A Guide to Making Item Builds (Conquest & More - S2)

Cap: The maximum amount of a stat you can have. If you build a stat past its cap, you don't actually gain any more of the stat in game. Caps can also be reached by using items like Elixir of Power or jungle/fire giant buffs.

CC: AKA Crowd Control, CC comes in two forms: hard CC and soft CC. Hard CC are crowd control effects that severely limit your player in some way such as stuns, silences, knockups, disarms, etc. Soft CC is crowd control that is less extreme such as roots, slows and cripples.

AA: AKA Auto-attack/basic attack, this is your god's basic attack. An AA god is a god that focuses on dealing damage through basic attacks. While some gods can be built to either be AA or ability focused, others are more locked into one of these types of builds. Strictly AA gods include all Hunters (except possibly Medusa and in some cases Neith), Arachne, Bakasura, Kali, Nemesis, Ao Kuang and Osiris. Strictly ability-based gods include all Guardians, all Mages (except Chronos, Ao Kuang, Freya, Poseidon and Zeus), Bastet, Loki, Ne Zha, Serqet and Thor (most Warriors are also typically preferred to have ability based builds, however they can often have one or two AA items as well). All other gods can play with either an AA or ability focused build, or builds that combine both of these aspects to maximize their full potential.

AOE: AKA Area of effect, this is a description of an ability, active or item's passive. Basically, a power's AOE is its size. For example, Zeus' ultimate has a large AOE while Nox's Siphon Darkness has a much smaller AOE.

DPS: AKA Damage per second, this describes the amount of damage a god can output (on average) in a single second. Maximizing a god's DPS is essentially maximizing how much damage a god can output in a given time frame (this is most often considered when determining a build for ADCs since it is their primary job).

Poke: Poking is when you are dealing small-medium amounts of damage to an enemy, usually over an extended period of time. Poke damage is usually dealt using safe abilities like Sun Wukong's magic cudgel or Agni's Rain Fire, but can be done with ranged basic attacks or other means as well.

Farm: Farming is killing minions or jungle camps to gain gold, experience and/or stacks for items like warlock's sash and Devourer's Gauntlet.

Meta: Meta is a complicated concept to explain. In essence, it's the generally accepted way of playing a game. In Smite that can be anything from what an acceptable team composition is to what's an acceptable item build. While "breaking the meta" can be a good tool to win matches, that's still different from building ignorantly. While this guide tries to be in line with the current meta, some aspects such as what's core to each role should probably be adhered to even when breaking the meta.

HP: AKA Health/Hit-points, the cap is 5500.

Mana: Used for casting abilities, the cap is 4000.

HP5: AKA Health Per 5, this is the amount of health you regenerate every 5 seconds. The cap is 100.

MP5: AKA Mana Per 5, this is the amount of mana you will recover every 5 seconds. (Example: I have 25 MP5, I will therefore recover 25 Mana every 5 seconds). The cap for MP5 is 100.

Physical Lifesteal: Physical lifesteal returns some of the damage you deal back to yourself as healing. For example, if you have 10% lifesteal and you deal 100 damage to an enemy, you will recover 10 HP. AOE basic attacks like Bellona's hammer and Bakasura's cone ultimate divide healing received by 3. Unlike magical lifesteal, physical lifesteal only applies to basic attacks, NOT abilities. The cap for lifesteal is 100%.

Magical Lifesteal: Magical lifesteal returns some of the damage you deal back to yourself as healing. AOE basic attacks like Freya's Irradiate and Agni's Rain Fire divide healing received by 3. Unlike physical lifesteal, magical lifesteal applies to both basic attacks and abilities. The cap for lifesteal is 100%.

Healing: Healing is the amount you are able to be healed. This stat can be altered by healing reduction items like Weakening Curse, Pestilence, Divine Ruin and Brawler's Beat Stick, increased healing items like Rod of Asclepius and Heavenly Agility or abilities and passives. The formula for healing is
100%(base healing) + (additional healing)% - (healing reduction)% = (actual healing)%, thus items like Weakening Curse that reduce healing by 100% will not prevent enemies from healing with increased healing items.

