How do you beat pantheon in lane, or atleast not feed him as a nontank toplaner?

doodlebob666·Jan 6, 2017·15 votes·6,291 views

Okay I know pantheon is a lane bully, but all bullies have a weakness, whether it be high cd's(renekton), or large parts of their damage that is gated behind different requirements that can be played around(darius) or (if riot is feeling sadistic) you can spend 75 gold to negate their ult(rip teemo).

Pantheon doesn't seem to have any of these, his cooldowns are short, his damage completely undodgeable and all of it in an instant burst with a built in execute. But he also doesn't have an insane winrate/playrate/banrate, so people must be able to deal with him. Unfortunately i can't, not from lack of trying I got to rank 5 on him to figure out how to beat him, and I still have no idea how to fight him. The only top lane carry that I could actually fight me was jayce and even then I won that game because he couldn't stop me from roaming. How do i beat him, aside from picking maokai with a full armor runepage and a cloth armor start?

53 Comments

Miror BJan 6, 20177 votes

There are two ways to "beat" pantheon: either survive the laning phase (as outside of that he's useless when not massively fed) or just beat him outright with poke (jayce being rather good into him).

doodlebob666Jan 6, 20171 votes

Who can out poke pantheon? The spear range is more than both gnar and teemo's auto range, and he can burst both of those two extremely easily. Would kennen and quinn n be a good champs for that? since I suck at jayce and their aren't many other strong ranged tops

Papa AndreiJan 6, 20178 votes

Urgot. No joke, Land that e on him and watch him run and cry because he can't block your Q

Im Taylor SwiftJan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Who can out poke pantheon? The spear range is more than both gnar and teemo's auto range, and he can burst both of those two extremely easily. Would kennen and quinn n be a good champs for that? since I suck at jayce and their aren't many other strong ranged tops

I main quinn and i must tell you that pantheon is a hard lane for her, unless you have lots of practice and you use your vault right after he tries to jump to you as quinn's vault cancels most gapclosers,then you start beat him. Anyways, if you are not experienced with her i wouldnt reccomend it, one mistake and he blows you up.

Tychusfindlay919Jan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Who can out poke pantheon? The spear range is more than both gnar and teemo's auto range, and he can burst both of those two extremely easily. Would kennen and quinn n be a good champs for that? since I suck at jayce and their aren't many other strong ranged tops

urgot and vladimir. I know vladimir is a little meh since the mastery changes and the nerfs hit him quite a bit, but if you're a good vlad he should still handle pantheon well.

AeszarckJan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Who can out poke pantheon? The spear range is more than both gnar and teemo's auto range, and he can burst both of those two extremely easily. Would kennen and quinn n be a good champs for that? since I suck at jayce and their aren't many other strong ranged tops

Maybe I'm just a pretty bad Quinn, but I've had a lot of trouble against Pantheon in the past as her.

I've found success with Lissandra, Jayce, and Rumble. I hear Ryze works okay, but I haven't played much Ryze.

Sire HippingtonJan 6, 20176 votes

He does have some mana issues, and he lacks any escapes or sustain. Going for some early armor and sustain, even if it delays your usuall built, can work wonders together with playing save. Also any champ that can poke him from outside his range can give him a hard time due to his lack of sustain. Normaly, junglers are a big issue for pant, though those guys are rarly top anymorewith the current state of the game.

PermabannedGarenJan 6, 20174 votes

Generally speaking? You don't.

There are very few champions that can actually beat Pantheon in lane, and most of his "counters" don't actually beat him in lane, they just can survive his early game and be more useful later. Champions like Nasus, Malphite (after you get sunfire if you're not feeding him you sort of win automatically, it is very easy to duel Pantheon as Malphite), or Gangplank are good for this.

The only champions I think probably beat him in lane are Jayce (who is hilariously overtuned right now) and perhaps Darius.

Tychusfindlay919Jan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Generally speaking? You don't.

There are very few champions that can actually beat Pantheon in lane, and most of his "counters" don't actually beat him in lane, they just can survive his early game and be more useful later. Champions like Nasus, Malphite (after you get sunfire if you're not feeding him you sort of win automatically, it is very easy to duel Pantheon as Malphite), or Gangplank are good for this.

The only champions I think probably beat him in lane are Jayce (who is hilariously overtuned right now) and perhaps Darius.

