Patch 5.9, "Dragon's Fortune" - Bran's Thoughts

Patch notes are found here: https://www.smitegame.com/news/dragons-fortune-5-9-pc-update-notes


Blah blah skins payhireztheyreallexclusive blah blah


Item changes:

• Soul Eater (buff): Ability lifesteal increasing from 10% to 15%. I'd talked recently in a different discussion involving both Ullr and Medusa with the use of the item, but felt at the time that the ability lifesteal was less effective than it sounded. This is a good shift.
  
  
• Hide of the Urchin (buff): Max stacks decresed to 7, protections per stack increased from 2 to 3, and time to generate the passive shield once evolved decreased from 3 to 2. This definitely makes this a more powerful choice. I like it.
  
  
• Stone of Binding (buff): Passive pen buff increased from 10 to 15. Bit of a push toward more aggressive early play. The next buff is similar in intent. I like this one.
  
  
• Talisman of Energy (buff): radius of buff increased from 55 to 70, buff duration increased from 6 to 8 seconds, max stacks from 5 to 6. These are nice effects and might make it a more common pickup.
  
  
• Shogun's Kusari (buff): Magical protection increased from 50 to 60. They just increased it, and they're doing it again? I think they should have just added a bit of health or something...the AS buff is pretty strong. And in combination with Heart's adjustment...well, can't say I particularly like it, but it WILL help it get picked up mid-game and later.
  
  
• Sovereignty (nerf): Personal phys protection decreased from 50 to 45. I can understand this one. It's okay. Total prots for you are now 60. That's fine.
  
  
• Heartward Amulet (nerf): Magical protection aura decreased from 20 to 15. Okay, now this one is just a dumbass adjustment. It's already in competition with a lot of other magical protection items, and magical power is higher. There are often only 2 magical gods on a team, so this pickup is already a bit more situational, and you're going to decrease the aura for teammates? Really? Someone explain this one to me, because I'm apparently missing something.
  
  
• Titan's Bane (nerf): Base pen decreased from 20% to 15%, and max pen now only peaks at 200 protections instead of 175. I think this is a better adjustment on the physical end than what they're also doing to Ob Shard.
  
  
• Obsidian Shard (nerf): Same as above, but for magical of course. Now this one...I dunno. I think the adjustment on the upper end is fine, but feel that maybe the base could have stayed the same.
  
  
• Shoes of Focus (buff): power increased from 40 to 55. Uh...okay? I guess? Definitely helps early game. I like that the power matches Magi now.
  
  
• Shoes of the Magi (buff): power increased from 45 to 55. Same?

God changes:

• Ah Puch (buff / shift): Corpse Explosion gets a 30 initial damage buff at all ranks, though the damage per corpse drops just a bit (5). Helps his early game while evening things out a bit later when he has more corpses. That's a nice adjustment, I think.
  
  
• Chernobog (buffs): Mana costs reduced on 2 abilities (probably because of the need to use both 1 and 2 for good clear), and Crystallized Curses initial damage increased by 20 at all ranks. Some other fixes and minor adjustments. Guess he's been struggling early with mana. Interesting that he gets that buff so early though.
  
  
• Cu Chulainn (nerf): One more nerf...this time to the passive power bonus in Berzerk form...drops it by base 5 so he's got a little less early game strength. Minor overall.
  
  
• Erlang Shen (buffs): Spot Weakness gets a mana decrease to 60 at all ranks instead of increasing per rank, and 9 Turns Blessing gets 1.2 second taunt duration at all ranks. This is nice for him and a good move.
  
  
• Hachiman (nerfs): Heavenly Banner damage decreased by 10 at all ranks, and Mounted Archery slow decreased by 5 at all ranks. This is overall a somewhat minor adjustment, and a good one since he's been pretty favored and a very solid pick. This doesn't kill his other function, which is good.
  
  
• Neith (buff): base basic attack speed increased from 0.95 to 1. This is so minor as to not really being worth mentioning. It helps her late game a bit.
  
  
• Skadi (buff): almost the same thing as Neith...up from 0.9 to 0.95.
  
  
• Xbalanque (nerf): Dead of Night adjusted again, needs 500 damage more to gain 1 stack. Guess it was ramping up too quickly and easily. Eh.
  
  
• Zeus (buffs): Detonate Charge gets a massive mana cost reduction, from 90 at all ranks to 60. LOL. That's probably important though, especially early game. Lightning Storm gets a base damage buff of 20 at all ranks, which is okay. I really hate that Detonate when I have 3 charges on me, though.
  
