Characters / Smite Babylonian Pantheon

This page is for the Babylonian Pantheon deities that are playable in Smite. The entirety of any God's lore can be found on the official Smite website.

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General Tropes

Babylonian Pantheon General Tropes

Babylonian Pantheon banner artwork

Babylonian Pantheon trademark icon

The deities and mythological characters of ancient Mesopotamia which are playable in SMITE. The Mesopotamian Mythology page deals with and can provide beneficent information about their real world counterparts.

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• Ambiguously Brown: Averted. Gilgamesh, the only humanoid character in the pantheon so far, has a noticeably darker skin tone and a Trrrilling Rrrs accent, but he is addressed as the King of Uruk (an ancient city state in the cultural-geographical region of Sumer).
• Culture Chop Suey: The in-game Babylonian pantheon serves as a representation of all ancient Mesopotamian cultures. The developers however avoided the usual inaccurate conflation with other Middle Eastern groups like the Egyptians, Zoroastrian Persians and Islamic/Muslim Arabians.
• Egocentric Team Naming: Oddly not with an individual, but with a location. The pantheon is named after Babylon, which was just one city/kingdom in the broad range of Mesopotamian civilizations (including Assyria, Sumeria and Akkad).
• Irony: Mesopotamia is historically considered one of the cradles of human civilization alongside Egypt, India and China. However while three of these have been present in the game since its birth, the Babylonian pantheon is the most recent culture included: it was added in 2021 which was eight years after Smite got released.
• Mesopotamian Monstrosity: Downplayed. While both implied in the lore and somewhat shown in-game, the Mesopotamian gods are admittedly flawed and amoral but they aren't any more malicious and horrifying than their original counterparts.
• Mythology Gag: Tiamat’s temple on the Chaos side of the Season 8 Conquest map is clearly based on the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the World. In fact, Tiamat herself refers to her new home as her “Hanging Gardens” when she first meets the other gods during the Dawn of Babylon event.
• Shedu and Lammasu: The head and wings of one such creature is used in the pantheon's icon (plus the banner flag) alongside the Dingir symbol or Anunnaki star.
• Time Abyss: Tiamat is officially the most ancient being in the SMITE universe, and it is heavily implied by the in-game lore that the rest of the Babylonian gods existed alongside her before the other pantheons even appeared.

Warriors

Gilgamesh, King of Uruk

"God, demi-god, what's the difference? I saw a spider running around here earlier. All that matters is who has the most strength!"

Voiced by: Nazeeh Tarsha

Sullivan King Skin Voiced by: Chris McCann

The oldest recorded hero in human history and the protagonist of The Epic of Gilgamesh. He was a tyrannical king until he encountered Enkidu, a man made by the gods to match his strength. They became best friends and went on many epic adventures together, but Gilgamesh lost him after an ill-fated run-in with the goddess Ishtar. Enkidu's death made Gilgamesh terrified of his own mortality and spurred him on a quest that ended with the acquisition of a herb of immortality, only for a snake to steal it in the last second. Gilgamesh matured from the experience, making peace with his mortality and becoming less of a tyrant to his people.

As a Warrior, Gilgamesh continues his journeys, this time through the battleground of the gods as his legend grows.

• His passive, Epic Of Gilgamesh, gives him two quests at levels 5 and 10. The first quest is to visit a location on the map and the second is to defeat at least half of the enemy team in a single fight. The reward for each quest is a Tier 1 item or gold if he has a full inventory.
• His first ability is to ignite the Sun-Forged Scimitar to damage and slow enemies in an area around him. For a few seconds afterwards, his basic attacks deal additional damage based on his own maximum health and extend the duration of the buff.
• His second ability, Drop Kick, unleashes a mighty blow that damages and launches a foe across the battlefield. Any minions in the way take damage, Gods that get hit by a launched enemy, launched Gods that hit a wall, or Gods that are hit into/by other Gods are damaged and stunned.
• His third ability, Hero's Advance, has him leap forward, damaging enemies and creating a beacon at his destination, providing movement speed to allies approaching the beacon and a smaller speed boost and Life Drain to allies inside the beacon.
• His ultimate ability, Winds Of Shamash, creates a large field around him that damages and slows enemies on creation. While the field exists, enemies in the field are dealt a small amount of damage over time, and enemies that try to escape are slowed, giving Gilgamesh an opportunity to damage them to knock them into the center of the field. Gilgamesh can also use Drop Kick to launch them into the Winds, forcing them into the center. The Winds turn into thread when the fields expire, damaging, rooting, and crippling enemies that failed to escape.

