the Arcana Mastery perk on it to complete the set.

How to Craft 600 Gear Score Items with Arcana

When crafting, you will need to use cooldown materials such as asmodeum, runic leather, and pheonixweave. You will need to obtain 3 major Arcana trophies of the applicable crafting trade skill and have them active in your house, obtain all the Arcana gear above, and consume the crafting trade skill food. Most items no longer require a certain Tier of Arcana Station to craft, though some still do. You can, however, obtain an Azoth discount depending on the tier of the Arcana Station you craft at.

• Tier 3 = 20% discount.
• Tier 4 = 30% discount.
• Tier 5 = 45% discount.

Finally, you’ll need to own a home in a settlement that has the appropriate crafting town buff active. Below is a summary of everything you will need to craft a 600 Gear Score item:

• Arcana level 200
• 5 pieces of Concocter’s Gear (see above)
• Earring with the Arcana Mastery Perk (cheap on Trading Post or craft your own)
• 3 Major Arcana Crafting Trophy +5 Min Gear Score for Arcana (Artifact)
• Sweet Wild Berry Infusion +15 Min/Max Gear Score for Arcana (Recipe)
• House in a Settlement with the Arcanist Wisdom buff: +5 Min Gear Score for Arcana

New World Arcana Guide Conclusion

That completes are New World Arcana Guide. For more on what you can craft with Arcana, check out our New World Consumables Guide