Often our mood or status dictates the SMITE mode we choose. Perhaps we have an agenda or goal. Maybe we’re just kinda tired, and Conquest is hard. Here’s what we’re really thinking when we enter that Siege queue.
Arena: “I Need To Master This Guy”

Need to master someone? Hello, that’s what Arena is for! When you’re loading into the match and you notice no one on your team has any masteries on their god — and your team comp consists of two Warriors and three Assassins — you know exactly what’s up. And if someone popped a worshiper booster in the lobby, that confirms it.
Assault: “Picking Is Hard”

Hitting “Join Queue” at 4 a.m. is hard enough, much less going through the further button prompts of calling a role, selecting a god and locking in the aforementioned god. Why go through all that nonsense when you can let the fates decide your god choice?
Clash: “The Compromise Between Playing Conquest or Playing Arena”

Half the party wanted to play Conquest. The other half were in the mood for some Arena. As the party leader, you have to come up with a compromise between the two groups, not unlike a parent of small children. That compromise? Clash.
Conquest Ranked: “Just F*** Me Up Fam”

Ranked Conquest: the SMITE equivalent of gambling. If everything hasn’t gone to hell in a hand basket by the end of the picking phase — which someone will surely leave seven minutes in, so you’ll have to requeue for another 10 — duo lane will probably go 0-25 collectively, your jungler will DC at the 30 second mark or the servers will implode as you’re taking the enemy Titan. Or all of the above.
Duel: “My Team Sucks”

You finish a match. You were the best. The team was too heavy. You lost. You think to yourself, “Screw the team! I don’t need the team!” You queue 1v1 Duel. You lose horrifically. You rage quit. You cry. You go back to team-based modes. Rinse and repeat cycle for the rest of your SMITE life.
Joust: “Cheese Mode: Activated”

If you’ve ever played 3v3 Joust, you know this is the home of the ridiculous cheese strats. This is your triple healer, all Guardian, all backdoor gods, all summons, picking every god who has a wall, type of a mode. After all, InnocentRabbit did make an entire video series out of it…
Match of the Day: “When Regular SMITE Isn’t Cutting It”

Stats aren’t tracked, leaving no record of how badly you did, and the rules of SMITE are bent with spin-offs like 100,000 starting gold, crazy cooldown reduction and being forced to play certain gods that cater to the Match of the Day in question. Yep, that’s right, a sacred place where those annoying meta picks might not even be selectable.
Siege: “We Have Four People”

One does not simply queue Siege without a four-man party. Queuing solo will result in getting roflstomped by a try-hard, four-man stack; meanwhile, your team is composed of people who are too new to have picked up on the unspoken rule about never entering Siege outside of a full party.
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