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• Authority Equals Asskicking: He is a historical king of the Sumerian state of Uruk, and one of the earliest known action heroes of all time.
• Back from the Dead: Gilgamesh mentions spending time in the Netherworld before being given his quest to defeat Tiamat. It is heavily implied that his gods allowed him to return for this very endeavor.
• Big Damn Heroes: In Tiamat's reveal trailer, he shows up to challenge her, destroying a horde of her canine minions in the process.
  • His Hero's Advance ability is clearly designed to help out on doing this - allies moving toward its beacon will do so faster, and then get Life Drain while inside it to help them turn the tide.
• Blood Knight: In the Talons of Tyranny event lore he clearly enjoys fighting with Tiamat and her minions, noting how Bellona shares his love of battle.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: Is aware that his story is included in most high school curriculums, according to one of his jokes.
  "Yeah, the name's Gilgamesh. I'm famous for being on nearly all required reading lists and being uncanningly strong."
• Carpet of Virility: Confirmed to have one in both his trailer model and in-game◊ model.
• Cool Crown: wears one with sharp prongs and inlaid rubies.
• Cool Sword: Carries a curved variety that is based off of actual sickle swords from ancient Assyria. With his second ability Sun-Forged Scimitar he can ignite it with the ferocity of the sun.
• Dead Sidekick: Enkidu, whose death is the main reason behind Gilgamesh’s immortality quest. Gilgamesh mentions him several times in his voicelines, remembering the wild man as the only one who could match his own strength. When he forms a comradeship with Bellona in the Talons of Tyranny storyline he poignantly notes how the war goddess reminds him of Enkidu.
• Diving Kick: Not only does he deliver one to Tiamat in his trailer, but also uses it for one of his abilities.
• Dreadlock Warrior: Sports a mane of dreads, each of them capped by golden cylinders.
• Flaming Sword: He is capable of wreathing the blade of his sword in fire.
• Enemy Mine: Played with. In Surtr's reveal trailer, Gilgamesh and his archenemy Ishtar are fighting the Fire Giant together as part of a team, but with Surtr being the Fire Giant jungle boss players have been pummeling for years and treated as such in-universe, their teaming up may be purely a shout-out to in-game team composition, rather than a pairing necessitated in the story.
• Foil: To Tiamat. He is the ultimate demigod hero of his civilization while she is the embodiment of primordial chaos. This is even reflected in their kits, with Tiamat being a complex mage with multiple ability sets and Gilgamesh being a fairly straightforward melee fighter. The contrast also extends to their splash artworks: Gilgamesh is confidently striding forward with an imposing city and army behind him, while Tiamat is breaking through a city wall with her monster children to scatter its frightened defenders.
• Godhood Seeker: Prior to befriending Enkidu, Gilgamesh was a petty tyrant who sought to become a full god. After Enkidu’s death his goal simply became the avoidance of death and not godhood per se.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: As you might expect, getting one of your allies thrown at your face by an enemy Gilgamesh is somewhat hazardous to your health.
• Guest Fighter: Receives a skin in the Nickelodeon crossover event; The Ren & Stimpy Show's very own POWDERED TOAST MAN!
• Heroic Build: He is built like this.
• Immortality Seeker: As inThe Epic of Gilgamesh, this is his main goal in Smite. He seeks to defeat Tiamat so the gods can give him immortality in return.
  "Death still grips my heart. Until I find the answer to death, my spirit, my kingdom, and my dear friend Enkidu will be lost to me forever."
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Due to this taking place after his Character Development with Enkidu. Gilgamesh is brash and highly arrogant, but is brave, kind, and fiercely loyal to those whom he considers his friends.
  • He shows more of this trait in the Odyssey: Perilous Seas lore, where he hesitates to strike Charybdis because she is a child (or at least appears to be one.)
• Manly Facial Hair: He sports a manly beard and has the heroic reputation befitting it. It’s even decorated with two bands of gold, so blingy as well as badass.
• Manly Man: His kit isn't quite as designed to display his Super-Strength as Hercules’, but he still has a lot of hypermasculinity to him, being a highly muscular man (clearly displayed by his choice of dress) who drop kicks his enemies.
• Mission from God: The reason why Gilgamesh has (re)appeared in the Smite world. His Babylonian gods have told him of Tiamat’s return and tasked him with defeating her once and for all.
  • As of the Odyssey: Perilous Seas lore, however, he is beginning to question whether this mission is right or not. He recognizes that he has no personal grudge against Tiamat and that some of her actions are understandable. He also realizes that his deal with the Babylonian gods may not be the best way to get what he wants, given how they were the ones who originally betrayed Tiamat and may do the same to him.
• Mr. Fanservice: Fittingly for someone who once attracted the attention of Ishtar (the goddess of war and sex), he is shown with a shapely muscular body, lush hair and beard and bold facial features.
• Mythology Gag: His ultimate, Winds Of Shamash, is based on a moment in the Epic when he called upon the sun god Shamash to help him kill the giant Humbaba. His defeat screen also has him get repeatedly knocked over and smacked around by a bull, a reference to the Bull of Heaven he famously fought.
  • Becomes a Tear Jerker when you realize that he was only able to defeat the Bull with the help of Enkidu, and now that Enkidu’s gone he has been left to get walloped by it.
• Purple Is Powerful: as one of the earliest recorded demigod heroes and a king, his cape and tabards are various shades of purple and magenta.
• Punched Across the Room: His Drop Kick has some pretty high knockback, capable of blasting a foe halfway across a lane.
• Semi-Divine: Similar to Achilles, Gilgamesh has partial divine blood which makes him quite eligible to join the Battleground of the Gods. However, he is peculiar in that his heritage makes him 2/3 god and 1/3 human, which still isn’t enough to grant him Immortality.
• Shout-Out: One of his jokes is simultaneously a Pun, a tribute to his friend Enkidu and a reference to Yoda’s famous quote from Star Wars.
  "You're going to try? Enki-Do or Enki-Don't! There is no try!"
• Together in Death: If killed, he believes he will be this with Enkidu, judging by one of his death quotes.
  "I shall see you soon.. old friend."
• Trrrilling Rrrs: Has a notable case of this in his voicelines, probably to show that he comes from the Near East.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: Aside from a cape and some leather straps, he doesn’t wear much on his well-built torso.
• Wouldn't Hurt a Child: In the Odyssey: Perilous Seas lore, he hesitates to fight Charybdis because she is a child—even though she is actually a sea monster freed by Tiamat. The event pushes him further towards the realization that his mission to defeat Tiamat may be wrong, or at least conducted in the wrong way.

