Starter Items in Smite have always been essential starts in the Conquest game mode: whether they are for giving you sustain in lane, enhancing your farming potential, or providing you damage for easier early wave clears. In Season 4, new variants of these Starter Items have been introduced and many of the old Starter Items have also been changed significantly. This article will be covering every Starter Item in the game as of now (Patch 4.4), and will explain which type of gods and roles will benefit most out of each specific Starter Item in certain situations as well as the item's viability. These 11 items will be divided into two categories: popular and unpopular. Unpopular Starter Items generally are in that spot because there is another item that brings more benefits for the same or lower price.

Popular Starter Items

Bumba’s Mask:

Cost: 500 gold

Stats: +50 Health, +50 Mana

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Your Basic Attacks deal +15 True Damage and your Abilities +15% Damage versus Jungle Camps. When a Jungle monster is killed: only the closest ally god in assist range with Bumba's Mask will be healed for 15% of the monster's health, restored 25 Mana, and given an additional 4 gold.

For: Both Magical and Physical Gods

This is the main Starter Item for junglers as its passive effect allows them to sustain in the jungle and encourages them to tank the jungle camps since only the closest god in range of the camps will gain the full bonus effects upon completion. Choosing to not start with this item as a jungler will generally put you behind in gold even if you are ahead of the enemy jungler experience-wise. Mid laners can also look to start this item as an option if they are often finding themselves soloing jungle camps without the jungler. Since the Season 4 change that decreased this item’s cost by 300 gold (was 800 gold), players can now look to purchase another Starter Item which helps them with early game clear/sustain. Starting with Bumba’s Mask with any other Starter Item besides Rangda’s Mask will leave you with 200 gold which is room for any 4 potions of your preference (usually 2 Health + 2 Mana).

Bluestone Pendant:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +15 Physical Power, +50 Mana, 5 MP5

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Enemies hit by your damaging Abilities take an additional 30 Physical Damage over 2s. (Max 2 Stacks)

For: Physical Gods Only

As a Starter Item dedicated to physical gods, this item brings out ability based gods’ full potential in the early stages of the game. This includes all physical classes: Warriors, Assassins, Hunters. It allows them to clear waves easily while maintaining their mana. However, keep in mind that this item will only bring benefit to ability-based gods and will not bring as much help to gods who are auto-attack based.

Death’s Toll:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +10 Physical Power, +100 Health

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Hitting an enemy with a Basic Attack restores 8 Health and 3 Mana.

For: Physical Gods Only

Unlike Bluestone Pendant, this is a Starter Item dedicated to physical AA-based (auto attack based) gods. Although it is 5 less power than Bluestone Pendant, this item is the definition of sustain for AA-based gods in the early to mid stages of the game especially for the gods who have cleave autos (1 auto that hits multiple targets in melee range) in their auto-attack chain. Some examples of these gods include Erlang Shen, Bellona (Bludgeon), Ratatoskr, Thanatos, Ne Zha, etc. Cleave autos allow Death’s Toll to proc multiple times on multiple hit targets, thus providing the owner of the item multiples of 8 Health and 3 Mana per cleave auto attack. Hunters benefit from this item mostly due to the fact that most hunters are AA-based and it can be seen as “lifesteal” in the early stages of the game bringing them power and sustain during the laning phase.

Mark of the Vanguard:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +10 Physical Protection, +150 Health

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - All damage taken is reduced by 5.

For: Both Magical and Physical Gods

Mark of the Vanguard is one of the best defensive Starter Item to pick up in the game. Although its passive seems to be underwhelming, taking 5 less damage from any sort of damage is definitely very strong in the early stages. This item is picked up from the start by mainly solo Guardian players (who do not have the option of Death’s Toll or Bluestone Pendant) and solo Assassins (who have high base damage but need the early defense against the other solo laner). Junglers can look to pick this item up, allowing them to flexibly play both aggressively and defensively depending on their style. Support players usually can look to pick this item up as a second Starter after finishing their Shoes/Boots and Watcher’s Gift making them efficiently tanky in the early to mid stages of the game.

Sands of Time:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +20 Magical Power, +5 MP5, +10% Cooldown Reduction

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - This item grants 2 MP5 per 10% of your missing Mana.

