So far it has been on 
, 
rework, and 
. Every time you put this mechanic on an assassin it was a contributing factor in why you had to revisit the champion to stop tank/bruiser builds. This is a mechanic that belongs on tanks because it inherently favors taking as much damage as possible without dying. The more damage you take with such a mechanic, the more effective HP it results in. You may as well put armor or MR scaling on an assassin.
DuskDaUmbreon45 votesI mean, they very much stopped tank/bruiser builds on Pyke by making him unable to gain health except by level.
Any "bruiser" or "tank" build he goes then will probably be intentional, or at least encouraged. 
is already one of his core items, and I'm pretty sure Riot is happy with that.
TotalJerk24 votesPeople started rushing items like Frozen Heart on Pyke. Going for pure resistance builds.
DuskDaUmbreon14 votesHas this shown to be problematic? Or is it just a thing that happens?
I did expect to see a Frozen Heart or Randuin's creep into his build, though, as, unlike most assassins, he can't grab a BC if he wants a bit of extra durability, meaning he needs to grab armor and MR if he wants it. Plus the item is a lot of utility anyways.
And, of course, for Pyke in particular, his base damages...aren't that great. The problem with Rengar and Ekko is that they had the base damage to be full tank (or all but) and still do assassins levels of damage. Pyke'll just end up being a Blitzcrank with no health if he tries to build like they did - Still a good amount of damage, but hardly enough to kill anyone.
Automated Riven3 votesIt's not problematic no. But it doesn't fit an assassin. But since he is played as support he doesn't actually need damage. So you just go straight resists and play like a support.
Terozu2 votesHe is an assassin support.
Damage is what he does...
Automated Riven7 votesHe doesn't do damage tho, because he doesn't build it. He gets an exacute and that's it. He is basically a shitty blitz with an exacute.
TehNACHO12 votesWell, no. One of Pyke's strongest features is his roaming potential, near unmatched except in incomparables like Bard's roaming. Stealth, easy movement over walls, and waaaaaay more movement speed is far from 'a shitty blitz with an execute'.
TotalJerk2 voteshe can't grab a BC
Yes he can. It's one of his best items in AD builds. People don't seem to understand that 14 hp and 1 AD both have the same base gold value so his passive is efficient.
DuskDaUmbreon22 votesDid you read the rest of that sentence?
Go back, and re-read it.
mack91124 votesPeople started rushing items like Frozen Heart on Pyke. Going for pure resistance builds.
That can't possible be good
TotalJerk9 votesThey literally had to patch him to push him more towards AD builds. Have you actually watched a high elo or pro pyke?
mack91123 votesThey literally had to patch him to push him more towards AD builds. Have you actually watched a high elo or pro pyke?
Idk man I've never seen that build ever
Ukobarrywewa1 votesI always build full resistances on Pyke. It's the only way to play him. Way too squishy otherwise.
Terozu2 votesUmmm no.
If you need resistances that badly you just arent good at pyke.
Beacon Academy4 votesResistances with Overgrowth = Tank with Infinite AD Growth.
LordGeovanni6 votesInfinite ad where you have to play an hour to get 12 ad lol
Sire Hippington3 votesNo shit, did you look at his ad-scaleings on rlease? I mean Orn would have had about the same value from going ad.... And the scaleings aren't that much better now either... Wondering why pyke goes for tank items rather than ad is like wondering why sejuany goes tank rather than AP....
Mokuto Bunshi2 votesPure resistance is no where as OP as health +resistance. Not even accounting for true damage just in general
Like if you got 600 hp and you get an item with 400 hp and 60 armor. Lets say ehp is armor X hp thats 60,000 ehp vs ad... theres only 1 item that gives that gives enough armor to match that ehp and its 
but even still because you dont have the health thats ONLY vs armor...
See what I mean?
Sire Hippington2 votesOfc they do, pike has bad ad-scaleings, good bases and high utillity. Going for builts that focuse on his base values and utillity rather than the scaleings is pretty obvious, especially since he's on a rather low budget as a support.
He has little to no reason to actually go damage...
Killer of Night92 votesHonestly i'm happy that Black Cleaver is a good choise on him.
It will make him able to help other ally by the %armor shread.
When i play with zyra or brand as an adc they can't give me nothing rather just CC and damage (
is one exception and 
is not builded that much).
with pyke i can afford on (
<- vision part, 
).
DuskDaUmbreon3 votesIt's very interesting, indeed, to see how previously high-damage, selfish items are being turned into utility ones for Pyke.
It's why I loved the idea of Ashe as a support (as well as the absurd mix of items). You could go 
and in theory it all worked out, because, despite having items from 5 separate classes, they all worked together because of Ashe's kit. You could apply a semi-AoE armor shred+slow, and when your ADC attacked them they'd get a small heal and Ardent's buff, you'd have Duskblade to clear wards easily, your E for vision, gave heals by killing minions...And you took Duskblade, BC, and Runaan's, usually only used by "greedy" champions, and used all three as goddamned support items. And it's nice to see the same thing happening for Pyke, seeing weird builds that don't even make sense on a support actually being great for a support.
Ashe mage AD1 votesLol, I was using Muramana with (tanky) mana items along with the CDR into adaptive dmg (20% cdr items) and Gathering storm + maybe zeal item and the result was a tanky utility Ashe that'd deal just as much dmg as an ADC if you also took the old Essence Reaver.
