Asides Part 1
These pages are meant to be read alongside the lore - ideally as optional / additional informative information, so it doesn't forceably interrupt the pacing. Dip in+out as you read along for some context (both mythological and game-based) peppered thoughout your lore-read.
Oh, and absolutely none of the music linked is lore-relevant.
It's just to match the vibe of me creepily putting my arm over your shoulder, taking you aside, and giving you some... methamphetami- interesting facets of the lore and mythology.
You know, just.... things that make you go.... hmmm......
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Old Assault Aside & Ragnarok
Like other games in the genre, SMITE has what's known as an ARAM mode - All Random, All Mid.
For us, this is Assault, the fifth Gamemode ever implemented into SMITE after Conquest, Joust, Arena and Domination. Or in other terms - the Norse map.
Very little exists about the first rendition of the mode's first incarnation in April 2013, during the Open Beta. The game didn't have much in terms of documentation, but related below is an early piece of concept art, and the map was reminiscent of two rural Norse villages attacking one another (using many textures recycled from the Medieval Joust map). Aside from this, the two sides of the map were mirrored with a Minotaur-Titan thrown in each base to defend, and the only differences otherwise was that Order and Chaos sides were simply being Blue vs Red. This map was extremely short lived, and was barely out in the live client before it was replaced.
There's really not all that much to talk about in terms of map changes... it's ARAM, it's just one lane - no jungle. One thing to note however, is that in it's original rendition there was actually a reason why you couldn't return to the shop upon leaving spawn - there was a small step you'd drop down from, into the lane itself (insignificant - aside from the fact it was the only time in the entirety of SMITE's history that map verticality has been utilised and proof the engine can support it and thus multiple layers to a map, the lazy bastards - and no 'bugginess' isn't an excuse, Terminus looks down on you)
The second iteration of the gamemode arrived in the middle of the same Open Beta, November 2013, and is what everyone thinks of when they hear about 'Old Assault'. Here we arrive at the field of Vigridr, the 100 League-wide Theatre of War in which Ragnarok takes place, and where most of the Norse Gods and Souls are set to face their destined deaths. As for a league in today's terms, definitions vary - Vigrid being roughly 220-450km / 140-300 miles wide and long in both directions. Roughly the size of a mid-to-small US state, all one colossal battlefield and evenly filled with conflict throughout, at the end of time.
One should note that this redesign was done notably before the Lore events that take place here (during the Fall of War arc). It's got lots of nice details nonetheless.
For a tl;dr for how Ragnarok is supposed to play out (skipping over most of the autismdetails synonymous with the Norse Pantheon);
- As a prelude, there'll be the Fimbulvinter - a 3 year-long harsh winter that will kill off basically all life across all realities - both through starvation and the instigation of conflicts in the mortal realms. Aside from not!Norse Adam and Eve tucked away in not!Eden, the rest are destined to fight (and die, for good) in Ragnarok.
- Near the end of the Fimbulvinter, Skoll and Hati (Fenrir's pups) will finally catch Sol and Mani; devouring both and plunging reality into a chill darkness, aside from the warmth and light from the stars in the night sky - further compounding the mass-death event of Fimbulvinter.
- Yggdrasil itself will shiver and shudder, causing widespread earthquakes, as the lines between realities fade, and allowing for Garmr (Guard dog of Helheim) and some of the dead to escape Helheim and Niflheim - compounding the Fimbulvinter further. While Garmr goes on a rampage, Loki will also escape his punishment as a result of the shudders across reality.
- All shit will finally kick off when Jormungandr decides to stop eating it's tail (because of previous autismdetails on top of the the Fimbulvinter). This will cause mass flooding, the Bifrost will shatter and the flooding will enable the ships to carry their fighters across realities. Most other mortals / Gods (many of the Goddesses especially) who don't have a due date at Ragarok but are still destined to die will do so in this stage, during the ensuing cataclysm and floods.
- Surtr will arrive from the South with the Fire Giants and lead the overall offense, Hrymr will bring the lionshare of the forces from the East (mainly all the Frost Giants, Loki, Fenrir and Jormungandr), while Hel will send the vengeful denizens of her realm from the North. The Dwarves in the Western Mountains and within Myrkheim will lock their doors, but will not be able to avoid their deaths to the cataclysms - either being drowned or collapsed in on, in their cave-systems. All remaining will converge on the field known as Vigridr.
- Heimdallr will signal the forces have arrived with the Gjallarhorn, and both sides will prepare themselves.
- Yggdrasil will shake again once preparations on both sides have finished, and everything in existence will feel anticipation.
- Thor will be the first to strike, preventing Jormungandr from solo'ing the battlefield entirely. This is the start of the fighting.
- Odin will get solo'd by Fenrir and eaten early on in the war. Fenrir will then be killed by Vidarr (one of Odin's sons) by having his jaw ripped open (by hand) having his heart impaled through his mouth and down throat.
- Freyr will lead the remainder of the forces in Odin's place against Surtr and the Jotunn, but will be slain by his own sword in Surtr's hand.
- Tyr and Garmr will trade with each other about mid-way through the war.
- Heimdallr and Loki will trade with each other once most of the forces have killed each other, nearing the end of the fighting. Shortly after the two die, Surtr will play his final gambit before he dies, and will incinerate most of reality away with himself, spilling flames over everything. This will clear the field of all the injured, and will spell the end of Surtr's side. The minimal survivors left are the pinnacle examples of the mightiest warriors that mankind has ever offered.
- When all others are finished with, all will be left is Thor and Jormungandr fighting, who will be the only two in fighting condition after the flames wash over the battlefield. Jormungandr will be killed after the longest individual fight of the conflict, and then after taking exactly nine steps, Thor himself will collapse, dead from Jormungandr's venom. Thor is the last death of Ragnarok.
Of the stated survivors Gods; there are only few, most of which are the children of the major Gods (the Norse believing that the children carry a piece of their parent's souls with them).
It's stated that Thor's children (Magni, Modi and Thrudr) will split Thor's previous patronage amongst themselves, and the boys will inherit Mjolnir. Sol's daughter will assume her place as the new Sun, while Vidarr and Vali will split Odin's duties between them. Baldr and Hodr will leave Helheim after the fighting is over, as friends, along with the rest of the dead and will make amends with each other and Vali.
Of the 'older Gods' that survive Ragnarok, Njordr (Skadi's ex-husband, Frey / Freya's father, Head of the Vanir) survives the conflict outright and returns to rule over Vanaheim in an eternal depression over his childrens' deaths, while Hoenir repeats his duties and aids in the recreation of mankind (like he helped create them to begin with, with Odin in the age before Ragnarok) - aiding Lif and Lifthrasir (previously mentioned not!Adam and Eve, the only mortal survivors) to grow humanity once again.
The final 'act' of Ragnarok mentioned, is the colossal Nidhoggr finally breaking free of Helheim / Niflheim, stretching his huge wings to their fullest extent for the first time, putting the remaining dead to permanent rest (by eating them outright, instead of just torturing the evil ones) then flying off, carrying any survivors towards Gimle, the ultimate golden paradise above all others for eternal rest and peace - for those who not only earned a place in Valhalla, but fought in and won over Ragnarok. Nidhoggr flying through the sky, carrying the survivors who aren't to continue into the next age is quite literally the finale of Norse mythology. The Prophecy ends there. We don't know what happens next.
The initial concept for the reworked Assault was for it to take place across the shattered Bifrost itself (the lane being the shattered Rainbow Bridge) however in the end this was changed into a frozen river connecting the two bases. The Order side is set at the gathering hall for the Norse forces for Vigridr (specifically mentioned by the devs to not be SMITE's version of Asgard or Valhalla) with an ethereal Yggdrasil looming in the background - meanwhile the Chaos side was themed around the death-vessal of Naglfar. Couldn't find much in terms of surviving screenshots of the Chaos-side, nothing much I can do about it.
