Team Dignitas Smite Spotlight: interview with Anatoliy

We sat down with one of our SMITE team members, Anatoliy 'Anatoliy' Alekseyenok. We discussed tips for up and comming solo lane players, and some of the recent map and meta changes.

 

Out of all the Gods in SMITE which would you say is your favorite?

Anatoliy: My favorite is hands-down Guan Yu. His kit is very strong and underrated with his slow, armor penetration contribution, and silence/stun ultimate. Not to mention his cooldowns are very short during team fights when you’re constantly dashing enemies and healing allies, especially late game when you have breastplate of valor.

 

Which god do you like least in the solo lane?

Anatoliy: The interesting aspect of the solo lane is that it’s evolving very fast and every solo lane player, including myself, are experimenting with many unconventional picks. Whether it’s Chronos, Loki, Kali, Anubis, Hel, etc, they all have their uses one way or another. Some gods are good in solo lane for a “counter-pick” but may not transition too well to be as useful in team fights compared to the other enemy solo laner. For example the Chang’e vs. Hel matchup favors Hel dominantly during the laning phase but in team fights Chang’e has more utility with her protection buff to allies, heal debuff to enemies and massive stun potential with the ultimate.

But to answer the question of my least favorite god in the solo lane would be Hel because she is the least useful in locking down targets in team fights and she requires a lot of mid-end game items to be a factor in team fights.

 

If you could change one thing about the SMITE scene or game, what would it be?

Antatoliy: The way the scene is currently growing with the tournaments, twitch streamers in SmiteGame and SmitePro, community websites like SmiteFire and TierMonster is all fantastic and I can’t think of a way to change the scene except maybe try myself to encourage more players and teams to participate in the weekend tournaments, there are no restrictions for entering and I don’t understand why some players or teams don’t participate.

As far as the game, I would probably like to see some sort of cooldown or restriction on wards and teleport. The ability to teleport to teamfights, disengage and port back fully healed seems too good to be true. Makes it more difficult and trickier for teams to be able to effectively split push or punish team’s that are out of position. Also the ability of buying wards is too loose. If one team is in a dominate position, they can effectively all purchase wards whereas the losing team doesn’t have that luxury.

Are you enjoying the recent changes to the map's graphics?

Anatoliy: The new map graphics look really cool. When I first saw it I was really impressed of the detail that went into changing the map. I think it’s a nice addition to attract more attention to someone who is playing for the very first time.

 

How do you feel about the increase to the cool down on Chang'e's Moonlit Waltz (her dodge)?

Antaoliy: I believe the cooldown increased from 18-16-14-12-10 to 20-18-16-14-12. It wasn’t that much of a difference because the early to mid game, I max out the first skill damaging ability (Crescent Moon Dance) and then maxing out the third skill heal (Moonflower Dance) to be more useful in teamfights. So the change only effects the end-game which is still pretty big but not that big to the point of making her less viable of a pick.

 

Do you think Tyr will be viable for the solo lane once he's ready for competitive play?

Anatoliy: Tyr is a great bruiser god with his second skill allowing him to sustain really well and the ability to switch stances for offensive/defensive options is a huge attraction to his prioritization during picks and bans. This last tournament we just played, Tyr was allowed for the first time and every game we either banned Tyr or the enemy team banned Tyr. We were practicing with Tyr and against him the previous week in scrims and he is definitely a solid pick, he can also be run in the jungle role.

 

What are your thoughts on the new active Eye of Providence?

Anatoliy:  Despite the ability to save gold on wards as the game progresses with Eye of Providence, the other abilities are too strong to pass up for combat purposes (Blink, Aegis, Purification Beads, Sprint, Creeping Curse, etc.)

 

What would you say you bring to the team other than your skills as a solo laner?

Anatoliy: Besides sitting in lane afk’ing and pillow fighting with the enemy solo laner, I do a lot of theory crafting for finding ways to exploit weaknesses in enemy team’s god composition or finding a good way to open the game with a level 1 team fight. Knowing when the enemy is at their strongest and weakest is very important to identify. I also do a lot of behind-the-scenes for our team.

What is one thing you would say you need to work on to improve your game?

Anatoliy: The one thing I need to work on to improve my game is to sometimes tone down my over-aggressiveness play style. Sometimes when I’m in an advantageous position, I’ll overstay my welcome and keep trying to extend my advantage which puts me in an overextended position and very susceptible to an easy gank. However, I know that if the jungler and/or mid player tries to gank me, the rest of my team is safe so I just try to ward often to see them coming in advance and retreat in response to a gank.

 

A lot of people find that playing in the solo lane can be boring, do you have any tips to keep it fresh?

Anatoliy: A good way to keep solo lane less boring is knowing when the enemy is doing their blue buff every rotation. So if your short lane is on the left lane, the enemy will 99/100 times do harpies into red into blue buff which means the blue buff gets started ~45s mark by the jungler and solo laner. You can make their task more difficult by harassing them while they try to do the blue buff. This can hurt both the jungler and the enemy solo laner if you steal it, make them reset it or even do a little bit of damage to both of them can mess up their own individual timings if they have to prematurely port back to base.

Also, I feel like a lot of solo lane players prioritize farming in the solo lane too much and don’t pay attention to allies positioning and when jungle harpies are coming up. If one solo lane player helps the jungler/mid do the jungle harpies against the enemy jungler/mid it’s an obvious 3v2 win. Sometimes it’ll be better to leave your lane, even with minions arriving, to help elsewhere. Because if you can win the 3v2 engagement, your team has the ability to 3 man push mid afterwards or do gold fury while the enemy solo laner sits there trying to single push your lane’s tower.

 

It seems a lot of players have issues knowing when to leave the solo lane to join a team fight and when to go back to farming. When is it appropriate to rotate out of the solo lane? When is it appropriate to go back and farm?

Anatoliy: Finding the timing is key to knowing when to rotate. Harpy timing is generally a good one to look out for. Also if the enemy solo laner ports back to base, you can take advantage of that by rotating elsewhere to gank or even just to ward/counter-ward.

 

Do you have other tips or tricks for ranked players who are in the solo lane?

Anatoliy: Look for opportunities of exploiting the enemy solo laner’s weakness and backing down to the enemy if they are stronger than you. Make sure to ward to know that the enemy isn’t baiting you to attack them and then an uneventful gank occurs. Mostly, don’t be afraid to leave your lane and sacrifice some gold and/or tower damage or even the tower itself for the greater good.

What games do you like to play outside of SMITE?

Anatoliy: I love playing a lot of competitive games. I play CS:GO occasionally, SC2:HotS, Civilization 5 Brave New World. I come from a heavy background of RTS genre with my semi-professional days of WC3:TFT 1v1’s. I’ve been starting to play chess again after a long hiatus.

 

Do you have any hobbies outside of gaming? If so what are they?

Anatoliy I love drinking tea and going to smoking lounges (or called hookah bars here in NYC), I like to play chess there. Also I like to learn new cooking recipes and experiment here and there.

Lastly is there anything you'd like to say to our readers?

Anatoliy: Don’t give up on your hopes and dreams. If you’re doing something that you’re very passionate about, don’t give up during adversity. Don’t let anyone bring you down.