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Why isn't anyone talking about Pantheon?

Xanit·5/11/2016, 4:59:02 PM·3 votes·963 views

Pantheon has been hanging around the position of #1 winrate toplaner by a huge margin, and he's BEEN #1 winrate midlaner for at least three months. I tried him out recently, and oh my goodness. I always knew he was a pain in the ass to fight, but he's so EASY too.

Just in case people forgot, since he's not very popular, I'll list a tl;dr of his abilities. (Also for demonstrative/comedic effect.) Passive: Free autoattack blocks just for attacking four times. He also has a gigantic base attack speed. Q: Targeted nuke, 100% crit chance on anyone with low HP, basically a free execute. Highly spammable, synergizes so well with Corrupting Potion that it's insane. W: Targeted gap closer, like every assassin ever (already awful design) with a stun tacked on, so it's ALSO an instant targeted disable (the WORST design). Also gives him a free autoattack block. E: AoE cone damage with an AD ratio of %300?? Also, this is what makes his Q and autoattacks execute with crits on enemies at low HP. R: Grand Skyfall. You've all seen it. At least it's not global, anymore.

So, with tons of guaranteed damage, huge mobility as a roamer, and assassin playstyle on a fighter's stat build... This guy's a complete monster and has not been addressed in a LONG time. I assume Riot has a rework in mind for him, considering his entire kit is a relic of ancient (and unfair) design philosophy, but he's not popular enough to warrant allowing him to dominate like Yi, Xin, and Zed are.

Riot doesn't have a rational reason to let him stay in this state... Nor an irrational reason, for that matter.

10 Comments

Ralanr5/11/2016, 5:23:24 PM3 votes

Pantheon is 6 in top and 11 in mid according to Champion.gg. He's not dominating as much as you think.

Pantheon's biggest weakness is time. The longer the game goes on, the less effective he becomes. Even if he builds tanky he can only target one person in a teamfight before blowing up. He's only useful late game if extremely fed and do be so fed he'd have to starve his team of kills (which is not the best idea).

Now personally I do think he needs a rework (preferably a VGU because his model is ugly and he could use some new lines). But it's mainly because of his scaling problem. Pantheon is a lane bully, that is what Riot wants him to be. But so many other lane bullies scale better as the game goes on.

Darius is terrifying. Renekton is better suited for tanking over Pantheon since he has a wider stun. Riven fucking snowballs like no tomorrow (Her early damage is high enough for me to consider her a lane bully. Yes she isn't "meta" right now, but that's like saying Twitch isn't an ADC because he isn't in the meta).

Pantheon? He graduates from lane bully to stun bot as the game goes on.

Now if they did rework him, then I'd be happy if they gave him better scaling at the cost of some early game power. If they don't do that, then I'd like him to be a manaless champion. Because mana is a restriction early game and a blessing late game (in theory) because unlike energy based champions, you can (late game) shoot out your combo in different ways effectively and more spammable. Whereas someone like Shen has to make sure he lands is e->q->W combo or else he doesn't have enough energy to utilize his W or E if he messes up.

Course the last time I suggested this, I got downvoted to hell.

Verxint5/11/2016, 5:05:32 PM1 votes

Pantheon is by no means near #1 top laner or #1 midlaner right now. He has decent performance on a 3% playrate, which usually means dedicated mains are the only ones who play him.

And listing a champs abilities dramatically and acting shocked that theyre allowed to be meaningful doesn't make them OP.

JavelinJoe5/11/2016, 5:06:23 PM1 votes

but he has poor late game scaling if he goes damage or he has poor early game harass if he goes tanky.

2 Weezy Baby5/11/2016, 6:17:32 PM1 votes

Pantheon sucks.

stealthfox945/11/2016, 7:29:09 PM1 votes

The ultimate counter to Pantheon is lategame.