Poseidon - Sea Man of Death

Poseidon, God of the Oceans

Or, more acurately, Poseidon, Squishy God of the Deadly Oceans.

Poseidon is a ranged mage who can deal out some serious damage, but at the cost of not having much defense. For those players who choose Poseidon, you are choosing one of the more fun gods to play. He brings a lot to the table in the form of damage, slows, a semi-decent escape, and a great Ult. Don't get too cocky, though, as Poseidon can be caught out of position and squished rather quickly. Play smart, however, and you will be carrying your team to victory.

Passive:
Changing Tides
Poseidon's passive boosts both movement speed and damage simply by filling his tide pool through basic attacks. A full tide pool grants a 20% move speed buff and a 30% damage buff. This can be a huge bonus when you look at the max levels: 30% damage bonus! 20% movement bonus! But, the tide pool constantly drains, so you need to be constantly refilling it. However, you will usually be able to have a 10-15% damage bonus plus a 10% movement bonus just by keeping it half-filled. The tide-pool is filled by using basic attacks, even on minions. So clearing minion waves makes you stronger and stronger. Remember this, as some of your skills drain your Changing Tides pool, so we want to use those only when we have to, keeping that nice damage/speed boost up for when we need it.


Skills:
Tidal Surge
The essential gameplay focuses on hitting your Tidal Surge. It does great damage, combined with a knock-back, and is great for damaging creeps as well as enemy gods. We start our build with Tidal Surge, and we max it out first.

Trident
Secondly, I find Trident to be the next skill to build. It turns Poseidon's basic attack into magical damage, plus it makes it wider, firing 3 shots instead of just one. This helps land your shots as well as do more damage. It also has a better "slither" than Ao Kuang. We use our Trident to flee from enemies, to chase enemies, and to generally get places a lot faster than we normally could. If it were only a "slither" then I wouldn't find it so appealing. But add in the extra damage, and it becomes a great skill.

Whirlpool
Thirdly is Whirlpool. I find it is good at all levels, and thus doesn't need to be maxed out until later in the game. I spend the early game focusing on the other skills to build their power, whereas Whirlpool is good at level one. It does have a bit of a cast delay, so you will have to learn how to predict where you want to place it. In fact, ALL of Poseidon's skills require skill to place properly, so spend some time getting used to leading your enemy. This skill reduces your tide-pool, so don't spam it. Use it when needed so that you can keep your damage and speed boost up.

Finally, we come to our Ult. And what an Ult it is! Release The Kraken! has it all: slows, stuns, range, and lots of damage. The casting hitbox has two circles, the inner circle where the stun exists, and the outer circle which lands only a slow. The damage is only dealt to the inner circle, so it isn't as big of an Ult as it seems at first glance. Make sure you learn to place that inner circle exactly where you want it. This is the skill of Poseidon, learning to place those shots. However, if you miss with the inner circle, that huge outer circle will still give you quite a slow letting you get in and hit with your other skills to deal some major damage as well. Poseidon is great in team fights with this ult. Pop it to deal lots of damage and finish gods off, or use it to initiate relying on the stun and slow to rack up tons of assists. I find a great combination is to go Release The Kraken! into Tidal Surge. This deals quite a ton of damage plus getting the enemy god way out of position, often times to the benefit of your teammates.

Poseidon is going to build as a basic mage damage dealer. There are many ways to do this, and I'm only presenting one. However, if you stick to magic power items, you'll be doing just fine.

Start with Boots of the Magi. Obviously. The magic power increase plus the speed bonus is essential early game, especially considering Poseidon has no leap.

I like Chronos' Pendant as an all around item. Magic power plus letting me get more uses out of Tidal Surge and Rlease the Kraken! makes me a happy player.

Warlock's Sash is a great item for Poseidon. Much like Ra, Poseidon can kill entire waves of minions with a single ability cast. Building stacks can be fairly easy, which in turn builds power for our Sea Man. While Poseidon is not as mana-hungry as some gods, being able to turn on Trident as often as possible makes us extremely dangerous. The extra mana provided by the Sash is exactly what we need.

Rod of Tahuti is big, expensive, and powerful. When you have the gold, get it. We are talking big power swing now.

After that, items are situational:
Polynomicon is useful because of Poseidon's passive. You will be swinging with basic attacks, so why not make them hit big and hit hard? Don't fear the Polynomicon; embrace the Polynomicon.

Obsidian Shard to get you the penetration you need to crush tanks.

Void Stone to keep you in the fight longer and let you play a little more aggressive without dying. It keeps you from playing full squishy, or glass cannon.

We'll be experimenting with the order in which we buy our items, but for now just keep in mind which ones are the ones to focus on, and buy them when you have the gold to do so.

We'll continue to expand this as we go. But just know that playing with Poseidon is about as fun as you can get. A little danger, a little intrigue, and a lot of fun.