Still functionally ARAM, the major gameplay change of the map was the introduction of Healing Orbs - but layout-wise, only the drops from spawn were removed, and the map was made a little bit longer (especially the central region between the first two towers). Still pretty much the same mode otherwise.
As for the mythology of the Map - well we've got quite a bit to chew into.
And what better way to lead from that, with the skybox - where we see SMITE's depiction of both Skoll & Hati chewing down on the Sun / Moon (aka Sol and Mani), alongside the first depiction of Yggdrasil set behind the Order side. Yggdrasil would see a later redesign along with the lore - so you can consider this version the 'Classic' version of it.
Meanwhile as for the Chaos-side spawn itself, we have the Naglfar, the colossal Norse Ship of the Dead (the one entirely made of human nails) - usually captained by Hrymr, but occasionally accounted to be steered by Loki. As previously mentioned, this was the warship that ferried across most of the forces of Ragnarok to the fields of Vigridr.
So yeah, instead of Chaos-side spawning in the frozen wilderness as we have today, it was instead Norse Neon-Demon Rainbow Hell Pirates of the Apocalypse (it fell a bit flat in execution from concept art, but was still cool).
Also at the Chaos spawn, we got a design for Garm(r); Hel's pet dog, Guard Dog of Helheim and Tyr's destined mortal enemy. The original Hellhound... or well, more historically accurately, THE 'Hel'hound. He was only a map prop in this version of Assault, but still there. There's also two of him for some reason...
Unlike the obvious comparion to the Greek Cerberus (Garmr's Greek brother-from-another-mother cross-pantheonic version), Garmr was a huge, single-headed, shaggy wolf / hound (wolfhound?) eternally soaked in blood and dripping gore wherever he went. While lacking Garmr's signature blood-soaked shagginess, it's what we have nonetheless.
'Naglfar during Ragnarok' was where the Assault gamemode was set all the way up until April 2019, lasting for 5.5 years in active play - with very little alterations, other than the towers from the beta being updated from the tree-with-gems-in-them to the Order-Chaos varients (you can see the beta ones in the 5th image down, and the updated ones in the 8th image down) (and you can still see the older ones whenever you die to one in the current Assault mode still - they never updated the icons). Come 2019, this map would be swapped out, leading into the Assault map we still play on today... which has lore implications, and is instead better placed in the main loredoc, instead of this optional Aside.
See you there!
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Bellona
As previously mentioned in the main doc, Bellona is a Roman Goddess of War. More specifically, War's cruelest aspects.
tl;dr While the Greeks had two prominent War Gods (Ares and Athena), the Romans had three (Mars, Minerva and Bellona).
Bellona alone represents one of the biggest mythological departures between the sister-Pantheons of the Greeks and Romans (incessant Romewank within the Roman Pantheon aside). While Rome 'added' many of their old tribal Gods into the Pantheon and compounded a few others from around the empire, they very rarely outright changed any entities role or purpose entirely, making Bellona quite a black sheep of the bunch, and an enigmatic entity in her own right.
To just touch on her design notes to begin with, SMITE does miss quite a few and ventures into OC / fantasy territory with her - and it's not just the huge weapons she uses. Bellona's key iconography is a masked helmet that's perched on her head / isn't fully worn (essentially a Roman-style version of the one you can see the remodelled Athena wear in-game); and we see nothing in regards to her iconic Quadriga / 4-Horse War-Chariot, or anything really in regards to her infamously vicious sadism, abusive nature or near-schizophrenically unstable aggression. And at the very least, the scourge she uses should be on fire.
But on the other hand... tanned, toned and enthusiastic red-eyed straight tomboy... acceptable tradeoff.
In the Greek Pantheon, she was merely Enyo. A very minor Goddess, partially associated with War on the side, that sometimes fucked chilled out with Ares on the battlefield; but whom was far more notable for being a member of the Graeae - the mythical grey crone-triplets who shared a single eye + a single tooth between them, whom pop up most famously as guides within Perseus's quest to slay one of their fellow post-Primordial sisters (Medusa, of the Gorgon triplets). The Graeae were themselves post-Primordial embodiments of aging, as well as the concept of extreme age and the general fear of aging itself. Of the three, we have Dino / Deino (Dread / Terrible - the same Greek word that is the prefix for Dinosaur), Enyo (Horror) and Pemphredo (Shock / Alarm) - all three forced to work together and often bickering like, well, old women due to their missing eyes and teeth.
Modernly they're falsely equated with the Fates / Moirai {Parcae} (thanks Disney Hercules), but were otherwise pretty inert entities - old women / crones simply too conceptually old to do much of anything at all. The Day of the Pillow never came for them.
Yeah, Ares was into GILF's in more ways than one. Sounds to me you're not enough of a MAN to handle one...
Transitioning from the Greek to the Roman Pantheon however, Enyo {Bellona} got a HUGE popularity increase - ditching her old crone dayjob, injecting herself with Tag: Age_Regression serum, and going from a literal who background post-Primordial to a savage and volitile Goddess equitable alone to any one the 12 Dii Consentes {Olympians} who were carried over to the Roman Pantheon - with living human sacrifices to her, war rituals, dedicated blood cults and general reverence amongst her worshippers throughout all the Roman Empire. Not quite to the point she became the '13th' Dii Consentes (Janus would be higher on the list anyways) - but close enough in scope.
Furthermore, when she was said to go into battle, she was no longer merely one of Ares's innumberable goon-deities, but instead lead her own consort of entities, equitable to that of Mars's {Ares} and Minerva's {Athena} - the most notable members of Bellona's entourage being Discordia and the Dirae {Erinyes / Furies} (the Furies no longer under the command of the Parcae {Moirai / Fates}), all there with the pure intent to terrorise the battlefield with Bellona's mere presence. If Minerva was Leadership and Strategic Warfare, and Mars was Combat and Warfare-in-Practice, then Bellona was Destruction and Psychological Warfare - indiscriminately spreading anything from Courage to PTSD.
Her parentage also varies across Pantheons depending on Greek / Roman poet. In the Greek pantheon, as a Graeae, she was the sea-nymph daughter of Phorcys and Keto, which would make her Enyo a post-Primordial and blood-relation to many Greek sea-monsters (said sea-nymph imagery going on to especially associate Bellona with naval conflicts later on, moreso than Mars / Minerva) - while, in the Roman Pantheon, she was a direct daughter of Jupiter and Juno, making her an even closer equivalent of an Olympian / Dii Consentes and also adding an incestuous flair to her continued fuckbuddy relationship with Mars. Though this may make her seem like a different entity entirely, the Romans themselves maintained that the Greeks were the ones who got her 'wrong', and are the ones to make the direct connection - so you can't really argue against it.
Also Bellona's Enyo skin is just completely and utterly inaccurate, like holy shit if you wanted to give her a greek waifu skin, just call it a greek skin - she's supposed to be an impossibly ancient toothless, blind grey crone whose mere visage makes you realise the horrors of old age... but with oddly youthful cheeks. Not Athena-but-more accurate (well, before Athena got her model rework). That skin is just flat out not Enyo. Bravo LoRez/Titanforge, bravo.
While in modern times it's given that the race of Amazons were the 'stereotypical' idea of the divine war-woman becuase of, lets face it, the porn tag, classically and throughout most of history, the Roman imagery of Bellona is the one that's more associated with organsed battle-maidens, and was the imagery most exported throughout cultures of the time - embedding her in wider European culture for centuries to come. While the Amazons embodied the muscular, tall and powerful warrior-woman, Bellona and her imagery was more associated with war itself. The Amazons were daughter-soldiers of War, Bellona was War.
Another thing to note is that much of the imagery people instantly / always associate with Athena is very often the case in fact Bellona.
