Quick Zhong Kui Conquest Guide

Hi, this guide is brought to you by Kriega1, I started playing Smite on PS4 in 2016 around Erlang Shen's release in Season 3, and eventually long term migrated to PC Smite around mid Season 7. I have peaked GM/Masters on PS4 and Masters in Ranked Conquest on PC. I also am a Mentor on the Official Smite Discord where I focus on general building for each role. I hope you find this guide as a useful learning resource for playing Zhong Kui in the Mid lane.

WIP

Passive - Demon Bag

Ability 1 - Expose Evil

Ability 2 - Exorcism

Ability 3 - Book of Demons

Ultimate - Recall Demons

Main Combos:

WIP

• Start at the Fire Giant side Speed/Red buff. When it spawns, hit it with an auto attack to leash/aggro the camp and pull it towards the intersection (towards mid lane) between the Speed and Red buff camps, at the same time your Jungler will have leashed the Red/Speed buff towards the intersection.
  
  
• As the 2 camps position together use Book of Demons (With assistance from Golden Shard) to clear the camps. Make sure to pickup the Red buff once it has dropped. After these camps are cleared you will be level 2.
  
  
• Now quickly make your way to the Gold Fury side Speed buff, if your jungler has not reached it yet (they should be) then leash the camp yourself towards the mid lane while you use Expose Evil to clear the camp. Avoid pulling the camp into tower range if possible. After this you will immediately head to lane while your jungler will typically clear the xp camp to the side of the green buff.
  
  
• From here you will usually meet the enemy mid in lane on the first wave. Depending on yours and their early pressure/clear and positioning you will decide whether you'll be able to fight or not and whether you'll be able to use Expose Evil on the whole wave or just be able to hit the front melee minions.
  
  
• How it goes from here will determine: if it's just a stalemate, you or your jungler has kill potential, if you will have mid camp pressure or if you'll have to back towards your tower line and safe clear.
  
  
• From here you'll mainly be looking to clear waves, contest mid camps, clear the damage buff, assist support with health buff clear (once they rotate over from duo), and being aware of rotation opportunities.
  
  
• In some cases you may be able to steal enemy side jungle farm but it is risky and not that generally beneficial for direct farm compared to your own side's farm and controlling neutral farm, but can be useful to put the enemy further behind.

• As the match goes towards the mid game, other than the usual farm opportunities you'll be looking to control the Stygian Beacon for your team and try attempt, contest and steal (if the enemy is attempting to kill them) the Gold Fury and Pyromancer objectives.
  
  
• When the Beacon spawns often both teams will try rotate over to control it, especially the mid, support and jungle. In 1vs1 cases you'll have to decide whether you or the other enemy has more kill potential and who is more likely to have their teammates to rotate over first to impact your decision if contesting the beacon will be worth it.
  
  
• As for Gold Fury and Pyromancer opportunities they will vary on factors such as: your team's overall objective shred, your ADC's current objective shred / build, your team's map pressure, how strong each team's teamfight is, where on the map everyone is (i.e. if one team is doing Gold, the other may decide to do Pyro as a smaller trade), if any members of the enemy team are on a respawn timer, etc...

• At this stage you'll mainly be looking at wave pushing, contesting Fire Giant, and Phoenix sieging / Phoenix defense, though Pyromancer and Gold Fury (especially Oni variant) will still be somewhat relevant but less important.
  
  
• As for late game teamfights, most often you will be positioned in the "backline" (behind your team's solo and support - who generally are the "frontline") and will play around your ADC to deal with the enemy frontline and jungler, while making sure to put out as much damage as possible to the highest threats on the enemy team.
  
  
• When it comes to Fire Giant opportunities, often there can be stalemates where both teams will try to force a teamfight or look for lone picks in order to gain an advantage, sometimes involving one team going for a non fully committing attempt at doing the objective to bait the other team to step up.

Here are your regular warding spots for mid, to help your team be aware of the enemy team's general rotations especially when you're not in mid lane. Generally with good map awareness you shouldn't need to rely on wards much yourself for safety.

• Green: Placing wards at these locations on both sides of the lane give you good general vision of the nearby jungle, giving vision of the entrances to your lane so you can see incoming ganks.
  
  
• Purple: You can place a ward directly in front of the enemy tower (but not within its range), which can give you a lot of information if you keep an eye on the mini-map. If they are sitting on the ward in mid, you know where they are. If their icons push further into the lane, you can assume they are pushing. If they go towards the right or left jungles you can make early calls on "Be Carefuls" or "Enemy Incoming" or you can assume they are doing their buff camps. If their icons move backwards towards their tower you can generally assume that they are going to one of the back pathways into the jungle, likely to clear camps.

Over here is shown the ideal lategame warding spots around Fire Giant, though often you will be sharing the responsibility for this rather than handling it alone, especially when it's not safe for you to step up to place deeper wards. Any wards placed closer to the objective within the Fire Giant pit tend to get destroyed by Sentries more often than not, so they tend to not be reliable.

Remember, minions act as moving wards in the lanes, and are able to spot nearby gods. If your towers are down, keep your minions pushed up as much as possible to provide an extra set of eyes.

• White Circles: These are all offensive locations that allow you to spot enemies near to or approaching objectives, and are helpful in covering multiple approaches. The closer you get to the Fire Giant, the more contested those spots will be and the more likely enemies will try to counter-ward.
  
  The ones closest to the enemy base can give you very early notice.
  
  
• Red Circles: Fairly obvious, but it's always good to have vision on the main jungle objectives, especially the Fire Giant. Sentry Wards are key here, as they allow you to spot and remove enemy wards. You can place wards directly on top of the objectives, or put them slightly to one side to try to spot enemy wards or protect yours from being detected.

Counter-Warding: Enemies may drop wards on your defensive side in similar (opposite) spots to where you would place yours. If the Fire Giant is already covered and you have a spare Sentry Ward, place them in these spots to limit the enemy's vision on your team.

Defensive Warding: If you're pushed back to your phoenixes or inside your base, locate your wards in the nearby jungle and general approaches.