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Nerida – Styx Envoy: Ghost of a Good Time

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For about a year now, Seasun has been struggling to introduce the concept of a sub-DPS (damage per second) character, specifically Enya – Exuvia and Marian – Riptide. Enya was often relegated to support roles, while Marian’s shot-by-shot damage output frequently left her benched as an inactive buff bot. To address this issue, a new character, Nerida – Styx Envoy, was introduced with the aim of promoting a more aggressive character-swapping playstyle. However, the team building possibilities that Nerida offers don’t quite live up to their potential, contrary to what one might initially assume. This isn’t because they lack synergy or are poorly designed, but rather due to a unique and intriguing dynamic.

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Abilities

Standard Skill

In simpler terms, Nerida’s default ability allows her to become invisible, using up energy to dash forward and create Phantoms that attack nearby enemies. This is your primary tool for dealing with large groups of enemies, especially in easier content where you can just turn it on and let Nerida run into walls while the phantoms handle any enemies automatically. It’s not quite as exciting as Danny Phantom’s action-packed adventures.

As you’ve been scattering illusions across the battlefield and simultaneously accumulating Wail Charge, you should know that with neuronics, each hit gives you two Wail Charge. Since each illusion strikes five times, you need to produce eight illusions to reach the maximum capacity of 80 Wail Charge. Due to the slow speed of your projectiles, you can typically generate ten illusions before triggering the second part of Nerida’s standard skill. Activating this skill depletes all Wail Charge and releases a hail of Wailing Ribbons, firing six initially and an additional one for every five Wail Charge used, resulting in 22 hits with 80 Wail Charge expended. This produces a substantial burst of damage, serving as your primary burst ability (though you’ll soon see it’s more than that), despite the fact that the projectiles don’t travel any quicker than Nerida’s illusions. Additionally, using this skill restores your S-Energy, allowing you to repeat the process.

Support Skill

This “ambush” skill, which helps keep your operative active on the battlefield instead of retreating after being used, makes its second appearance here. In Nerida’s case, she delivers a quick burst of damage with it. It may not seem extraordinary, but unlike many other DPS (Damage Per Second) support skills, this one does have practical application, as you will soon discover.

Deiwos Passive

Let’s take a brief pause to discuss Nerida’s Deiwos passive ability before we dive into her ultimate. When Nerida wields a Chaos weapon, any harm she inflicts with her skills additionally triggers Wraith Haunt on the opponent, equal to the damage inflicted. This effect depletes gradually over time to deal non-elemental, unamplifiable damage, and enemies marked as “Haunted” experience this. If you can build up enough Wraith Haunt on an enemy such that it would consume all of their remaining health (or decrease an enemy’s HP significantly enough so that this is the case), the damage conversion rate increases rapidly for a pseudo-execution effect.

Also, Nerida gets extra ATK based on her Alignment Index stat.

Ultimate Skill

In this scenario, Nerida combines all her diverse abilities, culminating in a significant advantage. Upon entering the battlefield, she employs an odd artifact called the Truth-Seer. This artifact amplifies the Wraith Haunt stacks of nearby enemies by 1.8 times and enhances the Wraith Haunt inflicted by Nerida by the same ratio while active. Furthermore, other operatives who specialize in Chaos skill damage will have 25% of their inflicted damage converted into Wraith Haunt as well. After a lapse of five seconds, the Truth-Seer dissipates, dealing Chaos damage. Notably, the accumulated Wraith Haunt previously ceased converting to damage while the Truth-Seer was active, but it transforms into a large burst of damage upon the Truth-Seer’s expiration, offering a more intense reward. This sudden burst of damage significantly boosts Nerida’s offensive power, as it nearly doubles her overall output, albeit at the cost of being heavily delayed. Similar to the Wraith Haunt damage conversion, this damage is also devoid of elements and incapable of being amplified, simplifying damage calculations – what you observe is exactly what you receive.

…Do jellyfish have eyes? Can they even see things?

