1. [Scylla] A Thoroughly Detailed Guide for Beginners -Outdated-

Overview

Smite guide the First: Scylla, horror of the sea. This guide will cover every detail about Scylla’s abilities, what items work best for her, what kind of play style she excels in while laning, and advice while playing her. This guide is a long read and might contain some information you already know. This is intended for people new to the game to help them become familiar with the mechanics of a god/goddess. Who knows, even if you’re experienced with Smite you might learn something!Last updated: 5/11/2016Disclaimer: The art provided for this guide’s thumbnail does not belong to me. Credit goes to Medral

Introduction: So, you want to be a sea monster?

Hello there, fellow Smiters. I’m glad to present to you my information on Scylla, horror of the deep. Scylla is a burst type mage, who’s centered around slow but heavy hitting abilities. If you synergize these abilities to their utmost potential, you’ll quickly find out how much of a powerhouse Scylla is.

In this guide I’ll be explaining how her abilities work, my recommended items, the mindset you want to be in when playing Scylla (such as aggressive, passive etc), how to work with your team using your kit, and several other things that aren’t quite at the top of my head right now. Don’t worry, though, I’ll explain it!

But enough of that, you came here to learn!

Chapter the First: Her abilities, what they do, and how to utilize them.

First and foremost let me make this clear; Scylla is a basic god to play for the most part; you land your root on someone and you get your main burst ability on them for almost free. But contrary to this simple formula, you can use your abilities in more than one way.

Scylla’s passive is very simple; for every ability that reaches rank 5, she gains 20 magical power and an additional effect is added to the ability. The additional effects are listed below in their respective portions.

“Ajax, Achilles!”

It’s pretty straightforward. Scylla sends two of her dogs in a straight line forward, and upon contact with an enemy target they will root and cripple them in place, in addition to doing damage. This is your main setup ability, as the time your target stays rooted (and not being able to get out of it without beads due to the cripple) will almost always be enough time to follow up with your Crush (second ability) or your ultimate. I’m sure most people know this but I just want to be clear; this does NOT ignore minions or go through walls. If you try to hit a god with this skill but a minion is between the two of you, it WILL connect with the minion. I just want to be sure you know this.

Alright, let’s look at the skill damage itself. As you can see, the early stages don’t provide much when it comes to burst. Just about all of your damage will come from your Crush or your I’m a Monster. Although it’s lacking damage in the early game, this skill is still a very valuable setup for you and your team. Even more so when you get it to max rank, causing it to branch off and hit two additional targets. Now, this is another thing I want to make clear; the two additional targets seem to almost always be the two targets closest to the initial one hit. The spacing isn’t that great either, so you’re likely only to root someone else who’s standing right next to your target.

Two more things before moving on to the next ability; Sic ‘Em is slow as ♥♥♥♥. It’s one of the slowest projectiles in the game. It’s not as slow as Poseidon’s wave crash (his first skill), but it’s pretty damn close. This being the case, if you throw it directly at someone who isn’t running in a straight line it will miss most of the time. To land this ability you need to lead someone into it; as in throw it where they’re going to move to.

Lastly about Sic ‘Em: There’s a rare case where you’ll be able to follow up with your ultimate out of your root, but keep this in mind; this isn’t until you start leveling up your 1. The root doesn’t last long enough at level 1 for the charge up and launch time of your ultimate. I’d say rank 3 should give you enough time to safely perform this, as attempting to do it beforehand might result in your missing, wasting the CD in the process.

Do NOT level this ability first. Always focus on leveling Crush and your ultimate first. When you can’t level up your ult, you’ll be leveling this ability EXCEPT for level 13; you’ll have the option of leveling your ultimate up to level 3. Instead you’ll want to level up Sic ‘Em to max rank to get the benefit of your passive and the max rank effect.

Crush: “Slow down!”

EDIT: Scylla’s Crush has received a buff, raising the base damage.

This is Scylla’s main damaging ability. It’s large, hits hard, and is great for poke/harrassment. First off, while this is obviously your clear ability, it’s surprisingly weak early game(EDIT: Crush’s damage has been buffed, making it hit harder earlier on in the game). In conquest you’ll find yourself struggling to clear during the early stages unless you build Soul Stone as your starting item. Regardless, it’s a necessity in securing damage on your opponents.

