Interesting. I use banshees and libs more than bats and tanks. Though I would say they aren’t useless just niche.
nailed it 
when it comes to approach ling/bane comps: novas shotgun aaaaabsolutely loves mass ling / bane. that last thing u need is something in ur comp to deal with them
I too use Shee/Lib more than Hellbats, but in a number of situations where Airstrike is on cooldown, or it’s bad to use Airstrike would you rather use 500 min for some tanking ability, or 600 for non-tank DPS? Also keeping in mind that going Mech/Sky means both sides benefit from your armory too.
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I think the focus need to be clarified again. OP is asking about Hellbat as “damage soakers” and not “do people use them”. I think people absolutely use them.
As far as the “soaking damage” part. Nova Assault mode gives 200SP every 8sec. Drone shields same 200 shield.
So the question is do 2 x 550HP Hellbat give more “bulk” to “soak damage” or do 4 x 150HP Marines (one of the least bulky alternatives) “soak more damage”… in the presence of Defensive Drone? As you really should not be engaging without one (unless you’re confident in overpowering the wave).
So that would give the Hellbat pairs 2 x (550 + 200) = 1500bulk. While giving 4 x (150 + 200) = 1400bulk. While it isn’t an exact scenario (considering micro, repeat shield casting, etc.) we can see the difference is very minimal. Both would gain slightly different advantages from Drone (more micro rotation from marines and but higher risk dying off shielding, vice versa). Both gain Nova’s Assault tanking, which takes majority of the “damage soaking” anyway.
To me, it’s obvious then for “soaking damage”, hellbats are pretty useless. That doesn’t make them useless (as a unit), as their splash anti-light is very much useful.
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But you can redo the math for 4 Marines taking Baneling shots vs single Hellbats taking Baneling shots (because they naturally spread themselves out vs Banelings). Also, the relative Armour vs Zerglings/Marines isn’t negligible either.
What are you talking about?
Should we also recalculate against storms because 4 units all taking storm damage totals more than 2 units? How about 4 units all irradiated vs 2?
I mean you are welcome to… but that isn’t the point is it? If you’re banking on your units to “soak baneling damage” then you’re doing it wrong:
- Majority damage is dealt by 1-2 shotgun blast via Nova… all Banelings/Zerglings should already have died… there is no such a thing as taking Bane in the face… except if you’re doing it wrong
- In that event, tanking the remainder with 4 marines or 2 hellbats is irrelevant cuz you already messed up
- But sure… if your reason for “soaking damage” is to plan to mess up then yes you’re very much justified to say ‘hellbats are better damage soakers’
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Or, I’m so active with Nova that she is pushing with nuke or clearing at a separate location. Or, Vipers are using their spells. Or, I’m dropping Hellbats to save my allies army.
There is definitely a bunch of situations that can all be exacerbated by various mutators.
I used to find Explosive Threats one of the hardest comps to play against as Nova but a Factory first Hellbat/Siege Tank build absolutely trivialises it. Equally, Hellbats trivialise zerglings in any other swarming comp saving minerals as you don’t have to put down those Defensive Drones making sure you have them if needed (for your or your allies army) and conserving minerals for the late game when you can Griffon Airstrike with impunity.
That kinda reminds me, all of Nova’s units are dropped from the air, i.e., we can drop Firebats like a mini cooldown, if there’s nothing else to drop…
We’re talking about soaking damage… sure, you do you…
Strange how someone who can push multi-location, micro Nova, micro army, etc. yet have had trouble with Swarmy… but magically only until they used Hellbats.
FYI, dealing damage is not soaking damage.
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No shotgun on her P3 though 
Hopefully you are stance dancing as much as possible which also means shotgun won’t always be available on other prestiges as well. Sure, you can always have shotgun available for a primary wave if you manage it properly but for mini waves like on Cradle, Chains or Aggressive Deployment Mutator you either lose a lot of Nova’s power by staying in 1 suit or need to be able to handle waves without shotgun.
yeah, thats kinda the main reason why i dont like p3.
reminds me on abathur p3. before you achive it you think its super cool. when you play it you realise that its worse.
nova has different tools to engage b/ling in case shotgun isnt ready.
- raven autoturret (they are aggromagnets and give you time to reduce the burst dmg of the inc wave)
- 1-2 quick defense drones
- fly towards incooming wave with raven and let HSM kick in
- airstrike
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We must have pretty different experienced playing vs Explosive Threats but best I’ve figured out to consistently win is to not make any flying units to not give the Scourge any targets.
Otherwise you have to have pretty perfect micro to not ever get your flyers yoinked and exploded.
Against Explosive Threats i normally I go for Tanks, Hellbats and Ghosts (with snipe turned off auto to manually target high value targets if I’m feeling ambitious with my micro).
You’re right here. Very often against Swarmy, there isn’t much reason to make air units (which becomes a hindrance more than it can help).
That said, as soaking damage goes, “free Railguns” is as good as soaking damage goes cuz it’s free…
Vipers don’t abduct anything unless it has massive tag or is a siege tank. Neither has anything to do with soaking damage. They won’t abduct your ravens, hellbats, marines… if anything your favourite tanks would be targets. Not exactly ideal damage soakers - tanks…
At most, any air unit will be affected by Parasitic Bomb.
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I mean as far as things go, every commander will always have upper tier units and lower tier but still good or decent/ great in niche situations.
Nova in her combat suit can already cover small swarmy comps well with great positioning, soaks, shotguns and shielded teleports. However on most standard 2 base economies, Nova’s star units tend to be gas heavier with ravens, liberators, and siege tanks. Her marines are a excellent mineral dump and not half shabby.
Her goliaths are also quite good at air. She’s mostly charge limited and tends to float minerals on 2 base economy once she hits 100/100 supply and seemed more limited by supply, charges and gas.
