Hey guys, Kit Ballard here. First time ever writing one of these but figured I should sometime, right? I'm not new to MOBA styled games as I mainly play League of Legends. I've played Nova for a few days now and I'm glad they made her free at one point so I could try her out in a real match.

In this guide, I explain the build path and ideas behind how and why I personally choose this one.

Nova's been in the Starcraft universe since Starcraft: Ghost. Sadly it never saw the light of day but atleast they keep bringing her back. Nova in HotS plays with stealth. You'll want to sneak up on people or behind the enemy's line and then unleash hell. Get spotted, and there's a good chance you've botched the mission!

Pros Out of Combat, She won't be seen Very bursty Global Heroic Ability that can have 2 shots Safely force enemy Heroes to use skills on Holo Decoy

Cons When moving, can be seen with a ripple. Low damage without her skills Can miss. Squishy and very low mobility.

Nova's trait is a passive skill, Permanent Cloak, Sniper, which lets her run around the map as a very faint shimmer. Even mounted. Any attacks, Hearth Stone, or Starting to Mount, will uncloak her. You can be hit out of Cloak if someone hits you with an AoE attack, or they use a skill shot at your location (be it they saw your shimmer, or was stupid lucky)

Nova uses 3 active skills to harass your foes to start with.

Snipe is a linear shot that will deal some rather good damage. When fired, it'll stop at the first target hit.

Pinning Shot is Nova's goto tool to slow down her targets for damage and a 30% slowdown for 2.25 seconds. The shot is a short ranged, target skill, so just get close enough to click em.

Holo Decoy is the last in her starting skills. Decoy starts off with a short range, but is a great distraction tool. Where ever you click to spawn a Decoy, it'll "uncloak" and attack the closest enemy, dealing 0 damage. It'll have the same amount of HP and Mana that you have, and will use Snipe and Pinning Shot. Great to force foes to use their skills before you assault them. This skill will not uncloak Nova

Nova is able to choose between 2 Heroic Skills at level 10.

Triple Tap is a very long ranged Targeted skill. Point and click. Nova will uncloak and starts to charge. after a second or 2, she'll start firing at the target, dealing massive damage. It'll rarely miss, with only cloaking or other Heroes blocking the shots causing you to miss your target. The downside to this is Nova is unable to move, and is a free target if spotted.

Precision Strike is her alternative option. It can be fired anywhere on the map, to anywhere on the map. Nova will stop what she's doing, channels for about 0.6 seconds, and several beams of light will envelop the targeted location. After about 1.5 seconds, it'll fire, dealing, at level 10, 1000 damage to anything within the blast zone. Nova is free to move any time after the initial use. Great to put in the path of running enemies, as they'll either run into it and die, or force them to double back, giving your team the chance they need to kill the Hero. What is also nice about this skill is if you're about to die and you have a charge, you can fire it on yourself (or near you if the foe's a ranged fighter) and it'll continue to fire, even after you've died, netting a kill or forcing an enemy retreat

In this segment, I explain the build path I choose and why it might be a good idea! Blue-ish borders are for the "Confusion" path. Red Borders are for the "Raw Burst" path.

Level 1

---

Since 90% of the time you're cloaked, You will want something to work along side it. Starting off with Ambush Snipe is a great idea, due to it dealing 20% more damage when you're cloaked, or just coming out of it. This is your togoto upgrade, as it'll help you burst down Heroes quickly.

Level 4

---

While Gathering Power is great for ramping up your damage output with skill shots, I would personally go with Remote Delivery. To nearly doubles how far you can place your Holo Decoy while making it's cooldown faster. You can use it to scout further away while staying safe behind a wall. There's another reason for this, I'll explain later.

For the Raw Burst set, you can get Gathering Power or Remote Delivery. While you need 5 kills in a row without dying to get the benefit of Gathering Power, you'll do about 200-350 more damage with Snipe.

Level 7

---

This tree path is a doozy. Lots of options to pick from that all help in some way. Personally, I choose One in the Chamber. Since you're going super bursty, after using Snipe and Pinning Shot, your next basic attack will do an additional 50% damage. Many people pick Anti-Armor Shells over the rest due to it's 250% additional damage, but there's a massive draw back to it. Your shots are slowed to a crawl. You'll fire 1 shot every 1-1.5ish seconds, which is very bad for defending your Core if it's pushed and your team isn't helping clear. Also, if your target survives your initial attack, you have a chance to get squished yourself, due to the low firing rate.

