Smite Patch Rolls Out Its New Character, the Master of Thunder

The new 3.2 patch for the PC version of Smite has been detailed, and its most significant addition is a new character.

Raijin, known as the Master of Thunder, carries around drums that he uses for his various attacks. These drums gather charges as he uses abilities or basic attacks, and once all four have been charged, he does extra damage with his next ability.

As for those abilities, they are all capable of doing area-of-effect damage. Percussive Storm sends out a series of attacks in a line, stopping after either four hits or once it's damaged an enemy player. Thunder Crash does damage in an area and then sends Raijin flying to that spot a moment later to deal additional damage.

Raiju is the most unusual of the bunch; it marks a target and send out Raijin's ally Raiju, "who hides in the enemy's navel." While he's there, he reveals the enemy to Raijin's team. Once Raijin deals damage to that character, Raiju wakes up and "claws his way out," dealing damage to both the target and their nearby allies.

Finally, his ultimate, Taiko Drums, sends Raijin flying over the map, allowing him to hit his drum four times to do your choice of three things. One option deals 100 percent of the ability's damage, one does 50 percent damage but taunts enemies for half a second, and the third deals 50 percent damage but fears targets for half a second.

Outside of Raijin, this patch doesn't add or change a whole lot. There are a handful of new skins and character-specific achievements, and some items have been tweaked. Most notably, Spear of the Magus has been altered to be less effective in all situations; it's now meant to be best against enemies with low magical protections.

In terms of characters, no balance changes have been made, though Bacchus' burp thankfully no longer shakes his teammates' screens.

Hi-Rez says on its website that it deliberately avoided making many balance changes in this patch as things have been changing rapidly since the launch of season three.

"The response from season three has been fantastic, and we would like to encourage everyone to continue to send their feedback!" the studio explains. "In terms of balance, we only made a few small adjustments and fixes to items this patch. We have seen rapid shifts in playstyle and new meta development and will continue to monitor the changes from season three as a whole, so we can make more informed changes in subsequent patches."

You can read the full patch notes here.