For: Magical Gods Only

This is probably the best possible Starter Item for any Mage. Cooldown Reduction is arguable the best stat to have on Mages since they all spam their abilities, whether it be for wave clear or poke. Having 10% out of the max 40% Cooldown Reduction is significantly beneficial to any magical character in Smite, not to mention it has the same base 20 Magical Power as its competitors Soul Stone and Vampiric Shroud. As a bonus, this item also passively provides additional MP5 in addition to its base +5 MP5 which ultimately makes this the most powerful Starter Item for a Mage to pick up.

Watcher’s Gift:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +100 Health, +5 Physical Protection, +5 Magical Protection, +5 MP5

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Being within assist range of a minion or jungle camp monster death without dealing the killing blow awards 5 bonus gold, and also restores +12 Health and +10 Mana.

For: Both Magical and Physical Gods

This Starter is locked in as a must-get for Supports and, more often than not, only Supports. Last-hitting minions allows the carries to get more gold, thus completing their builds quicker making them come online faster. By allowing them to do so, Supports lack gold and the only answer to that is Watcher’s Gift. Not only does it provide them with an extra 5 gold per minion assist, but it also gives them the sustain in the early stages by regenerating Health and Mana not to mention its great base Health and Protections. The other roles don’t need this item, however, due to the fact that they all are able to get farm efficiently in their individual lanes or jungle camps.

- Unpopular Starter Items

Rangda’s Mask:

Cost: 500 gold

Stats: +5 MP5

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Each time you get an assist you gain a stack, or 2 for a kill. At 6 stacks this item provides 7% Movement Speed and 10% Cooldown Reduction. At 16 stacks this item provides 15 Penetration, 10% Movement Speed, and 15% Cooldown Reduction.

For: Both Magical and Physical Gods

Although at first glance this item’s passive might be tempting when you’ve reached full stacks with it, it is certainly not the best choice to go. A game is very volatile in the early stages and can go in either direction, so investing 500 gold into this might cause you to fall very behind in farm since it does not give you anything significant until you’ve completed 6 stacks on it. By the time the full 16 stacks is completed, you are most likely able to sell it for a full 5th or 6th item.

Soul Stone:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +20 Magical Power, + 100 Mana

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Gain 1 stack every time you hit an enemy with a basic attack. If you have 5 stacks, the next time you deal damage with an ability the stacks are consumed and you gain 40 mana, and that ability and any abilities used in the next 3s will deal bonus damage equal to having +40 Magical Power for those abilities.

For: Magical Gods Only

This is the “early power” start for mages which is definitely an option to go if you want to focus outclearing your opposition. However, keep in mind that Sands of Time giving 10% Cooldown Reduction means your opposition is also able to put out more abilities within the same timeframe as you. The mana sustain is almost the same between these two Starters, but the 10% CDR from Sands of Time definitely transitions a mage much better into the mid to late stages of the game.

Swift Wing:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +100 Health, +10 HP5, +5% Movement Speed

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Whenever you leave the fountain, you gain 40% movespeed for 15s. You will lose this speed early if you enter combat.

For: Both Magical and Physical Gods

Another Starter Item that may seem appealing at first, but as you work with it you will realize that it isn’t bringing you much for the value of 800 gold in the early game. If you are a jungler, you may think that you can get to your jungle camps quicker, but the opposition outclears you much faster. If you are a support, the opposition will be tankier. This item just does not bring you as much benefits as the other options you can buy for 800 gold.

Vampiric Shroud:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +20 Magical Power, +100 Health, +4% Magical Lifesteal

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Killing an enemy restores 10 Health and 8 Mana.

For: Magical Gods Only

Just like Soul Stone, this magical Starter Item is overshadowed by Sands of Time. The passive and lifesteal brings a bit more early sustain, but does not transition well into the later stages of the game because the stats are too low to bring any significant value to the table.

War Flag:

Cost: 800 gold

Stats: +10 Physical Power, +100 Health, +5 MP5

Passive Effect: PASSIVE - Being in range of minion or jungle camp death without dealing the killing the blow restores 5 Health and 5 Mana to all allies within 55 units and also provides allies with a stacking self buff of 1% Movement Speed and 1% Attack Speed. Lasts 6s and stacks up to 10 times.

For: Physical Gods Only

This Starter Item is meant to be made for physical support characters, however its passive is too underwhelming for it to get picked up when an item like Mark of the Vanguard is its competitor, as Mark provides more early stats.

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