CDR: AKA Cooldown Reduction/Cooldown %, this stat reduces the cooldown timer on your abilities. The cap is 40%.

Movement speed: This is the speed your character moves. The cap is 1000.

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Physical Protection: AKA Physical Defense, this stat reduces the amount of physical damage you take, but can be temporarily removed or bypassed by penetration and protections reduction items/abilities. All gods have a base amount of physical protection without items. Towers, phoenixes, titans, minions, Fire Giant, Gold Fury, jungle camps and minions all deal physical damage. The cap for physical protection is 325.

Magical Protection: AKA Magical Defense, this stat reduces the amount of magical damage you take. All gods have a base amount of magical protection without items. The cap for magical protection is 325.

Flat Penetration: AKA Pen, this stat allows you to bypass enemies' corresponding protections by however large its value is, eg: if you have 20 penetration, you can bypass 20 of their physical/magical protection. The cap is 50.

Protections Reduction: This stat will either allow you to reduce the physical/magical protections of an enemy by its value or a percentage of their total protections. Unlike flat penetration, there is no cap to this value, your allies can also benefit from it when attacking enemies with reduced protections, and it unfortunately lessons the amount of protections bypassed by percent penetration items. Turrets and phoenixes are also immune to protections reduction making other options more effective.

Percent Penetration: This stat will allow you to bypass a percent of an enemies' protections. This is different from flat penetration since the amount of protections you bypass depends on how much protections your enemy has. Protections reduction items make percent penetration less effective since it will only allow you to bypass a percent of the enemy's reduced protections, not the original stat.

Power: Affects the power of your god's basic attacks and abilities (most abilities' power is calculated as base damage + some % of your total physical power). The cap is 400 for physical gods and 900 for magical gods.

Basic Attack Power: This is how much damage your basic attacks deal. Magical gods deal 20% of their power per basic attack while physical gods deal 100% of their power (items like Hydra's Lament and Polynomicon may temporarily augment this stat).

Attack Speed: This stat increases the rate at which your god can use their basic attacks, the cap is 2.5.

Crit Chance: This is the chance that your god will land a critical strike (deals 2x power or 2.5x with Deathbringer). Only physical gods can hit critical strikes. The cap for crit chance is 100%.

For any god that you're creating a build for, there are certain stats that cannot be ignored.

Movement speed is essential for all roles and gametypes, regardless of your god you must purchase something from the Boots or Shoes item trees. These items also give good stats for their price points, so there's no real point in not buying them.

Penetration is another essential stat for any god that wants to deal damage. The way damage is calculated, even against squishy teams you will do significantly more damage by purchasing a penetration item if you haven't bought one already than another damage item late game. Even supports and tanky gods need penetration if they wish to deal legitimate damage late game. Many of these gods also have high base damages on their abilities, but poor scaling making penetration superior to damage anyway. The only gods that can forego penetration are gods with protections reduction or penetration built into their kits like Guan Yu's Taolu Assault and Bakasura's Butcher Blades.

CC immunity of some form is recommended against most team compositions. This can range from Purification Beads or Magi's Blessing to counter hard CC to Winged Blade and Improved Sprint to counter slows to Aegis Pendant to survive enemy nukes, whatever allows you to survive. An important thing to remember is that you can only be helpful and dish out damage while you're alive, so building all attack power with no CC immunity or defense will leave you as a rather useless teammate. One thing to remember is that some gods like Chang'e have built in CC immunity into their kits, or have escapes and leaps that allow them to run away. Build around your god's kit, know their strengths and weaknesses and account for them. Always have some method of escaping, or you're just an easy target for the enemy team.

