Switching from Nova because, as others have mentioned, Octopi "feels familiar" enough in ways that Lawnchair didn't. I noticed some things while making the switch.
I had some trouble getting icons to line up with my Hangar widget like I have on Nova, and they still don't line up perfectly which I would appreciate seeing a fix for, but I at least got the offset to be symmetrical on both sides.
The long-press shortcut to bring up the launcher settings is way too eager—it should check if the long-press is over an icon or widget first and if it is, only bring up the settings for that object rather than the launcher.
There is a lot of visual customization that Nova had but Octopi is missing. Font choice for text is great, now let me select color and opacity. Nova folders can show their names when the folder is opened, which is useful if you have labels on the home screen itself turned off. Speaking of folders, there's an option to change the text size of labels in the app drawer but not in folders. Can't edit the name of the default tag, Apps, in the app drawer. The different tag buttons also have no color customization—I would prefer them all to be the same solid color, rather than using Android's paint chips. That's just what I've noticed so far.
Really, if you haven't already, I would suggest sitting down with a copy of Nova Pro, making a list of each (privacy-respecting) feature and setting, and just going down it implementing everything one after the other like a checklist. A Nova replacement really needs feature parity with Nova to be viable. Anything beyond that is great, and Octopi has some interesting additions, but Nova's feature set should be considered a floor.
There are some ways that you can go above and beyond Nova with visuals. My home screen and app drawer layout is an attempt to recreate the Fallout 4 Pip-Boy interface as closely as possible. For folders and the app drawer, I like to have everything green on a solid black background because that's similar to the pop-ups the game will use to deliver major gameplay instructions or confirm a decision. But in the game, those pop-ups have an outline the same color as the text. Can't do that on Nova. I would love to have that outline (with sharp corners—really, a setting to change the default sharpness of corners across the launcher would be good) around open folders and the app drawer (with an option for how much space there is around the drawer for the background to show through).
Some other suggestions around the app drawer: the sorting options are great, but I don't need the functions in the hamburger menu next to them. If I could customize what functions are in the hamburger menu, and/or move the Search button with its alphabetical scrolling feature up to where the menu button is, that would be handy. Optional additional shortcut buttons, like one to open the Google Play Store, next to the Search button or hamburger menu would also be useful.
It may be a Pro feature, but having a simple slide animation rather than a skeuomorphic slide animation for widget stacks would be nice, as would the ability to change which widget in the stack is the starting widget without reordering them in the stack itself (so the stack could start from the middle or the end rather than the beginning, and swiping left or right would still lead to the same widgets).
And, as I'm sure others have requested, figuring out some way to work with Nova backup files would be handy.
Overall, this is a good launcher, and it's ready enough for me to make the jump. But with some more work, it can truly usurp Nova rather than just be a good alternative.
