Smite

Smite features many different game modes with the largest being Conquest.

Players are formed into two teams with five players on each team. All players begin at opposite sides of a map at their team's fountain.

Before the players enter the map, they are granted an amount of gold to buy starting items.

These items grant special bonuses or abilities that enhance the player's god.

There are three continuous lanes running from one side of the map to the other. Each lane is defended by a Phoenix which is accompanied by a pair of extra defensive towers.

Phoenixes and towers deal a large amount of damage to any enemies that come too close.

The goal of each game is to destroy the opposing team's Phoenixes and the Titan, a giant warrior who must be defeated to win the game.

The players are accompanied by minions, small soldiers with a weak attack.

These minions spawn at the Phoenixes every thirty seconds and run along their lane until they meet opposition and attack immediately.

Minions will attack not only players and other minions, but also towers, Phoenixes, and the Titan. In fact, their presence is required for players to deal full damage to these objectives.

Defensive positions will prioritize enemy minions over players, allowing players to attack a tower without receiving damage; however, towers will fire upon players if there are no minions nearby or the player attacks an enemy player under their tower.

If a game is going badly for a certain team, they can decide to surrender after at least 10 minutes, though this requires a majority of the team to agree.

With every game, players have to choose a god or other figure to play as. Currently, players can choose between 110 characters from 15 different pantheons: Arthurian, Celtic, Chinese, Egyptian, Great Old Ones, Greek, Hindu, Japanese, Mayan, Norse, Polynesian, Roman, Slavic, Voodoo, and Yoruba.

Each character is classified as one of the following classes: Assassin, Guardian, Hunter, Mage, or Warrior. Unless otherwise stated, two players on the same team cannot choose the same character.

The player controls the god in a third person perspective, which is a unique characteristic of this MOBA, as other games of this genre are typically played from a top-down perspective.

Each god has a basic attack, a passive trait, and four abilities with varying effects, such as area damage, crowd control, buffs, and many more.

These abilities are acquired and upgraded when the player's character levels up by gaining experience from being in range of minions when they are killed, taking down towers or phoenixes, and defeating enemy characters.

The maximum level is 20 and each successive level is more difficult to reach.

Gold, which is used to buy items that increase power, defense, and passive effects, potions, wards and abilities, is accumulated through standard periodic income, by slaying enemies, or by selling owned items.

The large areas between the lanes make up what is called the jungle, where computer-controlled monsters such as packs of cyclopes or Furies periodically spawn at specific locations distributed symmetrically across the map.

Killing certain monsters in said jungle causes a buff to drop on the ground where it can be picked up by a player. This buff grants the player one of the following for a limited time, depending on which monster was killed: mana, damage, speed, attack speed or protection reduction aura.

There are three special neutral monsters who spawn less frequently: the Fire Giant, Gold Fury, and Pyromancer.

When killed, they grant the entire team who killed it a powerful damage buff for a medium length of time, set amount of Gold, and a speed boost when coming out of the base respectively. There are also some monsters which do not offer a buff, only experience and gold.

The matchmaking system uses a modified version of the TrueSkill ranking system.

Around December 2013, there was a feature added that allowed players to choose between US and EU servers, but was later removed from the game due to issues with the matchmaking system.

This feature was eventually re-added. Originally, most modes used to operate on queues with 3-minute matchmaking timers. Every three minutes, matches would be made from the group of people in queue at that time.

In late 2014, that system was replaced with a more traditional non-timed one that looks for an optimal match instead of just the best match-ups at the present time.

In this system, if it takes 5 minutes or more to match a player, the game will gradually lower its requirements until a match is found.

A new matchmaking system similar to the original one was introduced in 2018, with different times for different modes. The system will prioritize the player's general performance over their account level.

In Ranked Leagues, players are matched by a variation of Elo, a system that rates players with a number that indicates how well the individual skill of that player is.

The player will be matched with players that have a similar rating as them. The goal of this system is to have 2 individual teams that have a similar TOTAL Elo.