Is Fenrir Over-Powered? The Traditional New God Debate

Fenrir is finally here! Why waste time celebrating and praising Hi-Rez when we can moan about how over-powered the latest God addition is for SMITE. Although there are many players expressing their joy over the introduction of one of the most anticipated Gods, there’s always some naysayers complaining that the latest God is broken and “OP”, Fenrir is no different.

I recently discussed Fenrir’s abilities in a pre-release reveal but Hi-Rez did state that the numbers and additional effects were subject to change. As far as I can tell they didn’t deviate from that which was featured in the pre-release reveal.

I do feel people are very quick to judge with new characters added to MOBA games and I don’t mean to come across as factual or correct with my final findings regarding Fenrir, it’s more to see if any of the SMITE playing MMO ATK community agree with my findings. So let’s take a quick look at Fenrir.

Sadly I’ve not had half as much time with Fenrir as I wanted, mainly due to God campers that literally mark their monitor screen with a sticker so that they’re able to spam left click and select the God before anyone else. Bit over the top if you ask me, but I can understand why people would be so headstrong on playing a newly added character.

Fenrir’s abilities in themselves are rather ordinary. He has a pounce ability that can be used as both an escape and initiate ability, a self-buff that improves lifesteal and damage, a short range jump that launches 4 attacks on an enemy and his ultimate. His ultimate adds additional damage and gives Fenrir the ability to pick up an enemy God in his mouth before running around with it dangling from his mouth like a chew toy drowning in saliva.

Most of my experience with Fenrir has been in Arena and although it’s arguably one of my least favorite modes in the game, he is ridiculously fun to play. There was something really satisfying about picking up a full health Hades in my mouth before running him back into my base and watching him get 2-shotted.

Fenrir’s true potential becomes apparent when you combine each of his abilities. The ability to launch 4 attacks in quick succession, each applying on-hit effects, combined with his lifesteal, is enough to finish off squishy characters. And the characters with more defensive abilities serve as a great tool to restore his health.

As with the majority of God’s that people claim are over-powered, it’s as simple as learning Fenrir’s mechanics. The Aegis Amulet/Beads are enough to both counter/cancel his ultimate skill and his most damaging ability, making Fenrir next to useless while he waits for his cooldowns. That’s a standard technique for God’s that don’t have specific abilities to counter a certain God but for those with stuns, true jumps or any form of CC, countering Fenrir is easy. Playing as Apollo his Mesmerize instantly cancels Fenrir’s main damaging ability, and the same applies for Anubis, Cupid and any other God with crowd-control skills.

I would still consider myself a novice with Fenrir. I’m sure many others with better ability would be more educated on delivering a final verdict but if I was to be honest. The only issue with Fenrir is that he’s 10x more fun to play than most of the God’s in the game. Sure he’s powerful, but like many of the assassin God types, he’s squishy as hell.

Bottom line. Just because a specific tactic, one you’re comfortable with and use often, doesn’t work against a new God, it doesn’t make him OP. The best MOBA players are those with the ability and imagination to adapt and think on their feet.

Final Verdict: Not OP. I would be very surprised to see any nerfs to Fenrir, other than maybe clarifying his 3 attack against un-categorized jumps such as Nieth’s backflip.

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