SMITE Rise My Minions! Patch, New God Ah Puch, Ten New Skins

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*UPDATED with four new team skins!

GODS

AH PUCH, HORRIFIC GOD OF DECAY

Ah Puch is the god of death, darkness, and disaster. He is the lord of the ninth hell, the lowest and most horrible of them all, and king of the underworld.

Buried beneath the crust of the world descends the cruel hells of torment. The topmost of which are realms of torture and vile inhumanities, home to denizens of darkness and malice. Yet, further into the black below, at the inkiest recesses can be found the horrific ninth hell. Here dwells a deity of true evil, gloating over each corpse he’s claimed with macabre glee, and relishing the moment more of these lesser souls are his. He is Ah Puch, the mightiest lord of the ninth hell.

When night falls, Ah Puch roams the land, crowned by a wreath of human eyes, gruesome skull face bared for all to witness, accompanied by the shriek of ghostly owls. All that live are his for the taking. If Ah Puch finds a human in the night, he kills and drags the unfortunate into endless oblivion. Only those already wrached by his servants, those caught in gut-wrenching wailing, moans of agony, and fits of mania are safe from his touch.

VISION AND BALANCE

Ah Puch has the largest ultimate in the game to date. What were the challenges in creating the effect for this ability?
This ability is big. I mean, its really really huge. The ability creates a giant field of rushing wraiths that will impact enemy targets in the area. The tricky part was getting it to look good without having a huge performance impact and to make sure it reads clearly in gameplay. We achieved this by creating the wraiths using fast spawning projectiles with animated meshes attached to them. We then created multiple varieties of those animations to give the wraiths a dynamic feel. We also added some manual performance levels in code that replace the animated wraiths with static ones on lower video settings to keep performance at an acceptable level on lower video settings.

What other influences help in designing a character once a concept is approved?
I generally start by studying the concept and going over the general themes with the concept artist as well as the animation team. Using the mythology and the demeanor the character will animate, I will begin gathering real world references to go along with the concept. I gather all the materials into a single image that I can quickly reference back to as I start sculpting the character. For Ah Puch, I gathered reference of real world mayans, as well as depictions from film and television. We wanted his body to be slender and slightly emaciated, so I found body reference that reflected that. I also took reference from our current pantheon of mayan gods in smite. It’s important to make sure we reflect certain visual cues between characters in Smite to make sure they feel cohesive.

What aspects from Ah Puch’s lore did you want to build into his character? There were many pieces to Ah Puch’s lore that we wanted to incorporate, but ultimately his dominion over the dead called to us the most. We wanted him to be a true necromancer with explosive fury, and would settle for nothing less.

Ah Puch’s kit is highly damaging. Explain the ideas behind creating a high burst god in SMITE.
It’s fun blowing things up. Once we honed in on the corpse explosion mechanic, we realized that losing other utility like an escape mechanism in favor of a bigger boom was the way to go. That’s always the big trade-off when you’re creating high burst damage gods, and whether the damage is worth the sacrifice you’re making in other areas.

Wallpaper 2560 x 1440

Abilities

Hollow Ground: Ah Puch is closely attuned with the dead and may exhume decaying corpses at his will. When walking over a decaying corpse, Ah Puch lowers the Cooldown of Undead Surge by 2s, restores 6% of his maximum Health and 3% of his maximum Mana. Decaying corpses last 45s. A maximum of 6 corpses can be out at any one time.

Undead Surge: Ah Puch raises up to two decaying corpses from the underworld that surge forward exploding on anything they touch, when they reach maximum distance, or when Ah Puch reactivates Undead Surge dealing 90/110/130/150/170 (+35% of your Magical Power) damage and Slowing targets hit by 40% for 3s. The corpses collapse after exploding remaining behind.
Cooldown: 10s
Cost: 70/80/90/100/110

Corpse Explosion: Ah Puch causes the target area to explode dealing 60/70/80/90/100 (+10% of your Magical Power) damage. Corpse Explosion also causes any decaying corpses in the area to explode dealing 60/85/110/135/160 (+25% of your Magical Power) damage.
Cooldown: 8s
Cost: 60/70/80/90/100

