NTE Mental Damage Explained

Mental damage in NTE: Neverness to Everness is a special damage type that only triggers under certain conditions. Players may have run into the term “mental damage” in the item description of certain Cartridges, but since the game does not outright explain which damage qualifies as mental damage, this can lead to some confusion. Here’s how this works.

What is Mental Damage in NTE?

There are two sources of Mental damage in NTE:

• Nova Esper Cycle (Psyche + Chaos)
• Fadia (S-Class character)

Nova Esper Cycle

When you trigger a Nova reaction by forming an Esper Cycle by combining a Psyche character with a Chaos character, the game applies 1 “tick” of Mental damage to the target. After a brief delay, the tick expires, dealing an explosion of Mental damage to all affected targets.

This means Daffodil (Chaos) and Haniel (Psyche) will inflict Mental damage on enemies they face if you trigger a full Cycle gauge Entry Attack after their Cycle Gauges are full.

Currently, Daffodil is the only Chaos character in NTE, which means she is the only one that can trigger Nova in 1.0. The only other known Chaos character is Lacrimosa, another S-Class character whose banner is set to release with version 1.1.

Fadia

Fadia is an S-Class Standard character in NTE who has the ability to inflict six instances of Mental damage on a target through her ultimate. Additionally, the five basic attacks she performs immediately after her ultimate also inflict direct Mental damage instead of standard Psyche damage.

Fadia is the only character who has direct access to Mental damage without the Nova Esper Cycle reaction in the current version of the game.

How to Increase Mental Damage in NTE

Mental Damage can be increased from two sources:

• Quiet Manor Cartridge
• Eternal Waltz S-Class Arc

Quiet Manor Cartridge

The Quiet Manor Cartridge can be farmed from the Rabbit Hole: Mental Map anomaly zone using 40 Character Pixels per encounter. It offers the following set bonus:

• Epic (2): Mental Damage +10%
• Legendary (4): Grants wearer a 12% Mental DMG Bonus per Basic Attack, up to 3 stacks. Each stack lasts 6s.

Eternal Waltz S-Class Arc

You can get a free Eternal Waltz S-Class Arc by defeating The Never-Ending Arachne in the Deal? Deal! main quest for the first time. It has the following stats:

• Increases Max HP by 20%. Increases Mental DMG dealt by 10% for 10s after the wearer casts an Ultimate.

Naturally, the Eternal Waltz is the best Arc for Fadia.

You can also purchase Eternal Waltz from the Arc Shop for 25 Tri-Keys.