Items are a large part of Smite. The item choices and build paths you take can make or break fights and even decide games. Penetration is found on several items and is a core stat to damage dealers in Smite. Penetration is used to unlock other damage stats. Even with tons of power, a bit of penetration can go a long way. In this article, we will examine what makes penetration so good and then look at the penetration items available to physical gods.

A sample of physical penetration items.

Before we can talk about penetration, we need to cover protections. In Smite, protections reduce physical or magical damage taken by the following equation: Damage taken = starting damage x (100 / (100 + protections)). For example, at 100 physical protections, you take 50% of the sheet damage from that damage type.

Penetration increases damage done not by providing the user with power, but by allowing them to ignore protections built up on the target. Flat penetration values ignore the equivalent number of protections while percentage penetration ignores a percent of the enemy’s protections. You cannot reduce one’s protection into negative values, but enough penetration to reduce one’s protection to zero allows you to deal true damage and unlock the full potential of your spells and attacks. Loading up on six penetration items is not the way to play Smite, as flat penetration will cap at 50 and balanced builds have other stats that suit their characters and increase DPS alongside penetration items.

Assassin’s Blessing is the only starting item with penetration. It increases a jungler’s damage against camps and heals them for clearing the jungle. After killing enough jungle monsters and players, Assassin's Blessing will evolve and gain 10 penetration. This turns into a lot of damage in the early game when protections are still low. The penetration from the Blessing provides enough damage that junglers don’t sell their starter item until they have to in the late game.

Once evolved, Assassin's Blessing gives some penetration to junglers.

The Mace tree of items are the core physical penetration items in Smite. All of these items have stats that every damage dealer wants: power and penetration. The Mace item itself comes with 15 power and junglers often buy it at the start of a game. This Mace then gets turned into a full penetration item for an early power core. Damage focused junglers and other roles build more Mace items for their power and penetration stats. Each item in the tree comes with its own additional benefits.

Jotunn’s Wrath is a great penetration item for ability-based gods. The item provides 40 power, 10 penetration, 150 mana, and 20% cooldown reduction. The mana and CDR encourage spell casting and the other stats give good damage. The cooldown reduction on Jotunn’s Wrath can allow for an additional rotation of skills in a fight or allow junglers to engage and repeat gank while an enemy’s defensive tools are still down.

Brawler’s Beat Stick is a penetration item that has utility. The item comes with 40 power, 15 penetration, and 40% anti-heal for 8 seconds against anyone hit by your abilities. Brawler’s Beat Stick is a very aggressive item that provides high damage and gimps sustain. Brawler’s Beat Stick is often worth buying for the damage even against comps without overwhelming healing.

The Crusher is another Mace item. It brings 30 power, 20% attack speed, and 15 penetration. The passive of The Crusher causes enemies hit by your damaging abilities to take 20 damage + 15% power scaling over two seconds. The Crusher is built by ability-based Hunters as well as junglers that weave abilities and basic attacks. The Crusher is often an early buy to give these characters high burst and dps heading into the mid game. The more abiliites that can be unloaded at a time, the better.

Titan’s Bane is a controversial item. It does not have flat penetration, but instead gives percentage penetration to its user. During damage calculations, percentage pen applies before flat pen. This item has been changed several times and now provides 30 power and a scaling amount of percentage penetration. The more physical protection an enemy god has, the greater the percentage of those protections that Titan’s Bane cuts through, up to 40% when facing 200 protections. Titan’s Bane is historically hard to balance as there is a fine line between tanks being unkillable in the late game and invalidating thousands of gold worth of protections.

The Mace tree contains items that host penetration and power.

Heartseeker is an item similar to the Mace tree because it provides power in addition to penetration. Heartseeker builds off of Charged Morningstar, so it also has mana and Mp5. Heartseeker comes with 30 power and 10 pen, on the low end of the Mace items, but Heartseeker brings damage through its passive. Successful basic attacks stack Heartseeker, up to 5 stacks. At 5 stacks, your next damaging ability does additional damage equal to 80% of your power to a single player hit and restores 10% of your mana. Heartseeker can be used on ability-based Hunters in a power and penetration build or with Assassins like Ravana that use basic attacks and abilities to burst squishies.

