Thoughts on Counter Play

So firstly let me give credit where credit is due. I learned the most on the subject of counterplay from a former Smitefire member Subzero008. He was very aware of counterplay when both creating god concepts and deciding how to fix gods. In general, counterplay is the concept of how fun/fair it is to play against something in a multiplayer game, rather than focusing on how fun it is to play with that element. An example would be sniping in a multiplayer game. In some games, many of us have had the experience of suddenly dying over and over to a sniper, having no idea where the bullets were coming from and not knowing what to do. While incredibly fun for the sniper, this is insanely frustrating for those that are playing against them, a prime example of bad counterplay.

Why I decided to bring up this subject is because I've noticed a trend with HiRez's recent releases (not referring to the last three gods released, but more the last dozen). While their god designs have been getting increasingly fun to play as, they've been getting almost simultaneously as frustrating to play against. Let's take Sol for example. Sol for many is an incredibly fun god to play as. She's fast, dynamic, feels versatile and is truly a joy to run around the map with. However, playing against her is one of the most frustrating experiences. Many gods have no way of avoiding her Stellar Burst and are forced to take incredible amounts of damage for free. Even if they can also poke her down, she has a self heal. Then if you're forced to back she can take out your tower super fast due to her passive. Finally, even if you manage to get her into a bad spot, her 3 has slow immunity and complete invulnerability making her an extremely difficult target to track down. Loki is another god that has very little counterplay, but I don't think I need to explain why people find Loki frustrating to play against, especially at a beginner level. I'm not calling for nerfs, that's not what this thread is about. I'm simply looking for gods with better god design overall, that really take counterplay into account when they're initially conceived, because many of Smite's gods have really exceptional counterplay built into their kits, and it's a disservice to have to pit them against gods that don't.

If you want some additional info or are just intrigued by this subject, this video is also a great resource that I can highly recommend.

*waiting for the but actives are also counterplay part*

Well maybe nowadays you can consider them more counterplay as they don't cost money however they are a big resource when you use them.

Actives are a form of counterplay, but you also have to take into account that balancing a god around an active or item is bad god design since changes to that active or item can make your god that hinged on it become either op or up (eg: when Greater Purification changed to purification or when Bluestone Pendant became an essential balancing point for Sun Wukong).