Pyke is the only assassin or slayer that has to be completely killed to be taken out of a fight.

TotalJerk·Sep 20, 2018·36 votes·12,310 views

Therein lies the biggest problem with the "just CC him" line of thinking. For most other assassins and slayers if you catch them out you don't necessarily need to kill them to remove them from the fight, if Zed, Talon, Katarina, Fizz, Yasuo, etc. get CC'd and bursted down to 10% of their HP only to barely escape, that means they have to recall or spend time farming monsters/waves if they have some lifesteal/spellvamp itemization. For a lategame Pyke anything you do to him that doesn't result in complete death might as well be a waste of time because all he has to do is sit in a bush for a few seconds and come right back to the goddamn fight again and again.

66 Comments

RyusaetherSep 20, 201810 votes

Yeah the only difference is: he isn't an assassin.

If an assassin doesn't get CCed he will delete 1-2 or more targets ( Katarina ). Pyke can't delete anyone himself, he needs his team to do most of the job and he does the Clean-up of what remains of their health bars. He is still a catcher but he can't build HP, so he needs that passive to pick a target and then run away because he can't go in like Thresh or Nautilus.

He is a well thought character and honestly I see eay too many complains about champions' kits picking up a thing alone of their kit and making jt seem busted, when almost every character has a well thought set of abilities when put together.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 20, 20183 votes

There. That's it. Pyke isn't an assassin, he's an assassin-esque catcher. He's like an assassin, and plays a good amount like one, but he's ultimately a low-hp support with a way to clean up fights.

StephenizgodSep 20, 20188 votes

The most annoying thing about Pyke is, like you said, you have to kill him in order to take him out of a fight, but he is so god damn hard to catch sometimes. Goes invisible and has his 3 second CD dash + stun, he is so fucking annoying.

Plus the other thing you didn't mention is his Ult which means even at 1% HP, he can wipe an entire team if he can get the resets. Most of the other assassins at that health would likely die or at the very least maybe kill 1 person. This means he is still a threat no matter how low of HP he is as long as he has his ult.

Not saying Pyke is OP personally, he is just incredibly frustrating to play against and I think his CD's need a bit of retuning.

IllabetheSep 20, 20182 votes

Erm..... so many things wrong.

He doesn't have a 3 second cd dash-stun. It's 15 base seconds. At 45% CDR, that's still 8.25 seconds.
Any ADC with can keep up with Pyke's W as long as they can still see him.
You're grossly imbellishing. Pyke's Execute is NOT an Unstoppable or Untargettable. It can be interrupted, healed out of, skilled out of, side-stepped out of, or you can purely kill him and the skill won't even finish. It's the most counterable execute in the game....
He has some of the longest cooldowns in the game. Learn to play.

StephenizgodSep 20, 20188 votes

obvious exaggeration it would be completely busted at 3 seconds
Yea key phrase "as long as they can see him" which means 1 E and he is out of vision range
No shit, I said he has the potential to do it and most counterable execute in the game? are you high?
No he doesn't... he has pretty normal CDs for a support. Have you never played a support? They all have double digit cooldowns, because they are designed to build CDR.

Pretending Pyke is completely balanced is idiotic though, the dude is ridiculous right now. He isn't OP but he is a stupid disgusting champion design.

OleandervineSep 20, 20187 votes

I've said this since his release, but I feel like his gray health needs a timer where it starts degrading, like Kench's, in order to properly balance him. He's getting to that point where people are mastering him, and the overblown elements in his kit are REALLY starting to shine and cause him to be a game health problem.

Shukr4nSep 20, 20186 votes

But he s squishy.

TotalJerkSep 20, 201813 votes

The thing is that chunking most squishies is a big deal. Like I said numerous times in my OP, Pyke has to be completely killed off for the fact that you caught him out to matter. This is why a lot of high elo players still go tank Pyke despite the inability to build health. If he's tanky enough to barely survive it's just as good as being an outright tank.

D357R0Y3RSep 20, 201819 votes

just because he doesn't build health he's squishy<----------the boards

he has aftershock builds armor/mr has 45 base armor+5 armor per lvl 600+110 hp per lvl 32+2 mr/lvl

nice squishy

Shukr4nSep 20, 20181 votes

Thaere s also

"I broke rules but i got banned it s not right" on board

IllabetheSep 20, 20182 votes

Armor doesn't mean crap when 40% of the Roster is Magic damage, and every AD builds Lethality/Armor Pen/Armor reduction AND True damage. Most adcs completely destroy Pyke if they wait out their item 3095 , because then they can outrun him.

