A First Look at Tyr - Begone!

Hello all, this here is my first SmiteFire guide, and at that one of the first Tyr guides! I aim not to have the fanciest guide nor the most basic guide, but a clear and concise guide on how what I've found the mighty Lawbringer brings to the table.
Tyr, Norse god of courage and justice, is a melee bruiser. He mas good mobility, good sustain and most of all great damage; he is, in my eyes, a brilliant all-rounder as his two stance allow him great flexibility in any one given fight, going from an effective bruiser to a tough old tank in an instant.

- Great Damage
- Good Protections & Sustain
- Decent Disruptions

- Can be Squishy
- No Reliable Escape
- Dashes Can be Detrimental

Unyielding

Now this is an interesting passive, because its definitely one your not really, throughout a game, going to remember a whole lot; but it will play a big roll in keeping you alive, and allowing you to chase down opponents, like Apollo, easily. In my opinion, its something nice to have, but not a passive which really affects HOW you play.

Fearless

This is a brilliant ability, allowing you to either quickly initiate or escape. In Agressive Stance, it does fantastic damage, and when combined with knockup and knockback can seriously screw with the positioning of opponents. In Defensive Stance it is used more as an escape, or as a means of braeking apart groups of opponents for your team with the knockback.

Power Cleave

This ability does high damage to all enemies in front of you, meaning its commonly maxed out first in a lot of damage builds. In Aggressive Stance it does damage and knocks back enemy gods that are already in the air, whilst in Defensive Stance instead of the knockback, it heals you up to 3 times depending on the number of enemies hit (1-3), and the awesome thing is the heal is NOT percentage based :D.

Change Stance

Yeah, they really could have come up with a better name for this, but that's exactly what it does; it switches you from Aggressive Stance to Defensive Stance or visa versa. Aggressive Stance straight up boosts your physical power by 10/20/30/40/50, whilst Defensive Stance boosts BOTH your protections by 8/16/24/32/40 which is AWESOME. In my opinion, unless you're initiating or looking for a fight you should always be in defensive stance, because protections are awesome to have. Note though, if you are initiating, only initiate when your switch has cooled down, because you will want to switch in-fight.

Lawbringer

This is Tyr's finisher, his initiator and his escape. When activated, Tyr jumps to the target dealing damage in a decent AOE radius and slowing enemies for a short while. Now, like any leap, it allows you to jump over walls etc, meaning it can be a great gank initiator. Also, like any leap, it can be used to get out of hairy situations, but the downside is, it is a waste of an ultimate AND the animation is decently long so you MUST escape ASAP if you feel your going to die and not wait until the last moment. Oh, and if an enemy somehow escapes, use this to finish them off, but be wary of timing because of the short delay ;).

Intro

First off, I cannot stress enough that no matter how squishy, or juicy or downright sexy an enemy god looks, DO NOT EVER dash them out of a team mates ability. In fact, try as much as you can to push enemies BACK into allied abilities or BACK towards your team for an easy kill. Also, save your ultimate until you either really need it or it is the right time to use it.

Initiation Combo

First, make sure you are in Aggressive Stance BEFORE starting a fight, even if you are the team's tank, as the combo only works in Aggressive Stance. First use your Fearless to catch enemies and make them move where you want them to go. Just as the animation finishes for the last hit, use Power Cleave to knock them up further. This can be great for teamfights because it leaves the enemy helpless and grouped up for either your ultimate or your team-mates ultimates (like Zeus). Adding Creeping Curse into the mix right after this combo makes it deadly for this purpose.

Mid-Fight Combo

Hopefully after getting the above combo right, next you want to switch to Defensive Stance, resetting your cooldowns, but most importantly, using the Power Cleave to heal yourself off the group you've so nicely positioned in front of you. This ensures that you're able to stay in the fight just that little bit longer. Also, whilst in Defensive Stance either save your dash to get out if your dieing too quickly, or use it to disrupt enemy movements and abilities, like Isis's Wing Gust.

Intro

Well, personally the only time you would take this build over either the Jungle Build or Bruiser Build is because your laning with a dedicated tank, like Ymir, and are able to let loose the more Aggressive Stance side of things.

Stance Switching

For most of this build, you should be in Aggressive Stance because you're looking for that maximum damage output. The only time you should be switching to Defensive Stance is in mid-fight to regain health or esacpe using your Fearless. By staying in one particular stance this ensures that you will almost always be able to switch for that clutch heal of your Power Cleave

Relative ''Tankyness''

You are still a damage God, no matter how much of a MANLY MAN Tyr just happens to be. You need to be highly aware of this fact, and so your Defensive Stance will actually play a very large roll in keeping you alive, so if you have a chance, just pop over to a Jungle camp or Minion wave and heal up. Picking up an active item like Shell or Shard will really benefit you as well, minimizing damage for yourself, and in the case of Shell, your team as well.

Intro

First off, the job of the solo laner is NOT to get kills/fed or to be super aggressive, but to not loose his tower. This is your overriding priority when soloing. Also, it is for setting up effective ganks when the jungler needs/wants them, so he can become fed and make a big impact on the game. To this end, there are 3 crucial stages of the solo lane.

Stage One: Levels 1-6

In this stage, your only job is to survive and not die, nor give them the chance to get you low. As such, try and stay around your archers at the back, and if they try and make a move on you, just dash back to safety; this is why you get Fearless first. Once you get your Change Stance, switch to Defensive Stance because you're looking for that extra tankyness to stop you taking too much damage. Levelling your Power Cleave means you do a nice amount of damage to minions but mainly means you can heal back up, allowing you to stay in-lane as long as possible. As a side not, do not be afraid to let the minions come back to the tower in this stage, as you will loose out on gold, which sucks, but your not loosing out on exp and you're not dieing from OP MINIONS.

Stage Two: Levels 6-13

As soon as you hit lvl 5-6, ask for a gank. This gives you a break from lane to retreat and stock up on pots, but also gives you gold and exp, meaning you now have even more of an advantage over your opposites. In this phase, you should be looking to push your lane and potentially gank middle lane if necessary. You should be able to go toe-to-toe with both of them in a fight, but only do so if you have no cooldowns and minions nearby, giving you the advantage. Remember to target the enemy carry/squishier god to get rid of an opponent quickly and minimise the overall damage taken by you.

Stage Three: Levels 13-20

By now your lane should be well-pushed and their tower getting attacked consistently. Once their tower is down, it leaves you free to roam and help mid lane take the enemy tower, and then left/right lane take theirs as well. This is of course, a perfect scenario, but one you should be striving for. In teamfights later on, try and be the one to initiate second, after the tank, helping to group up enemies or take squishier enemies out altogether. Using your Ultimate from the jungle is a great way to break up enemies, and pick out the easy kills, as you are now hopefully behind a couple and can dash them back to your team mates for the clean up.

So I just wanted to get what thoughts I have on Tyr out there as soon as I could, just to judge the cimmunity reaction, so please! Go ahead and comment, any tips, what you think of the builds. Note this a WIP and the Jungle Summary will be forthcoming, its just I haven't actually tried jungle yet so I can't really comment :D! In addition, item summaries will be coming shortly! And please, if you liek the direction this guide is going, do upvote it, it really helps me know that people are liking what they see!

cormBLUE aka SYLO

PS: I will be working on getting my BB coding up, so don't be too harsh ;)