Darius and pantheon is a question of whether or not darius can trade with pantheon Q for Q. Darius wins because his Q hurts a bit more, has no mana cost level 1 compared to pantheon Q, and has healing attached. If pantheon manages to get his own Qs while avoiding darius Q retaliation, darius will quickly start to lose that matchup if he doesnt back off. Darius auto wins at level 6 because his ult is just better, period.

KVbqbFsC8eJan 6, 20173 votes

You beat him by simply not dying. You can't actually fight him, especially if he brings ignite. If you don't give him any kills early he falls off even harder.

DelimonJan 6, 20173 votes

You don't, he's broken and needs early game nerfs compensated with late game buffs. The only way that you're going to beat a pantheon 1 v 1 in lane is with a jungler gank.

Akali is SO HOTJan 6, 20172 votes

If you're a melee champ you are almost guaranteed to lose lane unless the pantheon player is really bad. The way you beat Pantheon is just not feeding him. Don't be greedy and go in for that minion if it means losing half your health to him. Accept the fact that you are going to lose a lot of cs during the laning phase and make up for it later on in the game when you have the chance to free farm and roam for kills where you are much more useful than he is.

noxus is opJan 6, 20172 votes

there is alot of personal skill required in this match up as well like take Riven for example: she can infact duel a panth in lane equaly or win if she goes in lvl 1 to 2 with cloth 4 and most likely fervor for masteries. a darius wins if he builds armor first as well and i usually run stormraiders on Darius against anything squishy. an Irelia can just wait till lvl 6 to all in him and beat him due to outscaling him but only when using the q against a near dead minion. Fiora i dont have as much expertise with but i believe she goes in at lvl 6 due to outscaling him aswell. Gnar usually just waits to build his rage while at the same time poking away Pantheon his passive but i also recommend cloth. Renekton usually in his favor if he can auto away passive b4 pressing w then q. Poppy straight up outscales him with like 1 tier 2 armor item not even gonna lie. Camille im not even gonna go into her i hate her fucking guts so much if i see her in the game i get tilted regardless i dont know how she is to panth because i refuse to play her i learned about her capabilities though but idk man idk. thats my gold expertise take it with a grain of salt but these are from my personal experiences thank you for taking your time to read it if you did.

Tychusfindlay919Jan 6, 20172 votes

Pantheon's biggest gate is his mana costs. It's not that his Q has a high mana cost per se (it;'s only 45), but if you actually look at his Q damage, it's pitiful, but spammable.

SO pantheon spends all lane trying to just Q you the hell out while his passive acts as a hard anti-all in (because pantheon is very squishy himself and is vulnerable to all ins when you actually get on him and get through his passive). It's a recipe for insane bully potential, and the killer is that when it comes to avoiding his Q, there is no counterplay other than stay out of its range.

If I want to be a technical asshole, I'd recommend darius (if darius is able to trade even one or two Qs, pantheon will run far OOM before he ever gets close to killing darius) or renekton (Renekton has manaless sustain in the form of his own Q which negates a ton of pantheon's poke, and so pantheon runs OOM) because they aren't tanks.

But to stay true to the spirit of the OP, there are only three non-tanks I'd recommend besides Jayce. One is vladimir in terms of kit counters. Unfortunately, vladimir is kind of in the gutter after riot decided he had to die balance-wise. Vlad works well into pantheon because he can spam his Q to negate a lot of pantheon's poke and even poke pantheon back. A decent riven can negate most of pantheon's poke with her E and farm safely because pantheon cannot force a trade with riven and riven cannot force a trade with pantheon. Finally, rumble. Rumble is the king of spam anything and everything. He can spam a shield to negate pantheon's poke and he can spam his flamespitter to mindlessly shove the wave so hard that if pantheon tries to poke him he'll start losing cs.

SGT Dingle BerryJan 6, 20171 votes

I'm glad he's in top lane punishing all the players bringing squishies into a role best used for tanky/hard engage roles. But hey, let's pick something that doesn't fit the comp at all and then QQ about losing at the end.

doodlebob666Jan 6, 20172 votes

http://imgur.com/gallery/YX6ZTJ2

Dark NephthysJan 6, 20171 votes

As what other people said to just survive. Another example of that is to just play passive until you reach level 6. Since his ultimate is not something he is going to be able to use in a 1v1 fight against you. Sure he could roam to other lanes, or use it to get back to lane but if you both are in lane in a 1v1, in most cases you should have the advantage.