Raw Burst tree, you'll want Anti-Armor Shells Hands down.

Level 10

---

I choose Precision Strike over Triple Tap due to the fact I love to pressure the map anywhere I am. Map awareness is a key thing, and knowing where to fire it helps a lot. You see your team chasing an Enemy Hero? Place a Strike a few spaces before the Enemy Hero to block off their escape. There's a good chance that they'll die from having to find a new path to run away or from trying to push their luck and run through it.

Level 13

---

Time to get serious. With this build, you're going to want to have Lethal Decoy. It'll do 25% of your damage, while using skills like Snipe and Pinning Shot. Remember how I said I'd come back to mentioning about Remote Delivery? This is where it helps a lot. Say you and your team's chasing an Enemy Hero down. Remote Delivery can be placed infront of the escaping foe, with a chance of killing them with the Decoy's damage. Also, having this upgrade will make your Decoys more believable and has a better chance of getting foes to think that's really you and waste skills on it.

Level 16

---

Since we are building for Burst and Confusion, you're going to take Double Fake. It'll up you to 50% damage (since there's 2 Decoys now) and makes the enemy unaware which one's you. Just be careful on placement, as when you use Holo Decoy, it'll create a decoy on your location. So move at the same time as you're placing a Decoy to not get hit by an AoE or Skill shot by accident.

For Raw Burst, You're going to take along the Crippling Shot. It lowers your foe's Defenses by 25% for 2.25 seconds, giving you time to land some devastating shots with both you, your clone, and your team. And your Clone's Pinning Shot will apply the Crippling Shot bonus.

Level 20

---

Since you can't pick Fast Reload, You'll have 3 options to pick from. Me, I'll get Precision Barrage as I love to suppress the field. When you get this upgrade, you'll automatically be given an extra Precision Strike. If you have 2 charges, after you fire the first, there will be about 1 second cool down before you can fire the second shot. Great for making foe's lives harder, or just lowering their health to get stamped out by your team. For even more confusion and Burst, bring along Rewind. As soon as you spawn your clones, Rewind and spawn 2 more. The game does not despawn the clones out and will cause some fun havoc. Photo of me using Rewind and Holo Decoy Near bottom of this page.

For Raw Burst, you're going to bring along Rewind. It has a 60 second cool down, so use it when you really need to drop someone.

To deal out the damage this kit's showing off, here's the scope of the pattern you'll want to follow when you're atleast level 16:

-

(Optional: + )

-

-

-

-

-

---

This is the general attack pattern you're going to follow. Pop up your Holo Decoy around your foe to pressure them into attacking it or running the wrong way (usually into you). Follow up with a Snipe shot, then Auto Attack dealing that extra 50%. Pinning Shot then Auto Attack for more damage. All the while your Decoys are helping you out. If the foe doesn't die, they'll be limping away. Here's your chance to chase, getting a Snipe or Holo Decoy off, as they'll be off cool down very quickly and a good chance the foe'll die. Or you can turn back and cloak, finding a new target to harass. Or use a Precision Strike to finish em off or force em to find a new path, giving you a chance to pop in a new Holo Decoy.

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

---

Due to Anti-Armor Shells's slow firing speed, you will have to change up the pattern a little. This is an example idea for a good combo to run on. The first snipe, try to get it in the 1 second frame of decloaking from your Pinning Shot. If you don't think you can get it and the Auto Attack, skip to Snipe instead of using Auto Attack.

This was fun for me to write as I've never done so before! Not every build is perfect, and not every build will win games, but I hope it helps you out. Thanks for reading and I'll try to upgrade this when I can and if I think of anything else.

-- Kit Ballard

3/16/2015 -- Ver 1.3.2 -- Added a Photo of Multiple Clones.

3/16/2015 -- Ver 1.3.1 -- Fixed an oops I had with not having Raw Burst's maps selected.

3/16/2015 -- Ver 1.3 -- Added a new build path: Raw Burst. Added optional, and annoyingly fun, idea of Rewinding for more clones.

3/14/2015 -- Version 1.0 -- Initial writing and posting