While it's not to discount Athena's popularity throughout history in the slightest, the imagery of the 'helmed War-Goddess' in regards to the Romans is not strictly Minerva. The confusion is a common and easy to make - in her Greek imagery, Athena almost always has a helmet on in her iconography, however her Roman counterpart was seen as a Patron of the backlines and decision-making, and thus was depicted as wearing a circlet / olive laurel, as much as she was shown helmed for direct combat (meanwhile Bellona was *always* in battle-ready gear). That's not to say the complete inverse is the case and that "all things you thought were Minerva are actually Bellona" - just that you should look into what you're looking at, before jumping to assumptions... like well... everyone fucking else does nowadays. ESPECIALLY if the statue / painting is from an ex-Roman region, was made during the Italian Renaissance or is linked to the Roman Catholic Church in any way (so, basically all of them you'll see in the museums).
Either ways, as a result of this cultural spread, Bellona was a close and formative inspiration for similar iconography in later yuro cultures - such as Freya and the Valkyries seen in the Norse Pantheon. For the bongs, one should also note that she is the second largest inspiration for Lady Britannia after Boudica, once the Romans left that shithole (with different ex-Roman national personifications varying across ex-regions of the Empire - for example Lady Germania is modelled closer to Minerva).
Famous cultural greats that drew on the imagery of Bellona, range from Shakespeare to Rembrandt - it really is only in more recent times that she's 'fallen off' in colloquial awareness.
And it's partly for that reason why she's SMITE postergirl! HiRez are on record for not wanting to have to have their mythology-based game-marketing need to compete with all the others in the same vein, which instead have Zeus / Ra / Thor / etc as their lead poster-character. Bellona strikes a balance between well-known enough that she's not a literal who to culturelets, but at the same time has enough iconic imagery to pull from, that she's immediately recognisable as some kind of Goddess - meaning marketing is distinct, benefits from the cool factor of her war aesthetic and the cute g0rl factor of being a cute g0rl, but not held back too much by obscurity.
Pretty smart overall if you ask me. Also, tomboys are based - and that's a FACT. I mean, they can try and backtrack all they want in recent years when they imply Bellona being the postergirl is for muh rallying / inclusivity (an actual statement they've put out.... when they redesigned the HiRez logo after her Ult / Flag), but at the end of the day if they want to go down that path - well, it's even more based, because Bellona is indirectly the face of bri'ish colonialism, the trans-atlantic slave trade and european imperialism. Also unphased tomboys are the antithesis of the... foetid... creature known as the tranny. It's not really like there's anything remotely advertiser-friendly / safe-space-friendly in overarching mythology, but go ahead and shoot yourself in the foot lorez, go ahead, I'll be laughing my way to the bank. Every time I see the first logo on the loading screen.
fukkin dumbass burger mythologylets. uhhhh a b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-BASED BELLONA BTFOING MODERNITY AHAHAHAHAAHAHA
tl;tl;tl;dr to the Greeks, Bellona was an ultra-granny, but she's a pretty fucking big deal in Roman and wider Yuro culture.
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Arena Aside
Arena is one of the oldest gamemodes in SMITE, only second to Conquest; and as such, has had quite a lot of iterations over the years. For the most part of the game's history, it's been set in a Roman Amphitheatre of various designs, with a nice throughline being that the time of day would vary for each version of the map.
To begin with, Arena appeared in it's first incarnation during the Closed Beta (November 2012), with Sunset Arena, shown below. Again, this was so far back in the game's history that little remains in terms of documentation, but the gamemode was very different.
Some key differences was that the map was *much* wider, the walls within the map were much thicker, and the regions outside of spawn were much smaller and defended by visible perma-towers, instead of towers embedded in walls. The exit leading out of spawn was also thicker, to compensate for the smaller tower coverage, so Hunters couldn't shoot in. Buff camps were present - those being Blue Buff, Red Buff and the old Grey Buff. At this point, Blue was ONLY MP5, Grey was the buff associated with Cooldowns instead. These three buffs were also placed differently, all 3 perpendicular to your spawn on the left-hand side exit (so the far camp was instead on the outermost ring of the map in a line with the other two camps) - and this is also why people still 'usually' take the left-hand side of buffs when a match starts even today.
Finally, minion pathing was different - instead of joining up with the previous minion wave at the middle, they would instead take either the left-hand or right-hand pathing when going through the centre of the map and only converge when near the enemy portal.
Oh - and the peak SOVL of the gamemode was much louder - the crowd cheering depending on how the game was going, and reacting to kills with cheer and applause.
While it was touched up a slight bit in August / September 2013 into Day Arena, it's not enough to note on, and were mostly just poly count increases if anything.
By January 2014 and the Open Beta, this Sunset Arena was switched out for Night Arena - the main difference now that the field was illuminated by spotlights.
The spawn was moved back a bit so it wouldn't take up so much of the oval, walls across the map were somewhat thinner (but still thicker than what we have now) and the statues behind spawns were divergently made into statues of the current Titans of the time. Buff camps were again present (updated to the cyclops camps of the time), but switched out the Grey Buff (cooldown) for the Yellow Buff (speed). Finally, the major gameplay addition of the patch was the introduction of the Minion Juggernauts as a reward for getting for 10 kills across the team, on top of new minion pathing (so minion waves would spawn alternatively between the areas protected by towers, instead of next to the portal; preventing spawncamping).
This map was played in the same rotation and queue as the previous map for a short period, despite the different gameplay mechanics - hence why these older Arena maps are given explicitly different names to differentiate between the two. This map did receive a few notable changes for the duration it was live - initially launching with no titan-statues around spawn, then varying in lighting a few times - see the differences between the images below for that.
Otherwise, as it's namesake suggests, it was always set under the night sky.
We now take a little detour, as we visit the initial designs of a different mode altogether.
There appears to have been plans for Arena to take place in a Mayan-themed setting, with those concepts eventually spiralling into their own gamemode - Siege, in May 2014.
From the design alone (top left of the image below), there appear to have been plans for more of a focus on instakill pits, as well as an accopanying side-lane Fire-Giant-esque boss. While the Mayan Kukulkan would be the mascot of the first rendition of Arena-with-pits / 'Corrupted' Arena (which featured alongside a large, fire-giant-like meteorite mechanic), the idea was evidently scrapped to keep Arena 'more like Arena'.
Siege itself was a 4v4 mode based off of a similar ticket system to Arena, themed around a mythologically non-sequitor conflict (tl;dr normal pyramid and evil purple pyramid), known for its 4v4 2-lane-gameplay and extensive yet oppressive Jungle with thin / easily jumpable walls, which placed an emphasis on rotation. Siege was also the mode known for introducing Siege Juggernauts, that could be teleported to and would push lanes after a certain number of minions were killed (the central Jungle Boss spawning a 'bonus' Juggernaut). Typically it would be played with a Melee-Physical and a Ranged-Magical God (and vice versa) in each lane in the initial 'laning' phase (in total, 1 Support, 1 Offtank, 2 DPS); with any teammate rotating to put pressure on the other lane whenever an opportunity presented. Once laning phase was over, the focus came down to having one lane push a juggernaut (either all at once, or with one teammate split-pushing).
Siege was popular with players from the earlier years of SMITE, owing to the fact it went unchanged for so long (almost unchanged entirely in the 7.5 years it was in queues in for), and earned itself a reputation of being a relatively serious / tryhard mode (as oppose to the more 'casual' / relaxed Assault mode). Whether it was due to the generally better players, the more exclusive atmosphere, the unique objective-focus on the ticket system for Juggernauts to spawn, or the fact it was out of the way of the 'main 4 modes' within the game menus (only accessible by looking at the 'All Modes' tab), Siege had a notoriously small, yet niche, playerbase.
It was removed from casual queues (along with Clash) in January 2022, at the start of Season 9, with the 'intent' of the amalgamate 'Slash' mode uniting the queues and reducing the wait time of these two lesser-trafficed modes. Hint: It didn't, and pleased neither playerbase, causing an externally noticeable dip in player numbers as each mode's dedicated fans quietly stopped playing - Siegefags disliking the lack of Jungle gameplay and it being 5v5, Clashfags disliking the colossal map size and increased focus on laning-objectives creating more of a hard snowball.