Assessment

Nerida’s approach in battle is simple yet effective: she transforms into a ghostly form and summons phantoms to build Wail Charge, which she then releases for a powerful burst of damage. Her ultimate ability adds extra punch to this attack, but there’s a brief gap between activation and detonation that allows you to substitute one of your supporting units to contribute to the accumulation of Wraith Haunt stacks, as long as they can inflict Chaos skill damage. Once these units have completed their turn, use Nerida’s support skill to bring her back into action just as her ultimate detonates, ready to repeat the process.

Generally speaking, Nerida is proficient enough to handle tasks and inflict adequate damage, making it feasible for you to activate her default ability and rest briefly while her ghostly minions perform the majority of the work in most situations. However, gamers seeking more captivating gameplay might not find this setup particularly engaging. Interestingly, Nerida’s endgame potential is optimized when paired with a competent sub-DPS, which is a first for any operative. This pairing, however, can make her individual abilities appear less impressive when compared to other self-reliant powerhouses in the current meta.

Weapons

You’d likely find it significant that Nerida’s top-tier gacha weapon, Shadow Surge, outperforms the free alternative, Web Snare, quite substantially. It offers standard advantages such as ATK boost, %DMG, and an exclusive %DMG Taken buff. At tier 1 (T1), it grants a substantial 38% increase, and at tier 2 (T2), it jumps to a considerable 74%. These figures are notably higher than those typically seen among operatives. However, there’s a caveat with this weapon that may not be beneficial for those aiming to skip the signature ability.

Careful readers of Web Snare’s skill summary will discover that its 25% attack boost doesn’t activate until after Nerida’s ultimate ability finishes. This isn’t a concern in long-term gameplay, but it does mean that the initial round of attacks deals less damage due to this delay, widening the power gap as much as it did when Cherno – Enigma was dominant a year ago.

Manifests

According to Seasun’s message, Nerida adheres to the traditional investment philosophy where performance improves over time (which you’re probably familiar with by now). Similar to past operatives like Enya – Tempest and Chenxing – Jade Arc, some of the same enhancements and benefits reappear in a slightly altered sequence. This means I have to update all the bonus tables when performing calculations. Thanks, Seasun. (In simpler terms, Nerida follows the usual “investment goes up over time” approach, similar to Enya and Chenxing but with some tweaks in the order of their abilities. These changes require me to redo the bonus tables for calculations.)

An intriguing aspect to consider is that Nerida’s Manifest 5 functions as a teamwide boost to attack, reinforcing her role as a sub-DPS character. Consequently, its practical value in real-world gameplay may surpass the charted values. However, remember it maintains the same high cost, so budget that factor accordingly.

Logistics

At first sight, Nerida’s equipment known as Sidhe Squad and her logistics set may not appear particularly engaging, as they only enhance one aspect of her skill sequence. However, the ability they amplify, Wailing Ribbons, plays a crucial role in Nerida’s combat routine, being the primary source of her damage output. Moreover, this damage is often augmented by Nerida’s ultimate when additional offensive power is required, and it becomes excessive when it isn’t needed. And let me tell you, the boost numbers on these items are impressive even considering buff dilution and diminishing returns. A 130% damage amplification while in Nerida’s ult is no small matter.

Regarding her abilities, Nerida doesn’t encounter problems with skill cooldowns, S-Energy, or U-Energy. In fact, she prefers not to shoot, so neither critical rate nor damage are beneficial for her. It’s unnecessary to mention that defensive stats don’t matter unless an offensive ability scales its damage from it. Thus, the only statistics that Nerida can gain significant advantage from are Attack (ATK) and Alignment Index, which increases her ATK as well.

For further detailed weapon and logistics setup comparisons, check out the additional resources. You’ll also find a handy tool there to help you fine-tune your equipment selection – a logistics optimization calculator.

Team Building

Nerida, who specializes in dealing damage quickly (DPS), gains advantages from supports that boost such damage. Enya’s Exuvia, with its strong skill buffing abilities, remains effective, but its additional utility may be limited before M3 because Nerida doesn’t like using guns and can’t charge her pod as a result. However, you can still use Enya effectively, but this time the focus might shift to Marian – Riptide, who is usually the second choice, due to her strengths in the role.