Certain stats aren't useful for all gods, but are incredibly essential to others. You shouldn't build attack speed on ability based Mages, or cooldown reduction on AA based Hunters. You should learn what your god excels at and struggles with and build to strengthen their best traits and account for their weaknesses. While you can try and break the meta, avoid building all of one god class the same. I've seen too many people try to build ability based gods like Bastet and Serqet with attack speed, people building lifesteal on gods with built in healing like Hel and people building Combat Blink and Aegis Pendant on gods that already have them built into their kits like (in this case Loki and Chang'e). If you learn the ins and outs of your god's kit and build around it, you will find yourself not only playing better, but also getting the feel for your god is meant to be played.

While it can be useful to have a specific build in mind for your god when you enter a game, more often than not you will need to counterbuild against enemies in order to maximize your effectiveness. Generally this is pretty straightforward, build items like Pestilence, Divine Ruin and Weakening Curse to counter healing, build items Witchblade and Hide of the Nemean Lion to counter basic attackers, build Improved Sprint or Winged Blade to counter teams with lots of slows, etc.

However, it's important not to get locked into your build just based on an enemy team composition as well. If fighting a lot of squishy gods, don't invest as much in penetration, if facing a team with 4 physical gods, you should probably buy physical defense. Determine what part of your build is your core (some gods may need more core items than others) and what part of your build is flexible to change. A flexible build will almost always beat a rigid one, so be open to trying new things even if you've seen success with other builds previously.

One factor of item building that I've mentioned here and there is cost effectiveness. Cost effectiveness is essentially how much an item provides you relative to its cost. For example, a complete item like Ichaival will provide much more benefits for around 1700g than a tier two item of a similar price. However, a complete tier 3 item will almost always be more cost efficient at that price than a less expensive item like Ichaival (ie: for every 100g spent towards Ichaival you may receive 5% attack speed, while for every 100g spent on a different tier 3 item you may receive 6%).

However, it's important to note that calculating raw stats does not take unique passives into account. For example, it's hard to put a price on Gem of Isolation's passive slow since it's a unique passive that can range from highly useful to completely useless. When building your god, it's easy to take all of the most cost effective items and build them giving you a final build with the greatest stats. However, there may be less cost effective items that let you come online much faster and have a better early and mid game, or items with unique passives that while they do not provide the same raw stats, may provide far greater benefits.

Overall, be aware of whether your god has a good early or late game, whether you should be building for early or late game in the current match your are in and what passives your god's kit can truly take advantage of.

An important aspect to consider when making a god's build is how well rounded they are, whether or not they have struck a balance between damage, survivability and utility. One important thing to consider is that each god and role may want to fulfill different purposes. For example, ADCs typically build pure damage, as well as lifesteal, Greater Purification and Greater Sprint to give them some survivability as well. Supports will typically try to maximize their utility, buying items like Sovereignty that will benefit their team, CDR so that they can use their abilities more often so they can be of more use, and Pestilence to make the other team less effective.

Not all gods and roles need to build for each of these three categories. Some gods may not have any or very little utility to offer, while others only provide utility and don't gain much by building damage. However, what people most often forget to build is survivability. Every god needs a way to survive enemy attacks, whether that's from building high defenses, having hard CC to deter pursuing enemies or having a way to escape. Typically most squishy gods need Greater Purification or Magi's Blessing, as well as a way to disengage battles, whether that's from a leap, dash, teleport or utilization of an item like Greater Sprint or Combat Blink. This is especially true of junglers and mid laners that will typically struggle late game without a method of escape.

Just remember, all that damage you built will go to waste if you're constantly dying. Build smart, and you just might survive out there.

During my time on Smitefire, I've seen some builds that have all the right item choices, great alternative choices and a build order that was simply appalling. Build order is really quite simple, there are a few rules to follow, but they tend to work for every class of god.

First of all is movement speed. You need movement speed as either your first or second item, it's essential to rotating, returning to lane, pursuing enemies and escaping, and it's not very expensive.