As of writing, you can still tour the Siege map in a custom match if you want to check it out.
Finally, we come back to something that resembles the gamemode we have today, with the June 2015 update - Roman Arena. It's always been Roman, but this one was especially Roman-y.
Layout became nearly identical to what we know today, and the only major change was that the cyclops camps were now individual mobs, as we'll cover below. This map is also the map with the most varients in the game's history, with (if I remember them all correctly) 7 alternate versions on top of the default - Corrupted Arena, Hades's Underworld Arena, Hel's Inner Demon Arena, Halloween Arena, Olympic Games Arena, Snowy Arena and P-........... one we'll cover much later in the main doc because lore...
This map also got a in-engine cinematic actually showing it off!
It's got nothing to do with the lore, but if you're unfamiliar with the look of the map, here it is: https://youtu.be/SKlVkYQYXak
There's been more Arena maps since then - but that's moving into the lore-related stuff, which I'll cover in the doc.
And unsurprisingly, just like the other maps in the game, there are a large amount of mythological details pertaining to Arena which may interest you to varying levels - especially since it contains a huge amount of unique divine designs.
We'll start with statues - because terms of statues, multiple Roman variations of the Greek Gods in-game have been represented this way.
- Victoria {Nike} appears as a large statue overlooking the spawns in Sunset Arena, and makes a reappearence overlooking the Portals in Night Arena. She was also present in the first rendition of the Closed Beta Conquest map, behind the Minotaur-titans, back when there wasn't even a distinction between each side. As a result of her feature within the Open Beta map, this also makes her one of the original deities in the game.... even if she wasn't exactly playable for the duration.
- For the Roman Arena (in order across the image below) Diana {Artemis}, Venus {Aphrodite}, Saturn {Kronos} and Mars {Ares} all appeared as statues within the centre of the map. You might think you can see others around the map - in reality, they're all just copies of one of these four. These have been duplicated in later maps because it's easy to re-use assets, regardless of context, one example being that Venus appears in Season 9 Conquest, in the Order-side base at the end of Duo lane despite being a Roman God, on a Greek-themed side of a map.
Furthermore, an early, chained Roman version of Atlas {Atlas} appeared as the Chaos-side portal-holder mini-statues on each side of the portal (the implication being that the Minions / Juggernauts would add to his weight until the portal collapsed in on itself).
- Also in the Roman Arena, while not a statue per se, Clockwork Owls appear as the 'Phoenixes' of each side above the Minion spawns - a reference to Athena {Minerva}. This one however, is purely a creation of Hollywood - while Athena's Patron animal was indeed the Owl, said Owl being Clockwork was only popularised by the character of Bubo, in the same 1984 Clash of the Titans that falsely associated the Kraken with Poseidon.
If you wish to extrapolate, perhaps Minerva in SMITE utilises Clockwork Owls as oppose to Athena - but it's just headcanon at that point.
Finally, the two Gladiator statues overlooking the Chaos side on the current version of Arena are...... nobody. Nothing. Not even Gladiators. Complete fantasy.
It's quite disheartening to see these Season 5 mystery statues be a lazy general-Gladiator design, which don't borrow from any recorded Gladitorial archetype. Since they're female (see the 'breast'plates) they should automatically be a Gladiatrix (which were heavily shunned and looked down upon in Roman society, as it was seen as sadistic cruelty against women for the sake of needless cruelty - at least until the decline and collapse of the empire, when a few got in as morals and dignity declined due to apathy and tolerance so for the rest of all time feminists could study them overexetensively say that grrrrrls participated, when they really didn't), but since they wear heavy armour, they're more similar to the Provocatores, who were uniquely only allowed to fight one another owing to the distinct armour advantage. In this possiblility however we run into an additional problem - Provocatores characteristically also fought with large shields, not two-handed executioners axes.
Since Gladiatrixes and Provocatores were each uniquely only allowed to fight another of their type, with no overlap whatsoever, the statues are quite literal non-existant / impossible Gladiators. On the other hand, if they aren't women and just happen to be Bellona's Gladiator's... with oddly chest-y chest pieces, they're definite Provocatores... if a little off, even then.
Regarding other entities within Arena, we also have a few additional figures.
In Night Arena, The Manticore was the first incarnation of the Siege Juggernaut (unlike the *puny* Manticore damage-camps of today within Conquest), however the Manitcore semi-famously originally debuted as the dummy-God in the Pyramid Training Grounds, that you could shoot things at forever (replaced by a dummy Ra, then the dummy Odins of today).
After it's first update, the Manticore was changed to Siege Tower structures (likely anticipating the soon-to-be-added Siege mode that didn't use them anyways lol), before shifting to Large Gladiators who would carry an Atlas-like burden, and then add said burden to the Atlas statues if they arrived at the enemy portal. Finally, and in it's current rendition, Minotaurs appear as the Juggernauts - however I go into more detail on them in the NPC aside.
Regarding the Manticore, as well as the beta-Minotaur-titans, there's an ongoing joke that they're not gone, but simply unemployed bums and seething at the Gods that are still in-game / who have jobs.
The April Fools of 2016 had a trailer for the Manticore to return as a 'new' Mage God with a fully developed in-game kit, and had the Lore Lady (Suehyla El-Attar, don't know if she's got an internal moniker past the Lore Lady otherwise) and the previous Lore Guy wh subbed in for her a few times (Mezmoreyez) arguing with each other (ending with the guy who did the new God trailers throughout the beta finishing up, HiRezTravis, current executive director). Of the abilities shown, the Manticore had 'Triple Shot' (a 3-shot cone which applied a Poison DoT), 'Purple Smoke' (an AoE that did no damage, disarmed basic attacks and applied a unique debuff stack that caused the enemy to start coughing and be unable to use VGS / Comms), 'Line of Smoke' (which did line damage, and detonated Purple Smoke stacks to apply intoxication, slow and a silence depending on how many stacks the enemy had) and the Ult 'Ally Ambush' (which would summon any non-playable entity in the game to rush out of any nearby jungle and attack the target (including Titans or the Fire Giant at higher ranks). His passive was 'Vengeance', dealing 25% more damage to any Closed Beta God (because they cut him out of the game) and he had two 'secret abilities' - one to change the map the game was being played on, and another that let him him become either the Fire Giant, Gold Fury or Chang'e Rabbit (that shot lasers from it's eyes) for a short period.
This unironically technically means that, as a release, there's been however many Gods in-game+1 released in total. The Manticore was a playable in-engine, the abilities have set numbers to them and footage of gameplay outside the joke-reveal does exist. Except the 'secret abilities'.
Link: https://youtu.be/8VIW9rVd5sc
In terms of other entities seen in Arena, we have the Lernaean Hydra, Nemean Lion and the Erymanthian Boar. I know you know there's another one, I'm ignoring it for a reason.
All starring in the Dungeon Crawler Adventure-Event Gamemode (Trials of King Hercules) as bosses, the Nemean Lion and Erymanthian Boar each have appeared as the semi-long-term buff camps within Arena. Meanwhile the Hydra has only appeared in Hel's Demonic Arena, as pit hazards (single headed and unkillable, Demonic Arena being the precursor mode to Corrupted Arena) - note they use a different model to the the Sea-Serpents that were found in a previous version of Conquest and in Susano-O's win screen.
All three of these creatures were legendary beasts that featured within the Trials of Heracles; as the 2nd, 1st and 4th trials respectively.
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And what a better time to completely fucking derail! Heracles {Hercules} is in the Roman Pantheon in this game right? Why don't we just cover all the things that both feature in his trials, and where they feature in-game! holy shit, i'm so goddamn subtle
The Trials of Heracles (again, mentioning because fuck you it's interesting and relevant) took place because Heracles sook atonement for having killing his first wife (Megara) and his own children by hand, after Hera drove him into a temprary fit of insane rage once she learned he was yet another of Zeus's bastard children.