This skill is your main priority when it comes to choosing what to level. Every point you get while leveling up will be put towards Crush. The reason for this is that Scylla’s passive is completely useless until you get your first ability maxed out. To make the most out of Scylla you need to focus on one skill at a time, providing yourself more power over the course of the game.

This is how your abilities should look at level 9. Now, when you reach level 8 you’ll see that you can’t put a point into crush, so is doesn’t look possible to have this ability maxed at 9 while also putting another point into your ult. That is, unless you skip a level. When you reach level 8 you’ll have the choice of upgrading any skill that isn’t Crush. Do NOT spend a skill point at level 8. If you do this, you’ll put yourself at a disadvantage. This is because at level 9 you’ll be given the option to upgrade your Crush to its final rank, AND also be able to upgrade your ultimate. This gives you the passive power from your, uh, passive and also unlocks the 25% pen and extra slow on your Crush. This is the optimal process for leveling skills as Scylla.

So the way this skill works is simple: you choose a target location on the ground and upon casting, you’ll throw a slow moving ball at the location you chose, creating a big circle. The images on the circle will spin as it subsists, becoming slower as the time it remains starts to expire. You can press 2 again to pop the ability early, but in some cases you won’t always want to pop it immediately (such as at max rank, as long as enemies stand inside of the Crush, magical attacks penetrate 25% of their protections. This makes it helpful for magical gods on your team in fights). While the projectile is rather slow moving, its large area of effect usually leaves little room for error when it comes to landing it. If your enemies are fast enough, though, they can easily maneuver out of its radius. It’s most easily secured after landing a Sic ‘Em. Although, if you’re rather good (or like playing riskily) at landing skill shots, a more effective way to use Crush is actually before using Sic ‘Em. You know how at max rank Crush reduces any enemy who’s inside of its protections? Naturally, this also goes for Sic ‘Em as well. If you throw your Crush at a target and then use Sic ‘Em to root them inside of if before popping it, you’ll actually get more damage out of the combo as opposed to the other way around. I personally don’t do this because it’s more risky and harder to secure, but it is an option.

Sentinel: “Zoey, guard!”

Now reading this ability’s description leaves a lot on your plate. It’s a ward, it’s a teleport, and it gives MP5. In reality, though, it’s only really useful as an escape. Don’t get me wrong, it’s (imo) one of the best escapes in the game. Simply put your doggy where you want to jump to and press the skill again to leap to its location. This skill will always be leveled last as it provides nothing of use except for you to get out of fights or reposition yourself.

One key piece of information about Sentinel, though: This skill counts as a LEAP. While you’re untargettable while in the middle of leaping, keep in mind skills such as Awilix’s Gravity Surge (her ultimate) which pull people in the air to her WILL affect you. Always remember this before choosing when to leap.

The details of Scylla’s ult are listed directly below this section. The reason it has its own section is because I ran out of characters for this single section. Oops.

Chapter 1 cont.

“Fun time!”

This ability is absolutely insane. Just activating it is enough to instill fear into your opponents. The base power is high, the scaling is high, the reset effect from killing an enemy god is mind blowing, and the potential to penta kill the entire team is ever present. Okay, let’s talk about I’m a Monster, Scylla’s ultimate. Immediately upon pressing 4 you’ll become CC immune and gain movement speed. You’ll now be able to make one super powerful attack, in the shape of a small circle. If you land the killing blow on an enemy god with your ult’s damage it will reset the timer, giving you another 6 seconds to act. This includes the CC immunity, speed, and attack. This ultimate is infamous for penta killing, for good reason. Oh but while it IS all powerful and scary or whatever, it does have its downsides. When you launch your attack, it’ll take about 1-1.5 seconds for the attack to actually connect with the ground. This leaves you wide open to hazards such as bursty mages or ADCs to wipe you out. It also means that your attack is rather easy to dodge in general, so you’ll want to either lead someone into it or make sure they’re in CC before launching it.

The only thing you get for maxing it is double movement speed, but you’ll still get your passive power as well. Also, don’t be afraid to use this skill to get away! If your Sentinel didn’t cut it and you still have people riding your ass, you can afford to use your ult for the move speed and distance yourself.