Fleeting Breath: Ah Puch throws a charm from the underworld which awakens a decaying corpse that applies miasma to targets in an area and falls to the ground, remaining behind. Targets take 32/34/36/38/40 (+15% of your Magical Power) damage every second. After the duration, targets take an additional 20/30/40/50/60 (+10% of your Magical Power) damage and are Stunned for 1s plus +0.5s for each time they were healed by an ability during the initial duration.
Cooldown: 10s
Cost: 70

Empty the Crypts: Ah Puch unleashes an army of wraiths from the Ninth Hell that swarm forward and deal 40/50/60/70/80 (+10% of your Magical Power) damage to enemies they collide with and apply a 7% stacking Slow for 2s (maximum 8 stacks).
Cooldown: 90s
Cost: 100/110/120/130/140

Death Mask Ah Puch –

100 Gems

GOD SKINS

Kawaii Pop Bastet –

600 Gems

Voice Pack Available

Desert Queen Serqet – 250 Gems

Executioner Nemesis – 1000 Fantasy Points

Voice Pack Available
*300 Gems for ticket. A loading frame will be given after purchase, which will have to be equipped in order to earn fantasy points. +20 fantasy points for guessing winning team. Winning any game mode will earn you +15 points per win. More information below.

Void Wyrm Kukulkan – 3000 Fantasy Points

Fnatic Anhur – 300 Gems (Fnatic Chest)

Team SoloMid Sun Wukong – 300 Gems (Team SoloMid Chest)

Cloud9 Chaac – 300 Gems (Cloud9 Chest)

Titan Vulcan – 300 Gems (Titan Chest)

SPL 2015 NA/EU Xbalanque – 300 Gems (Smite 2015 Season Ticket)

NA

EU

UPDATED CARDS

Iron Smith Vulcan

WARD SKINS & PLAYER ICONS

Curse Voice Ward Skin
Fnatic Anhur
Cloud 9 Chaac
Team SoloMid Sun Wukong
Titan Vulcan

ACHIEVEMENTS
This patch we are introducing Achievements into SMITE! Over 100 Achievements have been added, including Lifetime, Combat, Objective, and Kill Achievements. Achievements can be accessed from your Player Profile.

A new “Achievement Score” has been added to the Player Profile.
You can now pick and save your favorite Achievements to show on your Player Profile.

SMITE 2015 SEASON TICKET
Unlock the new Season Ticket bundle and receive two SPL Xbalanque skins, the Season Ticket Loading Frame, and access to the Season Ticket Fantasy Game! Every ticket purchased contributes $2.50 to the general prize pool for Season 2 eSports.

Season Ticket Fantasy Game

Each week you make picks for which teams you think will win Smite Pro League match-ups. Picking correctly will earn +20 Fantasy Points.
Players can also earn +15 Fantasy Points for winning any Normal or League SMITE match while using the Season Ticket Loading Frame.
Earning Fantasy Points unlocks additional Limited rewards like the Executioner Nemesis Skin, and the Void Wyrm Kukulkan Skin!
The Summer Split of the Pro League starts May 14, 2015 and features 7 weeks of play and 16 games per week. The Season Ticket will also cover the third and final Split of the Season, leading up to the World Championship.
The Season Ticket Loading Frame shows how many Fantasy Points you have earned, and also promotes the date and time of the next Smite Pro League match-up.

NEW SMITE Store! The SMITE store has been completely overhauled. You can now easily search for skins, wards, emotes, and all other content in one convenient location.

Added blur effect behind UI panels when Shader Detail is set to High and above.
Added option to disable/enable sound notifications in Audio settings.
Music Volume slider now controls the Landing Page music. NOTE: If your music is off you won’t hear the awesome new Kawaii skin song!
Updated messages when unable to use clan name.
Updated more tooltips for inconsistencies.
Fixed tooltips remaining on screen if you drag and release outside of the items.
Fixed typo in ‘Earning Honor’ description.
Fixed typo in Siege & Wild Juggernaut Kill Accolade description.
Fixed typo in Revenge Accolade description.
Fixed being able to edit the ‘Send’ button in chat.
Fixed ‘Hide God Stats’ option persisting in Profile Loadouts.
Fixed ‘Friends Online’ notifications showing incorrect values when clan members were online.
Fixed the enemy god slots not showing properly aligned in the match lobby.
Fixed Attack Speed cap showing as 2 in the Character Builder.

