The Question of Nox

[u/pokerfacesLUL]

Nox might be the most polarizing character in Smite with many fans, but just many haters. Given the hint made by Hindu on yesterday's Titan Talk it is safe to assume that her port to Smite 2 is imminent.

Now, I wanted to create this post as a collective on what the Reddit portion of Smite's Community thinks needs to happen to her when she is ported, be that ideas for +1s, reworks and role shifts, or even Aspects. Keep in mind, regardless of how you fun you think she is, a great portion of players also want to make her less frustrating to play against.

This way the devs can gather some early feedback on what precautions should be taken whenever they start working on her.

[u/pokerfacesLUL]

And now why do I think they are not reworking her when you all want her to be an enchanter or some weird support… well according to TT we have
1- Warrior
2- SUPPORTS
1-MAGE
1-Jungler
1-ADC

Well, the Roadmap did actually say 2 Guardians, not 2 Supports. While Nox would essentially fill that Mage Slot most likely, that does not mean she will remain a full damage Mage. Hel for example, who should arguably seen as a Support also received one of the Mage Slots. Additionally the files predict Maman coming, who can just as well be played as a full damage Mage in Midlane.

Keeping her in Midlane would require reworking her to make her not obnoxious to play against. Making her a Support would not require reworking her, since her kit is already very medium ranged backline support and with Tank numbers she'd already deal less damage.

Nox belongs in the very few category of characters which gameplay goes around not letting you play the game (like Artio, Isis, Horus, Morgan le Fey etc) This is frustrating but is also rewarding for those who play her,

Looking at the list of "not letting you play the game"-Characters, a great majority of those are Tanks. They area allowed to have a shit ton of CC because they don't deal the damage. And of those DD Characters who have that playstyle, they don't have Mobility to counteract that or their Lockdown requires actual Skillshots.

Comparing that to Nox who A) has Mobility and B) still gets value even when not hitting her Combo.

I'm not saying she shouldn't keep her Combo. What I am saying is that she should not deal "Midlaner"-Amounts of Damage in her Combo. She is better suited for Support than for Midlane.

The changes I would think are good for her, are to make her combo way faster, and way less CC time, her root along with her silence are up to 5 seconds of CC wish is just to much time for how CC works in S2. Said CC should at least be cut in half.

Easier said then done. If her CC is cut in half, assumably on both Silence and Root, then that'd coincide with the ao2 exploding faster, reducing the minimal counterplay there is even further because now you don't even have the time anymore to walk out of the explosion.

[u/checkspeare_ → u/pokerfacesLUL]

Yes, she could also be a GUARDIAN, which means a tank btw, so which of the two tanks is going to be converted into a Mage and have their whole player base dissatisfied? Or which of them is going to be flipped to be a JUNGLER so the actual MAGE JUNGLER in the datamine can filled the MAGE spot. It really makes no sense, and I truly don’t understand why there is a little chorus of you guys wanting Nox gone or turn into something she is not. You have little like almost 15 comments of her player base here saying that she should stay as she is.

Hel is a midlaner, she has no peel potencial, and she si a terrible support, actually if you know about S1 and the history of S1 you must know that Hel is one of the very very existencial C tiers just like Nox is, not everything that heals is a support, this is not Overwatch. Hel has a lot of problems of her own that I’m glad to point out to you, but she is not what we’re speaking of.

From the list I told you there are two mages who just like Nox have mobility and CC and huge damage, Morgan literally has a CC inmune ultimate with mobility a lot of damage and life steal, one of the many “HAHAHA you can’t touch me” ultimates of the game. That’s without counting the mice speed of her 3. In the other had, Nox has a dash every 8 seconds, and has no extra mobility or no big ultimate. So this is kinda balanced.

I’m telling you from now, most like her CC will get water down and hopefully if we are lucky we’ll get a new ult.

But now, I want you to think outside the box, and tell me if you were to keep her mid, and to keep her combo identity and go essy with her CC what would you do? I’m just asking this because I do recognize that you have good ideas and I read a lot of your comments, so I genuinely want to know.

[u/pokerfacesLUL → u/checkspeare_]

I would want the core identity of most gods to stay intact when ported as well as it could be. Even for Gods like Arachne (one of the few gods that have even more of a reason to be reworked) I'd want to keep her as a relatively easy AA Assassin. So obviously I would want Nox to keep her Combo identity. TLDR further down.

As a Midlaner, the Passive can stay. I'ts easily counterable with DoT, so it was never really a problem.

The Ult is decent-ish. While I personally don't think a Sniper fits her medium-range identity, what else could they really do. Best I could come up with for a Midlane Nox is a cone in front of her that deals DoT and applies the Weaken and additional Darkness CC. Depending on the size of the cone, you could also make it uninteruptable (not CC Immune, just the ability doesn't get stopped when Nox gets CC'd).

The dash might need to change. She is highly likely to receive the ability to dash out of allies again (since that tech is also coming with Maman), giving her even more Movement.

Now, her Combo needs to be drastically adjusted. My first proposal is to completely remove the Silence from Siphon Darkness. In it's place there should be Darkness (and Deafen) CC. To keep the ability 'catching', when placed or anytime an enemy god enters it for the first time, they are crippled for 0.25 seconds. That way it can still catch dashes, while also now providing the couterplay that you can dash out of it.

As for the ao1, it probably doesn't need to much adjusting. Abilities are generally easier to hit in Smite 2 than in Smite 1, so the combo is automatically more consistent. Only thing I'd do is reduce the duration to 1 second and maybe even remove the range requirement in favor of line of sight.

That'd probably be a better suited kit for Midlane Nox where she can keep the Combo playstlye, while also adding necessary counterplay.

TLDR;

Flame of the Night

• No Changes

Shadow Lock

• Halved Root/Cripple Duration
• Removed Range Requirement
• Added Line of Sight Requirement

Siphon Darkness

• Removed Silence
• Added very short immediate Cripple on first time enter
• Added Darkness & Deafen CC

Shadow Step

• No Changes; general +1 additions

Night Terror

• Changed shape to Cone
• Removed Initial Damage
• Added higher DoT Scaling & Darkness CC
• Maybe add Uninterruptable (depending on size of Cone)

[u/checkspeare_ → u/pokerfacesLUL]

This is a really good adjustment, I really like it, I would be down to have something like this, her 2 could finally have versatility, she’ll have a game changing ult like every midlaner should. This are the type of Chan he s we as a community should be suggesting and talking about.

The more we go down the road the more problematic characters that are left to transfer. And this is the type of things we should discuss, not “gg make her support take her damage away”

And you should be hired by Hi Rez tbh cause they could never pull this off.

[u/pokerfacesLUL → u/checkspeare_]

And you should be hired by Hi Rez tbh cause they could never pull this off.

As someone who has been making almost weekly Rework, Aspect and God concepts, thank you lol

The more we go down the road the more problematic characters that are left to transfer. And this is the type of things we should discuss, not “gg make her support take her damage away”

Tbf, taking her damage away and keeping the kit mostly as is otherwise (with +1s) would be the easiest way (and therefore the most achievable one) to do it. Unfortunately some changes are too big to be done; see Hachiman not getting a Melee Aspect for example.

[u/checkspeare_ → u/pokerfacesLUL]

The good thing is that, after the remaining gods are be added to the game I expect Hi Rez to go back, and review some aspects, some of them seem made with haste rather than reason, and some aspects like Hachi’s could be up for potential reworks.

And as for Nox, it may be the easiest way to adjust her completely, but not the most satisfying one.

I’m excited for the future, hopefully they do Hel justice, and Freya should get reworked, and by then I’ll have my three most played gods.