When comparing SMITE vs Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation, the Slant community recommends SMITE for most people. In the question“What are the best strategy games for PC?” SMITE is ranked 11th while Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation is ranked 13th. The most important reason people chose SMITE is:
Instead of imaginary champions and heroes, Smite derives its characters from ancient mythological gods from around the world. The roster currently consists of 92 gods from the Norse, Hindu, Greek, Roman, Mayan, Egyptian, Chinese, Celtic, and Japanese mythologies.
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Pros
Pro Characters are derived from mythological gods
Instead of imaginary champions and heroes, Smite derives its characters from ancient mythological gods from around the world. The roster currently consists of 92 gods from the Norse, Hindu, Greek, Roman, Mayan, Egyptian, Chinese, Celtic, and Japanese mythologies.
Pro 6 great game modes and a rotating match of the day
Smite has 6 game modes and all of them are extremely popular:
- Arena. A 5v5 death match, no lanes or objectives. Arena is best for people who prefer intense combat over strategy. Good for impatient but independent players.
- Joust. A 3v3 mode, with a single lane and monsters camps on one side, and an objective lair on the other side. Surprisingly focused on teamwork, despite small teams. Everyone has a role to fill, and learning how to adjust your play for your two teammates is half the battle.
- Conquest. The typical 5v5 mode, three lanes, jungle, towers, objectives. Conquest is the standard MOBA game mode, requiring lots of communication.
- Siege. A 4v4 objective push map slightly similar to Joust, but instead of small skirmishes it has massive battles. Two lanes definitely add chaos to the mix.
- Assault. A 5v5 ARAM (All Random All Mid) mode where everyone gets a random hero and has to fight on a single lane. You'll often get unevenly balanced teams but nobody ever gets upset because of the sheer fun of the game mode.
- Clash. A 5v5 mix between Conquest and Arena modes.
Additionally, there's the Match of the Day (MOTD) feature. It takes a random game mode each day and gives it a twist. This includes having no ability cooldowns, not being allowed to use basic attacks, being able to character swap and more, which can sometimes be a lot more fun than the regular game modes.
Pro Account progression doesn't affect in game power
Pro Fun and fast-paced, third-person MOBA action
Pro 3rd person view is a unique twist on the genre
The 3rd person view used in SMITE is a big change from the top down views normally used in a MOBA. The game also utilizes analog controls, unlike the traditional point-to-move system of traditional top down MOBAs. This creates a large blind spot behind the users character and also makes sneaking behind someone for stealth attacks a viable option.
Pro Hi-Rez approaches the SMITE community for feedbacks, brilliant ideas and mechanics they could use in the game
The company behind SMITE, Hi-Rez studios, actually listens to community feedback and looks for potential ideas and mechanics provided by the community. For example, the Odyssey ultimate reward in 2014, was nominated by players. The SPL Ticket Announcer Packs rewards were also picked by the community. And some in-game skins are actually created by players. The Harajuku Neith skin, The Ba5s Drop Janus skin, the Opera Bacchus skin, were all conceptualized by Smite players. And the most recent one, the Demon Bull King mechanic, which disables the towers and phoenixes in Joust to prevent camping, and the addition of the Japanese Pantheon to the game, were taken from community feedback as well.
Pro Titans bring a twist to the standard MOBA formula
Unlike the immobile and passive bases of other MOBAs such as DOTA 2 and League of Legends, SMITE features mobile structures called Titans, which defend themselves and their teammates.
Pro Features three ranked modes
Smite features 3 ranked modes, mainly the 1v1, the newly added 3v3, both of which utilizes the new Joust map. And the 5v5, on the Conquest map. All of which features experienced players and intense matches to satiate your search for glory and honor in the league of Smite.
Pro Updates often
Smite receives new characters, maps, and balance patches quite often. So you can expect a steady stream of content to keep the gameplay fresh.
Pro Great community events in the form of Odyssey event and Smite World Championship
Every year, SMITE releases an Odyssey event months before the Smite World Championship. Over the course of several weeks, cosmetic items are released every week until the start of the SWC. These cosmetic items will be available for purchase some time after the SWC and will be branded as "Exclusive Skins" after the event. Every purchase in the Odyssey contributes to the SWC Prize Pool. Players can obtain limited edition items when they purchase a certain amount of items. For example, the Archon Thanatos, and Ragnarok Force X Thor can be obtained by the player when they have purchased all the Odyssey Items. Additionally, every item purchase will grant an Odyssey Chest roll that can be claimed in the rewards center. This chest can contain god skins, ward skins, and voice packs . There is also a slim chance that the chest will grant exclusive in-game items.
Pro You can use the VGS for efficient communication
SMITE uses the Voice Guide System (VGS), which is the most efficient way to communicate in a competitive game to date, providing keyboard shortcuts for preset voice commands.