Guardians

The Babylonian Pantheon has no Guardians so far.

Mages

Tiamat, Goddess of the Salt Sea

"Your world is flawed and full of corruption! I have arrived to cleanse the land and reshape it in my own image!"

Voiced by: Lani Minella

Extraterrestrial Voiced by: Rebecca Davis

One of the Babylonian Pantheon's primordial deities, the symbol of Chaos. After siring many deities with her mate Apsu, her descendants rebelled and sealed him away, prompting Tiamat to wage war against them until she was banished by Marduk.

As a Mage, Tiamat is a jack-of-all-trades that blasts opponents at range from the skies before diving down and finishing them off up close.

During battle, Tiamat has a ranged Flying Stance and a melee Grounded Stance that she can switch between with each form's respective third abilities.

• Tiamat's passive is Death Begets Life, which grants her increased survivability when nearby units (friend and foe) die near her. In Flying Stance, she restores a small amount of health, while in Grounded Stance, she can generate Hardened Scales to provide considerable damage mitigation.
• Flying Stance:
  • In Flying Stance, her first ability is Primordial Onslaught, which has her channel to generate orbs of energy that she then fires in a line, piercing minions and stopping on the first God they hit. As the ability is ranked up, Tiamat increases the amount of orbs she can fire.
  • Her second flying ability is Ruination, which has her deal damage to an area twice, with the second blast being smaller, but stronger, with the ability to stun the target.
  • Her third flying ability, Grounding Dive has her charge forward and slam onto the ground, dealing damage at the landing point. Dive switches Tiamat to Grounded Stance, and also provides Tiamat with a Hardened Scale.
  • Her ultimate in Flying Stance, Children of Creation, lets her cast one of three other abilities, each one summoning her children on the battlefield:
    • Summon Serpents creates a pit that summons two waves of two serpents that travel down lanes to reinforce minion waves and reduce the damage of enemies they hit.
    • Summon Beast calls a monster that guards an area, charging and slowing a god that gets too close.
    • Summon Storm creates a storm that chases down the nearest enemy, dealing damage over time before knocking up the target when it expires.
      