GENERAL GAMEPLAY

Added some new contextual lines to the Arena and Conquest Tutorials.
Fixed Order side Brute Minion in Arena not deducting points while under 10 tickets.
Fixed being able to leash Arena buff camps far out of range.
Fixed issue with Old Phoenixes sometimes spawning off center of their pedestals.
Fixed issue in Profile/History where searching for another player would briefly display incorrect data.
Improved players experiencing hitching/jitter when interacting with deployable walls.

MISC
Enhanced integration with Curse Voice.

Now you can see which friends have Curse Voice installed and if it is running.
You can direct call using Curse Voice from your Friends List.

An additional Clan quest has been added.
Fixed sorting issue in League with Friends List.
Fixed Shutdown Accolade not working.
The SWC lobby pedestal fx will now only appear while the pedestal is loading.

ITEMS

Soulstone (NEW)
It’s been a long time since Mages had a starting item other than Vampiric Shroud to pick from. Soul Stone offers no starting Health, but provides significant Mana and a nice damage spike for early clear or poking at enemy gods.

+20 Magical Power
+100 Mana
Cost: 800 Gold.
Passive: Hitting an enemy with a Basic Attack tears out and stores a portion of their soul. Each soul grants +4 MP5. At 5 souls, your next ability cast is at +30 Magical Power.

Devourer’s Gauntlet
It might not come as a surprise that Devourer’s Gauntlet is getting an adjustment. This potent item is seeing a reduction in it’s base power, and an increase in the number of stacks it takes to reach it’s full potential. This will give more room for specifically Hunters to build and counter-build with a little more variation in the early laning phase.

Physical Power reduced to 25 from 30.
Maximum stacks increased to 75 from 60.
Physical Lifesteal per stack reducted to 0.20% from 0.25%.
Physical Power per stack reduced to 0.4 from 0.5.

Frostbound Hammer
With this change and the adjustment to Heavy Hammer, we are looking to make Frostbound a bit more appealing to build into.

Health increased to 400 from 300.

Heartseeker
Heartseeker saw no adjustment coming into Season 2 when its Magical counterpart did. Combined with the reduction to Devourer’s Gauntlet, Heartseeker is now a potent option for many Physical gods.

Price reduced to 1790g from 1950g.
Physical Power increased to 30 from 25.

Heavy Hammer
Heavy Hammer was just too good of a buy for aggressive starting builds. We’ve reduced the Health and the Slow to help mitigate the potency it gave to early jungle invades.

Health reduced to 100 from 200.
Slow reduced to 15% from 25%.

Hydra’s Star
Fixed buff using incorrect icon.

Magi’s Blessing
This change goes in line with the fix from last patch, in which Magi’s would not be consumed if you were already CC immune. We’ve adjusted the numbers to better bring it in line with its new functionality.

Cooldown increased to 60s from 45s.

Reinforced Greaves
Health increased to 150 from 100.

Reinforced Shoes
Health increased to 150 from 100.

Talaria Boots
With the changes to Talaria and Travelers, we are looking to make them more competitive options versus other Boots and Shoes, while also giving roaming supports an item that better rewards their mobile play style. Increasing the previous Movement Speed boost from 10% to 14% along with adding Gold and Experience makes this item a unique fourth option.

Fixed persisting passive after selling.
Fixed giving HP5 while in combat, rather than out of combat.
Passive (NEW): You gain +14% additional Movement Speed and +25 HP5 while out of combat. Each time you hit an enemy god with an ability you earn +50 Experience and +30 Gold. This cannot occur on the same god more than once every 90s.

Traveler’s Shoes
Passive (NEW): You gain +14% additional Movement Speed and +25 HP5 while out of combat. Each time you hit an enemy god with an ability you earn +50 Experience and +30 Gold. This cannot occur on the same god more than once every 90s.

