Nova Revisited Idea

[(PSN)crossx190]

 

Hi, this is a passion project post that I'd like to share with everyone. This isn't a complain post where I think nova is trash and DE needs to fix her right now and my proposed changes are absolute. Do I think nova is bad? No, she is pretty good and is and is the lesser frames in desperate need of a rework.  Do I think her kit flawed and can use some improvements. Yes. This is an idea I thought of to make her kit as a whole more useful as well as rework some mechanics in specific abilities to make nova more fluid to use. I also have explanations on why I thought of these changes to help you understand why I thought of them. I tried to keep the changes as balanced as possible and not completely overhaul or replace certain abilities.

 

Passive: Knockdown range increased to 12 meters.

 

Null star: Null star now deals true damage and the damage has been increased to 800. Passing through a wormhole temporarily charges any active star nova currently has for 20 seconds, amplifying damage from 800 to 1600 and damage resistance from 5% to 8%. Null star can be activated again to regain any lost stars with less energy cost depending on how many stars nova has left.

 

Why these changes: Null star is pretty bad at dealing damage for a first ability and that is made even worse against higher level enemies. I took the theme of anti matter particles being able to destroy all matter and implemented it to null star via dealing true damage which isn't resisted by shields and armor for better scaling alongside a damage buff to make it more viable, but not so much that it makes it a high dps ability to keep the ability balanced. Recasting null star is a quality of life change that lets you keep your max potential damage reduction without having to fall into a pit or using enemies as fodder.

 

Antimatter drop: When the antimatter ball passes through a wormhole, it adds charge to it.

 

Why this change: Antimatter drop is fine as it is. This is just a little quality of life improvement to charge antimatter drop faster without the need of using high damage burst weapons (Such as the tigris prime) via ability synergy.

 

Wormhole: Wormholes are no longer created the instant you cast the ability. Instead, casting wormhole will fire a non damaging projectile that travels forward, passing through enemies. When the projectile hits a surface or if the third ability button is pressed again, the projectile will detonate and tear open a wormhole. Wormhole now functions like teleporters in team fortress 2. Cast the ability the first time to create a wormhole entrance, and again to create the exit. If only one wormhole has been made, making the second one costs half the energy needed. Because of this change, nova can no longer place multiple wormholes like she used to. Only 2 wormholes can be active, the entrance and the exit. You can choose which wormhole you want to make; the entrance or the exit by switching the same way vauban switches between minelayers. Creating a second entrance or exit will cause the old one to disappear. Players can teleport through the exit or the entrance to avoid trolling or taking the wormhole by accident. The action button must be used when touching the wormhole instead of just touching it to teleport. Both wormholes can be as far away from each other as possible and no longer have a duration but have 10 charges before disappearing. Nova can add charges to the wormhole by firing wormhole projectiles at the wormhole. Players can shoot through the wormholes for a radiation damage boost. Wormholes also destroy enemy bullets and projectiles; enemies who stand in the wormhole take 1000 radiation damage per second. When molecular prime waves passes through a wormhole, it releases a shockwave that deals 3000 blast damage, knocking down enemies in a fixed 15 meter radius.

 

Why these changes: This is without a doubt nova's worst ability and is the major reason why I made this rework post in the first place. Simply put, I vastly improved wormhole to give you more control with your wormholes while reducing the grief factor the old wormhole had. Wormhole is the only ability in nova's kit that is severely crippled with negative range whereas her other abilities are either not affected by range or have more upsides than downsides with negative range. That isn't a problem anymore since with this change, wormholes have infinite travel distance without the need of range mods. The intention of making the wormholes appear from projectiles is so that you can place wormholes in hard to reach places as well as placing wormholes for strategic use. An example would be when trying to get past enemies unscathed or unnoticed without being in line of sight. All the other extra bonuses this new wormhole has were implemented so that wormhole has other uses where fast travel isn't needed.

 

Molecular prime: Negative power strength no longer speeds up enemies, enemy explosion radius is fixed and isn't affected by range mods

 

Molecular prime augment: Enemies are sped up (About the speed as if you had 50% power strength on nova) instead of slowed down and deal 40% less damage (At max rank), damage reduction scales with power strength. Damage reduction caps at 70%.

