[2020] Domination as a full time mode, let's open a dialogue.

This mode, by nearly every single measurable metric, was one of the least played adventures. If I was going to put them into "tiers" based on actual time spent playing the modes and unique players the modes attracted it would looks something like this:

Top Tier

• Big RPG Dungeons (Herc, Loki)

Mid Tier

• Corrupted Arena (and similar variations)

• Classic Joust

Low Tier

• Horde Mode (Da Ji's adventure)

• Racer

• Domination

• Deathmatch

• Short RPGs (Xing Tians, Fafnirs, Heimdallrs)

• Capture the Flag

Currently, we don't plan on bringing any of these back as full-time game modes because all of them had very bad retention. Meaning that lots of players played them on day 1 or 2, but they were quite often the least popular modes in the game by the end of the month (yes, even the high tier ones had this level of drop)

Our messaging for this year has been

• Lets invest in our core modes instead of one-offs.

This has a variety of advantages

• Keeps player pools as large as possible for matchmaking purposes

• Puts more effort and polish into things we know are successful, instead of risks or gambles

• Makes the game easier to learn and understand, gets new players more excited about our primary modes

This has resulted in Mulan's Joust, Cthulhu Arena, and the Upcoming brand new S8 Conquest Map (Most of the work all year into conquest obviously)

Adventures were a fun experiment and a few of them were extremely successful, but they required a large portion of the team working on them instead of new gods and core game modes.

If we were going to bring anything back, it would likely be time limited, not permanent, and would be Corrupted Arena or Classic Joust.

Dungeons would not come back (and no new ones currently planned) due to their extreme difficulty in setting up the progression systems involved, and their extremely fast drop-off rates. Dungeons can't just be turned back on, a great deal of configuration, setup, and UI work would need to take place to return them

Speaking more directly on Domination - This mode might be fun if the ruleset was kept but the map was completely redesigned in layout. Having 3 points in a straight line is a design mistake, and the pathing and geometry on that map is clunky and awkward. Most of the SMITE team unanimously agrees the mode is bad, and player numbers strongly support that. Based on its poor performance during adventures and time limited resurgences, we don't currently plan on revisiting it.

it was not

Those are easier to design and bring back than the big dungeons, but the Heimdallr one was quite a lot of work and didnt have very compelling results. No plans for them atm, we are 100% focused on Conquest

Classic Joust seems more popular than S3 Joust, but to each their own i guess haha. I do think all 3 Jousts are strong maps and have unique pros and cons. All 3 Jousts are more fun than Domination thats for sure lol. (i might be a biased tho)

Passionate response... but, sorry, no plans for that atm.

The playerbase for Siege is up since the queue time change and has stayed up, but its still the least popular / least played mode. Nothing else to say about it at this point in time.

its a very tryhard mode, I think it alienated a lot of players

not at the moment, each map we add to the game would increase The games total file size and update sizes, this could quickly grow out of control if we wanted to support all of them forever.

Its also a lot of work on upkeep, bug fixing, and etc for small amounts of custom games.