God Balances and improvements ideas!

@Sub, the guy who made this post cited a video that BestLokiNA made where he targeted Freya with Assassinate during the first few frames of Valkyrie's Discretion. So the ability went off, but didn't stun (since she was immune) and didn't do damage (since she was immune). It's a rare thing that he wants changed (somehow) but it really doesn't need to be.

Then this is clearly a bug, not an actual feature in the game.

Why are you even asking me this question. I'm pretty sure I've played for longer than you.


Sigh. This is a rant for another Design 101/Dissecting Smite, but:

He lacks counterplay. I see the same damn arguments recycled every time.

Mystical Mail isn't real counterplay because who the hell buys it, aside from the solo laner?

CC isn't counterplay, because firstly, that applies to every assassin (akin to saying "just kite him" against every melee character), and secondly, if it were as easy as to "just CC him," every assassin would be worthless. Every assassin has the ability to mitigate CC - and CC can't stop Loki from dealing his damage, so it doesn't even stop him from doing his job at least once. Thor has his multi AoE stuns, Freya has range, Batz has an AoE fear, etc etc.

Lastly, active items are not counterplay.

Active Items do not contribute counterplay to the game for three reasons.

1: They cost gold.

The entire point of counterplay is to do things disregarding gold and level gaps. Even if you are five levels behind, ideally, you should still be able to outplay the **** out of the enemy by dodging his skillshots, timing your abilities to interrupt his, being a kiting master, or whatever. That is what true counterplay should be.

But by making them cost gold, you are making it much easier for the person on top to buy them than the person on bot, while making them have the same effect. Active items are, in theory, an emergency tool, but they are also at a premium - luxuries, in effect. You can't deny it's far easier for a fed god to get an active than a feeding one - and because they cost gold, and in stages, the fed one will have more efficient active items, to boot.

It's like a lifeboat that costs money to enter, in the middle of a sinking ship. Counterplay would be surviving the sinking ship by any means possible - and in Smite's environment, you're in Arctic waters with sharks circling around.

Compare this to other games, where the waters are warm and calm. There are lifeboats as well as lifevests, and swimming is an option. You have more options, and the environment is less harsh, allowing you more options than "lifeboats or death." This is the ideal state of a game, where counterplay is abundant.


2: This "Counterplay" has no counterplay of its own. See CC immunity for more details.


3: Actives in of themselves are indicators of a larger problem. If you need Beads to get out of something, that means you can't dodge it, juke it, mitigate it, or otherwise avoid immediate death if you can't get out. The very fact that you NEED beads means that what you are beads'ing had zero counterplay.

Example: Ares ult from Blink. If you don't have CC immunity or beads, you die. It's as simple as that. And this can hit entire teams, can't be dodged, interrupted, nor does it have a delay, a skillshot, or any other forms of PLAYER INTERACTIVITY involved.

A direct LoL parallel is in Morgana's ultimate. It's like Ares' ultimate, attaching tethers to enemies in a circle, revealing enemies hit and slowing them by 20%, before stunning them.

There are key differences.. The "grab" range is short - equivalent to 30 feet in Smite, I'd say, with the tether range being longer. Morgana is not a tank, and is vulnerable to being focused and killed. Even if you do get hit, you are not pulled. Even the ability itself has a 0.5 second cast time. Most importantly, if you go beyond a certain range, the tether breaks, and you will not be stunned.

From here, several avenues of counterplay are revealed. Dashing away will stop it. Focusing Morgana will stop it. CC-ing Morgana before walking away could stop it. Or if you can react quickly enough, you could even avoid being tethered at all. And even if you do get hit, you aren't going to be pulled into a neat little circle to be focused and killed, so it's not a godly initiation tool like Ares' ult.

All of this, Smite lacks. Ares' ult just chokes out all of the methods of counterplay I just wrote. Not only is it unavoidable, but if its effect is also incredibly powerful - which is the exact OPPOSITE of how THE ENTIRE GAME DESIGN OF MOBAS should work.

@sub about the Assassinate: it's not a bug. If it were a bug, then things like crippling a Xbalanque out of the first few frames of his dash wouldn't exist. There are a certain number of frames where you're targetable in any ability.

I think the game is designed differently. There are many things that require beads, so if that needs counterplay, then the devs need work.

Wait. I misread what you said. I thought you said Freya was hit by Loki's assassinate - aka took damage and stuff, without being stunned.

In any case, it's still a bug, because from what I can tell from your statement, it still puts you behind Freya, aka it's trying to target her and does, but to little effect other than positioning. If it were working properly, it would register Freya as untargetable and merely teleport Loki to target location.

Also, untargetable means the same thing across multiple MOBAs.

Also, I'm pretty sure Xbal isn't CC immune on the first bits of his dash on purpose. Instant CC immunity is foolish.

Also, I don't think "there are untargetable frames in every ability" is correct. I think you mean "on any leap." If Loki is hitting targets while they are untargetable, then that's a bug. If he is not really "hitting" them but merely appearing behind them, as if it were cast on an Aegis'd target, that is still a bug.

Please refrain from posting multiple times in a row and use that edit button. :)


Common on bruiser junglers like Bellona, Osiris, and Tyr. Gotten on assassin supports as well like Fenrir, Ne Zha, and Thor. And where else do you see Loki aside from the solo lane?

The problems you have with Loki aren't with Loki, they're with Smite.

^^ Basically what Greenevers said. Your arguments are all very valid Sub, (part of the reason why I enjoy arguing with you) but they're more problems with the game than Loki. While Loki lacks counterplay in that sense, smite has actives that LoL doesn't like Purification Beads and Aegis Amulet which will mitigate most of Loki's burst damage for a small 600g, which is still pretty affordable even if you're behind. Of course the main issue is that smite is using these items and other items as a crutch for its very unavoidable CC reliant god design that -as long as it continues this way- will inherently need these items for counterplay since the kind you described simply isn't wouldn't be as powerful to match the current gods in the game.

As for the part where I asked if you ever played Loki that was sarcasm, I know you've played Loki :P
My problem is that I forget that it doesn't translate that well through the internet, sorry 'bout that.

I understand the whole CC immunity part, the video is just an example to what i'm saying, but what about when they aren't cc immune? like a normal jump, what i don't like is that it shows the animation of loki's ult and not just the little twirl for when he teleports, im talking about when he becomes golden for 0.5 seconds and does like a backflip behind the target, for players who jumps and BECOMES cc immune to loki's ult(like huns bat jump) is a bit unfair. while for other gods, lets say...xbal's ult, when a god jumps when xbal's ult is finished, the jumping god INSTANTLY gets stunned before he hits the ground. Or let me say this, for all fenrir players out there, did you ever had that moment where u tried to jump away, but got stunned? It had the audio for his jump and maybe fenrir was off the ground for a bit but then instanly went down as soon as he got stunned. But when loki ults a target, the enemy just jumps away like nothing happened, and loki is there being confused because to him it showed the asassination animation, but no stun D:

ALSO even though freya IS CC immune on her ult, that DOESN'T mean she is immune to DAMAGE. if you have watched that video a bit more, BestlokiNa doesn't complain on the cc part, he complains that it DIDN'T inflict the damage, which caused him to lose.

Um, she is immune to damage. Try to hit a Freya during her ult.

It's called opening frames. If, like you said, a Fenrir tries to jump, there are about 2-5 frames where someone can cripple you out with abilities like Shackles, so the animation and audio triggers will start, but not complete. It's simply the way abilities work, and allows for what HiRez believes to be "counterplay".