      
• Grounded Stance:
  • In Grounded Stance, her first ability is Consume, which is a short range cone that damage and slows enemies hit. Tiamat is also capable of executing her Serpent and Beasts (gaining Hardened Scales) as well as minions, monsters, and buff holders below a certain health-threshold (executing a buff monster gives her that buff while dropping a second buff for an ally).
  • Her second Grounded ability is Outburst, which creates a series of rifts that damage and knock up enemies hit.
  • Her third ability in Grounded Stance is Rising Flight, which has her quickly propel herself backward and into the air, dealing damage at the starting point, and switching her to Flying Stance.
  • Her ultimate in Grounded Stance is Tempest Of Undoing, which is a spin attack that damages enemies on hit, giving Tiamat a Hardened Scale for each God hit, while also slowly revoking the existence of enemies hit, dealing additional damage over time.

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• Always a Bigger Fish: Tiamat has the honor of being one of the few entities to pull this off on Cthulhu, as she casually imprisons him while the cosmic horror is mentally torturing Zeus. This really puts into perspective just how powerful Tiamat is.
• Blow You Away: Summon Storm has Tiamat summon Umu dabrutu, a storm that follows enemies before knocking them upwards and dissipating.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: In her reveal trailer, she casually delivers one to Cthulhu while the latter is mentally torturing Zeus, and seals him back under the ocean.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Tiamat is the official, literal puncher of Cthulhu in this verse. Takes an older, even more ancient abomination to destroy such a nightmarish one.
• Draconic Abomination: Her overall design is that of a classic quadrupedal winged dragon, but she is a primordial deity — the first god in SMITE's cosmology — who spent untold eons slumbering in the depths of primordial chaos until she met her mate Abzu, and with him created the Heavens and the Earth. Touches like her fishy tail and the various symbols on her help clue in how utterly ancient and outright unfathomable she really is.
• Dragons Are Divine: As shown in her reveal trailer, Tiamat is a colossal draconic goddess with golden scales and armor, white fur, small wings with glowing blue feathers, and a halo that acts as an extension of said wings. As an added bonus, her halo features the Dingir symbol, a sign in the Mesopotamian cuneiform script meaning “god” or “goddess”. This symbol is also carved into a golden plate on her forehead.
• Even Evil Has Standards: In the Odyssey: Perilous Seas lore, she does not approve of the destruction and carnage Scylla and Charybdis wrought in order to draw out Zeus.
• Evolving Attack: Primordial Onslaught initially allows Tiamat to fire two orbs of energy. This increases to four when she reaches rank 3, and caps at a maximum of six at rank 5.
• Flight: Her flying stance involves her taking to the air.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: In line with her plan to remake the world In Their Own Image in the storyline, Season 8 begins with a new Conquest map that has trappings of Babylonian architecture.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: In her reveal trailer, Tiamat creates a pack of canine-like monsters. In the game proper, however, none of the monsters summoned by Children of Creation are said canine-like monsters.
• Giant Flyer: Appears as one in the trailer when she flies from the ocean to the top of her new temple.
• Instant Runes: Cuneiform runes appear behind Tiamat when she uses Primordial Onslaught. According to Tiamat's concept art, said runes are her name in Cuneiform script (𒀭𒋾𒊩𒆳).
• I'll Kill You!: She declares this of Gilgamesh after he shows up to challenge her.
  Tiamat: King Gilgamesh, you seek immortality. But you found only DEATH!
• In Their Own Image: In her reveal trailer, she repairs the damage caused by Cthulhu, but also states that it's only so she can do this. Smite's lore further elaborates that she seeks to return the world to the way it was as she remembered it, before the younger gods were born and began making their own marks upon it.
• Life Drain: If an ally, enemy, or Minion dies while proximate to Tiamat in her flying stance, she gains health.
• Lord of the Ocean: The primordial goddess of salt water, she is first seen in her reveal trailer emerging from the ocean.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Tiamat can accumulate Hardened Scales via her abilities in ground stance, which mitigate the damage she takes.
• Mighty Roar: In her reveal trailer, she releases a triumphant roar after she has landed on top of her new temple.
• Monster Progenitor: In her reveal trailer, she creates a horde of canine minions to enforce her rule, before they are slain by Gilgamesh. Her Ultimate ability in flying stance, Children of Creation, enables her to Summon one out of three different types of monster — the Serpents of Tiamat, the Kusarikku, and the Umu dabrutu — each with different effects.
• Mother Goddess: In Mesopotamian Mythology, alongside Abzu, she was the creator of the cosmos and birthed the first generation of gods. SMITE's lore also states that she created the world the game is set in as well, and is enraged that lesser gods would dare claim it for themselves.
• Mother of a Thousand Young: In Mesopotamian Mythology, she birthed several races of monsters to wage war on the other gods, after they slew her lover Apsu. In the game proper, she can use Children of Creation to summon one of three different types of monster, each with their own effects.
• Non-Mammal Mammaries: Averted, making her the first monstrous female character in SMITE to not have them. Ironically, she is actually described as having breasts in the original myths.
• Offing the Offspring: Tiamat can use her Consume ability on Serpents of Tiamat and Kusarikku. This instantly kills them and provides her with a Hardened Scale.
