Many items in SMITE fly under the radar of players because people don’t see them as useful enough to be picked up despite their seemingly amazing stats and passives. It could be for many reasons, from the player not believing it’s effective for their power curve, to the item being too weak, to simply not having a full grasp on how the item performs on paper versus in practice. Some of these items have recently begun to see a spot in the sunlight, such as Void Shield which has been picked up more in the past week than in the past 6 months. But many still remain in the dark and often get ignored, and in extreme circumstances, can lead to teammates harassing you for picking up one of these items. Perhaps no other item has been so wrongfully ignored insofar as Masamune has. Be warned, following the end of this sentence, there is A LOT of math and numbers flying around.

Masamune has been surprisingly ignored despite the fact that, for nearly every assassin, it’s a better item than Stone Cutting Sword by leaps and bounds. Especially right now with the total dominance of Warlock’s Sash being built on almost every mage, you’d think that it would see more play than it currently does, yet it’s still incredibly rare to see it on the battlefield that I’m always surprised when I see someone buy it because it means that I’m not the only person who knows it exists. Yet, something that seems to be glossed over is that, outside of boots of course, a fully stacked Devourer’s Gauntlet and surprisingly Bloodforge, it is the most cost efficient item per point of power at just 44 gold per 1 power, and it gives 10% move speed. For comparison, Stone Cutting Sword, which is seen as the best item in the Katana tree, costs 58 gold per 1 power. And the only other items that give 50+ power are Transcendence (gold/per varies due to a number of factors), Shifter’s Shield (only when above 50% HP, otherwise it’s 40 power), Deathbringer (64 gold/power), Malice (60 gold/power), Devourer’s Gauntlet (requires 61 stacks to get 50 power), and Bloodforge (38 gold/power)

Now, that comparison only notes the cost/power and not passives, so let’s compare passives. Let’s assume we’re playing Susano and going up against a Raijin who has a fully stacked Warlock’s Sash and has a Breastplate of Valor and both gods are level 20. For power, Susano has Warrior Tabi, Masamune, a Jotunn’s Wrath, Bloodforge, Brawler’s Beatstick and Titan’s Bane, giving him 275 base power. With a fully stacked Warlock’s Sash, Raijin has 2585 HP and with Breastplate of Valor, has 146 physical protections. After Susano’s penetration (30 flat and 33%), Raijin has 68 protections. Because of the 635 HP difference between the 2 gods, Masamune gives Susano the max extra power you can get from Masamune at 50, making his power an effective 325 against Raijin. Because Masamune has an instant effect, Susano can start swinging abilities right away. For simplicities sake, Susano will hit every ability in their order. Hitting both strikes of Storm Kata would deal 542 damage, dropping Raijin’s HP already by just over 20% to 2043. Using Wind Siphon would then deal another 120 damage, reducing Raijin to 1923 HP. Following is a Jet Stream that hits for all 4 ticks, dealing a total of 423 damage, leaving Raijin with 1500 HP. Finally, landing Typhoon will land 494 damage on Raijin’s HP bar, and reducing him to a final total of 1006 HP. If at some point you hit Raijin with 3 auto attacks, your first 2 would deal 242 damage a piece and the final would do 303, leaving Raijin with just 219 HP. While it looks long on paper with a lot of numbers, Susano can do that entire combo in just over 4-5 seconds, or about 2-3 without using the auto attacks.

VS background courtesy of MrFMFilms

Now we have to back all the way up to compare Stone Cutting Sword on Susano. Susano drops back to 275 power because of the 50 power loss of Masamune’s passive, but can gain up an astounding 108 penetration, reducing Raijin to 38 protections after all 3 autos needed to get full use out of Stone Cutting Sword. But with such a staggering loss of power, does the extra penetration make up for it? Before we use any of Susano’s abilities, let’s assume we get the autos we need for Stone Cutting Sword. First auto would deal 213 damage, 226 for the second, and the final would do 301 and Raijin would have 1845 HP. So far, the case isn’t looking good for Stone Cutting Sword, as a full chain with Stone Cutting Sword with no passive stacks, then 1, then 2 does 47 less than a full chain with Masamune. Now we can finally use an ability as well, Storm Kata will deal an impressive 601 damage, a 59 damage improvement. Wind Siphon after and you’ll hit him for 137, 17 more than Masamune. Now you must auto once again if you wish to keep Stone Cutting Sword’s passive going, so add on 259. At this point Raijin is down to 848 HP, and we’re only 2 abilities in. Hitting every tick of Jet Stream now would do 471 damage, 48 more than with Masamune, along with another auto for 259 while the ability ticks to keep the passive going, for a total of 730 damage. That leaves Raijin at just a single auto away from death, so instead of using our Typhoon, we’ll just swing to kill him.

Now, I realize that was a lot of numbers with a lot of behind the scenes math, but you may be looking at this and thinking “Now, I thought he was saying why Masamune is better than Stone Cutting Sword, yet I don’t get the kill with Masamune and with Stone Cutting Sword I don’t even need to use my ult” and you’d be right, you don’t in this example. The important thing to look at is the number of autos attacks you need between the 2 examples though. Using 3 is enough to nearly kill Raijin with Masamune, or kill if he took hardly any damage before you fought him, but look at how many you need for Stone Cutting, 5 with Typhoon and 6 without it. Recall that in the first example, you cut the time for a full combo in half if you didn’t add the auto attacks at the end, as Susano has an attack speed of 1.43 at level 20, meaning that for his first 2 autos, he would need .7 seconds to initiate the attack and the third would need .87 because of the 1.25x swing at the end of his chain. That means 3 autos would need about 2.27 seconds to complete Susano’s attack chain. Considering that assassins, especially one like Susano, need to be in and out before anyone can react, wasting 2.27 seconds (or more in some cases) just for an item passive is contradictory to your job. But if you aren’t wasting that time, you’re not using an item for its intended purpose, wasting the item slot to an extent. That is why, as an ability based assassin, penetration and Masamune are your best friend, because you’ll be ready for literally any situation. Lots of protections? No problem, you have the pen to deal with it. Massive HP bar, but limited to no protections? Thanks for the free 50 power and making Masamune even more of a value pick. That is why Masamune needs to be in the spotlight, and not the unsung hero it currently is. One final note, just as Stone Cutting Sword is wasted potential if you aren't getting its full passive a good bit of the time, Masamune is the same. Always keep an eye on your enemies' HP, and if you feel the passive is no longer useful, switch it out for something you feel is useful.

Get your own AKRacing Chair here and support our players, all profit goes towards the teams!