BALANCE CHANGES

Ao Kuang
Ao Kuang is getting a fairly significant pass in this patch. The Dragon King has been one of the lowest performing gods in SMITE since his Season 2 damage adjustments. The adjustments to Water Illusion and Dragon Call both have balance implications, but are also big quality of life improvements for Ao Kuang players. The changes to his Ultimate are more substantial. Slightly increasing the range makes it a little easier to catch fleeing players. Adjusting the kill threshold to be flat at all ranks makes it easier to use early game at the cost of late game potency. Finally adding a heal for a successful execution gives Ao Kuang more options to re-engage, where he was often forced to use his ultimate to escape with low Health.

Water Illusion: Now automatically detonates at the end of its duration if Ao Kuang did not manually detonate.
Dragon Call: This ability can now be activated in Stealth without revealing Ao Kuang.
King of the Eastern Seas: Increased cast range to 17ft from 15ft.
Increased kill threshold to 30% at all ranks from 23/26/29/32/35.
Restores 10/15/20/25/30% of Ao Kuang’s maximum Health upon successful execution.

Apollo

Increased base Physical Power to 40 from 36.
Increased base Physical Power per level to 2.6 from 2.5.

Athena

Defender of Olympus: Fixed Liberté skin playing Standard Athena voice when casting ability.

Awilix
Gravity Surge: Tyr knock ups are now pullable by Awilix.

Chronos

Accelerate: Fixed Lotus Crown Passive not working when Section 1 is activated.

Cupid
Share the Love: Fixed the description saying “Magical Power”.

He Bo
Fixed Denton showing off to the right on He Bro and Sydney Shredder during Defeat.

Janus
Portals: Fixed Portals in Joust sending players off the map.

Kumbhakarna
Mighty Yawn gets a mighty buff, and Epic Uppercut gets a quality of life improvement, having some of its damage split to be upfront rather than all on landing. Striking a Crowd Control immune target with your Epic Uppercut means they will now take some upfront damage instead of avoiding it all.

Mighty Yawn: Now also applies a 30/35/40/45/50% Attack Speed slow if enemies are awoken early.
Adjusted the targeter shown after casting ability to be more accurate.
Epic Uppercut: 25% of the damage from this ability now happens on the initial hit, with the remaining 75% upon landing.
Initial hit now deals 75/100/125/150/175 damage (15% of your Magical Power).
Landing hit now deals 225/300/375/450/525 damage (+40% of your Magical Power).

Mercury
Fastest God Alive: Fixed Mercury gaining full bonus on his Passive from Talaria Boots, even while in combat.

Neith
Neith is one of Smite’s ability based Hunters, and this adjustment is to help bring her a bit better in line with her carry counterparts.

Spirit Arrow: Fixed an incorrect scaling issue on secondary targets hit.
Increased base damage to 90/155/220/285/350 from 80/140/200/260/320.
Increased scaling to 90% from 80%.

Osiris
Yep. Fixed those 2x Boots on his recommended list! In all seriousness, Osiris’ base Attack Speed adjustment going into Season 2 coupled with downward adjustments to his core items put him in a tough spot. While still being lower than it was in Season 1, this starting Attack Speed increase will help him to utilize his strong Basic Attacks earlier.

Increased base Attack Speed to 1 from 0.95.
Fixed showing 2x Boots in the recommended list.

Sun Wukong
It’s happening! Sun Wukong gets some love this patch, with a minor increase to his clear and a meaningful Stun duration scaling change to 72 Transformations. We might not be done with the Monkey King, but we’re taking this one cloud hop at a time.

The Magic Cudgel: Increased bonus Minion and Jungle camp damage to 25% from 20%.

Master’s Will: Increased damage to 90/140/190/240/290 from 80/130/180/230/280.

72 Transformations: Increased Tiger Stun duration to 1.0/1.1/1.2/1.3/1.4s from 0.6/0.8/1.0/1.2/1.4s.
Now Quick/Instant Castable.

Ullr
Fixed Denton showing off to the right during Defeat.

Xbalanque
Branching Bola: Fixed missing glow effect on the Shinobalanque skin.