What will happen to Pantheon now that BC changes will hit Live?

Darth Valer·Apr 20, 2015·14 votes·1,808 views

as it is now gives him everything he wants. A little bit of health for durability, CDR for his Qs, but most of all a good chunk of AD, flat ArPen and armor shred. Next patch, though, BC is going to be a sustained damage, anti-tank item, whereas Pantheon prefers burst and squishy targets.

Can we still hope for AD Caster friendly itemization in the short run, or Pantheon and his fellows are going to be completely thrown out of the meta while being spat upon and cursed?

19 Comments

UdoIkOSc4uApr 20, 20152 votes

Urgot item 3070

junglerboy16Apr 20, 20151 votes

It will effectively count as a defensive item now, so I would say get Youmuu's as well for the brutalizer flat pen, and BC as a mid-late game utility damage item.

It's a nerf to full damage Panth, but a more bruiser panth can just swap out a more defensive item for this instead.

CubedJusticeApr 20, 20151 votes

Pantheon isn't legally allowed to build defensive items, actually. His shield is actually made of knives.

djjomonApr 20, 20151 votes

Honestly, I don't think too much will change. 20% CDR will encourage spamming, which he doesn't have the mana for. He'll love the passives, but he needs flat ArPen before %Pen. If he's going just one damage item, then tanky, he might opt for Cleaver, he might not. Depends on what the team needs/who the enemy is.

Full damage, or at least heavier damage Pantheon will likely build it, alongside item 3074 , item 3134 -something (assuming it has a new build path), or both.

Dunkrius2gApr 20, 20151 votes

Just wait for it to come out. No point in speculating when we can try it out prob in a few weeks or something. If it is strong, Riot will tweak it a bit. If it is good as is... Then all good. #BePatient

Darth ValerApr 20, 20151 votes

Fighter Pantheon Build is like: item 3111 item 3074 item 3071 item 3035 item 3156 item 3143 . He gets 3.000 hp, 180 armor, 150 mres (not a lot but enough to soak up some damage as a frontline diver) and can deal tooooons of burst damage to squishies.

New BC will weaken this build, in particular he'll lose BC as a nice mid-game option. item 3142 packs just too many useless stats. Plus current BC offers more penetration than Youmuu when enemies have 75 ~ armor, which is basically anyone in mid-late game skirmishes.

BluePolarizerApr 20, 20151 votes

New BC is better late game. Sometimes you can't finish off late game ADCs, and if they live even by a thread, they'll just kite you and you die for nothing. With new BC, it is much harder to kite Pantheon or run away from him once he's on you. However I don't like the loss of flat arpen.

StoningtonApr 20, 20151 votes

I thought it was a buff. If you rush BC on mantheon right now, it's a nerf to his early game and a buff to his late. He can build pure tank after BC and give utility to his team with his awesome armour shred.

I guess it's a nerf to damage mantheon while a buff to bruiser mantheon.

BluePolarizerApr 20, 20152 votes

I thought bruiser mantheon was 3 damage items while damage mantheon was full glass.

StoningtonApr 20, 20152 votes

{quoted}

I thought bruiser mantheon was 3 damage items while damage mantheon was full glass.

The general definition of a bruiser is 1-2 damage items then full tank.

Silents429Apr 20, 20151 votes

I think you are going way far to be thinking anyone is going to be tossed out of the meta from the changes.

aperson1Apr 20, 20151 votes

It's probably gonna end up in a similar situation to Liandry's - build Phage for lane dominance, upgrade it late-game to stay relevant.

Jeddy017Apr 20, 20151 votes

I'm sure Riot will look into developing an AD caster friendly item that builds out of item 3134 .Whether that's by inserting it into the build path of an existing item or making a new one,who knows?

OblongOtterApr 20, 20151 votes

I don't even usually get BC on him until later, and by then I'm building a bit tanky so I'd appreciate the new stats.

Earl EulrichApr 20, 20151 votes

could be fine on support panth though.

Darth ValerApr 21, 20151 votes

item 3071 is actually my third damage item as Panth jungler after item 3707 and item 3074 . It'd probably be the second, or even first item toplane since most of the enemy laners would stack tons of armor. The shred effect is so freakin' strong.

The LovelessApr 21, 20151 votes

Build burst items and LW/YGB. Too many Panth players do overtime damage. Man up and buy dps so you can kill people quicker.

Teridax68Apr 21, 20151 votes

I think the changes to item 3071 are a step towards improving AD caster itemization overall, even if cooldown-dependent assassins like Pantheon are going to have a slightly harder time. AD caster itemization is way too dependent on item 3134 overall for its early/mid-game power spike, and weaning champions off of it would allow for smoother and more diverse build paths (we could end up with a cheaper AD + CDR item, for example, which so far has yet to appear). The flipside to the loss of early burst on TBC is that it will allow AD casters to scale far better into the late game, especially since the additional CDR means it'll be a lot easier to max out on the stat.

On the other hand, I also think Panth would scale a lot better with item 3142 if attack speed were genuinely good on him: his passive already encourages it, and there are a lot of ways the stat could be made more attractive on him, yet right now he is completely dependent on the current state of AD caster itemization, especially the mid-game burst it provides via CDR and flat pen, to do well. There's a lot on his kit that looks like it needs updating (his main nuke and his hard CC are both point-and-click, which forces him to have terrible mana management in lane), and hopefully the tweaks he'll receive will allow him to be more versatile in what he can choose to build.