Chronic Smite Rage: Signs, Symptoms and Treatments

Editor's note: this article was written with a sense of humor, try to read it that way as well :)

Chronic Smite Rage: Signs, Symptoms and Treatments

So you’re winning your lane, warding the jungle consistently and rotating like a champ. Things are going great so far. Suddenly there’s a ping on the map, signalling an enemy Anhur ganking from up high. You retreat, wondering how you missed the MIA. It’s not that bad though, you warded. You can retreat in time. Ping, and you realise there’s an enemy Sobek coming in low to prevent your escape.

At this point, you’re starting to seethe a little. The chat remains woefully empty; left lane has failed to call missing on both lane partners. And now they’re collapsing in on you. Within a couple of seconds it’s over and you’re spectating your left-lane teammates while you wait to respawn. You begin to type; asking them to please, please call missing. You notice they have zero wards, and are stood right up against the enemy tower trying to kill the enemy Anhur with the 3 level advantage.

Inevitably, it’s a double kill, and you’re astonished to find that the two of them have eight deaths between them. Before you know it, your polite request for some MIA’s looks something like this:

Starting to sound like you, or perhaps someone you know? You may be suffering from Chronic Smite Rage (not to be confused with Kali rage). It's okay. We've all been there. This is a bit of an issue within Smite. And it’s not just unpleasant for those who receive the abuse, but for every person on the team. Undeniably, it’s frustrating to play with someone who just simply isn’t playing as well as you, but I’m not sure that in the history of every game of Smite I’ve played, has raging ever successfully motivated the team into performing better – in fact, they’re often far less cooperative than to begin with.

Worst case scenario, they leave the game, and you're all forced to fight a 4v5. It doesn’t particularly help your performance either. How’s that aim, now you’re shaking with fury? Getting angry is scientifically proven to significantly decrease your performance in Smite games by up to 65%! (maybe not scientifically, but trust me anyway). It’s also important to remember that everyone – everyone – has bad games. Yes, even you. Remember that time you went 0-7-2 as Poseidon, and the Apollo on left lane was so furious with you he told you about the unspeakable things he did to your mother last night? Don’t be Apollo. You don’t want to be Apollo.

What a jerk.

And if you’re on the receiving end of player rage? Never underestimate the value of a good old classic mute and report. This is something I took a while to learn. I would, always, without fail, rise to the bait. And the outcome? We stood in the fountain trading insults whilst the enemy team slaughtered our minotaur.

They have nothing to tell you that will improve your play. So why are you listening?! Whilst constructive criticism can do wonders for your play, there’s rarely a time the recommendation to uninstall and play Tetris instead will actually help you improve at Agni. Or any God, really. (Why is it always Tetris they tell us to play rather than Smite, anyway? What is this, some sort of elaborate marketing ploy for Tetris? To be investigated.) So you're having a bad game. It could be worse, friend; at least cats haven't developed apposable thumbs yet - because when they do, we're all going to be feeders IRL.

The sooner you mute them, the sooner you can pay them no attention and focus on getting back on track – remove that negativity from your game and kill that Minotaur!