The standing Oracle of Delphi at the time (Pythia / Pythoness / Pythonessa; an extremely important preistess who was the relay between the mortal and divine realm, and would hand out prophetic visions like candy at Halloween) communed with Apollo, and then directed Heracles towards the King of Mythenia to seek redemption for his crimes (Mythenia simply being Ancient Greece's different boundaries compared to today; taken now as a colloquially alternate name, similar to Japan vs Nihon). This King, Eurystheus, was devoutly loyal to Hera, and comically prone to jumping into large vases at the slightest fear and henceforth essentially acted as a mouthpiece for her.
The gambit? Hercules would have to complete 10 direct requests without seeking help - all apparently impossible tasks - else Heracles forever be enslaved to him (which in tacet terms was him saying he was going to have Heracles executed if he failed). These tasks also doubled up as jobs-that-really-did-need-doing around Greece at the time in relation to divine issues - but later on became more and more complex, until Eurystheus had to start thinking of conceptually impossible tasks designed to entrap Heracles, resorting to get Heracles to capture animals over outright killing them (hence having to deal with the danger for a far more sustained amount of time, in hopes he'd die en-route back to Mythenia).
Without further ado, these trials were:
1. Kill the Nemean lion - A Large, Golden Asiatic Lion, personally raised by Hera as a cub, that had a coat of fur that rendered it completely immune to external damage and razor-claws (not razor-sharp, literal razors-for-claws) that could shred any armour. Heracles had to trap in it's own cave then in the pitch-black darkness wrestle and then strangle it to kill it - circumventing it's immunity to external damage by crushing it's internal organs with brute strength alone. To pelt it, he could only use it's claws, but would go on to use said pelt as his iconic yet practically lightweight armour. This trial alone was deemed impossible from the getgo and was Hera's intended method to execute Heracles (her son vs Zeus's), so when Heracles returned, Eurystheus was in shock and gave Heracles some time as he communicated with Hera further. To set up the next trial...
Seen in game as the Red-buff holder in Arena, but was first introduced as a boss within the Trials of King Hercules adventure-gamemode. Oddly, white instead of gold. Hide of the Nemean Lion is also a buildable item, which is slightly more accurate to its design.
2. Kill the Lernaean Hydra - A creature literally designed, by Hera, with the sole intent and biological purpose to kill Heracles.
Situated at one of the entrances of the Underworld (the Lake of Lerna), it would famously regenerate two heads of any one head it lost - what is however usually overlooked is that it's central head was completely impervious to damage until the rest were dealt with (forcing you to decapitate heads to kill it), and it's mere scent would be poisonous enough to kill any normal man. Interestingly, there's no description of it's torso - and while assumed to be serpentine, it's been depicted as both draconic and centauric. Heracles had to have an assistant boy called Iolaus sear the beheaded necks shut, and they breathed through wet cloths that dried slowly as they held the torches close, offering a strict time limit, (Heracles also crushing a giant crab underfoot that Hera sent the Hydra as backup). This trial thus wasn't counted, as he got help from Iolaus.
Seen in-game various times, as a miniboss during the Trials of King Hercules adventure-gamemode, and the individual heads seen within the Hel's Inner Demon Arena adventure gamemode. Received an internal redesign ~S7-S8 with the seeming intent they would get into the Conquest Map in the region / as the Boss the Draugr occupied, but must have been shelved at some point. Said design is still seen in the HotG card game, and is reiterated throughout later design notes.
2. Capture the Ceryneian Hind - A particularly skittish deer, so incomprehensibly fast that it could outrun an arrow, which Heracles has to chase for an entire year into the far Northern land of Hyperborea (not now, schizo/pol/) before capturing in it's sleep. Since the deer disappeared the second Heracles released it to hand to Eurystheus, the trial *almost* wasn't counted as Eurystheus never touched it to verify its existence (yeah, he's a cunt). Just a heads up on Hyperborea though, it was located seemingly around far, far North Europe / Russia; basically anywhere from North Scandinavia to North Siberia. (oh fugg spurdo n gondola mite B hyberboryan :DDD finland ebig win :DD)
Currently one of the few monsters within Heracles's trials that hasn't appeared in SMITE.
3. Capture the Erymanthian Boar - An incredibly large and incomprehensibly wild / untameable, shaggy boar with huge sharpened tusks, that Heracles had to drive into deep snow to slow down, restrain over his shoulder and carry for days (without sleep) as it writhed and thrashed constantly. Not to be confused with the rage-fuelled Calydonian Boar - the Erymanthian Boar acted more like a Ted Kaczynski that violently wanted to be left the fuck alone compared to the Calydonian Boar school shooter that just wanted to kill everything because of it's shitty single-mother upbringing (and that's a comparison you won't see every day).
4. Clean the Augean stables in 1 day - The largest stables in the known world of the time, that housed over 1,000 immortal livestock and had never been cleaned out once. Just pure, unfettered shit, as far as the eye could see. Heracles managed to accomplish this feat by rerouting the Alpheus and Peneus lol peneus rivers through them - although this task wasn't counted as one of his trials since it he didn't complete it by-hand as intended, and again had 'something else' do it for him.
While the stables aren't in-game, you'll likely have seen enough shitters in your time to get a feeling for what Heracles was dealing with. I've listed two prominent examples below, but you get the idea.
4. Kill the Stymphalian birds - Artemis's pet carnivorous birds, reared by and regularly used in wars by Ares, whom were nested within the Swamp of Stymphalia; said to have been coated in razor-sharp metal feathers and had bronze beaks. Upon being unable to enter the swamp withut getting eaten alive by the birds, Heracles used a divine rattle to force them out of the bushes and shoot with Hydravenom coated arrows - and while he didn't get them all, he drove them all away Eastwards forever to give the impression that he had.
In real life, these weren't based on the usual war-animals and carrion feeders like crows or vultures; but instead either Curlews or Ibises (most likely the bald and pitch-black 'Hermit Ibis'), which as a neat side-note, are natural competitors with Owls (Athena's sacred animal). They might have also just been some warrior-priestesses to Artemis that Heracles murdered, who had a nickname of 'the Stymphalian birds'.
Seen in-game within Ares updated card art.
5. Capture the Cretan Bull - A Gigantic, Immaculate White Bull and literal beginning of the cuck/bull meme. Initially Poseidon's recognition of King Minos right to rule Crete; after Minos refused to sacrifice what he saw as the ideal specimen of a Bull to Poseidon, Poseidon worked with Aphrodite to have the bull send Minos' wife Pasiphae into a mad lust and undying romantic love for it. After one very rough stretching session inside a fake cow skeleton (made by the legendary craftsman Daedalus), the bull impregnated her with Asterion, the Minotaur (who was passed on all the rage of Poseidon not getting his fucking sacrifice). Pasiphae went on to blame Minos, make him infertile (or ejaculate dangerous insects), helped free Daedalus / Icarus and got away with it all because Minos had his hands tied by politics / religion; hence an identical definition of 'cucked' as it's modern secondary usage within vernacular.
The story of capturing the bull was much less eventful - Heracles sudued it by strangling it, then bound it and dragged it back by hand, having to force it to say still on the boat back to the mainland - an exponentially stronger, but less rowdy version of the Erymanthian Boar. In real life this would have been based off of an albino Aurochs, a proto-domesticated cattle species, that may have reached 7-8ft tall (compared to the average ~5-6ft); though the legend itself predates the Greek Pantheon, as it was a key aspect of the Minoan worship (later going on to inspire the household name 'Moloch'; given the Minoan's penchant to sacrifice children to the Bull-God)
Seen in-game as...... me!
6. Steal the Diomedian Mares - Hairless, fire-breathing and razor-fanged horses that fed on unsuspecting (human) visitors to the island of Thrace whenever they got rowdily hungry (also the parents of Alexander the Great's famous horse, Bucephalus). Heracles set the horses free from their bronze chains so they could instead feed on the natives of Thrace and King Diomedes (as poetic punishment), before calmly tying their mouths shut and leading them onto the boat to deliver and show to King Eurystheus.