I always thought her charges were a fair design, rewarding you for using all her units while she was one of the first powerhouse commanders before the sheer insanity of optimized abathur speedrun play came around. She could easily use a hero army to be easy to pick up but hard to master with lots of micro, unit ability control groups for snipes and raven control groups to deploy turrets and bombs to heal.
Her charge based design encouraged you to use a little of every unit rather than stack one like most other commanders at the time.
That said, hellbats i think are a decent 2 base filler/meat shield when resources are floating and other prime units are on cd. I kinda see them kinda like the pawns in a game of chess. You don’t really expect to checkmate your enemy’s king with them.
But they make a useful close ranged meatshield that can facetank and kill the odd thing here and there. And you’ll usually have a barracks for marines anyways.
Now nova microed carefully, especially post mastery with some minor life regen with raven healing and point defence drones shouldn’t be taking too many losses anyways. But if it’s 2 base economy, swarmy or just supplemental, they’re not bad fillers. I just wouldn’t call them the Queens of Nova’s army.
They’re more like meat shields to take the place. Losing a raven or a siege tank or liberator on oblivion could be a sour loss, but they’re in a lot better space than the last century i saw someone using built banshees and vikings on a raynor before prestiege which is mostly a higher effort for sameish rewards outside of the flying tag and some mutation scenarios.
Nova’s charge system makes every unit have a potential role, even if just as a filler or meat shield, i would probably put the hellbat as the only average/semi good unit in a list of great to excellent units for her.
But as far as things go, Yeah, at least for my personal playstyle i remember often hellbats when 100/100 supply capped with combat suits or banshees when prioritizing gas for ravens/ liberators/siege tanks were the nova units i seemed to build or stack less.
I still remember like tossing a charge or two of nova since she was a casual meta on her release. She was basically sold as a elite commander with both a elite hero unit and Army at a time when kerrigan brought the hero, raynor brought the army, etc.
I kinda agree yeah. Hellbats aren’t really the best unit for supply but eventually on 2 base eco you usually hit a point where if your micro is good with stance dancing/drones to prevent damage and point defence drones, and especially post 15+ where splitting a few points into health regen to supplement ravens makes 100% hp easier. You’ll usually float minerals even using air strikes as you wish.
To the point i’ve even seen the odd nova here and there literally suicide some or all their workers after 100/100 supply in the odd blue moon of a base brutal lol.
But i don’t think someone using them is gonna drastically make or break a game either way. Just like some people will meme about protoss commanders not building a pylon for artanis. [“oh no! One less zealot. Now we will lose the game!.. Oh, wait nvm.”]. I think they’re just kinda one of those filler units that don’t really change the game.
I do remember using 1 or 2 as fillers up for the 40 → 100 supply road. Sometimes i’d wait for them to die and not really worry, occasionally sacrifice them to “friendly bullet fire” to build a extra raven at 100/100.
I really wouldn’t call them the highest tier nova unit by far. They just have the misfortune of being a okay unit on a commander with a great aoe in combat suit shotgun.
Just like how blaze is one of the most ridicolously powerful anti swarmy aoe units by FAR. (Name one other unit who is seen as ‘semi off meta’ who can literally set entire bases on fire, literally chainfire ignite infinite limited infested by vision only, set buildings on fire on don. And yet still isn’t as a popular pug meta just since tychus’s nade and Sirius’s 50 dmg aoe suicide turrets for lings/banelings do the same role.
If you could put blaze in any other commander’s roster, and they needed a ground aoe, there’d be like no question he’s one of the strongest anti light grounds in the game for zerglings while Nova’s hellbats and raynor’s firebats are okay meatshields here and there. You can have a good unit overshadowed by a great unit, and a freakishly extremely powerful specialist just kinda overlooked just since a bread and butter unit like Sirius kinda does some weird amalgamon of aoe fear ‘tanking’, detection and suicide turrets ‘good enough’ while contributing more to objective damages to round out a commander’s weaknesses over their strengths more.
But man is blaze just absolutely a army igniting wonder on miner evac and don and the odd ultra swarmy builds when the zerglings alone fill up the screen and you just watch them all chain ignite on fire, evaporate and kill themselves.
I kinda feel like nova’s hellbats are kinda in a similar situation. They’re a okay tool in a area their default commander can always handle fine.
But i never mind a few of them as path to 100 supply fillers when other stuff is on cd and i could see them being more useful on 1-15 or p3 or fire insurance when nova is away from a army. If anyone hypothetically lost a raven or liberator/siege tank, you could feel it.
If one loses a hellbat or wants to kill one to open up supply for a extra raven/liberator/siege tank, they served their role as a decent meatshield filler.
But yeah they’re definitely the most skippable unit of nova’s roster by far, but still one that’s worth keeping in mind as a pretty disposable meat shield or swarmy shield.
They probably won’t change the match, but if you float the resources anyways on 2 base, why not, who cares.
You can always just kill them later at 100 supply later if you want to get more of the better units anyways and still float minerals on 2 base nova.
So do 2 Hell Bats with defensive Drones work well to soak damage? You have units with more hp, and Drones on top of that. I don’t think a lot of things go through DD, but in those cases, better to use Hellbats than Marines, Tanks, etc.
Her P3 is bloody fun though. Being able to spam nukes every… just over 2 minutes IIRC?, is bonkers! And your nukes are more effective since you can really can in and get extra coverage, without worrying about Nova getting taken down.
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Hellbats are great against Explosive Threats I think which is one of the toughest comps and do surprisingly well when you get more than just a couple (assuming a factory first P1 build).
I think P3 is a meme. Don’t get me wrong, it’s incredibly powerful on offensive maps but on defensive maps it can kind of fall over. If I know the map before going in I’d go P3 but random map I prefer P1.