Heartseeker scales well with other items that provide power and penetration.

Some Attack Speed items also come with penetration attached. These items are not too popular, but can be used by Hunters and some Assassins or Warriors in niche situations.

Asi is the penetration item with lifesteal. Its trifecta of stats are 10 penetration, 15% lifesteal, and 25% attack speed. Asi is sometimes picked up mid to late game on Hunters, either to provide lifesteal to transcendence builds or to supplement the lifesteal of Devourer’s Gauntlet. Because Asi lacks power, it isn’t a catch-all item for Hunters and is only seen occasionally.

Ichaival builds out of Short Bow and is a bridge item for Hunters. It has 25% attack speed and 10 penetration. When basic attacking gods you gain 10 power and reduce their power, stacking up to three times. Ichaival comes in and out of the meta depending on how much dueling power Hunters need in the early to mid game when this item would be purchased.

Silverbrach Bow also builds off of Short Bow and comes with 10 penetration. However, it brings 35% attack speed and 20 power. It also causes your character to gain additional power based on how overcapped on attack speed you are. This is not a good item because it still isn’t gold efficient to massively overcap attack speed.

Toxic Blade is the only full item in this article that is available to physical and magical gods. Most of the other items here have the physical penetration stat, but this item has 15 penetration that works for both damage types. Toxic Blade also comes with 100 health, 30% attack speed, and 10% movement speed. The passive introduces anti-heal to your basic attacks, reducing healing taken by 20%, stacking twice to a total of 40% for 8 seconds. Brawler's Beatstick is usually the better item for anti-heal, but Toxic Blade can be used on gods that are heavily reliant on basic attacks and really need the anti-heal.

A diverse set of items all provide a combination of penetration and attack speed.

Protection Reduction is similar to penetration. Penetration allows the user to ignore protections to increase their own damage, but effects that reduce protection debuff the target, increasing the damage they take from that damage type. Just like the order of operations with penetration, percentage protection reduction goes into effect before flat protection reduction. Then penetration is calculated. Protection reduction is a strong effect because it allows multiple gods to benefit from an enemy's weakened protections.

The Executioner is one of the best items in Smite and is a core item in most Hunter Builds. This item provides 30 power and 25% attack speed. In addition, each basic attack reduces the enemy’s physical protection by 12%, stacking up to three times. The DPS gained from The Executioner is massive and often allows Hunters to shred everyone from the mid game on. While The Executioner and Titan’s bane mathematically reduce the effect of each other, Hunters often build both items because the combination still provides tons of penetration against even moderately tanky opponents.

Stone Cutting Sword is a melee-only item that comes with 50 power and 10 percent movement speed. Similarly to The Executioner, Stone Cutting Sword empowers basic attacks, causing them to decrease the target’s physical protection by 10, stacking three times. These attacks also increase your physical protection by 10 for the duration. Stone Cutting Sword is an item that can be bought on Warriors and Assassins that use their basic attacks and have to deal with physical threats.

Void Shield is the most defensive item on this list. It is a hybrid item, providing both offense and defense to its user. It brings 50 physical protection, 150 health, and 20 physical power. In addition, it exudes an aura, reducing the physical protection of nearby enemies by 20. This effectively gives 20 penetration to all of your physical allies. Void Shield is a good item on aggressive Warriors or Assassins looking to be bruisers and deal damage while being reasonably tanky.

A few items reduce the physical defense of a target.

Penetration is a strong stat in Smite. It allows damage dealers to ignore large amounts of protection and thus greatly increase their damage. For physical gods, the Mace tree contains the most popular penetration items. Titan's Bane is the odd Mace out, as instead of a flat penetration value it provides a scaling amount of percentage penetration. Penetration is also found on items such as Assassin’s Blessing, Heartseeker, and Asi. Items like The Executioner directly reduce the protections of enemy gods, allowing multiple sources of damage to benefit from their effects. There is a variety of penetration items in Smite that all have secondary effects that shape the course of matches.

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