Next are stacking items. Generally these are best built early game so that you can farm your lane and have the longest possible time in the game with full stacks. The only stacking item that is really acceptable late game is Hide of the Urchin since its stacks increase on kills or assists which tend to occur more often during the late game than the early game.

Then we have penetration. Penetration is typically best built late game to counter enemies' defenses, however there are exceptions to this rule. Void Stone and Void Shield are really designed more towards the laning phase, giving you an edge during the early-mid game. Additionally, if you're facing a particularly tanky enemy in lane (eg: Hercules) you may wish to buy penetration earlier on. However, as a general rule of thumb, penetration is best bought after your third item.

Finally we have synergistic items. These are items that are far more useful when paired with items that you already have, but are much less cost effective without those items. Some of these items include Rod of Tahuti which scales higher with the more magical power items you have and Deathbringer which for most gods needs to first be paired with Rage to be cost effective (there are exceptions to this with gods with natural crit chance or that can crit on demand). Be aware of what items your item needs to be paired with to be effective and avoid buying items before they'll really be useful in your build order.

Generally a team's mid laner is a mage that can be the magical powerhouse of the team, dealing large AOE damage during teamfights. During the game you will need to push the middle lane, a short lane lacking the mana buff that is often ganked by junglers. You will also be expected to rotate to help the other lanes, and finally you're expected to be of use as an AOE damage dealer during teamfights.

This means that there are several stats a mid laner needs to emphasize. You need power and penetration both for lane clear and kill potential late game. However, you also need mana and health sustain in order to stay in lane for a long period of time, some method of rotating quickly (whether through abilities, movement speed or items like sprint) and the ability to survive enemy ganks and team fights, typically through some method of CC immunity and an escape.

While every mid laner is different, there are several components that most if not all mid laners will need (assuming we're talking about mages). Every mid laner needs either Shoes of Focus or Shoes of the Magi for movement speed (Travelers shoes and Reinforced Shoes don't offer enough damage potential in traditional builds). You will need some form of magical penetration, even against squishy teams since every god has base magical protections. Most mid laners will utilize Rod of Tahuti late game simply because there's no other magical power item that can compare to the massive power it provides. Finally, you NEED some method of escape, whether that's through an ability like Agni's Path of Flames or an active like Heavenly Agility. While not necessary against every team, some method of CC immunity like Purification Beads or magi's blessing is also central to most mid lane builds.

Mid laners' actives are essentially there to fill in what their passives and kits cannot. Typically mid laners choose actives that give them more survivability since they want to invest most of their build into offense, thus Greater Purification, Aegis Pendant, Heavenly Agility and Combat Blink are popular options. Heavenly Agility is also particularly useful on mid laners that are less mobile and need its help in order to rotate quickly.

However, not all gods need two use two active slots on survivability, those that have natural escapes, hard CC to control their opponents pursuits or items like magi's blessing may use one of their active slots for other purposes. However, it's also important to consider that items like Heavenly Agility, Weakening Curse or Greater Blink can fulfill both offensive and defensive roles, giving you more overall utility than an item like Girdle of Inner Power or something similar.

Most mid laners will need some method of health sustain during the laning phase. Some gods can self heal and can go without lifesteal or are safe enough to not need lifesteal and instead utilize Healing Potions for most, if not all of the match. However, for the majority of mages you will need a magical lifesteal item relatively early in the game to be able to sustain in lane against your opponent.

Mana sustain is another issue for mid laners since they lack the blue buff of the solo lane. There are two ways to solve this issue: mana and MP5. Generally MP5 is more desirable for sustaining a lane over an extended period of time, while mana is more useful for using many abilities over a short period of time. Take this difference into account when making your build.

