The 10th Season of SMITE is officially over with the Year 11 or 11.1 Patch releasing on Tuesday – but what are the biggest changes of the start of SMITE 1’s potential last year?
If you mention SMITE, everybody instantly thinks about SMITE 2, the Unreal Engine 5 “sequel” of Titan Forge Games’ third person MOBA. But SMITE 1 is living on in the foreseeable future, with the new season starting today! The first big Patch of Year 11 has dropped, changing almost everything about the game as per tradition extensively. But what are the biggest differences compared to last year, and what can you expect from the SMITE Year 11 Update?
SMITE Year 11 Update – Everything You Need to Know
SMITE Year 11 Update – Divine Legacy
Of course, SMITE 2 is still coming, and Titan Forge has added some Divine Legacy rewards. Divine Legacy is the cross-gen event between SMITE 1 and SMITE 2, providing players with usable skins, titles and other accessories in both games (as porting over the skins from SMITE 1 to 2 would take literal hundreds of years). The new rewards are available in the Divine Legacy event, which you can participate in for free by completing challenges tied to the history of SMITE 1: getting gods released in specific Seasons to Mastery levels, or just playing with them can earn you skins!
SMITE Year 11 Update – Cross-Gen Battlepass: Dawn and Dusk
The new Battlepass is also tying the two parts of SMITE together, as most contents of the Dawn and Dusk BP will be usable in SMITE 2. However, you have to link your SMITE 1 and 2 accounts to access both the Divine Legacy and the Dawn and Dusk content in each game.
SMITE Year 11 Update – Immortal Honor Event
Immortal Honor is also a new event with skins that are unlocked every patch. This event is a bit more special than the likes of it in the past, as the skins coming for the gods will all be cross-gen, while also revealing which characters will be added to SMITE 2 after the Closed Alpha and Beta tests! If you see your main in there, it won’t take long for them to hit the sequel.
SMITE Year 11 Update – Bug Fixes and QoL
The new Season’s first patch also fixed some bugs such as Charon not getting punished by anti-shielding items as much, the item Enchanted Trinket not giving the correct stats and calling for a Pause PC would be tied to F6 – which is the button for giving a match up.
It also finally differentiates allied and enemy Blinks and Teleports in audio, which makes it easier to distinguish them.
SMITE Year 11 Update – The Balance Changes
Game Modes
Celestial Comets have been added to all modes, crashing down to the Battlefield of the Gods randomly after the first 90 seconds of a match has passed. They can be destroyed for Chunks which give gold and XP, as well as Indra’s Scepter if the whole meteor is destroyed. A new Comet will only fall if the previous one’s Scepter has expired.
The Joust map will be changed to the Jade Corruption map which is the Japanese event map from Season 7. The only difference is some swapping around of camps.
SMITE Year 11 Update – Conquest
The main game mode of SMITE, Conquest had some work done. Firstly, the Green Buff and Chest Back Camp have been swapped, meaning Green will be closer to the Duo Lane. The Shield and CD Camps for Duo and Solo have been moved to the outer side of the map, with new Naga camps appearing in their old spots. These Nagas hold the key for the Teleporters showcased at the SMITE World Championship, allowing players to TP from Solo to Duo if defeated.
Bastions have also been buffed around the towers, giving more gold but being much tankier. The Crimson and Golden Totems have also been buffed to be more worthwhile to fight over.Another new jungle camp is the Cyclops Rogues, which are a Conquest only mob. When defeated, they open a little shop which let’s players buy Items for 60 seconds, giving the opportunity to get enhancements on the fly. The Stygian Beacon has been heavily nerfed, with captures only dealing damage to all the front structures of the enemy team – sadly, no more roaming Titans in Year 11.
While Surtr joined the roster of gods a year ago, the Fire Giant remained, and it’s getting stronger with buffed stats this year. However, it’s lair now has an Effigy which can be destroyed, and gives 15% extra damage taken to the FG. Oh, and the Big Bad of the Battleground now has a Ra beam which homes onto it’s target.
Some Jungle Camp Spawn Timers have been changed, as the Blue, the Duo Speed and the Chest Camps will spawn at 00:15, 00:15 and 00:30 seconds into the game respectively. Year 11 also decreased the Gold value of each Camp, but increased the XP, so everyone gets level 2 before lane without shenanigans.
Ranked has also been hard reset and Bake Kujira is available, while the Joust banned gods are also changed – you can finally play Maman Brigitte in the 1v1 mode!
SMITE Year 11 Update – Item Changes
Recipes
Recipes have been removed from the game, but the best parts of them will live on in the new Shards. Two of the Shards, Carapace and Claw have been taken out of the game as well, but a number of new shards were added:
- Golden Shard, which makes your AA’s splash,
- Sturdy Shard which gives defensive stats when CC’d,
- and Vibrant Shard, which gives extra damage to your next auto or spell based on distance travelled.