For example, pressing the keys V>F>1 would send out a message saying "Enemy missing left", which means an enemy has disappeared from the left lane. While pressing V>B>F would send "Enemies at the Fire Giant'" or in simpler terms, the enemies are trying to take the objective. These simple shortcuts are very convenient, allowing you to quickly exchange information with your teammates without losing focus on the game.
Pro Beginner friendly
You get five free gods of every role at the start to help you learn the role you want. You can learn the game basics and mechanics in the Practice mode and the Jungle Practice map where all gods are available for you to try and experiment with. The community is also friendly to new players. You won't have a hard time adjusting to SMITE's mechanics and gameplay.
Pro Provides a lot of incentives to play the game often
You have the daily quests which rewards you favor and gems (in-game currency). So you don't have to worry logging in daily, like its previous predecessor, the daily log-in reward.
There are gem events, which is a limited period of time in which players can get gems (valued in game currency). There's a First Win of the Day reward (FWOTD). Rewards every time you win a match, insane sale discounts. Also, Hi-Rez employees sometimes give away in-game freebies in their Twitter account.
Pro The least toxic community for a MOBA
The community of Smite is the nicest in the MOBA genre and has many members who are ready to provide help and coaching to new and less experienced players.
Pro Better framerate when ran in DX12
This game is DX12 compatible which allows for a higher frame rate over DX11. DX12 is only able to be taken advantage of on Windows 10, so that is something to consider, but for those that can take advantage, there is a slight gain to be had.
Pro Pleasing graphics
The graphics stand out as polished and make for a really nice looking RTS. This is top of its class in graphics for an RTS in 2016.
Pro Cool mechanic for controlling troops
There is a tool in the game that allows one to "lasso" their units together into an army. By making an army the player can then control that army as they would one troop unit, meaning that all micromanagement for a large group of troops is unnecessary as the game will deal with it in a more intuitive an easy manner. This can be done with as little or as many troops as the player want, which overall makes for an easy way to control the game when in the heat of battle.
Pro Good mix of gameplay modes for any skill level
The game features a single player story mode, a story mode called Ascendancy that will walk the player though how to play the game and multiplayer modes that are ranked as well as custom multiplayer modes. Through the assortment of modes the game allows for any type of player to find gameplay that they may like, whether they are a seasoned RTS player or a newcomer to the genre. Whether playing locally in single player or online with friends or random people, there should be plenty on offer for any skill level.
Pro Focuses on positioning over micromanagement
The maps in this game are large, sometimes taking up as many as 20-30 zones in a single map. What this means is that the player will need to focus a lot more on position of their units over actually micromanaging every aspect of each unit (due to the vast size of maps and the amount of units on them). This allows for gameplay that has a broader scope in strategy, as it forces the player to plan out what is best to protect and the best position to hold of enemy attacks all while still trying to grow their army in order to overpower their enemy.
Pro Easily allows the player to utilize specific info on their enemies
At all times the player can vies on a mini map how much their enemy has expanded and into what areas. There is also a thing called player power rating, which allows the player to know on a point scale what their enemies military and economic power level is. Which means you can get a sense of what fields your enemy is expanding into. Combining these tools allows for a quick way to know where the enemy is expanding and into what fields of tech they are concentrating on. This way the player can adjust their strategy accordingly, making for an even deeper level of strategy overall.
Cons
Con Third person camera limits your view of the battlefield
Your camera is locked behind your character, so you won't have an overhead view or be able to view the entire battlefield like in most MOBAs. This makes communication much more important since you can only react to what happens in your line of sight. Without proper communication you won't be able to set up regular plays you could do in most MOBAs.
Con Excessive snowballing on certain characters
If not countered or shut down early, some characters can become extremely strong, making a comeback for the other team virtually impossible. This is especially annoying for new players since they'll have to learn it the hard way.
Con Community is toxic
Try playing ranked and at least 1 person will throw the game on purpose, sit in base, or feed on purpose. The games community is honestly horrible. I have played more games where a person purposely throws lately than games that don't.
Con Server issues
Con Physics are unrealistic
Many of the units will pass right through each other, making for units that behave in an unrealistic way and can pull the player out of the immersion of the title. The units also all hover over the ground, which means they have no real weight to their actions, when combined with the unrealistic way they move makes for something that just does not looked polished.
Con Demanding system requirements
The game requires a high end GPU as well as at-least a 4 core processor. This means the game is quite demanding and needs to take advantage of multi-cores in order to play smoothly at high graphical settings. So for those with a mid-range system, the game may play at lower frame-rates, which can be frustrating.
Con Lacking in options for factions and units
There are only two factions available in the game to play with, so makes for limited choice. On top of this each faction has only so many different units, which also shows a lack of choice. Combined, once the game has been experienced and both factions played with there will be little in surprise as to what the game has to offer.