Mass-effect – How does the DPS between Nova’s rank 5 evolutions compare

mass-effect-3

At rank 5, Nova can evolve one of two different ways, Power Recharge or Half Blast. The descriptions are:

  • Power Recharge – Increase recharge speed of all powers by 25% for 15s.

    • Damage: 385
    • Force: 585N
    • Radius: 4m

  • Half Blast – Gain the option to use nova two times in a row by reducing its barrier consumption by 50% but at the cost of reducing damage and force by 40%.

    • Damage: 245
    • Force: 405N
    • Radius: 4m

Given these statistics, how much DPS does each version of the power do over the same period of time, all other factors (enemy shields/armor/barrier, difficulty, etc.) being equal? I'm having trouble figuring this out by eyeballing it because I'm unsure if Power Recharge increases Nova's recharge as well and what effect that would have.

If there are other, more situational factors that would significantly affect the DPS output that are more clear from hands-on experience with each version (basically, if it sounds good on paper but actually isn't so much in practice), please mention those in your answer.

Best Answer

Power recharge doesn't affect Nova since whether or not you can use Nova depends entirely on if you have shields or not. The biggest point of the power recharge is to make your Biotic charge have a lower cooldown so you can go into a crazy Charge->Nova->Charge->Repeat cycle until whatever you are targeting dies.

If you are comparing absolute DPS, the Charge->Nova->Charge->Repeat combo can't be beat. The reason behind this is that, once your power recharge rate goes up high enough, your charge will be instantly available right after a Nova, and rather than doing a second nova at half damage, you can do a full blown charge at max damage. Since this is the case, you want your only nova to do as much damage as possible rather than just 60%.

However, if you worry about survivability, then you can go for the half powered nova so you retain some shields.

In my first playthrough, I went the entire game using the Charge->Nova->Charge pattern (difficulty hardcore), and I had no issues with survivability. Just don't do something silly like Charge into a banshee and get impaled.

Related Topic