 

Why these changes: This ability is great and doesn't need any improvements. However, most experienced nova players realize that nova benefits greatly with Narrow minded than stretch. While the range of exploding enemies takes a hit from negative range, the proposed changes is meant to offset that while leaving the explosion radius to a reasonable range. As for the change to the speed increase to enemies, first of all, speeding up enemies with negative power strength was never intentional but was kept in due to players wanting it for speedruns in defense. The proposed changes as well as the augment mod idea is so that nova players can still speed up enemies without dipping into negative power strength, hindering nova's other abilities. Since molecular prime doesn't have an augment mod yet due to the ability being ridiculously good and giving it more bonuses could make it overpowered, this would be the perfect way to give it one while keeping speed nova in the game. Also, one problem with speeding up enemies is that once enemies get to high level, players won't be able to handle those fast enemies and molecular prime's augment is left unused for the rest of the mission. The damage reduction on the augment mod is there to help counteract that and keep the augment mod relevant for as long as possible in the mission. This is an improvement that can't be implemented by dipping into negative power strength, hence why I proposed this augment mod idea.

[mikakor]

Both your worm hole and your molecular Prime, no. Never, please. They are perfect like that. No need to change that.

For the rest... Heh, why not. But I'm clearly against the two last ones, they don't need changes.

[(PSN)I_I_Hope_I_I]

Hum... its an interesting idea to say the least, specially the Molecular Prime one, Molecular Prime and Antimatter Drop are used a lot to nuke defenses, but because of the poor ability damage a Speedva has it quite nerfs the nuke capability of the Antimatter Drop, BUT you most also notice that having an Augment will make you basically remove a mod that could either give her duration or efficiency, hell, even range maybe, the idea is nice, but it just doesn't work on a Speedva.

I think Speedva is has good has she gets, even though i i would love for Antimatter Drop to have more range, but she is good has she is right now in that department.

[GnarlsDarkley]

5 hours ago, (PS4)crossx190 said:

Molecular prime: Negative power strength no longer speeds up enemies [...]
Molecular prime augment: Enemies are sped up 

11/10 will downvote. I like my enemies 60% faster and not just 20% plus I lose a Modslot to your Augment

5 hours ago, (PS4)crossx190 said:

the proposed changes is meant to offset that while leaving the explosion radius to a reasonable range.

And make Null Star a waste because they start to seek enemies

5 hours ago, (PS4)crossx190 said:

Also, one problem with speeding up enemies is that once enemies get to high level, players won't be able to handle those fast enemies 

Then they shouldn't use this build or mod for 10/20/30% slow. I can handle level 500 enemies at 60% speed just fine

5 hours ago, (PS4)crossx190 said:

Damage reduction caps at 70%.

We have Null Star for that which gives 90%. Another hidden nerf

5 hours ago, (PS4)crossx190 said:

Why these changes: This is without a doubt nova's worst ability and is the major reason why I made this rework post in the first place. 

Then you have different uses for her than me. I used her Wormhole a lot on Plains to farm for wisps. This change would kill 33% of the efficient wispfarm methods

Edited December 3, 2018 by GnarlsDarkley

[Karinia]

I think that nova is fine as it is now. She was a balanced frame from the beginning and she does not needed too much touch. Nice that you try to improve it but I think she does not need any touch now.

[(XBOX)zThulsaDoomz]

What?  Why?  Nova is one of the best frames we have right now....just.....no

[TzXtetriC]

The only thing i would change from nova is antimatter balls flight speed because once it reaches the destination, everything is dead by your squadmates

And a new change:
Press once to throw as normal with a fast flying speed to reach enemies faster
Hold to cast a charged ball at the cost of energy, the more you hold the more energy it costs, with a slight fly speed increase

Edited December 3, 2018 by TzXtetriC

[S.Dust]

Everything but Nova's first ability is fine. The only change her 1 needs is to be duration based and only be a defensive ability.

[(XBOX)Umbra Howl]

Noooooo

[clxrffdman]

Nova is completely fine, for once a warframe with all 4 abilities being good/usable, and you want to rework it? I would rather not. Go try to rework atlas instead or something.

[(PSN)Elvenbane]

Here are the changes I'd like for Nova:

1) Fix the bug where Nova's Antimatter drop can inflict a rad proc on herself (may require augment)

2) Update visuals for Wormhole

Perfect.

I would not be in favor of any of the changes mentioned (exception being that I wouldn't mind or care if passive range was increased).