Typically stacking items are desirable components of a mid laner's build since they spend much of the match farming their lane. Depending on your god, Book of Thoth, and warlock's sash can become a truly powerful part of your build. However, one important thing to note about stacking items is that they don't come with passives that offer any utility, but rather raw stats. These items are also weaker than others in their price range prior to the stats they provide at full stacks. This makes them primarily a late game investment, but once you reach full stacks this investment will pay off.

Depending on the enemy team, you may also wish to invest in a defense item. For example, if the enemy jungler is constantly ganking your lane, you may want to consider getting Breastplate of Valor rather than Chronos' Pendant. While you want to keep most of your build offensive, you need to be able to survive enemy attacks, so make sure that you have enough defenses and escapes to stay alive.

The role of the traditional support is first and foremost to provide the most utility to their team as possible, bolstering their allies power and defenses, reducing their enemies, protecting their allies and enfeebling their enemies with CC, setting allies up for kills, being the tank at the center of each fight and healing their allies if possible. Some examples of these supports are Geb, Kumbhakarna, and Sylvanus. Non-traditional supports may take a more offensive role, still staying tanky but focusing more on setting their allies up for kills than necessarily protecting them. Examples include Sun Wukong, Ares, and Guan Yu. However, most gods that play support can play either or a blend of these roles, so it's important to know how you desire to play support and build around that.

As with every god, all supports need movement speed early on in the game. Their options include Reinforced Shoes, travelers shoes (their respective physical counterparts) and Shoes of Focus. Support gods' main core most often consists of Sovereignty and Heartward Amulet. These items provide the most to your teammates, giving them physical and magical protection as well as HP5 and MP5 while they're near you. Supports will also often carry Wrath of the Gods to secure objectives early game (you should have this by the time gold fury spawns if you choose to do so), and some way to initiate, be that through Greater Blink or an ability.

Supports are rather limited in the actives they can buy. Supports often buy into Wrath of the Gods to secure objectives early game and most also need Greater Blink to initiate on opponents. Gods like Sobek and Athena who have dashes can get away with buying alternative actives since they can initiate using their abilities. Popular actives include Enfeebling Curse/ Weakening Curse, Shell of Absorption, and Girdle of Support. If CC is a major problem, you may also want to consider Greater Purification, especially if you're playing a less tanky offensive support.

There are several stats that supports want to emphasize to maximize their utility. Both offensive and defensive supports should try to build in some CDR since this allows them to utilize their abilties (and their hard CC) more often. Because most supports don't have useful basic attacks, they are entirely ability reliant to be of any use at all, thus CDR is more valuable on them than on any other role.

If you have healing, you will likely want to bolster that as well. lotus crown is a great item for mass healers since it buffs the protections of all who are healed. Rod of Asclepius is also great, giving you health, movement speed and making your healing more effective.

Any items that make your teammates stronger and your opponents weaker are useful for a support's kit. Items like Witchblade and Pestilence can hinder enemies' success, while items like Void Stone and and Gem of Isolation can help you and your allies take down enemies more easily.

Finally, make sure your defenses and health are balanced. Medium defenses and medium health will beat a lot of health and no defenses or vice versa every time. Health and defense are essential to any support, even if they're playing offensively.

The ADC or Attack Damage Carry's role is just that, to carry your team in the late game with your insane attack damage. This means you have to have strong basic attacks to both finish off enemies as well as objectives like towers, gold fury and fire giant. To do this, you must build your passive items with the maximum attack power possible and reserve your active slots for allowing you to escape enemy attacks and ganks.

The ADC core for season 2 has been very limited. The original two builds since the start of the season are -> ninja tabi -> ichaival -> -> -> and -> ninja tabi -> asi -> -> -> , utilizing Bluestone Pendant as your starter and with the option of selling Ichaival or Asi once at full build for Malice.


These two builds maximize ADCs' damage per second or DPS more than other builds as of yet with their combination of power, penetration, attack speed and critical chance.