Hey there! As a fellow enthusiast, I remember we’ve been on the hunt for a solid Chaos sub-DPS to complete my gameplay loop in this game. The pool of operatives fitting that role is already slim, but it becomes even more challenging when considering the tight timeframe for unleashing Nerida’s ultimate, during which they need to deal maximum damage. While Cherno – Enigma can pack a punch, the setup required is often too complex or time-consuming to justify the effort. In this scenario, Riptide emerges as the clear choice. Her special bullets charge rapidly because each of Nerida’s phantom spawns counts as a skill cast, and her swift sub-DPS mag dump receives an unexpected boost due to it technically being skill damage, thus contributing to Neridia’s ultimate explosion. To top it off, Riptide passively enhances standard skill damage (where most of Nerida’s elemental damage lies), making them a perfect match. In essence, Riptide feels like an extended part of my standard skills, making such a strong pairing that they might as well be my second standard skill!

Despite being a standard DPS (Damage Per Second) character, Nerida gains advantages from the shared resource pool that includes Acacia – Kaguya, Eatchel – The Cub, as well as more affordable options like Acacia – Redacted and Chenxing – The Observer.

Should You Pull?

I thought about this for a while, because Nerida really is a bit of a mixed bag.

As a gamer, I’ve noticed that Nerida’s damage, while massive, tends to come too late in endgame content for competitive viability. However, the pseudo-execution mechanic is handy against bosses with tough HP barriers. Yet, even within this niche role, her effectiveness is debatable as other DPS characters can simply dash between triggers quicker, effectively offsetting any invincibility periods. But when it comes to sustained DPS content like Supreme Battlegrounds, she performs much better and could be a decent option for competitive players – provided you already have Riptide in your team. Attempting to achieve results without Riptide would be futile.

For most players, we’re faced with another dilemma: While Nerida’s primary skill excels at auto-attacking mobs, it can get quite tedious. Additionally, playing as Nerida feels sluggish – her phantoms take an eternity to deploy, Wailing Ribbons move at a snail’s pace towards targets, and even her ultimate’s delayed explosion seems excessive when its effects could be constantly active without the need for a cast time. Personally, I found her gameplay less engaging than Vidya – Agave in any content that doesn’t require much effort beyond activating the phantom factory. However, it’s true that easy mission-clearing abilities do attract a specific group of players.

However, when you compare Nerida to most new DPS characters who are just as effective or even more enjoyable to play, my suggestion for casual players shifts from “maybe” to a generous “probably not.

In essence, Nerida – Styx Envoy seems out of place, as though she was crafted for a different type of game. For instance, in games that heavily focus on character-swapping like Wuthering Waves, her sub-DPS role transforms into a mechanic that thrives on optimizing game systems that favor this style of play. However, Snowbreak is not such a game.

In Snowbreak, where DPS and support characters have been fine-tuned to perform their roles as efficiently as possible, allocating power to simulate character-swapping gameplay instead diminishes your overall output. To put it simply, in most regular game situations (one could argue all scenarios not specifically tailored for her success), Nerida’s swap-dependent rotations can be replaced with a traditional DPS for comparable or even superior performance.

As a gamer, I’ve got to hand it to Seasun for stepping out of the box and proposing a fresh gameplay approach, one that could potentially be beneficial for the gaming community. However, a new meta needs to measure up to the old one to be significant, and unfortunately, after a year of rapid power increase and powerful solo DPS releases, Nerida falls short in meeting this standard. It’s also crucial to acknowledge the overly restrictive nature of her kit, as she only works effectively with Chaos skill damage characters. This essentially limits your choices, pushing you towards using Marian – Riptide, which doesn’t significantly enhance player freedom in team composition and strategic planning.

With advancements in this area and the addition of novel gameplay dynamics to recognize such playstyles, Nerida could reach her full potential. Currently, she’s experiencing the drawbacks that often accompany innovation, which unfortunately means she doesn’t fully realize her combined abilities.

Supplementary Material

Link to spreadsheet

Includes tools for calculating weapon sets, supply chains, and expansion rates, as well as an optimizer for logistics management.

Cheat Sheet

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2025-05-10 08:48

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