• One-Hit Kill: Consume automatically kills any Minions, Large Monsters, or Buff Holders below a certain health threshold that fall under its area of effect, as well as any Serpents of Tiamat and Kusarikku.
• Our Dragons Are Different: She is a primordial goddess that takes the appearance of a winged dragon. Unlike Fafnir, it is her true form.
• Our Founder: The Babylonian city she erects from the ocean has such a statue.
• Our Minotaurs Are Different: Kusarikku is a humanoid bull monster.
• Power Copying: If Tiamat uses Consume to execute a Buff Holder, she duplicates its buff for herself, while leaving the normally dropped buff on the ground for a teammate to pick up. If she picks up another dropped buff normally, this enables her to hold two regular buffs at a time.
• The Power of Creation: Her reveal trailer has her using this ability to reverse the destruction Cthulhu caused to Mount Olympus, and erecting a Babylonian city out of the depths of the ocean.
• Pretender Diss: In the reveal trailer for Season 8's Conquest Map, it is implied that she sees the other gods as such, and pointedly tells their followers so.
  Tiamat: You believe in gods that made your world a battleground. Witness the might OF A TRUE GOD!
• Primordial Chaos: She is a representation of this, not just for her own pantheon but also for the entire SMITE universe. In fact, during the Talons of Tyranny event lore she calls Neith a “daughter of her daughters” because she (Tiamat) is the true mistress of the primordial waters from which Neith arose.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
  • A variant of this, as in the reveal trailer for Season 8's Conquest Map, she denounces the other gods as warmongering liars to their followers, and encourages them to worship her instead.
  • Is on the receiving end of this later courtesy of Shiva, who calmly but fiercely calls out Tiamat for her extreme pride and petty anger.
• Sea Monster: She emerges from the depths of the ocean and has physical features based on several types of sea animals. Her body is covered with plates reminiscent of crustacean shells, her neck and tail are fringed with jellyfish-like membranes and the shape of her head seems to be based on that of a Goblin Shark.
• Shockwave Stomp: Outburst consists of Tiamat stomping on the ground, causing the earth directly in front of her to rupture, damaging and knocking up any enemies caught up in the attack.
• Spared by the Adaptation: In Mesopotamian Mythology, Tiamat and her lover Apsu were slain by the younger gods after the latter attempted to wipe them out but failed. Smite's lore changes this aspect of the myth to state that Apsu was sealed away by the younger gods while Tiamat herself went into a deep hibernation after being banished by the younger gods. This allowed for Tiamat to be involved in the game's storyline, with her presence being explained as her awakening from this slumber. Additionally, it also opens the door for Apsu to potentially be added to the game in a future update.
• Stance System: Tiamat has two stances, flying and grounded, each with their own set of abilities and ultimates. Using the third ability of each stance enables Tiamat to switch to the other stance. Her flying stance focuses on ranged magical attacks, while her grounded stance is melee-based. When using her ultimate in flying stance, Children of Creation, Tiamat changes her posture slightly, which the developers have colloquially referred to as a third stance, by virtue of the fact that it grants Tiamat access to three more abilities.
• Super-Persistent Predator: Summon Serpents enables Tiamat to summon a wave of two Serpents of Tiamat, for a maximum of two waves (and four serpents in all). The serpents will travel down lanes and attack any enemies they come across, and won't stop attacking until they are slain.
• Summon Magic: Her ultimate in flying stance, Children of Creation, enables her to summon one of three different monsters of the player's choice, each with their own unique powers and traits.
• Superpower Lottery: Tiamat is a stance switcher that has two stances, flying and grounded, and a passive, Death Begets Life, which is common to both her stances. Each stance has three abilities (Primordial Onslaught, Runiation, and Grounding Dive for her flying stance, and Consume, Outburst, and Rising Flight for her grounded stance) and an ultimate (Children of Creation for her flying stance and Tempest of Undoing for her grounded stance). Her ultimate in flying stance also allows her to access three more abilities (Summon Serpents, Summon Beast, and Summon Storm). This gives Tiamat a whopping ten or eleven abilities, depending on if one counts Children of Creation as an ability in its own right, since its only effect is to allow the player to choose between three abilities. Either way, this is the largest number of abilities out of any god currently in the game, beating out the eight abilities that the previous record holders, King Arthur and Merlin, had. If that was not enough, Tiamat is also the first and only god capable of holding two regular jungle buffs simultaneously, rather that the standard one. In addition to picking up a buff normally, she can use Consume to execute a buff holder and duplicate its buff, while still leaving the normally dropped buff for a teammate to pick up.
• Tail Slap: Gives a hefty one to Gilgamesh in his teaser trailer.
• Terrifying Rescuer: While she stops Cthulhu's mental assault on Zeus and fixes the damage that he has caused, she also makes it clear that she intends to remake the world In Their Own Image. Gilgamesh showing up to challenge her also suggests that her intentions are less than benign.
• Time Abyss: Tiamat is officially the most ancient being in the SMITE universe, having existed in the primordial void for ages before she herself created the world now claimed by other gods. In the Talons of Tyranny event lore, Baba Yaga describes her as the "first sea" from which everything came.
• Villainous Rescue: In her reveal trailer, she shows up to rescue Zeus as he is being mentally tormented by Cthulhu. However, given that she states that she will remake the world in her image afterwards, it's safe to say that she doesn't have good intentions.

