Which Shoes Should I Get? (Magical)

   This is a basic guide to help you guys decide on which boots/shoes to buy in different situations. Its honestly comes down to personal preference but this can help you if you ever get into a bad situation and need to change your build up.

Name:	Shoes of the Magi (Pen)	Shoes of Focus (Cooldown)	Reinforced Shoes (Tank)	Travelers Shoes
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Cost:	$1600	$1500	$1450	$1400
Stats:	+45 Magical Power +10 Magical Penetration +18% Movement Speed	+30 Magical Power +250 Mana +10% Cooldown Reduction +18% Movement Speed	+20 Magical Power +150 Health + 30% Crowd Control Reduction +18% Movement Speed	+20 Magical Power + 18% Movement Speed. 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 +30 Gold. This cannot occur on the same god more than once every 90s.
Stats Explained:	You get early power and pen letting your attacks you shred through enemy protections and do more damage early game.	You get early cooldown reduction that lets you cast more and gives you a little extra mana.	These are the more defensive boots because they give you health and CC reduction this allows you to fight gods with a lot of CC with a lesser chance of getting chained into a bad situation.	You get less power but in exchange every time you are out of combat you gain 14% more movement speed and 25 HP5 allowing you to rotate faster and recover from fights faster. This also grants you +30 gold when you hit a god. Will only work on the same god every 90s.
When Should I Get Them?:	I would get these on gods that can push lane fast and that you know how to play.	This is the safest option and can be used on any mage or guardian and still be effective. These are the main boots you buy on supports because being able to use your abilities more often lets you put your ADC in a better situation.	I only get these boots if I’m playing support and the enemy team has a lot of CC. These boots allows me to be a little more tanky early game and allows me to get out of CC faster.  For example if you are fighting a Ymir or Athena, these shoes are very useful and can save your life and your ADC's life.	I don’t use these much but they can be useful if you know your team is going to need you to rotate a lot by giving you the the extra speed and recovery as you travel.

How to Play Support in SMITE (Updated 2/23/16)

 Should You Play Support in SMITE?

Credit to Getsukeii on Deviantart 

Should You Play Support?

If you want to play as a Support in SMITE then you need to know how to initiate fights,body block, rotate through lanes and ward.


If you answered yes, keep reading. If you don’t know what position you want to play or if you want to try Support anyway keep reading. If not try another Role Guide or keep reading for fun, I would.


What is a Support?
   A support is usually a guardian with the exception of a few warriors and mages. There main job is to tank up damage, save teammates, ward and in general to SUPPORT their teammates. Okay, yeah that role pun thing is officially a thing now.


What Do Supports Build?

Credit to Getsukeii on Deviantart 

   As a support your main job is to be tanky (aka protections + health) and annoying (aka cooldowns and bodyblocks). To do that you want to start off by buying Mark of the Vanguard, level one boots and 2 wards. The second you put both wards down (where to put them is covered in the next section), back then buy 3 health and 3 mana potions and head to buffs. 

  Mark of the Vanguard gives you a little magical and physical protection, health, and its passive reduces all damage you take by 5. This is more useful than you would think especially against enemies with dots.(damage over time, hits you once then for the next x sec does damage again).

  

  Once you get enough gold, you want to get Shoes of Focus for cooldowns so that you can move around faster, it gives you cooldown reduction allowing you use your abilities more often, and be more supportive ,pun intended as always. Plus the mana and power that it gives while small it does help. 
  
   
   Next you build Breastplate of Valor because it gives you a lot of physical protection, more cooldown reduction and mana. This helps a lot because you will be using your abilities a lot, so the mana and CDR let you use them more often and more times. The physical protection helps you tank damage you take from minions, hunters, assassins, and objectives because they all do physical damage.

  
  Next you should go into Hide of the Urchin to get more physical protection, magical protection, health and mana. The health and protections let you tank more damage without having back or worry about dieing, the mana lets you use more abilities and its passive that gives you +2 physical and magical protections per god kill/assist for up to 10 stacks.(that's an extra 20 protections on top of the 35 it already gives you) The stacks make this item better as time goes on which is why you get it early.
  
   You then want to pick up Bulwark of Hope to get more magical protections because mages hurt a lot and if you didn't know mages do magical damage and so do guardians. It also gives you health but what makes this one of the best defensive items in the game is its passive which gives you a shield equal to 150 health + 15 per level if you take damage after being under 30% health. This will save you multiple times per game and it gives you hope to survive to fight another day...or in another minute but you get the point. The only limitation to the shield is that it can only be used once every 60s which is fair for the sake balance.