However: It's very important to try to keep up with the meta on ADCs currently since there has only been 1 or 2 builds that maximize their DPS at any given time. These two builds are what are best at the time of this writing which will attempt to stay up to date, but be sure to check what's currently in the meta since item builds for ADCs really only want to maximize their DPS and this may or may not be up to date. Currently Soul Eater has also been seen as a replacement for lifesteal in both builds since it's very strong in the laning phase and because its attack speed scales well.

ADCs need their actives to survive. Generally the pairing of choice is Greater Purification and Greater Sprint, but other choices can include Greater Aegis/ Aegis Pendant and Greater Blink/ Combat Blink. Achilles' Spear is not recommended since it makes you more vulnerable to damage and vulnerable to slows, but can be useful to bolster your lead if you're already ahead.

As mentioned in the core section, ADCs are very limited in what they can build. The only true alternatives at the moment of this writing are Brawler's Beat Stick since it allows you to duel the other ADC more effectively in lane and The Crusher for split pushing gods like Apollo. Hastened Fatalis has also made a comeback since Greater Sprint lost its similar passive, but is a niche item at best.

The role of the jungler, despite what some people may think, is not to just gank lanes and secure kills. The jungler's role is most similar to the support, assisting their team in as many ways as possible, while being able to survive the jungle. The jungler is expected to clear jungle camps, counter jungle if possible, provide teammates their buffs, gank lanes when given the opportunity, help lanes in need and defend lanes while their teammates are at base. To do this, junglers need good sustain in the jungle, strong power so that their ganks are a threat, movement speed so that they can roam the map as quickly as possible, and CDR so that their abilities can be used to aid their teammates frequently.

Firstly, junglers need Bumba's Mask to survive in the jungle. It allows them to take out jungle camps more easily as well as sustain their health while taking out the camps. the only exception to this is Thanatos since his built in sustain is enough that he benefits more from Death's Toll. It is heavily recommended that you also start with Hand of the Gods or Rage of the Gods, since these actives will allow you to spend less time clearing jungle camps and more time helping your allies.

Junglers will then need either Warrior Tabi, Ninja Tabi or Talaria Boots so that they can move around the map as quickly as possible (assuming you're a physical jungler). Later on you will need some form of penetration since this is essential to your damage output. Ability based junglers will typically choose Titan's Bane while basic attack focused junglers will prefer The Executioner.

Finally, later in the game you will need either magi's blessing or Greater Purification in order to escape enemy CC. Since junglers need to build a lot of attack power, they are left as rather squishy gods (unless you're a guardian jungler), leaving them vulnerable to being targeted and taken out during teamfights later in the game. CC immunity is the easiest way to avoid this, as well as some method of escape, be that through an active or one of your god's abilities.

It's generally a given that a jungler will use Hand of the Gods. This can then be upgraded to either Fist of the Gods or Wrath of the Gods (see the actives section for more details on this). The second active slot will typically then be used for Greater Purification unless you decide to buy magi's blessing. If you do decide to buy magi's blessing (which is the most common option), junglers can then choose from a variety of actives. Some popular options include Greater Sprint (which is excellent for sticking to enemies), Achilles' Spear, Girdle of Inner Power, Aegis Pendant, Enfeebling Curse/ Weakening Curse and Shield of the Underworld.

Aside from the core, the rest of a jungler's build is determined by a number of factors. If your god is more of a bruiser late game like Thor, you may decide to go with a build with some defensive items like Shifter's Shield, Void Shield, Witchblade and other such items. If you're more of a damage dealer, you need to determine whether or not your damage comes from your basic attacks or from your abilities, and whether or not your abilities can crit.

Ability based gods that cannot crit (eg: Bastet, Loki) will typically choose items like Jotunn's Wrath, Hydra's Lament and Heartseeker so that they can utilize their abilities as often as possible and deal as much damage as possible with these abilities.

Gods that are ability focused and can crit with their abilities like Serqet and Ne Zha will often buy items like Deathbringer and Malice to power their abilities' critical hits, but avoid Rage since they cannot build its passive easily.