Once they have these items, Pyke may as well be wearing paper armor.

D357R0Y3RSep 20, 201812 votes

armor doesn't mean crap?

try FIGHTING PYKE as an adc in laning phase and see what goes

45 fucking base armor as an assassin dude autowins trade against anyone that isn't swain and then has regen with his passive

god this boards tilts me so hard

IllabetheSep 20, 20181 votes

At what point in the game?

Early game, they don't have their items yet. Get a item 3095 on Jinx Jhin MissFortune Caitlyn Vayne and they can literally outrun Pyke. He might be able to hit them with an E, but that's his only hope of survival. If E's down, he's dead.

He doesn't outtrade anyone lol except an adc whose built poorly lets him W up to them, and then Q's at close range.... making their skills less effective at hitting him. His damage ratios are low.

Diana Also outruns him.

I don't know about you...... but I shut down a pyke hard just last night with Morgana .

You know what's even funnier?

I actually counter Morgana when I play Pyke.

Your problem? You don't have experience playing Pyke, so you really don't know how to play vs him or what to expect. I play both him and the champs that can kill him. I have more Season 8 Mastery on him than any other champion....and I rarely lose to him when I'm NOT playing him.

D357R0Y3RSep 20, 20186 votes

he outtrades any adc any of them, he has way more base ad than them and 45 base armor

there is no fucking way an adc can manage to trade against pyke especially with aftershock

jesus lol

IllabetheSep 20, 20181 votes

Let's see..... http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_champions/Attack_damage

Base AD:

The only adc with Dramatically less Base AD than Pyke is MissFortune , due to her passive's overwhelming damage amplification. Never seen an MF really lose their presence in a game, and usually gets to almost 1 shot damage potential.

The rest.... start between 6-1 AD lower than Pyke. Hardly enough to make a difference, and most of them actually have TOTAL AD scaling skills. Pyke's are all BONUS AD.

(Not to mention they are ranged champs, he is not)

Now..... let's look at AD GROWTH.

Pyke at 18 is 96.

Which Adcs have less than 96 base AD at 18?

Miss Fortune at 95.9 (OOH BARELY)

Kai Sa @ 87.9 (for the same reasons MF has low Base ..... her passive....)

....... and ...... THAT'S IT. Those 2 adcs. Every single other adc..... scales higher than Pyke in AD. The two who don't.....both have damaging passives that more than make up for it.

If an adc is dumb enough to stand still.... use no skills, have no life steal items, or item 3031 , then yes. Pyke can outtrade them, especially on low elo builds (high elo builds build ARMOR/RESIST, so they don't build assassin items). But any adc who actually has a clue..... doesn't stand still..... once they get one crit off on Pyke they are GONE. They run from him and start orbing. Or, they have such overwhelming damage that it's Pyke that tries to run (1000+ crits are common in 3-4 item builds now)

I've run the table with Pyke vs Adcs. But I've also encountered the adcs who know what they are doing. Any adc worth their salt destroys Pyke. Any who don't or stay around on a map too long at low HP...... ofc he beats them. E past a team just to R the dumb adc. Doesn't mean that Pyke solo'd them. It means they were clueless.

It's rare for Pyke to do 1/2 of a true assassin's damage. Try playing him sometime. You might get 1 in 4 games where he runs away like a train..... but 3 of 4 games are spent doing 30-50 CC's that are not used by your team, wasted, and don't give Pyke gold or anything for his effort. And if he tries to solo/duel..... he dies.... repeatedly.....written off as useless.

If you scroll down my Pyke games on just this account.... I have MULTIPLE 20+ kill perfect games. But then I want you to look at the damage I did versus my team. Usually about 60% to champions vs the next highest contributor. But I give them a run for their money vs CS (total) damage.

Pyke lacks on hit proc effects, which most assassins have (Talon's passive, Zed's R chargeup, Akali's Passive, etc) His skills don't hit multiple times, which most assassins do (unless he manages to reset his Ult, which remotely gives him access to 1-2 more ults).

He's what you have if you took away Talon's Bleed and Zed's R Mark, or one of Zed's clones. A core Assassin kit with no actual finisher/fast paced damage mechanism.

Which...... makes his players turn in other directions. Aka..... tank.

P.S. If you can hit Aftershock 1/3 of the time on Pyke, you're insanely lucky, since your Q would proc the Aftershock, and its effect would be gone by the time you finish E..... so that's either an all in dive scenario, which gets you killed (and indeed Aftershock Pykes die more), or it's a wasted Scenario.