Relics
Relics now also have quests tied to them, and can only be upgraded by completing said quests instead of buying the better versions. For Tier 2 upgrade, you need to kill 140/80 minions for the first and second Relic, and for Tier 3 you need to damage or CC enemy gods.
Relics now also only have 2 upgrades – there’s no choice at Tier 3. This means that beloved versions such as Heroic Teleport, Aegis of Judgement and Corrupting Blink have been removed, but some of the remaining Relics kept the effects of their counterparts.
There’s also a new relic called Divine Barrier, which puts down a wall that decreases damage of all enemy Basic Attack that pass through it, and at Tier 3, increases the damage of friendly attacks – which sounds cool, but outside of Duo lane or a full Ranged meta, there are better Relics to pick up.
Consumables
2 new wards have been added to the game. Proximity Wards slow enemies entering their radius, revealing them for a while after exploding, while Raven Wards fly along a straight line, revealing everything in their path, while ignoring walls. These new wards provide great opportunities for setup and a new layer of depth to macro play.
Lifesteal Rework
Lifesteal is now 50% less effective against minions, but in return, the Lifesteal on items have been increased by 50%, as well as the Lifesteal on gods abilities like Camazotz’s Passive or Cernunnos’ 1. Also, the Lifesteal caps have been increased to 80% for Physical and 70% for Magical gods. This means that you can lifesteal more effectively from gods, while minions will heal you 25% less.
Stacking Item Rework
Stacking Items have been reworked. Now instead of having to last hit minions, you have to deal damage to enemy minions and gods, with the amount of “stacks” gods give being double. Devourers Gauntlet needs 30k damage to activate, Transcendence requires 35k, Book of Thoth 45k while Warlock’s Staff needs 55k.
Returning Items
Void Shield is returning alongside Blackthorn Hammer! Both of the items do what they did before getting deleted, with Void Shield providing a Physical Protection debuff to enemies, and Blackthorn giving CDR or MP5. There’s also a semi-new item called Void Doumaru, which is basically a Magical version of Void Shield.
New Glyphs
Two new Glyphs have been added to SMITE 1. Devoted Deathbringer multiplies your Crit chance by 1.3 while giving extra Power if you go over the Crit cap, while Envenomed Executioner decreases heals and shield to enemies hit.
Item Balance – The most important changes
While a plethora of items have been changed, I’ll try and list the most important and impactful ones:
- Manikin Scepter doesn’t give Physical Protections but gives AS, so it’s better for damage roles,
- Protector of the Jungle is the Tank Jungle starter now with its added Protections,
- The Hammer Tree (Dawnbringer, Frostbound, Runeforged) has been buffed with extra Power but decreased Health,
- Gem of Isolation’s passive CD is now 5 seconds,
- Shadowdrinker’s Stealth and Movement Speed duration has been increased,
- Mystical Mail received a cost decrease and buffs to all stats,
- Shogun’s Kusari now gives 10% AS instead of CD,
- Transcendence now has Physical Penetration instead of CD on evolve,
- Pythagorem’s Piece now gives more Power and Health but doesn’t have CDR
- Potion of Power received the same treatment that Upgraded Transcendence did, so it might not be as common as a midgame buy anymore.
SMITE Year 11 Update – God Balance
The god balance is even bigger than the item balance, so I picked the most important ones again:
- Da Ji’s 1’s Slow and Damage Scaling has been increased, making her deadlier in the early game as well as late,
- Cliodhna’s Ultimate now has lower cooldown, which could push her back into the Solo lane,
- Fafnir’s Coerce heals him for more, making him more survivable,
- Charybdis’s Autos now deal 5% more damage from Item effects, while her 1’s Damage Scaling has been increased,
- Eset’s Ultimate have been nerfed, dealing less damage, which should make her weaker in Duo and securing objectives,
- Tiamat’s Ultimate, grounded 1 and 3 and flying 3 have been buffed, making her more fluid to play,
- Vamana’s Passive and Ultimate has been buffed, which should counteract the nerfs he received – don’t worry, the ult buff is just 1 second minimum and maximum duration, his reign of terror won’t return,
- Even though he was one of the best Solo’s during Worlds, Osiris’ 3 and Ult have been buffed, with his 3 now decreasing 30% Attack Speed at Rank 5,
- Odin’s passive has been shifted – it’s only 4 stacks, but it gives the same stats when fully stacked,
- Bake Kujira has also been nerfed, with his passive converting less Protections – but he’s still very good.
And with that, Year 11 of SMITE 1 has officially begun! The list of changes seems endless, and it’ll take some time to get used to everything new in Season 11 – for guides and tips, check back to ESTNN!