AA focused gods' builds will vary a lot, but popular item choices include The Executioner, Jotunn's Wrath, Hastened Fatalis, Qin's Sais, Rage and Deathbringer.

At first glance, the solo lane appears to be very similar to the mid lane; in short it is not. Unlike mid laners, solo laners are much more focused on sustain and surviving being isolated from their team for much of the match (hence the popular term "solo island"). Their primary focus is to 'win' their lane, push towers, avoid dying from ganks by the enemy jungler, with little to no focus on rotation for most of the game, and be of use in the late game in teamfights. This role can vary from solo laner to solo laner, but they will still follow most of these concepts. Thankfully for mana sustain, the solo lane comes equipped with a mana buff, but for mana hungry gods they will still have to build items to maintain their mana while in lane. Solo laners will also typically need some method to sustain their health while in lane since they need to be able to put constant pressure on it in order to win lane.

Since the role of the solo laner is essentially to survive, every class of god is capable of solo laning, although Warriors tend to be favored over the other classes due to their inherent toughness.

Solo lane is probably the most flexible lane in terms of builds since every god will typically have to build uniquely. There really is no "core" build per se. Bluestone Pendant for physical gods' mana sustain and Shielded Teleport for getting back to lane quickly are probably the two most common items I see on solo laners across all the classes, but both these are still highly replaceable. Since there isn't really a core build to speak of, I'll leave my more specific item comments in the "Additional Build Components" section below.

Solo laners actives are heavily dependent on what god you're playing as. In general, Shielded Teleport is a popular option in order to get back to lane to keep pressure on as quickly as possible, as well as give you an opportunity to rotate quickly all the way from the short lane. Greater Purification is popular for the squishier classes since they need to be able to survive enemy ganks.

Hand of the Gods can also be useful since solo laners can sometimes need a way to secure their mana buffs from steals and if your solo laner has poor lane clear early in the game. Aside from that, the choice is situational, try to build your active to play on the strengths of your god's kit or reduce the potency of your opponent's.

Solo laners need to have the most flexible builds in the game since they will typically be in lane against a single opponent more than any other role. This makes counterbuilding especially potent during the laning phase. Items like Divine Ruin and Weakening Curse to counter healers and Witchblade to counter AA focused gods are among the most potent counterbuilding items. Lifesteal items and Stone of Gaia are popular choices for solo laners in need of health sustain. Stacking items are also particularly good to have on solo laners since they will be able to build the stacks very easily while maintaining their lane.

Out of all the alternative gametypes, Siege is the closest in gameplay to Conquest. This means that in most cases, you can build your god pretty much the same. However, there are three primary differences.

Firstly, you will not have a permanent jungler since there aren't enough camps. This means that Bumba's Mask should be avoided and junglers may want to work their build to more suit laning than jungling.

Second, you will be pushing lanes... a LOT. Build items that let you do this more effectively, stacking items are useful since you will get a lot of farm and items like The Crusher can be useful for taking down towers quickly.

Finally, Siege is only a 4v4 without as many opportunities for open team fights. This means that CC immunity isn't quite as important as it is in conquest since you will usually be dueling one or two enemies more than teamfighting.

Aside from Conquest, Assault is by far my favorite gametype. Despite being more casual than the other modes, you'll still have the most fun with a build that fits the gametype well. Unlike Conquest, in Assault you cannot return to base or buy stacking items, and there's no jungle but rather a large central lane (so no need for Wards).

Because you cannot return to base, health and mana sustain is key. Items with good MP5, HP5(eg: Stone of Gaia, Sovereignty & Heartward Amulet's auras) or lifesteal (eg: Pythagorem's Piece) are particularly valuable in this gametype. Meditation and later Salvation are key items to leading your team to a win, since they will allow your team to sustain far better overall.

