With the new Arena map being right around the corner, it might be a good time to get into playing this action packed game mode. Arena is Smite’s most popular game mode - yes, it even surpassed the main competitive game mode in Smite - Conquest. However, there are still some people who think that playing Arenas doesn’t teach you anything. I disagree - it is a great game mode for practicing teamfights - one of Conquest’s most important aspects. And for the people who just want to have fun: you will find plenty of it in this game mode too. There are a lot more casual players which means that they are usually calm and nice.

Team Composition:

In Arena, the meta is less strict than in Conquest. You can have multiple gods of the same class and still win easily. All of the classes in Smite can bring different boons to your Arena team. Let's sum them up now:

Guardians:

The tankiest class in Smite is also one of the most useful for Arena. They protect your team, hand out heavy CC and set up most kills. Picking a guardian for Arena matches isn’t a must, but they offer so many perks that it would be a shame not to pick one. You can also go ahead and pick 2 guardians, however, be aware that you will lose out on a lot of damage by doing that.

The most useful guardians are: Ares, Athena, Bacchus and Ymir.

Mages:

The class you really cannot start an Arena match without. Mages provide your team with the much needed damage and wave clearing capabilities. With higher gold and experience spooling, mages are even more effective than in other game modes. In Arena, two mages should be picked because they are, without a doubt, the most useful god class for Arena.

The most damaging mages are: Chronos, Freya, Kukulkan, Poseidon, Ra and Scylla.

Assassins:

The assassin class really shines in Arena’s extremely short early game and mid game by damaging enemies with high poke damage. Assassins are also very useful as counters against mages because of their ability to chase them down, kill them and get out quickly. Locking in an assassin is not necessary for your success, but having one might prove useful in many situations.

The deadliest assassins are: Kali, Loki, Mercury and Nemesis.

Warriors:

Even warriors are a great counter to mages, but in a different way than assassins. While assassins try to chase and kill the mage in order to disrupt the enemy team, warriors should use their increased protections to zone out enemy mages and put them out of position. Having a warrior on the team is recommended, but it is not necessary if you already have a guardian.

The most fearsome warriors are: Bellona, Hercules and Sun Wukong.

Hunters:

Last but not least, we have the hunter class. Their massive late game damage might prove useful, but their slower start is a bit of a nuisance. If they’re worth picking depends on the utility they can provide without having all of their damage items.

It is a bit weird, but the best gods from the hunter class are those who have supportive ultimate abilities: Cupid, Medusa and Xbalanque.

Item Builds:

Item builds in Arenas differ slightly from those in Conquest. The most important thing to note is that there should be a maximum of one stacking item and the player wielding that item needs to have good clear to truly take advantage of it. If you bought a stacking item, remember to communicate this with your team as most people don’t check the scoreboard often. Use it to check on enemy team’s builds and learn to counter their items and gods accordingly. If you are a damage dealer, try to move your penetration items up in the priority list. All gods will have higher protections than they would normally have because of the much faster experience gain in Arena. This will cause them to level up faster and get more and more protections with each level. So instead of building Spear of Magus as your 4th or 5th item, try to build it as your 3rd item.

Start of the Game:

Teams should almost always start on the left side by killing all 3 buff camps. There really is no advantage to invading in Arena, which is why most of the time people will not even try. Instead of taking down each buff camp separately, try to pull the mana camp and the attack camp next to each other. This will allow you to kill them much faster with area of effect damage. After the 2 camps are down, a mage should go to the center of the map to kill incoming waves. If your team is quick, you can even pressure out the enemy team by not allowing them to clear minions. Always look for easy picks (mages isolated from their group for example) and capitalise on them.

Mid and Late Game:

This is all about getting kills and making sure that your team last hits every single enemy minion. Have your team’s support initiate and if you can, help him by using abilities such as Xbalanque’s Darkest of Nights [4] or Artemis’ Calydonian Boar [4]. The team that engages first has a big advantage, so make sure you are the ones initiating.

Also don’t forget to check the minimap and minion waves every few seconds - especially if you’re pushed back. Every 10 kills a Siege Tower spawns. Defend this tower with your team and try to kill any opponents near it. The enemies will now have to make a choice - they will either try to destroy the tower, protect their portal and die in the process or they will forget about the tower and try to defend themselves which will make them lose points anyway. You can make sure that your team does not get into this scary position by destroying the tower when it reaches the middle of the map while posing aggressively to the enemy team.

If you have already hit the 10 tickets mark (by which normal minion kills no longer deduct tickets) and the enemy still has a few more left, try to stall the game by killing enemy waves. If your team doesn’t get caught out of position, you can shrink the enemy team’s lead from 10-31 to 7-10. At that point, both teams need to get 2 kills which makes their lead essentially useless.

[VVGG]: Good game!

Thank you for reading my guide. If you have any questions or suggestions, please, leave a comment below this guide or send me a message on Twitter - @TheRikisak