Goddess of War: Athena Jungle - In-Depth

Updated by latent - 3 days, 18 hours ago | Closed Alpha 8

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Starter Build

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Final Build

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Optional Items

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GODS ABILITY ORDER

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GUIDE SECTIONS

1. The Basics 2. Bunkering Down 3. Teamfighting

SECTION | THE BASICS

[GOD:Athena]'s full damage build is a late game hypercarry. It is seldom seen in Smite history that a character can simply delete any squishy from the game with a near instant crowd control. I am, and have always been, a firm believer that [GOD:Athena] on a full damage build is the best Assassin in the game, with a strong positive matchup into [GOD:Loki] since she can interrupt Vanish and Flurry Strike, who is the only other viable full damage Jungler as of CA8. For the Open Beta patch, she wasn't nerfed very much at all, only seeing a change to CC buffering which makes her A02 Confound barely any weaker for a full damage build, and seeing a buff to [ITEM:(168)Hydra's Lament], gaining 10 Cooldown Rate in exchange for 5 Strength, which is a massive upgrade.

So let's set the main premise of this build: Autocancelling. Every time [GOD:Athena] uses an ability, her passive turns her next basic attack into Reach, an empowered basic attack that deals 42 + (125% Strength + 70% Intelligence) magical damage. This basic attack also travels through walls, can Critically Strike and proc on-hit item effects, and grants you Haste while using it. Knowing all these things, we can begin to combine some very powerful on-hit effects and we start to see some ridiculous results. Note that when a Reach basic attack hits an enemy, any subsequent enemies hit will take 20% reduced damage, and they won't take the extra damage from on-hit effects such as Polynomicon and Hydra's.

Most of [GOD:Athena]'s kit in the jungle doesn't matter, as most of her damage numbers aren't actually that insane outside of her Reach, but knowing what her abilities do in-depth will help develop a greater understanding of why and when you should use abilities.

A01 - Preemptive Strike
This ability got a major buf in Smite 2, although not exactly where you would expect it. In fact, I'm pretty sure its buff is actually a bug. The dash has a 0.66s charge time before you can cast it, but after it's fully charged, you can activate the ability by pressing whatever input you use for basic attacking. In Smite, that was the end of it, you charge the dash, you can't do anything and then you cast the dash. But in Smite 2, there's currently a bug (which hopefully becomes a feature) that while you're charging your dash, you can take any action that isn't basic attacking. This means that you can use your A02 Confound or A03 Shield Wall, start using your A04 Defender of Olympus, or even use your interact key for anything while you charge your dash, such as taking the side portals or lane portals. Casting other abilities is more important for a more support/tank build, since you lose damage on Reach procs, since it casts 2 abilities at the same time. However, charging your dash and then teleporting to the other side of the map allows you to have your dashed charged and ready to go without any audio cue for the enemies to react to, which is incredibly strong at the right times.

This ability used to give you a block stack which reduced basic attack damage by 60%, and you could have up to 3 block stacks, but this was removed and replaced with a Protections buff. While it's been shifted around a bit, it's currently sitting at 15/20/25/30/35 + 10% Physical Protections and 15/20/25/30/35 + 10% Magical Protections. While much weaker against carries, this change sees a massive buff against squishy characters, giving up to 15% more effective damage mitigation before penetration. If you can, try to hit the dash when engaging, but never forget that it's also your quickest escape if you need it. It also slows the target you hit. Note that this is Athena's only ability that scales with Strength and does not scale with Intelligence at all.

A02 - Confound
Also seeing a minor... shift? It's hard to call it a buff or a nerf since it doesn't really do much, but it was also given a slow for the entire taunt duration. In nerf news, its taunt duration was reduced to a measly 0.8s/0.9s/1.1s/1.2s/1.4s. This will be the second ability you level up, since, despite its long cooldown, its duration is what allows you to guarantee kills in the midgame and become a huge pain for anybody unexpecting of a flank.