Possibly (?) seen in game in Classic Apollo's Ult....? His chariot is 'supposed' to be pulled by Swans and the only other thing that the burning horse remotely resembles is a Diomedian Mare. Need to be a bit more fang-y and carnivorous-y and hungry-y / emaciated. But still, the horseshoe fits.
7. Steal the the Girdle of Hippolyta - The divine Girdle of the Amazonians, which was owned by their leader, demigod Daughter of Ares, Hippolyta. You should know those from your hentai tags, but if you weren't aware, a race of warmongering musclewomen-only warriors (stronger than mortal men); who would abduct and rape breed with the strongest of men, then kill any sons. What they don't tell you in the porn mags is that Amazons would only have one breast, as they'd cut / sear one off to be able to fully draw a war-bow across their chest.
What should have been a simple trial (given that Hippolyta was already impressed with Heracles and possibly intended to breed with him) turned into a full blown 1-man-vs-an-entire-supersoldier-Army war, as Hera infiltrated the Amazonians beforehand and tricked them into thinking he intended to steal away Hippolyta for himself. The Amazonians attacked Heracles pre-emptively without Hippolyta's knowledge; Heracles solo'd the fucking lot, before a melancholy showdown with Hippolyta herself (Heracles thinking she had tried to trick him, Hippolyta just not being able to let Heracles 'killing her entire race' slide).
Almost certainly seen in-game as the Belt of Frenzy; which in it's initial implementation was called the Girdle of Frenzy. While there is a Greek Goddess of Frenzy outright (Lyssa, yet another one of Nyx's {Nox's} kids), the specific choice of it being a Girdle implies it's Amazonian more than anything to do with Lyssa.
8. Steal Geryon's Cattle - The cattle themselves were completely mundane, it was their guardsmen, the Giant Triplicate Geryon (3-headed, 3-bodied, conjoined) and his two-headed hound Orthus (Cerberus's little brother, son of Typhon / Echidna). At this point Heracles was so experienced, he dealt with them swiftly (Orthus with his trademark club, Geryon with a Hydravenom arrow that blew straight through one of Geryon's heads, instantly killing the other two with the venom). Just to piss of Heracles though, Hera scattered flies on the cattle to irritate them and have them spread out aimlessly in all directions and get lost as Heracles slept; which led to him spending the next year wrangling them together again to present to Eurystheus.
There's been no depiction or either Geryon or Orthus in SMITE, as of writing - though Orthus is essentially Cerberus's little sheepdog brother with one less head, so take that as you will.
9. Steal 3 Hesperidian Golden Apples - The Pure Gold Apples (one of which Eris took many ages before, as her signaure golden apple) that were guarded by the Primordial Hesperidian Forest Nymphs and sometimes additionally a serpentine dragon called Ladon.
The most complicated trial by far, to even find where they were, Heracles had to pin down and beat up the constantly shifting Pontus (a near-Gaia-tier Primordial, Primordial of the Seas themselves, now known as trope-figure that is The Old Man of the Sea) then free Prometheus (Titan of Forethought and Scheming; known better as the Thief of Fire and Champion of Mankind) as payment. This led him to the hurricane-stricken ends of the world - now thought to be the modern day Western mouth of the Mediterranean Sea, at the Southernmost point of the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, before the Sahara Desert (back then Western-most Mauretania, within the Maghreb Region). Along the way Heracles invented the Bane-knee-kill by killing the immortal Titan Antaeus by snapping him over his knee (which circumvented Antaeus's immortality rule of needing to touch the Earth), and visited Egypt / avoiding becoming a sacrifice to 'their Gods' (yep, the Greeks were canonically crosspantheonic too, and acknowledged the existence of other Pantheons, even if they were more footnotes than fully fledged equal Pantheons).
Once at the Atlas mountains, Heracles finds none other than... 'Atlas' holding up the Celestial Spheres, and from there, the story greatly diverges between versions. In the two main accounts, Heracles either holds up the Celestial Spheres for a while in an ultimate act of strength (the skies and stars on his back), so Atlas can spend a small amount of time with and fetch the apples from his daughters, the Hesperides themselves (in some accounts nearly having Heracles hold up the Celestial Spheres for the rest of time from a trick of phrasing on Atlas's end) OR Heracles is advised by Atlas and goes on to slay Ladon to get them apples. In some cases also, like how he freed Prometheus, Heracles goes on to request Zeus for Atlas's punishment to be alleviated or independantly builds the Pillars of Heracles to hold up the Celestial Spheres for Atlas, to free him; which are modern day mountains that are the Rock of Gibraltr and Jebel Musa, at the mouth of the Mediterranean.
One such example of the Hesperidian Golden Apples can be seen in game within Discordia's hand. Also Atlas (basically the main topic of the Trial) is quite obviously in game too.
10. Capture Cerberus - As simple as it says on the can, Cerberus was the iconic, colossal multi-headed, snake-covered, dragon-tailed guard dog of both Hades and Hades (yes, that makes sense), who was never allowed to leave it's post, else any dead try to make a break for it (both out of Hades into the Living, and from the Styx into Hades without paying). While accounts vary from 2, 3, 50, 100 and [50 canine +X non-dog] heads; Cerberus is pretty iconically given to have 3 canine heads nowadays.
Down in Hades, Heracles first frees Theseus before humbly asking Hades himself to borrow Cerberus (which Hades agrees, under the provision he doesn't use weapons or otherwise damage / hurt Cerberus more than necessary). Heracles wrestles Cerberus into submission, carries him carefully back to Eurystheus, whom in turn promptly flees, screaming in fear, signalling the end of Heracles Trials.
Seen in-game as.... well... Cerberus. Also, since there's nowhere else to note on this, you may somewhat recgonise the Hellmouth seen behind Cerberus in his splash art, as it was a common divine design element... albeit in Medieval Anglo-Saxon / Christian art. The initial intent was a Christian adaptation of Fenrir (another well-known-dog with a giant maw-of-doom), to appeal to the Bongs / Norse they were genociding culturally enriching and re-educating, but quickly became closer stated to be in relation to Leviathan, the Abrahamic Demon-Prince representative of one of the 9 Deadly Sins, the Cardinal Sin of Envy stemmed from one of Tiaamat's children, whose shared entity being in conflict with the entity of Ba'al to the Canaanites was literally demonised into Leviathan and Beelzebub by the later Semites. Cerberus become closer associated with the imagery of the Hellmouth much later, during a resurgence in Greek imagery within Christian art around the 1400's, as Hellmouths were often seen as an entrance to Hell from which nothing could escape or the opposite concept to the Pearly Gates of Heaven in which no unwanted could enter. The concept of the Hellmouth and the role of Cerberus are not too dissimilar - hence why the two became linked to one another, and have remained associated ever since.
So, what I'm saying is that in pic related, you can see Cerberus and Fenrir.
You may be thinking - Anon, you forgot something! There's another buff ca-
I didn't.
Concluding the topic of entites within Arena, the in-game Basilisk is just a big gay made-up-bullshit lizard - it's not a depiction of any described varient of Basilisk, and unlike the previous 3 Beasts that were explicitly stated within the Heracles Adventure-mode, this lizard.... just kinda exists. Basilisks hailed uniquely from the Roman Pantheon (not present in Greek texts) and were either small octopedal lizards with a roosters head (similar to Cockatrices, aka rooster-wyverns) or giant snakes - both of which were so toxic, they'd kill anything they'd even look at, leaving a literal trail of death in their wake. Medusa btfo by an evil chickenlizard lol, Basilisks didn't even need you to look at it to kill you, unlike her.
No matter which way you cut it, the 'Basilisk' that features in-game isn't a Basilisk, and isn't reminiscent of any mythological creature.