Chapter the Second: How to build Scylla

EDIT: Due to the addition of new items as well as changes to certain items, I’ve swapped the build around a tiny bit. This updated build is how I think Scylla is most optimally used.

Scylla’s items of preference aren’t too different from how you would build other mages, but there are some items whose purposes are already filled by her abilities. I’ll list several items that I think bring out the most in Scylla and explain why I chose them and how they affect her.

This is the standard build for Scylla: Shoes of the Magi, Chronos’ Pendant, Rod of Tahuti, Spear of the Magus, Spear of Desolation, and Book of Thoth (not in that order).

Let’s take a closer look at each item.

The power and mana on Thoth is almost too good to pass up, and any time you can stack I recommend you should build this item. You could take Warlock’s Sash over Book if you’d rather have the health, but I think this item suits better as it allows you to get your damage out more frequently due to the power and mana it provides.

A very basic and fundamental item. These should be taken over Shoes of Focus as they provide more power and penetration. The CDR provided by Shoes of Focus is not needed due to Chronos’ Pendant providing all the CDR that Scylla should need.

Another simple item. It gives you MP5, CDR and power. This item provides a good amount of power along with 25% cooldown reduction, which is the most Scylla should ever need.

This is a core item. You should always have Rod of Tahuti in your build no matter what. It gives an insane amount of power, and gives even more power depending on how much you currently have. Due to it giving bonus power scaled off of your power that you have at the time, this item isn’t built early. It’s a mid game item as it won’t benefit you as much early on.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. “But Yokada, why would I take this over Obsidian Shard? It has more power AND 33% penetration!” While that may be true, Spear is overall just better on Scylla. The reason for this is mostly due to the flat pen on Spear. While Shard gives you 33% penetration, that’s only 33% of their current magical protection. Spear gives you a static value, 15, plus 10 (stacking three times). The result is you penetrating more of the protections they have. This also goes hand in hand with Crush being maxed out, since it penetrates 25% of their magical protection, essentially covering Shard’s purpose.

Spear of Desolation is an absurd item on Scylla. The raw power and penetration combined with the passive of lowering your cooldowns when you get a kill almost makes it seem like it was made for Scylla herself. This item takes Scylla’s kill potential to new heights, and it was already pretty high to begin with.

Now that we’ve analyzed all of the items in her build and what they mean to her, let’s look at some alternatives.

This is a substitute for Book of Thoth. This item is taken if you’d rather have more health against bursty gods other than more mana/power.

Soul Reaver offers solid power and mana, plus a very bursty passive effect. The passive is useful, but due to the cooldown on the effect I think it’s worth investing into a more constant stream of damage rather than waiting for the passive to come off CD. It’s still a very valuable alternative.

The order of purchase for this build is Book of Thoth, Shoes of the Magi, Chronos’ Pendant, Spear of Desolation, Rod of Tahuti, then lastly Spear of the Magus.

Now that we’ve thoroughly covered Scylla’s build, let’s move on to the next section.

Chapter the Third: Play style

This chapter can be skipped as everyone has their own play style and mind set while playing, but here I’ll offer some advice I think could help you when it comes to playing Scylla.

When laning in middle or in other modes such as siege or joust, try to angle your Crush in such a way that you can hit the wave and your opponent at the same time. This applies really good pressure as not only are you clearing, but you’re also poking them down.

If you don’t have enemies present, use your Sentinel to check if camps or buffs are up through the wall without actually going in there, just in case they’re down or an enemy is taking them.

Try to harrass and poke your opponent as much as possible, but don’t be too rash!

Scylla’s attacks are slow, so you need to focus on making them connect. If someone rushes you down, your first priority is to root them in place and secure some distance. After this you can punish with your Crush. When using your ult, remember that you have full CC immunity and a whole 6 seconds to act; don’t feel pressured to make an attack immediately. Be calm, aim carefully, and make the attack count.

Until Next Time!

This concludes my guide for Scylla, horror of the deep. I hope you found it helpful, and if not, no harm done. I would appreciate if you sent this to someone you felt could make some use out of it. It would be my pleasure to help anyone that has any questions or concerns. If you have any feedback at all, please let me know down in the comments!