Also I'm sure Poppy is a good pick and maybe even Illaoi JarvanIV . Though honestly if I saw some one on the enemy team pick Pantheon, I'll prob just pick Chogath since he can sustain through his Q spam and if you land your Q + W on Pantheon then he is basically dead because of your ultimate and Cho'gath doesn't really care to much about Pantheon's shield all that much.

lilpokflufJan 6, 20171 votes

He pretty much one shots all squishies and destroys most melees without waveclear in lane. If you have this match up and you fit into those just accept that you lost lane and farm what you can without dying. You'll have to get outside help because it is very hard for pantheon to mess up his skills if you give him the opportunity to go all in.

doodlebob666Jan 6, 20171 votes

I would disagree with ganks being helpful since he can easily 2v1 pre 6 and after 6 your midlane is probably going to get mandropped if you let him push you in.

DelimonJan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

I would disagree with ganks being helpful since he can easily 2v1 pre 6 and after 6 your midlane is probably going to get mandropped if you let him push you in.

That's not how ganks work. When you gank HP is shared and you use crowd control to lock down the enemy laner so that they cannot do a lot of damage or you flat out burst them down. If you time it wrong you pay for it with pantheon which is why it's important to bait and switch.

Tychusfindlay919Jan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

I would disagree with ganks being helpful since he can easily 2v1 pre 6 and after 6 your midlane is probably going to get mandropped if you let him push you in.

pantheon is notoriously bad with handling ganks.

He has no sustain, he's inherently squishy, he has no escapes, and his kit is meant for bullying one person to hell and back, but is useless against anything more than one person.

Vanic998Jan 6, 20171 votes

Play a mage. With long range, Pantheon will never get close enough to hurt you without him losing half his hp. I play Vel'Koz top and it works extremely well against Juggernauts.

Shuriman CuratorJan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Play a mage. With long range, Pantheon will never get close enough to hurt you without him losing half his hp. I play Vel'Koz top and it works extremely well against Juggernauts.

Mind me asking, but what runes do you use with Vel'Koz top?

Vanic998Jan 6, 20171 votes

I use 3 AP Quints, 9 Armor Seals, 9 AP Glyphs, and 9 Magic Penetration Marks on Vel'Koz Top.

Shuriman CuratorJan 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

I use 3 AP Quints, 9 Armor Seals, 9 AP Glyphs, and 9 Magic Penetration Marks on Vel'Koz Top.

Awesome Thank You, i'll give this a try.

Irelia BotJan 6, 20171 votes

I kinda cheat and play Karma if I know I am against a panth.

Easily can pop his passive and poke him with Q.

If he tries to all in you use shield and link him and he will more then likely lose the trade.

If he coutner picked me then it is much harder. I always tend to get cloth armor to start since I can not stop him from poking me and if I get below about 40% health I am willing to back in order to not die to his combo.

Papa AndreiJan 6, 20171 votes

karma just is the NOPE NOT TODAY champ xD

SexualsaurusJan 6, 20171 votes

I beat a pantheon recently as my Quinn, sounds wierd but you can abuse him at lvl 1. All he can do at lvl 1 is throw a spear at you so he can't do much also at the start of the lane he hasn't stack his passive yet so trades are easier.

He has no sustain and his abilities have high mana cost. If you manage to bait out his mana then he has no way to fight you. Olaf can destroy him too, pantheon has no escapes and no way to stop a charging Olaf.

Ryze is another champ that can lock down a pantheon and has a shield to absorb some of his damage.

Automated RivenJan 6, 20171 votes

take cloth 4 and he runs out of mana before he can kill you. its basically the best way to beat him .. also running a fair amount of armor in runes is effective.

AptestJan 6, 20171 votes

buy your cloth armor BEFORE you rush your triforce.

yes i know you have it in your build and you plan for it to be the 4th item.

get it now.

SpoofghoulJan 6, 20171 votes

i pick yorick or sion into him they both beat the shit out of him due to outsustaining

basically with sion i can just max e and outrange and outpoke him and i have more sustain

with yorick pick warlords keystone as his ghouls do work with lifesteal and will heal you when they attack stuff, throw E on pantheon wall him watch as your ghouls claw him to pieces, repeat all laningphase long he has no sustain

Maximum MordeJan 6, 20171 votes

Play ranged mage works well.

five oh tree Jan 6, 20171 votes

Ekko Since ekko can't really lose lane (long range reliable wave clear) and has a good late game, he inherently beats pantheon. He can also easily kill pantheon after level 6 with some practice on him and good ping.

My IGN SucksJan 6, 20171 votes

If you're feeling ballsy, play Tryndamere . Now you're probably thinking, wtf no way because it seems really counter-intuitive considering Pantheon's poke, stun, and passive. But good players (think foggedftw1/2 and boxerpete) absolutely wreck Pantheon with what should be one of Pantheon's best matchups.

