Novus are a mechanical species that features in Universe at War: Earth Assault.
History
The Novus were created by another unnamed race who served as their Creators and were a species that appeared Human. This race would create a series of intelligent machines and AI's that would serve them and one such entity was sent on exploration missions. While this was being achieved, the homeworld of the creators was attacked by the vicious Hierarchy who razed the planet and killed every living being on the world. The machines would survive and the ones sent on the exploration mission would return only to find a world in ruins. The primary AI would take on the name as the Founders and rallied the remaining machines that left their world and trace the path of the murderers of their creators, forging themselves as a weapon against them. The machines took on the name Novus which meant to follow. They would gather the remains of one of their creators and cloned her to serve as a warrior as well as a reminder of where they came from. This entity would be called Mirabel and she was paired off with a Novus battlesuit to help her in battle.
The Novus would engage in numerous guerilla missions against the Hierarchy and always managed to survive. Their latest assignment took them to a primitive planet called Earth where they arrived through a portal and witnessed the Hierarchy were in the process of wiping out its inhabitants and gather its resources. They quickly arrived and immediately engaged Novus forces though were somewhat surprised by the fact that the sentient inhabitants of the world were still alive. However, rather than communicate with them, the Founder decided to obey their primary programming of combating only the Hierarchy forces and ignore the native sentients despite arguments put forth by Mirabel about communicating with them. After forming a base, they were successful in attacking several Hierarchy Walkers. During another assault against the Hierarchy forces, Mirabel disobeyed orders and managed to form a translation program to communicate with the sentient Humans and enlisted their aid in destroying Hierarchy slave pens as well as gathering intelligence data on enemy operations.
With this information, they developed a clearer idea on their opponent's actions. However, they also attempted to find elements of their portal technology that had been sent to Earth to ensure that they had a means of returning home. Mirabel along with Vertigo were dispatched to secure the technology. After securing it, they began assembling the Home Portal in order to connect their homeworld to Earth to secure their entry as well as their exist. At the same time, the Founder tasked Mirabel and Viktor with learning more about the Hierarchy's plans and the reason why the planet had not been purified yet. Thus, they assaulted a Hierarchy base where a Material Uplink Node was present that transported Mirabel aboard. However, this was a trap as the node exploded and both Mirabel and Viktor set about freeing what few Novus prisoners were on board the ship as well as reactivating the teleporter before the command ship self destructed as was its intention to eliminate the intruders. They were successful and managed to get entry back onto Earth where they reported to the Founder that the Hierarchy had set a massive assault on their base in order to attack the Portal. Ultimately, the Hierarchy invasion forces came and struck heavily at the Novus installation despite their valiant struggle. Whilst they managed to repel their attack, the Portal was damaged and became destabilized. This was dangerous as the resultant overload based explosion would not only destroy the Earth but the Novus homeworld as well. Thus, the Founder made the ultimate sacrifice in order to close the Portal. His last words were to Mirabel telling her that she was right and that they needed to exceed their programming to survive. Shortly afterwards, he perished and the Portal was destroyed thus leaving Novus stranded on the planet with Mirabel now their leader. Following this tragedy, the Novus base at Egypt was assaulted and destroyed by a Hierarchy assault force that intended to deploy their Purifier planet buster weapon. However, a stray Walker shot at an Egyptian pyramid led to the emanation of a signal that forced the Hierarchy to retreat. Shortly afterwards, the Hierarchy began attacking the North American continent in order to destroy the "sentient" humans nuclear stockpiles and Novus attempted to aid their organic allies but failed to halt the Hierarchy onslaught.
Shortly afterwards, Novus came under attack from another alien race - the ancient Masari who had been awakened by the Hierarchy attack on Earth and began attacking all perceived threats to their survival.
Background
Being a race of white colored machines, the Novus possess a wide variety of appearances from Humanoids to vehicles to aerial craft. The Novus are the creations of an older alien race who built a wide range of machines to serve them. One such machine intelligence, later known as the Founder, was sent out into space only to return to find its homeworld and its makers destroyed by the Hierarchy. They believed in the use of guerilla tactics as well as advanced technology to fight this enemy as well as undermine the use of the opponent's own equipment. It was on that day that the Founder would form the Novus; which translates as those that follow. Their purpose was simple; to destroy the Hierarchy for what they did to their creators and the few machines that survived would follow their enemies, bent only on revenge. The Novus considered themselves as the immune system of the galaxy that worked to combat the malignant actions of the Hierarchy. They were single minded in their goal of defeating their sworn enemies and followed their "primary programming" which was to defeat this foe at any cost. They tended to refer to other intelligent species as being "sentients". At first, they were not willing to change their programming as they believed that they needed to defeat the Hierarchy as, if given the chance, they were capable of consuming the entire galactic core. Thus, they were not at times willing to help out the Hierarchy's victims as they believed by doing so they would be countermanding their programming and wasting their time which would be better spent combating their foe. Typical policy in regards to native sentients was to ignore them and protect only Novus assets. They believed that this programming gave them a key capacity to achieve their objective and the Founder felt that Mirabel lacked this as she was an organic being and thus had to gain her strength from within herself.
Technology
The Novus are a mechanical species that make use of nanotech and possess the capacity of downloading their minds into new locations. This computerized nature means that they are perfectly capable of adapting their means to their threats through the use of software known as Patches which are downloaded into themselves. This provides an increase to different abilities making them handle resources better or deal additional damage. They specialize in numerous technological fields which include nanotechnology which augments their industry. Furthermore, they make use of computing technology and can deploy viruses into enemy systems causing damage. Finally, they also make use of their specialist Flow network. They also make use of the Flow with flow networks allowing them to move about their forces quickly across the battlefield and even to other planets. These, however, require to maintain them known as Flow Generators made of Flow conduits. Novus forces convert themselves into nano-matter which travels through the lines of the network. In addition, they were capable of travelling the galaxy through the use of quantum portal technology that allowed them to open gateways to other worlds. However, the journeys were typically one way as Novus did not have the means to make a stable permanent gateway. Thus, they tended to send pieces of their portal technology along with their travelling forces in order to ensure that they had a way of returning or escaping the planet they resided on at the time. Weapons include the use of anti-matter and projectile weapons known as flechette rifles along with missiles. Their combat strategy does not involve brute force but rather sudden surprise assaults as well as misdirection. The machines were quite capable in the arts of gravitic technology and were able to build Black Hole Generators that allowed them to deploy their super weapon; a gravity bomb. Once launched at a location, it would suck all forms of matter be it organic or inorganic and destroy it in the process. They were also adept in the use of electromagnetic pulses which are used to disable enemy structures and units though leaves infantry alone.