Unimpactful in this specific build, but for every 150 Protection from items [GOD:Athena] Athena has, she also gains 0.25s duration on her taunt, up to 0.5s. This means that the optimal way to build her as a tank is to build exactly 300 Protections from items, or as close to it without being under, and then buying as many Intelligence and Cooldown Rate items as possible. More on that in a different build guide someday, maybe.

A03 - Shield Wall
This is the first ability you level up. This is one of the best clear abilities in the game with [ITEM:(1936)Bumba's Cudgel], dealing a solid amount of damage on the initial hit and a disgusting amount of damage on the detonation. Both hits also slow enemies, which is the main utility of this move in fights, allowing you to more easily line up your Reaches. Aside from that, it's mostly just extra damage. This ability does introduce a decent amount of mix-up potential, since you can use this ability to bait [ITEM:(184)Purification Beads] or [ITEM:(206)Talisman of Purification] off people who tend to pre-beads abilities a lot to help buy you time, or you can taunt immediately to burn the beads and come back later for the guaranteed kill.

A04 - Defender of Olympus
This is [GOD:Athena]'s bread and butter. This allows her to be one of the best hyper farming junglers in the game. Anytime you see somebody rotate, ult their target and countergank. Your target gets a choice to engage or escape, and can easily help people survive in numerous situations. This ability is on its 120s cooldown for a reason, dealing massive damage and providing global pressure, allowing you to deny your enemy jungler the ability to dictate the pace of the game. This ability will be the last ability you level, unless you know you have a team which is constantly landing the ultimate's damage for you. By the time you're level 9 and can put your second point in this ability, you'll know.

SECTION | BUNKERING DOWN

As with most Intelligence scaling characters, [GOD:Athena] struggles in the early game. This changes quickly however, once she reaches the mid game. Your main priority throughout the entire game is to farm on this character, and shut down any attempted ganks and protect your teammates by killing your enemies.

5 items in this build are core, and will never be swapped for anything else. I've personally found the most success with this specific build order, but feel free to try out different orders and see what works for you.

Starting build:
[ITEM:(1936)Bumba's Cudgel]
[ITEM:(141)Axe]
[ITEM:(216)Health Potion] x2
Either [ITEM:(99001)Multi Potion] or a Ward

Since this build is meant to utilize basic attack cancels to their utmost, it only makes sense to go the premier basic attack cancelling starter, which just so happens to also be a Bumba's item, allowing us to farm more easily in the jungle. Every Reach basic attack will deal an additional 20 true damage, and once upgraded into [ITEM:(1945)Bumba's Hammer], an additional 40 true damage and healing you for 60. Your next basic after an ability will also reduce your cooldowns, allowing you more uptime, and giving you a bit more health to synergize with your free protections for dashing in and amazing base defensive stats.

We start with [ITEM:(141)Axe] to speed up our early game clear, since Strength is a much stronger early stat than Intelligence, and our final cleave auto will be chunking camps if we even need it. I recommend starting the game by using an ability to begin with a Reach proc ready, since they have an infinite duration to use. 2 [ITEM:(216)Health Potion] is standard, but the [ITEM:(99001)Multi Potion] or Ward is largely up to choice. I personally grab a ward so I can check the enemy's buff camp to see which side they start on and plan potential invasions.

[GOD:Athena]'s best start is on the Red Buff side, clearing the Manticores, then both back Harpies, and then immediately rotating up to the mid Harpy buff camp. If the buff is Blue or Purple, I usually take it, if it's Speed or Red, I try to leave it for the mid laner. You always want to pick up the Red Buff at the start of the game.