  
• Zhong Kui (buffs): Demon Bag now only needs to witness deaths to gain stacks, rather than needing to use Exorcism (Bran's thought: what if his back is turned??? XD). Max stacks are doubled to 40 though, and only 1 protection gained per stack to see the same end result. Only loses 1/2 stacks upon death or ulting. Book of Demons stun duration increased by 0.2 seconds at all ranks.
  
  Holy ****, all I can say is this is a VERY nice quality of life adjustment for Zhong. Okay...you're hearing it here first. Since he hasn't received any skins for like 20 years, Not only will he get a base skin refresh, but HR is going to be releasing 5 NEW skins at ONE TIME, 2 of which are going to be T5 skins. Also, this is only the first buff of MANY. Hello Ullr.

Interesting patch. Some emphasis on early to mid items for aggression, and a nerf to some later-game items. Reasonable adjustments to the gods overall, though I don't really know for Cher, since he's barely been out.

Bet techno is happy about that zhong buff.

I very much like this patch... as a support main. As a former mid main, the buff to both the boots is poorly executed, because Shoes of Focus and Shoes of the Magi have now the same amount of power. It was usually a trade off of utility versus damage when choosing a boot or the other. With this change, it is obvious that Focus will be the focus of the patch meta.

Also, the nerfs to Titan's Bane and Obsidian Shard are great, again, because I support, so they can't shred me as fast. However, these items were meant to shred, so nerfing that will see a shift to more flat pen items, especially Spear of Desolation and Spear of the Magi for magic, and Brawler's Beatstick and The Crusher for physical.

The nerf to the two biggest aura items do not make any sense. Sovereignty's protections got reduced, but Heartward Amulet's aura got reduced? No, it's one or the other. Because now, people can choose Gauntlet of Thebes for the aura and then a pure physical item like Breastplate of Valor and pure magical item Pestilence, which would cover team protections, auras, and health, with other stats, like CDR.

Lastly, the duo lane will see an ability hunter meta. Earlier, it was apparent that Medusa, Ullr, and Hou Yi were pretty contested picks. The buffs to Skadi and Neith solidified this meta, as they are two ridiculously scaled ability based gods. With the flat pen meta mentioned earlier, we could also see some split pusher ADCs.

Regarding the shoes...it was only 5 power difference before...so it's not really all that much difference.

Flat pen has been extremely common (Crusher, Brawler's, Deso, Heartseeker, Divine, etc.) for a while now. Ob Shard has been used a bit less, I think, though Titan's has still been pretty common.

The magical boots change was stupid. Mages are going to be even better early game now (But that suits me). I don't like the Zhong Kui change, they dumb him down to make it easier to make stacks but also nerf him as well.... 40 stacks to get full benefit this time? The only real buff was the slight stun increase. Ugh...

Stone of Binding going to be picked up a lot more now im guessing. The Ah Puch change does hardly anything in conquest. Unnecessary nerfs to Obsidian Shard and Titan's Bane, the lower effectiveness against squishies is ok, but increasing the protections needed for max penetration? Do they not want people to pick the item up?

VERY.

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I'm very surprised about the nerfs to TB and obsidian. I almost never pick those up anymore, outside of conquest. I wish they'd bring back the damage against towers.

Yay, Stone of Binding buff

Yeah, I didn't really get the reason for the magical shoes buffs, but oh well.

Regarding the 40 stacks for Zhong Kui, I don't think that's a nerf. Thing is, if he wanted to gather 6 souls at a time, he'd have to hit his Expose Evil AND his Exorcism on the entire wave. Now, he just has to be close to them, and he can get 12 stacks on each wave (6 from enemy minions, 6 from his own). So if anything, that's a buff. Only situation where he will get only 1/2 of the stacks he would otherwise have gotten is in the Jungle, where he can only get 3/40 stacks instead of 3/20. AND he only loses 1/2 with a death or ult.

Does it dumb it down? Yes, but holy hell was it sometimes difficult to get those stacks, and it made you commit to moving to the SIDE of the enemy minions just to get as many stacks as possible. That's a lot of extra exposure, when Thoth can stand 100 units back and blast the entire wave. Now, he doesn't have to worry about building those stacks with Exorcism, so he has better options in how to play the waves.

It doesen't change much in his waveclear, he still needs to use Expose Evil and Exorcism to be able to clear the wave (except when he will be able to insta-clear mid to lategame).