You aren't laning against Pantheon. You're laning against his mana pool. Which if you're resourceless and have sustain Tryndamere you can all in as soon as he can't combo because he used it all up throwing spears in your face.

WacingTheFindJan 6, 20171 votes

How to beat pantheon in lane:

YOU.DON'T.

AirKingNeoJan 6, 20171 votes

You can't actually beat Ignite Pantheon in lane. You'll have to safe farm.

EndlessSorcererJan 6, 20171 votes

The two best methods of "beating" Pantheon during the laning phase are:

[1] Survive

Pantheon falls off rather badly as the game progresses, so most champions outscale him rather well if they can stay relatively even with him. Build defensively early, try to avoid dying to him or missing significant amounts of gold/experience and you should be fine.

If nothing else, Doran's Shield and Ninja Tabi are useful items to rush against him before continuing into your normal build. Considering how mana-reliant Pantheon is, outlasting his mana pool is a legitimate victory condition.

[2] Call for assistance

Pantheon tends to play fairly aggressively during the laning phase to begin snowballing and he lacks any real escapes. Ask your jungler and/or mid-laner for ganks during the early laning phase to set Pantheon behind to help your allies begin snowballing.

GULAG 4 UJan 6, 20171 votes

Full armor rune page

Look at marshbouy's "pantheon suck my ass" rune page

alternatively go afk

SmileInABoxJan 6, 20171 votes

Sustain champs are great against him, like Swain and Irelia . Any champ that rushes early armor works well too, if you're patient enough to chill and farm under tower for the early levels (lookin at Malphite and Poppy here.) I also found that champs with a good combat ult are good against him too and can just all in him and kill him at level 6 since his ult doesn't offer any real power in combat. I used to main him, and ultimately the champs that gave me the hardest time were and Riven .

SqueyJan 6, 20171 votes

let him push you to tower, then get you jungler to gank. Pick a semi tank champ with a decent cc to help with the gank and profit. Or go a sustain heavy champion and get some armor first like irelia/ nasus. Goal being to just survive lane phase and out scale.
Or the 3rd option is go someone who can burst him down early and preferable 100-0 or close. As pantheon has to get some items b4 he can 100-0 you in 1 combo.

Oh or pick someone who can farm safely out of panths range like xerath/ swain

RookPusherJan 6, 20171 votes

Pantheon falls of hard if he doesn't get kills. You starve him out. Take someone who can heal well enough. I often go Maokai, go super tanky, then root him under the tower. You don't want kills, you just don't want to give him kills.

SchenixJan 6, 20171 votes

If you're asking how to beat a top laner with who that top laner does well against, the answer is fairly obvious. Just because you wanted to play a champion other than the pool that does well against him, does not entitle you to be easily able to beat him or have the possibility readily open.

So, as a bruiser or tank [or the exception that is Jayce for practically any top lane statement] -- it's relatively fine to go even or win on Pantheon through stalling, buying an early Vest, or simply abusing the champion strengths and durability or sustain versus Pantheons depleting mana pool. If you want to go into hard mode, and pick champions with little range and weaker early game as well -- why are you trying to achieve to win against Pantheon who counters that statement? Your champion must have a different strength, to optimize the use of a champion, you draw on their strengths.

To not feed a Pantheon is the better of those two inquiries; wave manipulation and jungle presence are a key tool if your champions strengths do not allow you to impact other lanes effectively through either roams, or Teleport. Wave manipulation, while a good tool, is a cog in the larger machine. You should know your junglers pathing, or at least predict the enemy junglers pathing so as to understand what you should do with the wave -- not just attempting to keep it on you near turret and be denied 75% of the CS by Pantheon. Pinging for your jungler when he pushes is nice of course, but as a squishier melee -- you are forced to walk to his range. This cannot be helped, you need to hope he misplays his own management or trades -- or manage yours to the best of your ability and ask for ganks, because Pantheons specialty lies in being a bully that is not affected by mobility creep. In these scenarios where he misplays, you need to act quickly and be very aware of your cooldowns and damage so as to make that misplay into a good trade.

That being said, Pantheon also has a decently depleting mana pool for what he is, so a Corrupting Pot, or Cloth 4, or Dorans Shield are not bad ideas to just out sustain him and stay back from the river against most junglers [rek'sai and lee sin and the like don't care of course, so be mindful]. It takes away from his snowballing a moderate amount and if you play it safely and hope their jungler isn't worlds better than yours, it should turn out relatively fine. Of course, as with any matchup, it is subject to rng / misplays / skill and should be allocated as such for self-evaluation constantly while attempting any form of small countermeasures or intelligent design.