Assassins

The Babylonian Pantheon has no Assassins so far.

Hunters

Ishtar, Goddess of Love and War

"This land holds many wonders and secrets hidden from the eye of man. It takes a woman's touch to bring out the beauty in a battlefield."

Voiced by: Dalia Ramahi

The Babylonian god of love, war, and fertility, Ishtar is considered to be one of the chief deities within the Babylonian pantheon. Cruel, wrathful, and power-hungry, Ishtar is a figure who lives up to her title of a deity of warfare, often going on conquests, causing discord and chaos among those who displease her, and even causing her lovers to suffer. Because of this, Gilgamesh ultimately rejected her affection following a proposal of love, to which Ishtar caused the death of Enkidu and became his arch-nemesis. For her actions, she was once banished to the underworld, only to be rescued by Enki, the only god in the pantheon to respect her.

Ishtar is a Hunter who uses her tactical knowledge to adapt to any situation.

• Her passive is Mark Of Vengeance. When dropping below 75% HP, she marks the enemy god that most recently damaged her, gaining a stacking Attack Speed buff when hitting that god with basic attacks. If Ishtar is involved with a kill or assist on that marked god, she receives a large movement speed increase for a few seconds.
• Her first ability is Imbue Arrows, which allows her to change the attributes of her basic attacks for a few seconds.
  • Strike Shot fires arcing explosive shots that can be fired over walls, dealing increased base damage but reduced critical damage.
  • Spread Shot adds four additional arrows alongside her main arrow. These extra shots deal greatly reduced damage and can't trigger item effects.
  • Storm Shot increases her attack speed, projectile speed, and range, but her attacks deal slightly reduced damage.
• Her second ability is Rolling Thunder, which sends down four lightning strikes in a line, with Ishtar having the option to choose the direction in which the strikes travel. Enemies hit by more than one strike are Mesmerized.
• Her third ability is Jolt, which has her charge forward, damaging all enemies in her path. If she hits an enemy god, she'll jump backwards and fire her bow at them, dealing damage in an area around the affected god. This arrow is treated as a basic attack, so it can deal critical damage and trigger basic attack item affects.
• Her ultimate is Blades Of Retribution. Ishtar becomes CC immune while preparing to fire out 5 swords of light in a cone in front of her after a moment, damaging and crippling enemies hit. The swords will remain at their destination before returning to Ishtar after a few seconds or when the ability is recast, damaging and crippling enemies on the return. Enemies are stunned if they're hit on both the initial cast and the return. Hitting multiple swords at once deals reduced damage, with the damage penalty resetting when the swords are recalled.

