NivusThe Truly Grand WizardI am removing
Arcane Reach and
Arcane Focus from play, as well as altering his attack damage scaling so that he has 35-80 at level 10. In addition, his range now increases with his level, reaching maximum at level 10 without needing Arcane Reach. Stats otherwise unchanged.
SKILLS1. Magic MasteryNivus conjures one of three Rune from his Book, chosen with equal chance. His next attack gains global range and is imbued with the magic of the Rune, thereby enhanced with one of three special effects:
- Weaving Magical Strings: A reduction in movement and attack speed of 55/77/99%, which decays over 10 seconds. Prioritize the foe with the highest damage.
- Temporal Disruption: A long/longer/insanely long teleport backwards. Prioritize the foe closest to the exit.
- Silencing Ward: Silences enemies in an AoE for 7/10/13 seconds. Prioritize spellcasters.
Nivus retrieves 3 Rune from his Book, and choose one with his cane, fusing it into the cane for an empowered attack.
Cooldown: 15 seconds
2. Chain SpellShoots a regular bolt that pierces to an additional 2/3/4 enemies.
Cooldown: 6 seconds.
3. Magic MissilesCasts 3/5/7 homing magic missiles that never miss. Each deals 12/18/24 damage and slows by 30/50/70% for 3 seconds. Missiles attempt to damage as many enemies as possible, prioritizing those closer to the exit.
Cooldown: 10 seconds.
4. DisintegrateDisintegrates enemies in a small range, whose HP is no more than 25/50/75% of their maximum, and below 225 HP for each enemy. No more than 3/5/7 enemies can be disintegrated.
Cooldown: 20 seconds.
5. Aspect of the ArcaneNivus gains 8/16/24 attack damage for his next attack each time he harms an enemy with an ability. Stack-able with multiple consecutive ability casts.
Aspect of the Arcane cannot be upgraded before other skills.
CHANGES IN PLAYSTYLENivus receives minor changes in this Hero Improvement. He remains a frail glass-cannon, requiring soldiers to provide safe sniping spot. However, his sniping capability has been vastly improved. By replacing Arcane Reach and Arcane Focus, he gains access to two new, game-changing passives:
Magic Mastery and
Aspect of the Arcane.
Magic Mastery tap on Nivus' expertise on multiple areas of magic, namely the manipulation of time, space, and overpowering hostile spellcasters. He gets a global attack every 15 seconds with this skill - a fantastic sniping tool. Moreover, the enhanced attack carries a special effect that is very useful in stalling the step of enemies.
Weaving Magical Strings is a strong slow that rob the strongest enemy of its movement and attack power for a considerable period of time. 'Shock' enemies such as Saurian Brute and Bloodshell are most harmed by this effect, and therefore prioritized.
Temporal Disruption is a tailor-made leak catcher, and can also halt the movement of slow, strong foes that are busy fighting your soldiers. Finally,
Silencing Ward is the silence that we all want. It targets spellcasters behind enemy lines, those who has been annoying us since we play Kingdom Rush: Frontiers (I'm looking at you, Blood Tricksters). This effect emphasizes Nivus' ability to dominate hostile mages through the superior magical knowledge that he owns. Each of these effects on their own would be OP with a 15-second cooldown, because Nivus can either totally stall or repeatedly disable any enemy, or constantly keep enemy spellcasters' heads down from a safe range. However, with them being stuffed together in one skill, with each having only 33% chance to activate, Nivus might not do the thing you want at that moment, though it is ensured that he will do something else just as useful.
Aspect of the Arcane is a damage-focused skill. With Nivus' 3 original skills centered around harming as many enemies as possible, Aspect of the Arcane can give Nivus a ton of burst damage after each ability usage - 155-200 magic damage after Chain Spell, and 203-248 magic damage after Magic Missiles. Disintegrate may grant a random amount of bonus damage, from just 24 to over 100 with one good activation. Magic Mastery's Silencing Ward, being AoE, may give multiple stacks as well, but it is harder due to the lack of clustered spellcaster in KRF.
In general, Nivus remains the long-ranged mage that he is, with just a little bit of change to his strength. I always feel like he is lacking damage, especially when facing enemies with large HP pools. So now I give him these two tools that helps dealing with those pesky mooks, as well as improving his crowd control, which is almost nonexistent right now despite his kit having multiple multi-target spells. All the while, what I wish to achieve the most is emphasizing his aspect of an eccentric, knowledgeable wizard that he is, and always should be!
P/s: On a side note, has he been buffed silently. I remember Magic Missiles' cooldown used to be 15 seconds, and Chain Spell's being 7, but now they are 10 and 6, respectively. That of Disintegrate seems shorter, too.