Finally, bringing it all back to SMITE for the final external reference within Arena, Wally / Waldo appears somewhere in Roman Arena within the audience. Somewhere. Being conceptualised in 1987, this makes the ground-shaking name of 'Wally' (....dun dun dun!) the most modern independant physical concept in the entire game's history. At least, outside of skins.
Sadly because the people of the past are fucking retards and either couldn't archive their shit or outright never found him, I can't show you what he looked like in-game. I have no idea if he's present in the Season 5 version map either, but it is what it is.
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The Height(s) of SMITE!!!
Using the average height of a sea cliff in Southern England (50-75m, according to bong gubbermend published data, 5m to qualify as a cliff, and the tallest in the entire UK being 250m tall); we can deduct that this single attack destroyed 7-12+ miles of coastline, to an indeterminate depth inland based off of trigonometry caculations (thanks school mathematics!).
So Jormungandr is fucking enormous at this point in the narrative, to the point his various splash arts do not give him nearly enough credit.
For context, Jing Wei's passive allows her to travel ~450 'units'. A unit appears to be ~1ft, because LoRez are from a third world country the USA (both these measurements are backed up by Arena seemingly being exactly 500 units, and Hachiman being stated as 10ft tall on the dot in-game, with a nice standing-straight posture), hence this means that this attack, alone, obliterated a length of coast (as the crow flies, no variations in erosion) roughly equal to ~30-50 Conquest maps in length (given a Conquest map appears to be ~1250 units from base-to-base). And that's just Jormungandr's upper torso - in lore at this point, Jorm very much could be a literal World Serpent, and not just exploiting a loophole by 'encircling' the World from within the smaller sphere of the core / mantle of the Earth.
Fun fact: if you want Janus's achievement, basically the only way to get it is by firing it from your spawn directly at their spawn on a Conquest / Assault map after a Deicide, into their lowest health member. Clash, Arena and all Joust maps are all physically too small to get the achievement on, unless you're out-of-bounds; Slash / Siege being just long enough to get it if you put your back to the wall.
If you weren't aware also, it's the minions are normal sized ones in SMITE, the Gods are the tall ones (to reiterate from the Core Lore, as apparent 'avatars' of themselves within the Divine Realm) - though in-game and canon scalings are much different for gameplay purposes. As in, Ratatoskr isn't the size of a Jaguar, Scylla isn't 5'9'' and Jormungandr isn't shorter than the Fire Giant. If you want more 'objective' proof that in-game scalings are deliberately gameplay-intended (as they should), we can see in-lore art when Hera is measured against the Praetorian soldiers, that she's a more 'conventional' height - instead of ~8-9ft tall as her in-game model comparison to the same soldiers would imply.
While I could do a height chart manually, I'm also not into self-sabotage with my time, when one already exists. Bite me faggot, the scope of this doc alone is enough for me to say I'm not lazy. The below link was made by a leddit.... bird-furry? (birdfucker? look, it's leddit, what did you realistically expect) (???) sourced from when I searched for one on a search engine. I've kindly stolen used the magic of ytdl to rip it off of their shitty stream-loader from the command line, overlayed some smooth music on, reformatted with a more efficient codec (for better loading times) and linked here, so you don't have to go to that literal fucking shithole.
It's far from an accurate order (the featherfag included wings in total height in areas for a reason I can quite obviously assume to be so Horus would be in the gigachad tiers next to Cabrakan and and not the manlet tiers) and it could have scale-calculated heights instead of just giving us the names we already know - but in terms of scope, for the most part, it's fine (updated until Charybdis's release, missing Cliodhna onwards),
They're all taller than you anyways, so you won't get anything out of a dick-measuring-contest, you eternal /fit/ manlet (spoonfeed alert: the NGMI eternal manlet line is always 1 inch below the Anon you're talking to).
In terms of explicit inaccuracies, everyone is present, however there's no distinction between Classic skins and Updated models when both should be present anyways (so Gods like Athena, Ares and Hades are noticeably smaller comapred to their defaults; yet Bacchus being shown in his updated version, which is also shorter), and is inaccurate when it implies Assault Jorm / Jorm's Ult form =/= his 'true' Ragnarok form, despite giving Tiamat a 'true' height. Jorm's true form would be literal miles in length or greater according to the coastline-crash attack (or, if he really does encircle the world at this point, it would make him 40,000km, or 25,000 miles, long. It seems to be implied he 'encircled it' from within Earths mantle / core however, before he supersized - so should be relatively much more manageable / small / thin, perhaps a few hunred miles long being a good estimate) - but again - you're probably only going to be interested in the topic for the duration of the video alone so who gives a fuck, the birdfurry's thing is good enough.
Height-chart video: https://files.catbox.moe/ynkjwp.mp4 Alternate Link for those who hate Catbox: https://streamable.com/t8sky3
longjorm is loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong
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So... What the fuck is Set's head supposed to be?
If you were wondering what animal-head Set has... well... nobody actually knows for certain, to the point it's simply referred to as the Set animal, or the Typhonic Beast. (long story short, just know Set was loosely translated into Typhon in Greek mythos, even though we know Typhon had completely different design notes already).
Despite us not knowing exactly what animal Set is based on, the Typhonic Beast shows up extensively throughout heiroglyphs, both in and out of reference to Set (implying it was a real, commonly known animal to the Egyptians), with the only varience being the apparent width of it's snout / beak - though it is disputed as to if it was as much 'real' as it was just 'widely known of' (like the fossil and biological record of the vicious, highly dangerous Australian Dropbear - highly attested throughout Australia even today, despite bewildering lack of remains).
SMITE actually respects the mythos somewhat well in this regard with his default skin, by obscuring the head / details and keeping the shape closer to the heiroglyph moreso over any modern animal; however the best living contender today seems to be the ancestor-version of the Saluki, an Egpytian breed of dog which may have resembled the heiroglyph of the Set animal more back in the day. At least, pre-milenniasworth of breeding, along with clipped ears and trimmed tail in an Ancient Egyptian style. And perhaps a more uhhh....'Borzoi'-like snout.
This is also concordant with Set's role in his mythology. While loyal and trained, dogs of the time were a little more... feral 'untamed' and were employed as more extensively as guard dogs than they usually are today, over simple pets and farmer's aides (making Set's role in fending off Apophis and later unfounded aggression towards the bird-gods of Ra / Horus more logical).
Sadly however, it appears LoRez are making a real ass of themselves, in post of his release; with many of his skins going down the 'Donkey / Horse' interpretation of what the Set animal was. Pun intended.
While Set was indeed represented on occasion as a Onager (Wild Donkey, hailing from the Persian / Foreign region, North of Egypt) in later heiroglyphs; it would be similar as portraying Thoth as a Baboon - while technically correct, it was far from the colloquial understanding of him, and would have been more just a regional representation to better suit a locality's understanding of what Set embodied, over Set's overarching portrayal across wider Egypt.
And yes, the Jackal of Anubis is different from the Saluki of Set - Jackals are significantly less evolved than the Wolves (ie, Dogs) that Saluki are evolved from, are far stockier, and have their signature trangular pointed ears.
tl;dr Set's head was (probably) a Dog with a trimmed hairstyle.
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Agemo, Animals in African Religion & Kangz
Are you a big smelly racist that thought 'Agemo' was just 'Omega' spelt backward, and was just a lazily designed mascot for the Yorubans?
WRONG!
Checkmate athiests.
Say Hello to the Yoruban Patron of Children and Messenger of Olorun, 3rd worshipped Yoruban Entity in the game.... just not a playable one. He is a ward skin though - so there's that I guess. But, first, some context.