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• Action Girl: The ultimate example of one from Mesopotamian Mythology. While she is associated with sex and femininity, Ishtar oversees the domain of war and is known for her ferocity.
• Animal Motif: Lions, which are her sacred animals. They are heavily featured on her outfit and weapon, and a couple of them also appear in the background of her default card art.
• Arch-Enemy: To Gilgamesh. She was the ultimate cause of his best friend Enkidu's death, and he clearly displays a vendetta towards her in her teaser trailer. The feeling is mutual as Gilgamesh has frequently confounded and humiliated Ishtar, so she seeks to get even.
• Bling of War: As a war goddess, she is decked out in shining gold armor, ornate jewelry, and vibrant fabrics.
• Blood Knight: As can be seen from her voicelines, she really looks forward to the sweet bliss of battle.
• Crown of Horns: She wears a large pair of bull's horns on her head which glow when her passive is active. It may be a reference to the Bull of Heaven she sent to attack Gilgamesh, but horned crowns were also worn by most gods in Mesopotamian art.
• Dynamic Entry: In her teaser trailer, she lands in a blast of golden light and electric sparks, which Gilgamesh barely manages to dodge.
• Enemy Mine: Played with. In Surtr's reveal trailer, Ishtar and her archenemy Gilgamesh are fighting the Fire Giant on a five-god team together, but with Surtr being the Fire Giant jungle boss players have been pummeling for years and treated as such in-universe, their teaming up may be purely a shout-out to in-game team composition, rather than a pairing necessitated in the story.
• Hard Light: The swords summoned in her Blades Of Retribution ability are made of light.
• Heaven Above: One of her major titles is “Queen of Heaven.”
• Improbable Aiming Skills: The Strike Shot enhancement from her Imbue Arrows ability allows her to fire arrows that can go over walls.
• Interplay of Sex and Violence: Her main theme. Ishtar embodies both the passion of love and the destruction of war, and can switch between these two facets in an instant. In the first chapter of the Odyssey: Soaring Isles lore, she tries to seduce Gilgamesh after engaging him in combat.
• Master of the Levitating Blades: She summons five floating swords to hurl at Gilgamesh in her teaser trailer. This turns out to be her ultimate ability Blades Of Retribution, where she fires the swords in a cone before having them fly back to her.
• The Musketeer: While she mainly uses her bow, she pulls out the two swords on her back to slash enemies during her Jolt ability.
• Mythology Gag:
  • She asks for her sister Ereshkigal to release her in one of her death voicelines, a reference to the story where Ishtar descends to Ereshkigal's underworld domain and ends up trapped there (to say the least). The ending of this story, where Ishtar’s husband Dumuzid is sent to take her place in the underworld because he did not mourn for her, is referenced in one of her jokes.
  • One of her other jokes refers to the story in which Ishtar destroyed Mount Ebih because its natural beauty was an affront to her authority.
• Navel-Deep Neckline: Her gold breastplates show all the space in between.
• Revenge: Ishtar is extremely vengeful towards anyone who obstructs her desires or insults her pride. This part of her personality is reflected in her passive, where she marks the god who most recently hit her and gains attack speed while hitting them.
• Shock and Awe: Her arrows and abilities all crackle with electricity to reflect her association with storms. Her second ability Rolling Thunder has her send down four lightning strikes in a line, applying the Mesmerized effect to enemies who are hit by more than one strike.
• Take Over the World: Ishtar is all about challenging other gods and taking over their domains if they are not strong enough to resist her. She famously did so with many gods in her own pantheon, and now she is setting her sights on other pantheons in SMITE. In fact, she declares that Olympus is hers for the taking in her direct taunt to Zeus.
• War God: She is this combined with a Love Goddess.

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