I already have over 1.3 million Mastery on Pyke. What do I know?

D357R0Y3RSep 20, 20185 votes

god i'm so done imagine thinking that adcs are going to win trade against tahm kench E passive, 45 base armor, 62 base ad

P.S. If you can hit Aftershock 1/3 of the time on Pyke, you're insanely lucky, since your Q would proc the Aftershock, and >its effect would be gone by the time you finish E

it's not luck, it's skill Also aftershock gives armor/mr against EVERYONE not just the stunned target so if pyke engage on a support, gets aftershock, the adc deals no damage to him while he's fucking clubing the support with his adc then gets hp regen from passive

all of that while he won trade easily

https://youtu.be/6yrB6fJOj5U?t=32 https://youtu.be/6yrB6fJOj5U?t=55

here is an example of how it would happen

not get your 1.3 million mastery out, nobody cares about how much you have if you can't play pyke properly

reaper4042Sep 20, 20181 votes

You forget in low elo, everyone stands still because they dont know how to kite,

IllabetheSep 21, 20181 votes

What does low elo vs High elo have anything to do with Pyke's potential?

BârdSep 20, 20182 votes

Pyke. Is. Not. An. Assassin.

D357R0Y3RSep 20, 20182 votes

so he's a tank?

it would make sense

BârdSep 21, 20181 votes

Still wrong, but slightly less wrong.

DearPearSep 20, 201810 votes

{quoted}

But he s squishy.

He's way less squishy than most assassins with their normal itemization ;)

JaegaerSep 20, 20181 votes

IllabetheSep 20, 20183 votes

Except he isn't an assassin. He's a pseudo tank with a cleanup crew skill. He doesn't do the full HP bar of damage by himself. Assassins do.

DearPearSep 20, 20188 votes

{quoted}

Except he isn't an assassin. He's a pseudo tank with a cleanup crew skill. He doesn't do the full HP bar of damage by himself. Assassins do.

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IllabetheSep 20, 20182 votes

What's funny?

DearPearSep 20, 201811 votes

{quoted}

What's funny?

Mobility, invisibility, means of execution : "not an assassin". He was advertised as an assassin support : "not an assassin".

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/388434602580246528/492370725748080651/unknown.png

"not an assassin".

BârdSep 20, 20184 votes

An assassin is a champion who gets in, uses their high burst to kill a priority target, and then leaves.

Ability to go in: Check
Ability to get out: Check.
Ability to kill a priority target: Nope.

Pyke can put people in a bad position. Pyke can finish them off once they're low. Pyke can't get them low without a lot of help unless he's been fed an ungodly amount.

Pyke is league's equivalent to Dota's Bounty Hunter.

He looks like an assassin, or at the very least a damage dealer, but he's just a scary looking support.

JohnnyNeverSinsSep 20, 20186 votes

His passive in the Laning phase is a fucking lie..getting back like 60% of the damage deal to him...it's like tahm kench only worse..

Yautja wannabeSep 20, 20184 votes

Then everyone builds him as a tank and the next thing you know he's last hitting with his ult while being LITERALLY UNKILLABLE. Support btw!

crippler38Sep 20, 2018

Yeah, his ratios aren't that great and his damage is slow to come out, but his base damage and CC when engaging is great.

Hopefully they bump his ratios a bit, and maybe axe his base a tiny bit, especially on his ult. He's supposed to be an assassin not a roach.

IllabetheSep 20, 20181 votes

You do realize he already has one of the lowest base AD's in the game?

crippler38Sep 20, 20183 votes

Are they? They felt pretty good last I used him.

Must be just imagining it, my mistake.

KFCeytronSep 21, 20184 votes

Seems like just a few weeks ago that people were praising Pyke's design as the most balanced and healthy assassin kit in the game.

BârdSep 20, 20183 votes

Pyke is not an assassin.

Assassins have the pattern of "get in, burst down a priority target, get out". Zed Talon Fizz follow this to a T. Pyke can get in/out just fine, but does not deal enough damage to do this past the early game unless his target is nearly dead already.

Pyke is not a slayer.

Slayers are squishy melee carries that melt down enemies with high DPS. Fiora MasterYi Yasuo are good examples. Pyke is nothing like this. His burst damage is unimpressive, but his DPS is abysmal.

Pyke is a catcher with the aesthetic of an assassin. As far as his gameplay goes, he's much closer to Blitzcrank Thresh Bard than he is to Zed Fizz Yasuo

And no, you don't have to 100% kill him to take him out of a fight.