Good luck however, and do hope you find a way for yourself.

coreychichiJan 7, 20171 votes

http://i.imgur.com/DpQ9YJl.png

Supreme Senpai69Jan 6, 20171 votes

Like many top laners, just don't feed him an absurd amount of kills and you just won lane. Like, you might not ever actually kill him. And that's fine. Just don't give him kills. You'll scale, he won't.

AeszarckJan 6, 20171 votes

Rumble is my favorite champion to play against him since I can shield whenever he tries to throw a spear, negating most of the damage. My Flamespitter poke bypasses his shield. If I manage my heat well, I can do a full combo when he jumps on me and turn the trade in my favor.

You don't want counterpicks though, you want tips. Firstly, take minions that you know are safe, and don't take ones that you'll take a beating for. If you think that getting a minion or a few minions is worth getting poked for, then do it. Once he throws his spear, it's on cooldown and he either has to trade with you or back off. Finish farming those minions because you know that you're not going to be harassed, but if he jumps on you, make sure to fight back. You're generally going to be on the same level of strength as him in a trading situation. His advantage is that he gets to harass you with a spear at range, but that doesn't matter much in melee range, where you can use all your abilities to full effect. You will eventually be poked down if you keep farming. Pantheon will walk up to you while you're farming, throw a spear, and probably back off (or maybe continue to threaten you by walking forwards). Try to avoid going into his spear range at all, and when you do, make the time you spend count. If you notice that the Pantheon is inclined to bully you hard by zoning you off the minion wave and threatening you with spears when you walk towards it, call your middle laner or jungler, because the wave should be pushing to you. If it isn't and he's freezing it, then bait him into trading with you. If he's smart he'll notice the change from you being a pansy to you being super ballsy, but he might not, which will give your middle laner/jungler a chance to gank.

That's all assuming you're melee. If you're not, the rules are a bit different. Like melee champions, some ranged champions get creamed, others have a good chance. Bringing down the shield and abusing the window where he doesn't have it to harass him is important, but make sure not to take minion agro or Pantheon's retaliatory trade will be significantly stronger. Try to stay out of range of his spear, and when he uses it to get a minion, try to abuse the cooldown as much as possible. Make sure not to push him too far in, because you'll get ganked and he sets up ganks well.

MunchCrunchLunchJan 7, 20171 votes

okay. so the only time I ever beat a pantheon was when I played Olaf . he was pretty bad so might be why. anyway. Never won that lane with any other hampion. darius can work. but if hes good. I doubt it really when he gets points in his Q even if hes losing he will just poke you out. if he shoves you under turret. you aren't safe either. because his passive allows him to go under and chunk you with a spear. walk out without talking damage. you just better hope you have a smart jungler and not a blind fuck basically. give olaf a try i guess. not many melees can fight him .if any at all. because he will simply poke you out with abilities and if you retaliate you take minion agro. his passive outtrades you and he will stun you in a minionwave. a good pantheon takes ignite. good luck winning that lane lmao. I've seen rumble work against him. am guessing swain can work too . mundo can farm safely with cleavers and eventually outscale if he finishes tabis and sunfire. pretty much 1v1 him after

but its pretty fraustrating that he makes about 90% of top lane roster obsolete

bottom line is that no champion with ranged abilities can actually beat him in lane its pretty much not possible unless hes worse.

EschetonJan 7, 20171 votes

You use a full armor runepage. That way he runs out of mana before poking you down. So no kill pressure. And seeing he tends not to run tp you can start to abuse him by pushing the lane. Works extra well against an ad jungle also.

AcidTheWarlockJan 7, 20171 votes

Don't die to him. Play like a bitch and get what farm you can. Call for ganks and ping missing after he leaves at 6. Just outscale, if you feed him even 1 or 2 kills he'll go crazy killing everyone he can go after. If it's TLD assassin build, he falls off hard around level 11 or 12, if it's tank with CotC he'll be another frontliner and still be a threat.

Don't get me wrong, his damage isn't nonthreatening after he falls off, but others just get better.

Biggus v ChungusApr 22, 20191 votes

I found Trundle to be good against him. Even when hes 3 kills ahead I was able to ult, q, and beat him. You steal all of armor and magic resist when you use your ult on him which makes him easier to fight.