   Next you build Winged Blade to get more health, movement speed,attack speed and CC reduction. Plus its passive gives makes you immune to slows, increases your movement speed by 20% for 4s when you are hit by a slow, and this can happen every 30s. This basically lets you move faster, basic attack faster, get out of CC faster, lets you take more damage and walk it off, and its passive lets you get out of slows faster. Ironically that could be a bad joke but I didn't think of it.

  From here there are 2 main routes that I would recommend. The first is better if you are ahead and/or if you are dying a little more than you would like. The second is better if you are able to stay alive in fights and want to be able to do some damage while at the same tank still being tanky.

Credit to Getsukeii on Deviantart 

    
   If you want to just be tanky and don't care if you get kills. Mantle of Discord gives you +60 Physical and Magical protection and its passive that basically makes you CC immune for 1s and stuns enemies with a 20 unit radius for 1s if you take damage while under 30% health. This is a very strong item but is should be saved for late game or if you are ahead in gold.

 
   If you are behind then an alternate item is Spirit Robe which gives +40 Physical and Magical protection,10% cooldown reduction and 20% CC reduction. Maxing out both your cooldowns and CC reduction. It also gives you 15% damage mitigation for 3s if you get hit by hard CC, once every 10s. This is a cheaper alternative to Mantle of Discord and is still very strong.

Credit to Getsukeii on Deviantart 

   The second option is to get Ethereal staff which gives you +400 health, +300 Mana, +30 Power and a passive that will turn 2.5% of your health into magical power. That is an additional 28.75 power only counting the health from the items you already have. Meaning that no matter what god you play, you will get an more than 28.75 power just from this items passive. This makes this a great item that lets you be tanky but still do damage and help your team in fights.

What do I do as an Support?

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Start:
  Start off by buying Mark of the Vanguard, level one boots and 2 wards then you want to run out as fast as you can and ward near the enemy end of the gold fury and by the enemy xp camp (on the map as the blue diamonds). This is to prevent the other team from invading your side of the map. The second you put both wards down RUN AWAY, back, then buy 3 health and 3 mana potions then run to get the damage buff for your mid laner and then clear the cp camp near lane with your ADC and head to lane.

Early Game:
    Basically during the laning phase, you want to protect your ADC, help them clear waves and let them get the last hit. When enemies get close, use your ability to poke them and/or set up kills for your ADC or prevent your ADC from dying. When using your abilities, try and aim them so that you can weaken a wave for your ADC to clear and then to poke your enemy. At this stage of the game you want to ward around you lane either near the enemy xp camp or near yours depending on where you are getting ganked.*

Mid Game:
     Once you get to the 10 minute mark, as a support you don't necessarily have to camp your ADC unless they need it or if lane is constantly getting ganked.  Basically you are your team's support so you can and should be able to rotate around the map if you need to and feel comfortable with it. If I rotate, I go to mid or wherever a team fight is but I always pay attention to my ADC. As you rotate you need to ward around your lane to make sure your ADC is safe, and have vision of the Gold Fury if your team starts to get an advantage or if the enemy team gets an advantage. When you are new to the role I advise that you stay with your ADC because the enemy support will probably be doing the same thing.*

Late Game:
    Once you get to late game your job is to initiate teamfights with CC, protect your ADC during the fights, keep the enemy team under control with CC, body blocks etc. and help your team stay alive. After fights it's your job to be the last one out of the fight, let everyone escape and protect them as much as you can. As you move up into the enemy jungle and start taking towers, you want to ward where you are pushing. Also during the late game you need to ward Fire Giant as well because if a team get fire giant, it can lead to them snowballing and it can be very difficult to recover from. In other words as teams get their full build or an advantage ward Fire Giant. *

Green Square = Early Game

Blue Square = Mid Game

Red Square = Late Game

*** The annotations on the map are just suggestions,ward where you think you need to ward or ask your team.
***As a support you are expected to ward a lot but your entire team should be warding especially late game.
*** The ward above the grey line are for when you team is pushed up, The wards below the grey line are for when your team is pushed back.

Tips for Support:

• Use VGS to communicate with your lane partner.
• Know that sometimes you will have to die for a team mates.
• Tank objectives when you can. 
• You are not supposed to get a lot of kills but if an enemy is about to get away you can secure the kill.
• REMEMBER YOU ARE ONLY AS TANKY AS YOU BUILD. 
• MINIONS HURT A LOT IN THE BEGINNING.