Aside from sustain, Assault primarily consists of team fighting and pushing towers. Items like magi's blessing, Purification Beads and Winged Blade are particularly useful in order to survive the CC that you encounter in large teamfight scenarios, and to avoid being picked off by pulls and other CC. Items with positive AOE effects like lotus crown or Sovereignty are also more useful since you will always be near your teammates. Similarly, items with debuff auras like Witchblade, Void Stone and Pestilence are also particularly useful since you will commonly be near the entire enemy team as well.

Finally, try to build your god around teamfights more than dueling. Focus on protecting yourself from as many people as possible while also being able to dish out damage to as many people as possible (some exceptions can be made for Hunters and Assassins). And please, for me, if someone is jumping around in the middle of the lane during the beginning of the game don't attack them. Join them. Jumping around in the middle of the map before an Assault game is considered good courtesy, just have fun out there!

Out of all the gametypes, Arena deviates from Conquest the most. Unlike Conquest, Arena is just what it sounds like, a large circular arena. There's no jungle or destructable towers, although you do have what is essentially a large fountain, a central "lane" and buff camps on either side of the map. Essentially, Arena is just one large, constant team fight.

Since your base is so close to the center of the action, sustain should not be a focus of your build. Your real focus should be solely on how to teamfight the best. Items like magi's blessing, Purification Beads and Winged Blade are particularly useful in order to survive the CC that you encounter in large teamfight scenarios, and to avoid being picked off by pulls and other CC. Greater Aegis and Aegis Pendant are also very helpful since teams have a tendency to focus one player all at once. Items with positive AOE effects like lotus crown or Sovereignty provide greater benefits than normal since you will always be near your teammates. Similarly, items with debuff auras like Witchblade, Void Stone and Void Shield are also particularly useful since you will commonly be near the entire enemy team as well. Good CDR will also allow you to use your abilities as often as possible and make you a better asset to your team (with the exception being most Hunters).

Finally, avoid items that simply aren't as useful in Arena; Hand of the Gods and Meditation are examples of this. Supports can take advantage of not needing Hand of the Gods (or Meditation in Assault) by getting other actives like Shield of the Underworld and Girdle of Support. Power/defense, utility and survivability should describe your build, anything else is a waste of space.

Lifesteal

Professor Proxy

Professor Proxy or Proxy Damage has made numerous highly detailed articles about items, item building, gameplay, you name it. While some articles may be out of date due to changes, he's still my go-to resource for most things Smite related because of the level of research he puts into his writing. I encourage you to check him out, I like him so much that I'll typically read his articles as soon as they're published.

Know Your Enemy

Hosted by TrendKiLL, Smite's official Know Your Enemy series is fantastic for learning how to play a god, or finding out something new about a god you love. While item builds are not its focus, it's important to understand a god's ins and outs in order to know how to build them. In terms of learning this, I typically find that Know Your Enemy gives the most in depth overview of a god in the small amount of time it's allotted.

Tiermonster

Tiermonster is a great resource for finding out what builds pro players are using on gods and what builds are popular for the various gametypes. Oftentimes when working on a god's build I'll cross compare to see what ranked players are doing and what the pros have been doing, having access to both of these at the same time is just an added bonus.

Smitestuff

Smitestuff is my preferred resource for finding out my own personal statistics and seeing what's worked best for me and what hasn't in various matches. While the site can be buggy at times, it's still my favorite for doing this since it organizes the information clearly and makes it very accessible.

Mages

Agni
Anubis
Aphrodite
Chronos
Hel
Janus
Kukulkan
Nu Wa
Poseidon
Ra
Scylla
Zeus
Zhong Kui

Warriors

Chaac
Guan Yu
Hercules
Odin
Ravana
Sun Wukong
Tyr
Vamana

Guardians

Ares
Bacchus
Cabrakan
Geb
Hades
Ymir

Assassins

Bakasura
Bastet
Hun Batz
Kali
Loki
Mercury
Ne Zha
Serqet
Thanatos

Hunters

Medusa