Nova
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Build: Da Build
Level 1
Level 4
Level 7
Level 10
Level 13
Level 16
Level 20
I've been a long time
Nova player, and ever since the nerf patch, I've been tinkering with her playstyle and talents to try to figure out how to make her viable/fun. In particular, I've been trying to unlock the potential of
Snipe Master, the talent that is supposed to make her more powerful in skilled hands, and I think I've done it with a lethal combination of three talents:
Snipe Master,
Explosive Round, and
Lethal Decoy. Essentially, once you've got all the stacks,
Lethal Decoy's damage output becomes significant and sustainable, making her one of the best poke heroes in the game. There's 3 main points about this playstyle you should keep in mind:1. Land your
Snipes. If you miss snipes, you simply won't be good with Nova with any build. I repeat, the first thing you have to do is make it so that 60-80% of your snipes are landing, and after level 7, you train yourself to stop taking random snipe shots so that number goes up to 90-100%. Use W (
Crippling Shot) to make sure that they're slowed and you can easily hit them before you snipe, hide behind friendly walls and safely land Q's whenever you can. Even if it won't result in a kill, or it's a tank like
Diablo or
Rexxar/Misha, just throw it out there to build up your stacks. When you get to 16, your game gets easier, but until then, rely on reliable snipes and your auto-attack.2. Hit and Run. Poke the **** out of them. With your holograms and your stealth, you can out-poke most heroes in the game. Land your snipe, then sprint the other direction. Wait for stealth, then repeat. Don't be in the thick of things if you can help it. Operate at maximum range, and keep people at a distance, especially heroes with a stun or root (
Diablo,
Xul, etc.). If you get caught, you will die, so don't be visible long. And please don't lane. You don't do enough auto-attack damage to contribute, and when you reveal yourself on the map, the enemy team can comfortably over-extend and kill your teammates knowing you're on the other side of the map. Plus, you're way too good at single-target burst damage to waste your time laning.3.
Lethal Decoy. Once you've hit 16, your game gets a whole lot easier, and your playstyle shifts dramatically. You should have a solid
Snipe Master stack, hopefully the full 75%, and each decoy will fire off one explosive snipe that hits the primary target for almost as much as an untalented snipe (~400, 500) and also hits everything around it because of explosive snipe for ~200-300 damage. And you can do this every 8 seconds! Without leaving stealth! And once you have the full 75%, your snipe hit percentage should literally be 100%. If the situation is not ideal to snipe, just don't do it. Drop a decoy instead, and do a solid amount of damage. Clear waves with it, interrupt objectives, dismount heroes. Do all the things you've ever dreamed of doing, but didn't because you were too afraid of losing stacks. Your decoy becomes your main source of damage, waveclear, objective taking, everything. Still snipe when you can, since at this point each one does >1000 damage, but coast on your decoy most of the time.The combination of Lethal Decoy, Explosive snipe, and Snipe Master allow Nova to not only become the best poke hero in the game, but also addresses a lot of her old problems, like laning presence and consistent damage. It takes a unique hit-and-run playstyle with extremely precise snipes, but if you can pull it off, you can wipe teams and win games. Thanks for reading (I know it was kind of long) and feel free to leave comments and feedback below!
Longshot
Covert Ops
Holo Stability
Pinning Shot
Precision Strike
Triple Tap
E.T.C.
Psionic Efficiency
Ghost Protocol
Rewind
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