To what shouldn't be much of a surprise, animals play a relatively large part in Yorubanism / wider tribal African religions and most of everybodys ex-tribal beliefs, so listen the fuck up faggot, because your great^50 grandcestors were doing things in a similar vein to this shit too, and observing objectively less developed cultures is a semi-useful way for us to understand the logic on how practices may have arisen, in times we have little-to-no written evidence on. In Yorubanism's case, animals are often given as the direct vessals for both the Egungun and Ajogun (beneficial and destructive spirits), as to which they can interact with the world around them and interfere with humanity. A good portion of the folk songs and poems in more casual settings you'll hear Africans just randomly belt out in public are in reference of this general concept (across many tribal religions) - it's an equivalent of rhetorically talking to your pet dog, except you're currying favor, bartering and communicating with the spiritual worlds. Spirits common to certain animals are usuaully often associated with a particular characteristic displayed by the animal in question - so a bull would more like have masculine-inducing and strength-inducing Egungun or aggression-inducing and stupidity-inducing Ajogun.
Animals especially close to the family setting are said to share a portion of their soul / Ase with their masters, much akin to how a community can influence each others souls / spirits - and the Orisha nonetheless have pets of their own that act as extensions. As indicated, Olorun (Olodumare) has his pet chameleon; but other examples include Obatala's (Sky) fondness for snails, how Shango (Thunder) has a pet dog called Lube and likes Rams, or how Eshu (Chaos / Trickery) has a pet dog called Madigboleshu and likes Black Cockerels. Dogs in particular are common in the region and within the Yoruban religion, in part due to the superstition that they have some degree of foresight into the future.
Animals are typically classified by aethetic appearence - the major groups delineated by Fur, Scales or Feathers - these kingdoms of animals are (in Yorubanism's case, but varying based on locality), headed by the Lion, the Python and the Ostrich respectively. Following the throughline of overarching communalism observed throughout Yorubanism, mundane yet communal herd / pack animals such as Wildebeest are considered to be more likely to house Egungun spirits, as they work together and passively generate good spiritual energies and well-developed Ase (said to have their own animalistic / internal priests to the Orisha, in their own animal-tongues) - meanwhile the inverse of these (aka lone predators, Snakes etc) are more likely to attract the malicious Ajogun spirits, as their communal wellbeing is poor and they aren't taught the ways of Yorubanism from birth. This isn't simply limited to those of one species either, but instead simply those of the same trait - so a herd of Gazelle and Buffalo would be said to be working together, and thus benefit from each other's company; as they are both quadraped, both have horns and both eat grass (etc), exhibiting similar behaviours and thus attracting similar spirits.
So what about animals with unique traits and features? This leads us to Agemo and co.
Unique traits are often considered to be signifiers of direct association with divine entities, instead of mere spiritual association and divine preferences. Each 'kingdom' has specific animals, that, on top of their general characteristics displayed, may have supernatural skills - rats are skilled in the reproductive arts, while nightingales and songbirds are unparralleled singers - and for the most identifiably unique animals in each kingdom, this can extend from supernatural abilities into outright divine gifts and patronage. The easiest example of this are the three most distinct avian creatues within the Bird Kingdom to the Yorubans, of which all are widely forbidden to hunt or sacrifice;
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- Vultures - Unique in their scavenger behaviour, and considered assistants for death and advocates for beauty, as they clean up corpses. Patron animal of Oshun, Goddess of Beauty. Mandatorily must be present for sacrifices, else it be meaningless.
- Hornbills - Unique in their beak-shapes and call, and considered divine mediators. Mandatorily must be present for non-sacrificial rituals, else it be meaningless.
- Parrots - Extraordinarily revered creatures, seen as direct speakers on behalf of the Orisha and spirits - though not necessarily truthful or well-meaning.
As such, chameleons are often one of the more significant animals within many African tribal cultures (including Yoruban culture) owing to this kind of distinct 'uniqueness'.
First, and most obviously, their shade-shifting is commonly associated with shapeshifting, which is a concept directly linked to a good portion of the Divine Realm. On top of this, no other lizard has a curled tail, no other lizard has fleshy bird-like feet, no other *animal* has independantly controlled eyes and only frogs hunt similarly with their tongues. Real hipster shit. This is be interpreted in many ways, with Chameloens not only said to be able to switch forms of themselves and their surrounding; but also able are thought to switch objects in their surrounding to give premonitial warnings, switch the moral alignment of spirits around them and even switch the biological gender of a person is it a tranny if it's a biological switch? such is the depth of african philosophy...., and as a result are found to be sought after especially on black markets, as their scales regularly fetch a high price as ritual ingrediants. Did I mention that? All of the above (aside from the ones too-sacred to hunt) are extensively used within tribal rituals, usually for the 'traits' the animal exhibits - both alive or dead. I mean, a rat's ballsack is basically viagra, right?
Past this, Chameleons feature in relation to many African creation narratives, and commonly appear in latter-end Bantu Expansion religions in relation to either Primordial concepts or the local Pantheon-head - while Agemo (in our Yoruban case) relates to Olodumare as his pet and personal messenger, the shared concept of the Divine Chameleon ranges from the Southernmost Xhosa peoples to the Westernmost Senufo peoples. The extent as to which this is linked to an organised spread / evolution of thought during the Bantu Period (like the evolution of the Mesopotamian Pantheons into the Mediterranean Pantheons, or the Celtic into the Nordic / Slavic) is unclear however. Due to the general lack of cultural artifacts across Africa, even the proposed Bantu Expansion theory is only the best logical conclusion for African pre-history we have in combination with genetic data; let alone proving or disproving which cultures branched from one another, and which developed in isolation.
I do wish there was more to comment on and read into relating to African religion at times, but until Africa can get it's shit together and figures out what an internet connection is so they can fucking record their ideas before they're obliterated by modernity, we're kinda limited by how much is available (unless I were to go on a specific expedition to record their mythology myself). Hell, Nigeria is the 7th most populous country in the world, with Yorubanism as it's largest indigenous ethnic group at ~1/7th of its population, and holds a large minortiy-majority in the Nigerian capital, (Lagos, the most populous city in Africa) - yet, little has been recorded about Yorubanism itself aside from many disorganised notes on various aspects on their religion.
Oh yeah, and in Voodoo, Agemo can be given as an aspect of the entity of Jesus (Eshu is synonymised with Lucifer, albeit in a somewhat more Jewish 'tempter-prosecutor' light than 'le pure-evil' Satan in Christianity). So Jesus is not just in-game as the Ecce Mono I guess.
On topical closing notes, for lack of anywhere else relevant: The Egyptians are not black, and if you group them with the conventional meaning of the word African simply because they exist on the same continent, they'll choke you out. Saw it happen once lol.
Their Gods were not black, their culture is not black, there were no black kangz or kweenz (at all, full stop; I know, and no) and the only thing black in their entire domain were a few Ethiopian slaves that the Upper Kingdom held. Even a moderate tan is pushing it, and to exemplify this, the Isis Eset remodel is waaaaaaay past that point, and is far, far less accurate (even in terms of fashion / staff) than Classic Isis Eset. Even if Classic has it's own littany of inaccuracies, so that neither are 'good' - anecdotally, Classic gets a 7/10, Remodel gets a 4/10.
Ethnically, they would have been a slightly lighter tone than the Arabs that occupy the country today (given it was before the Islamic Conquests), so unironically, something akin to the Lebonese people or Al-Assad family would be your best bet in the current day; as those examples hail from a region within the Fertile Cresent relatively local to Egypt (Phoenicia), and was somewhat less impacted by the Islamic Conquests. They're not European / White either (to you /pol/fag 'we was kings' types too), they're Levantine. 'le caraml egyptn g0rl' (Menat, Pharah, Sehkmet of Death, Queen Opala etc) may make for good masturbation fantasy; but is completely and utterly inaccurate, and disheartening to see proliferated by fucking retarded diversity-burgers / porn addicted nips, and something I can kinda empathise with the Egyptians with on this one.
While it's funny to laugh at the Black Egypt or Black Israelite 'movements' as retarded american niggers fitting their stereotype so hard, to the point they're even stealing histories now; it's a insult to the Egyptian people that's honestly undeserved, and pollutes current talk about the mythology. Egypt is not an African country, it's an Arabic country - the 1,800 km natural boundary of the Sahara Desert is far more significant to it's geography, than it being located on the same big shape on the world map.
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