We really enjoyed Novus! It was super fun, combat moved quickly and the options are a wonderful sweet spot between too light and too heavy. When I read the rules I was concerned about a couple things. I thought that snags and boons would never come up because of the number over the TN required. I was also concerned that AR (armor rating) would draw combat out. Hah! I was so delightfully wrong. The numbers in Novus just work, and it was super fun to see how smoothly it all comes to together. I absolutely LOVE the options in magic and character creation, and I think this is a savvy, well done game.
Thanks! I am glad that you like it.
We are going to use Novus to run our game in the foreseeable future! We tried several games and they didn't "fit" with my desires and our play style, Novus really shined. We plan to add some new options to the game and I hope to publish my setting with the system at some point (pending my application for a license of course...). At first, we will start with a "vanilla" fantasy world, and then transition into Dark Portals when I have more setting info set down. This will give us a chance to test out any optional rules we want to include.
Well, as long as you aren't planning something like the infamous "Book of Erotic fantasy", you can basically consider yourself as licensed
1) If you set something on Fire with a spell or otherwise, what is the ongoing damage? Are there any ongoing damage rules somewhere?
Actually, no there are not. This was something that I had not really considered before. In most instances, I would imagine, if something catches fire, it is either going to end up being destroyed as the fire consumes it or somebody will put it out. Some simple rules concerning continuing damage from sources such as fire make for a good article for Libram Novus or if you are interested, I wouldn't mind letting you do and release your own version first.
2) If you're casting a "ball" spell at a target area vs. a person, but you miss the TN, how does the spell deviate? Is there less damage or an easier way to avoid it?
You seem to be missing something here. Reread the "Spells vs. DEF" sidebar on page 58. Remember, you use the SAME roll for both the casting TN and the check against DEF to see if it hit. A specific location has a DEF of of 15, so with the usual CTN of a "ball" spell being 23 or so, that means that the mage isn't going to miss the target location so long as the spell was cast successfully.
Now, since the attack looks like a normal bolt until it reaches its given range, it might be possible for some extremely
talented individual to deflect or redirect such an attack. In that case, the "ball" would explode upon traveling a distance equal to the distance from the caster to the original targeted location. (if the "ball"
hit a target before it reached its targeted range, I would have it
explode at that point. attempting a deflections SHOULD be dangerous..
3) Why do monster stat blocks not have initiative? That would be super helpful when using the book (especially newbies) for an encounter. 
Cause I am a dummy...
4) How many levels of monsters can a PC Party typically handle? If I have 6 PCs at level 2 (Total of 12 levels), is there a formula or something to eyeball as far as challenge?
Hard to say.... It depends upon the party and its combat capabilities. Unlike d20, where a 5th level Fighter will always have a +8 BAB or something like that, in Novus, you CAN build a character like Joxur from the tv show, Xena. That incompetent fighter is possible, and so is the guy who cannot hit the broad side of a barn with a sword, but who can pick off a fly at 200 paces.
the wide potential range of combat capabilities is hard to judge.
However, having said that, I would think that a party should be able to defeat a foe of equivalent total levels (i.e. 6 2nd level adventurers have a total level of 12, so they should be able to defeat a group of foes that also equals 12 levels - easily...)
When creating the creatures, I did not min-max them or even max them out. I built them on a slightly conservative basis as "average members" of of their race/type. PCs are quite often above average in most respects, so you could always add an extra 10% in levels on the foe's side and likely not have it be unbalanced.
Now, if you built an exceptional foe, then hoooooweeee..... all bets are off...