Starting at Speed is also fine, but you have to make a choice if you do. If you start at Speed you choose either to do Red Buff immediately after, rotating using the extra movespeed you get to clear it before arriving, and then rotating to the mid Harpy buff camp. This usually ends up about a second after the buff spawns, but you do begin the fight with 2 buffs, allowing greater mobility and chase or escape potential should you need them, but also risking not having a buff if you die in the fight. Alternatively, you can choose to forgo the Red Buff to a higher pressure mid laner, somebody like [GOD:Zeus] or [GOD:NuWa], allowing them to pressure lane while you prioritize fighting, or even give the red buff up for the solo laner, basically winning them lane on the spot. In this case, you would go to your Speed side back Harpies before immediately rotating to the mid Harpy buff camp. Since your only goal is gold and xp to get ahead, you need to make sure you're contesting as much neutral experience as possible. Grabbing the mid Harpy buff camp also grants infamy.

I see a lot of junglers ganking duo incredibly early now. You don't really want to gank as [GOD:Athena] before level 3, and ideally level 5, but if you do hit level 2 and cringe gank duo lane, you will need to level up your A02 Confound second instead of your dash, making much more of a commitment to the gank, but potentially getting a lot of reward. I don't recommend doing this unless the enemy is pushed up onto your side of the lane, but not far enough that that they can see you coming from the jungle. A lot of supports right now are warding the purple buff choke and the brush around the lane, so I think this strat is much less reliable than you would think, and is more common in characters like [GOD:Loki] who can stealth through the wards.

First Item:
[ITEM:(232)The World Stone]

This is one of [GOD:Athena]'s most effecient items to purchase. In former patches it was outclassed by other options, such as [ITEM:(1895)Book of Thoth], [ITEM:(153)Chronos' Pendant], and [ITEM:(1926)Soul Gem], but since the overall cooldown and damage nerfs these items have received, [ITEM:(232)The World Stone], in my opinion, has become her best in slot first item. A combination of 15 Cooldown Rate, 75 Intelligence and Mana Regen for extra time to stay and farm, stay and fight, and to top it off, a whopping 37 seconds off her ultimate from a single item purchase. If you are going to go a different item, I highly suggest starting with one of these four listed items.

Now, this might seem like a weird purchase, since our first item was Axe, but we are still going to use it for later, so be sure NOT to sell it. This does set us behind a bit of gold, starting off 450g later than the other jungler, but since we're playing to countergank and farm, we don't really mind that much.

Second item:
[ITEM:(183)Polynomicon]

[GOD:Athena]'s first core damage item, this is when your build really starts pumping. We go this item second because it lacks cooldown, but it also gives a massive amount of mana regen in tandem with the mana regen from [ITEM:(232)The World Stone], effectively removing any potential mana issues. This item turns our basics into 125% Strength + 135% Intelligence nuclear missiles, but the fun does stop there.

Third item:
[ITEM:(168)Hydra's Lament]

This item is the best item in this build. There is no build in the game has has a multiplier quite as strong as this (until they add high Intelligence/Crit Chance items). A staggering 30% damage which, unlike [ITEM:(183)Polynomicon], multiplies the damage of the basic attack itself. If a future crit build becomes viable, it'll also use this item, guaranteed. As of the Open Beta patch, this item will be gaining 10 Cooldown Rate in exchange for being reduced to 40 Strength, so I'll show these numbers with the reduced Strength. On each Reach basic attack, your basic attacks become meteors the size of Jupiter, dealing a massive 162% Strength + 91% intelligence scaling. After this, the [ITEM:(183)Polynomicon] proc happens for an additional 65% Intelligence, meaning your basic attacks are actually 162% Strength + 156% Intelligence. Each. For reference, that's more scaling than [GOD:Neith]'s Ultimate has, by more than the amount of scaling [GOD:Nemesis]' ultimate has.

