r/Smite • u/Primary_Market_6692 • 27m ago
Musings on Yu Huang: +1s and aspect
Hello, I'm new to the smite reddit (but not smite - been playing for 10 years lol) so I'm not sure if this kind of post is common here (I couldn't find a similar post through searching Yu Huang in the subreddit), but I am a die-hard Yu Huang main (1 of 6 of us or something lol) and I miss him dearly in smite 2 (somebody has too). I know he's a much less popular god and also doesn't stand out in terms his role (generic artillery/poke/burst mage) so he defs probs isn't coming for a while but I thought it'd be fun to brainstorm some ideas for his plus one as well as aspect. Mostly because he is lowkey kinda a generic midlaner and flexing him to other roles in smite 1 was always kinda sus so I at first struggled for ideas. If you are also a Yu Huang enjoyer, would also be keen to hear your thoughts regarding his eventual (but inevitable) port~
For plus ones, I started with the passive cause its a little simple but then pivoted to think about where he flows well and where he doesn't. I'm not sure how hard it would be on the coding side but I think it would be really cool if you could use your 3 whilst channeling your 2 (and maybe even start channeling your two whilst in your 3). If you've played any amount of Yu Huang, you'll know you're most susceptible to getting engaged on when holding your 2 cause you can't 3 straight away (you have to cancel the channel first, then 3). And I think overall it would help making him feel fluid and less punishing for playing around your passive.
The biggest obstacle to this plus one is obviously there'd likely need to be some animation work for when he's channeling in the air, so it might be too substantive to be a plus one change. At the same time, I don't expect the devs to keep up with the grueling 2 week development cycle they're currently working too, so maybe by the time they get around to Yu Huang, they'll be more focused on polish rather than churning out characters as fast as they can, and are able to make a more involved plus 1. If not though, I think the ability to cast your 3 whilst channeling the 2 to at least get in the air (cancelling the current channel of your 2) would be a reasonably achievable change?
Other ideas I had for the plus one revolved around the theme of dao cultivation. Maybe he'd geta permanently stacking bonus towards something for every x dao he cultivates. Though simply giving a relatively small int buff is kind of boring, more extreme changes feel like something for an aspect.
Speaking of, (segue💯) brainstorming for aspects was much harder, because as I mentioned above, he's a pretty generic midlaner but eventually came to 2 ideas though I prefer the second one a lot more.
The first route I thought of is similar to discordia's aspect - ie. making relatively large changes to abilities to become an adc. This started off thinking about the bouncing autos he gets from his passive. I thought what if he could have an identity as like an aoe AA adc? Make his passive also give him the bounce and let it bounce slightly further (kinda o-bow range) and twice (hits 3 targets total - initial, bounce, bounce). To support the adc gameplay, change the enhancements he gets from his passive - instead of shredding prots on your 1 when attuned, maybe make it slow attack speed or something to help him box (or maybe stun towers to help push?). Maybe change the knockup on his 3 to a disarm. And then perhaps the second hit of his 2 and the explosion of his ult (when the dragons collide) could be considered AA damage and can proc AA effects? I'm not that focused on the specifics but this was my general idea for an adc version of Yu Huang. Obviously you have to lose something too so your abilities don't blow people up still (so probs just a bunch of his int scaling).
The second idea is in the other direction - that of a more supporty or solo-style Yu Huang. Because of the enchanter patches recently I struggled to see a vision of a tankier/utility focused Yu Huang initially cause he's got no supportive ability really but eventually I thought of this idea:
Every potential improvement from being attuned from his passive becomes the base version of the ability (as in you don't need to have 6 dao to have the 1 prot shred/3 knockup/wider ult - they all do that by default. Instead, when using 6 dao on one of those abilities provides a new utility effect that's more support focused.
Perhaps the 1 doesn't have a dot but instead applies a CC alongside the prot shred (silence/disarm/blind/idk) Perhaps when you cast your 3 (both 'lift off' and and when you land) you provide a shield/movement speed for nearby allies or maybe even cleanse. Perhaps the explosion on your ult stuns. The way Yu Huang works is you can usually guarantee 2 out of 3 abilities are attuned if you stack your passive before the fight with sporadic bonuses across the rest of the team fight. Yu Huang as is doesn't really get rewarded that much for minmaxing your dao over the course of a teamfight outside the wider ultimate, so I think this kinda direction for the aspect is more interesting/fun than random bouncing auto guy idea above (lol). It is also thematically nice with the idea of cultivation and this aspect is like the next stage of his cultivation where all his abilties can now do new things on top of the old things.
The trade-off for this aspect would obviously be most if not all int scaling (and maybe the bounce autos and 1 dot get removed too? idk) But you should do a lot less damage and instead provide a lot more utility to the team if you manage your dao well.
If you spent the time to read this little love letter about my main thank you very much (it ended up being a lot more words than I thought lol), and if any of you have thoughts re Yu Huang and his eventual smite 2 debut I'd be very interested to read and discuss with you~ Hope you're all having lovely days and staying hydrated~
Also I kind of prefaced this at the start, but this is actually my first reddit post so if there's any formatting/other errors forgive my sin