Juggernauts: what's their identity and how should they build?

Few days ago I made a thread about the melee items that were on PBE in 8.12 cycle, asking if they just straight out removed them or just delayed them (turns out they pushed them to preseason).

That made me think again about classes that could use them, and one in particular: Juggernauts.

Today I wanted to talk about what defines a juggernaut by my point of view and why they should get some items that aren't just things that a CC Machine Tank would build. But I'm making a thread because I want to hear your opinion as well, both on juggs and items, because IIRC there were contrasting opinions on the fighter items testing on PBE.

So, what defines a Juggernaut? In my perception, a Juggernaut should be a champion with limited mobility, with maximum 1-2 Hard CC and a decently telgraphed kit/way of playing, but with High conditional damage output (via DPS that can become burst under the right conditions), good sustain (preferably in combat) and high reward from getting up close and personal with his target and someone that should thrive in the midst of a teamfight with more people around. They can be either single target oriented ( ) or AoE monsters ( though their focus is mainly 1 opponent, they damage/CC others a lot even before focusing them).

In my opinion we do have some really fun, different and well done Juggernauts in the game, however there is a thing that really bothers me abuot them: their itemization.

Juggernaut's itemization has been the same for quite a long time now: you go for 1 or 2 Damage/HP items (/+) and then you basically go for a tank build. This is because Juggernauts are really easy to kite and are big targets for CC spells to hit them with, so they will almost surely take damage before entering a fight, and if they're too squishy they will probably never get into it. That's even more of a problem because of a reason: picking a Juggernaut top often means you're left without a tank engager, unless your jungler (or in some cases the Support) picks a tank (which is pretty uncommon but that's probably because of the current meta, at least in SoloQ). Sadly a Juggernaut is usually not the best initiator: they are really good at punishing mispositionings (really bad ones) and people getting caught, or bad engages, and then proceed to steamroll the enemy team. But they're not proper engagers per se. They lack innate tankiness via huge shields or dmg reduction abilities, nor they have insane CCs or Disruptions (or at least ones that allow them not to die before using them).

Now, this is a Juggernaut weakness and I personally don't want to get rid of it. Juggernauts shouldn't be good initiators AND great damage dealers. So what I'm asking for is not "make an AD+HP Righteous Glory so we can engage and kill them". The thing I want the most? To focus even more on their strenghts, for juggernauts to destroy people for bad initiations and for cluelessly getting upclose on them in mass (if the Jugg plays it correctly obv), but with sheer damage. I would really like to build AD+HP and not get deleted from the rift for not going into tank itemization. I would really like for them to be relevant in teamfights (but only if their conditions to shine are met) and post laning phase.

That's why I really liked Atma's Reckoning and Spear of Shojin . They offered you options that met both sides of what makes a Juggernaut be one: build Damage+HP and have conditional windows of strenght. has poor base stats but its price is decently low and has a very good passive (I personally think there should be more items of this kind), helping you in prolonged fights or even better rewarding you for stacking it before an initiation (mainly during objective control). instead has good stats and a decent passive that can become really good if the proper conditions are met. Sure it has to be rebalanced a bit for some instances of damage, but the idea behind it isn't even remotely bad. The purpose of these items is to make its user a war machine while in the midst of the battle, and that's the definition of a Juggernaut to me. Sure they could help divers as well and other classes like bruisers and some skirmishers, it's not like they should be for Juggs only. However, the most common fear is for these items to be abused by other classes, like tanks, assassins and marksmen. To be honest, my only concern is for assassins to abuse : it gives them juicy stats and they can be able to proc its passive. Although they usually go out of the fight after their burst combo, so they probably won't use the 6 seconds bonus fully, and they really want to get lethality and Armor pen and the 20% CDR from first. Marksmen can't abuse the item (no, not even Jhin because they made it so it ignores his passive conversions) because they should be upclose with 3 enemies, and the stats aren't the best for them, and tanks would never opt into because of the really poor and inefficient stats for their (tanks') purpose and its passive isn't worth for them because most of them have AP scalings (oh hey hello there , but you're a mix of a Tank and a Juggernaut anyway).

To conclude, I would personally like if they added some other way to get tenacity via items, and most importantly I would like to get Items for AP/Hybrid Juggernauts ( ) that can't be abused by tanks (and that might be helpful for battle mages too, they definitely deserve a bit of diversification from other mages' build). This class really needs some love.

So, what are you guys' thoughts on the matter? What defines a Juggernaut in your opinion and do you think they should be allowed to itemize some other way? Do you think and would be good introductions in the game?