All you have to do is deny him a reset. If you dodge his ult or use a well timed heal to bring yourself above the kill threshold at the last second, he instantly loses all potential to pop off.

Sure he's not "completely out of it", but all he can contribute now is the occasional Q or E, which aren't exactly god like.

Also, if you get a good catch on a Pyke in the late game he's gonna die. He can be somewhat durable early on with aftershock, but that means nothing in the end game because he has

GripaAviaraSep 20, 201810 votes

Pyke is not an assassin.

Yeaaah

Looks at lore Looks at skill (2 mobility, invis, execute) Looks at itemization

Clearly he's a Mage

BârdSep 20, 20181 votes

"Looks at lore"

Realizes lore doesn't impact gameplay

"Looks at skills"

Realizes he has no major damage source unless his target is already nearly dead

"Looks at itemization"

Realizes that Pyke always runs aftershock and usually rushes tank items

GripaAviaraSep 21, 20181 votes

Aftershock is the last in popularity: https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/champions/runes

BârdSep 21, 20181 votes

Hey, genius, that source is for all champions, not for Pyke.

https://champion.gg/champion/pyke/Support?

Both the most popular page and the highest win rate page are Aftershock.

http://na.op.gg/champion/pyke/statistics/support

87.58% of Pyke players are running one of these two Aftershock pages

https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/champions/runes/pyke

That would be the page you actually want to link to, and even THAT says aftershock all the way.

DearPearSep 21, 20182 votes

{quoted}

Pyke is not an assassin.

I guess he's a ranged AS AP carry. Or whatever. Disregarding Riot's own classification. Disregarding major parts of his kit. Whatever dude.

BârdSep 21, 20181 votes

By Riot's class definitions, Pyke is a catcher.

Plain and simple.

He can set up ganks really well, but he can't solo kill anybody who isn't severely far behind in levels.

You might think "Oh he kills people and he looks like a rougue, so he's an assassin", but no. Pyke doesn't kill people. Pyke either enables his team to kill people, or lets his team kill them and takes the credit.

Not only is he closer to being Bard than he is to being an assassin, but Bard is closer to being an assassin than Pyke is because Bard does damage.

Anyone who insists he's an assassin is deliberately ignoring two very important things about Pyke.

He builds tank.
He doesn't do damage.

Sir PrepuziusSep 21, 20182 votes

what you say in this thread is exactly spot on, dudes here just don't like the champ, want it nerfed, and uses the excuses that "he is an assassin" in the childish attempt to corroborate their biased argument

ShadWoooSep 20, 20183 votes

So he is not assassin? His damage is low? He can't build tank? wtf

Every single game he gets 2-3 kills in lane and from that point if he builds yoomu/duskblade he can solo adc with one combo if he hits everything, proc duskblade, press ignite and hits ult.

Majority games he acquire 15+ kills and can basically solocarry.

As for tankyness maybe he cant build hp but item 3065 + item 3111 = immune to mages and synergy with selfsustain, and ad champions usually need him to be visible to target him which he won't be most of the time.

ThilmerSep 20, 20182 votes

To be fair, he has ridiculously low damage for an asassin.

When he doesn't have his ult ready, or when you have 50% hp, he does peanut damage and can't 1 vs 1 anyone.

He's not a pure asassin and it shows.

Shukr4nSep 20, 20181 votes

1500hp mid game vs true dmg and stuff. Then depends what rank we talking about

TotalJerkSep 20, 20181 votes

Trying to fall back on accusing the other person of being low elo instead of refuting their point? Tank Pyke is even more common the higher your elo specifically because of the reasons I complained about.

SaiannaSep 21, 20181 votes

if they have some lifesteal/**spellvamp **itemization.

They'd need like 2 whole games focusing solely on wave farming to heal up using spellvamp :P

hotdogsaregud4yaSep 21, 20181 votes

I wrote a post about this about grey health too. Seems that grey health healing along with his utility cc is quite ridiculous for you as well

Yautja wannabeSep 21, 20181 votes

Yo, they're nerfing Pyke's ult! They're... wait, what? I'm sorry, they're BUFFING his ult?! WTF?!?! Why though? Okay, so let me guess this straight, they're increasing his ult's damage from 200-650 to 250-650... Why? Just... why though?[zombie-brand-mindblown]

ZaFishboneSep 21, 20181 votes

Ummm, there are lots of assassins who have a one-shot combo that they can instantly trow at you even at low health. Some of them also have sustain that allows them to heal A LOT if left alone. I agree that Pyke is probably the most egregious of these examples, but there are many assassins who you should never count as being out of the fight if you didn't kill them.