Fourth item:
[ITEM:(1900)Staff of Myrddin]

If doing this once after every ability wasn't enough, dealing 162% Strength + 156% Intelligence damage 4 times after ulting in, or 3 times in any other situation, why not add a 4th or even 5th Reach proc? Using [ITEM:(1900)Staff of Myrddin] on your A02 Confound is one of the most powerful things you can do, but don't let that fool you. The item is incredibly versatile, allowing you to even use it on your A01 Preemptive Strike to engage and have it up again immediately to chase or escape, or even use it to escape twice, gaining an insane amount of distance if needed. Most of the time however, your best option is to [ITEM:(1900)Staff of Myrddin] > A02 Confound > Reach > A03 Shield Wall > Reach > A02 Confound > Reach. That's enough to kill most squishies in the game at the time you buy this item, basically guaranteeing a kill every 180s. Even if they use their [ITEM:(184)Purification Beads] or [ITEM:(206)Talisman of Purification] to avoid the taunt, you have another A02 Confound ready to go for whenever it wears off.

Fifth item:
[ITEM:(234)Rod of Tahuti]

This is your final core item. Since we built a Strength item, while it does provide most of the damage in our build, we're still lacking in the Intelligence department, being down a whole item. The Intelligence isn't adding much damage to our abilities, and this option also provides Penetration. I've tested the damage spread between this item and other items thoroughly and this item outpaces pretty much every other option, including [ITEM:(1928)Spear of Desolation] and [ITEM:(143)Obsidian Shard], even against incredibly tanky builds. I've also tried some Strength options like [ITEM:(196)Titan's Bane] and [ITEM:(185)Qin's Blade], but the damage gained from [ITEM:(183)Polynomicon] and the actual basic attack itself is just too high to ignore.

Our first and only situational item (while the first item is preference based, this one is situational) is our Sixth item:
[ITEM:(202)The Cosmic Horror]

While this item is realistically probably the best in slot item, granting a massive 25 Cooldown Rate and a solid amount of Intelligence alongside it, it still is the only feasibly replaceable item in the build. Our main choices of replacements include, but are not limited to:
[ITEM:(158)Divine Ruin] - For antiheal and a bit more pen (If you're going to need it, I recommend buying [ITEM:(190)Ruinous Poison] or [ITEM:(1911)Ruinous Venom] as soon as possible and upgrading this last)
[ITEM:(143)Obsidian Shard] - For heavy tank comps (This item is particularly good multiple characters build [ITEM:(206)Talisman of Purification], including at least 1 squishier character)
[ITEM:(206)Talisman of Purification] - For heavy CC if you need it to survive (It's okay to pick this one up earlier, but I still wouldn't build it before [ITEM:(183)Polynomicon])
[ITEM:(165)Helm of Darkness] - For sneaky fellows who like to be a bit sneaky (Makes you a bit tankier, adds a bit of damage and also surprise factor of a 90s stealth active effect)

SECTION | TEAMFIGHTING

Keep your eyes on the prize is [GOD:Athena]'s main goal. Never forget that your job is to nuke somebody squishy, but sometimes an opportunity can present itself. The best way to get used to this character is to keep playing her to get used to her damage.

The best way I can describe it is that it's always more damage than you would think, and always not enough to kill on your own, until you buy [ITEM:(234)Rod of Tahuti]. Before then, you'll likely need some help killing people in teamfights.

Always play to flank, only dash in on people who have burned their escape. It's always better to just walk up to somebody with your Speed buff and close the distance so you can save the dash for an escape, but the A01 Preemptive Strike is also an additional Reach proc, so you might need to use it to secure a kill. You can cover a lot of distance with the dash into a long range Reach, so chasing kills is not always a terrible idea, since enemies can't hide around corners from Reach and she can close the distance after a short windup.

It's always beneficial for you to trade your life for the life of the ADC (or their carry player). In most situations, you will outtrade any squishy character in the game, and occasionally be left at low health. Sometimes you'll die, sometimes you won't. If you do, don't sweat it, as long as you trade the kill. [GOD:Athena] is an incredibly commital character, and can get a massive reward out of a successful escape if she manages to kill her target. Namely, if she's left at low health, but doesn't die, she can back safely and use her A04 to ult in at full health while buffing and/or protecting another ally, helping to push her advantage even further.