Vlada Cut1 votesI mean, they very much stopped tank/bruiser builds on Pyke by making him unable to gain health except by level.
Any "bruiser" or "tank" build he goes then will probably be intentional, or at least encouraged.
True. So true.
[zombie-nunu-hearts]
MorganFreemanBot36 votesIt's actually the proper way to balance assassins.
Assassins aren't supposed to build tank, but they're still supposed to build survival tools. Giving them mechanics which allow them to weave in and out of fights, but still melt if locked down and focused, is EXACTLY the way assassins should play.
l MrD l1 votesIt's actually the proper way to balance assassins.
Assassins aren't supposed to build tank, but they're still supposed to build survival tools. Giving them mechanics which allow them to weave in and out of fights, but still melt if locked down and focused, is EXACTLY the way assassins should play.
yeh idk if many people will agree on me though but i feel like ekkos move back to where he was is strong enough eithout a massive heal :L
MorganFreemanBot6 votes[{quoted}](name=l MrD l,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=tNis9hcr,comment-id=00030000,timestamp=2018-08-09T17:18:30.719+0000)
yeh idk if many people will agree on me though but i feel like ekkos move back to where he was is strong enough eithout a massive heal :L
Ekko's back-blink has a 4 second delay, so he has to have someone cross EXACTLY where he was 4 seconds ago.
Put bluntly, it's probably the hardest ability to land in the entire game. It's also one of the most impactful, but it is NOT easy to pull off.
Arakadia4 votesIt is innacurate to say someone has to "cross EXACTLY where he was 4 seconds ago." considering the AoE is quite large.
Anyways, he doesn't even need to land the damage for it to be a get out of jail card. Of course he loses a lot of its power if doesn't use it for/hit the damage, but it is very reliable as an escape. Especially because enemies cannot stop him front activating it unless he is CCd.
Somebody Love Me8 votesIt's actually the proper way to balance assassins.
Assassins aren't supposed to build tank, but they're still supposed to build survival tools. Giving them mechanics which allow them to weave in and out of fights, but still melt if locked down and focused, is EXACTLY the way assassins should play.
I actually love this reply after thinking about it, but it also makes me sad.
Before lethality, Assassins used to build stuff like Ravenous, BORK, Merc, etc on top of the armor pen they built. These were tools to help them survive in long term fights. Now they just build to one shot before they get one shot.
Fízz v210 votesPyke has it because he is a melee support that often plays vs 2 ranged champs tho
Killer of Night95 votes[{quoted}](name=Fízz v2,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=tNis9hcr,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2018-08-09T16:28:17.797+0000)
Pyke has it because he is a melee support that often plays vs 2 ranged champs tho
.
is the only one that has that but after the nerf he will never be totally bad as support.
Infernape12 votesAnd all of those are tanks. They can build HP, he cannot.
Fízz v21 votes^ What I wanted to answer too
plus Pyke isnt even an assassin anyway, he is a support
DuskDaUmbreon9 votesAssassin support.
The idea is odd, but not impossible.
Fízz v21 votesBut he goes aftershock and is too unreliable and immobile to be an assassin
DuskDaUmbreon9 votesHe has a speedup, an unconditional dash, and a conditional blink. That's pretty far from immobile, that's actually way more mobile than 
, who people are, for some absurd reason, still calling hypermobile. Fuck, that's more mobile than a pre-6 Kassadin (Who's an assassin), and is one more speedup than Fizz (another assassin) has. Actually, a lot of assassins are slightly less mobile than him, with only really 
and 
being notably more mobile (both having an additional dash). Saying Pyke is immobile is...well...absurd.
Ahri for a while could go Comet instead of Electrocute. Still can, in fact. Kassadin can go Aery. They're both still assassins (Ahri being a hybrid, sure, but still an assassin). Why is Pyke not an assassin because he takes a different rune?
And assassins are supposed to be high-skill, and they're meant to be high-risk, high-reward. That last part is literally the opposite of "reliable". Assassins aren't supposed to be reliable.
Fízz v22 votesWell people are calling Zoe lots of things.
Why is Pyke not an assassin because he takes a different rune?
Because his keystone is a tank rune, comet and aery are still damage runes.
The thing is, Pykes only reliable escape is his E, which is also part of his combo/damage, and his gap closer. So he cant really get out of fights, isnt that the same reason why Diana isnt an assassin? Plus Pyke builds full tank with maybe a Maw or a Black Cleaver, so.. yeah.
Killer of Night96 votesI can answer to this.
Riot has added an ad/ap ratio on aftershock because they wanted diver to took it (mostly 
i guess).
Also there is no way this is a true tank rune since it has no %armor and mr anymore, it give only flat armor and mr which can be abused by everyone.
The tank part now is mostly because of synergy (
armor and mr that scale with his kit) or because there is no other valid choice for them (Guardian is a support rune since it rely to be close to another champ and grasp is a bad option in jungle since you can't use it that much).
I can pick it on diana if i want since it deal magic damage but it don't work just because of the nature of her cc (you have to be close to proc it while pyke can proc it by Q).
Automated Riven7 votesPyke isn't actually an assassin. He is a resetting gold sharing support to pander to people who want to get kills from the support role.
However, his builds don't involve any damage and he takes tank runes.
It's to the extent that building damage on him is am off build now. The only offensive item typically taken is black cleaver.
Child of the Pit9 votesTo be honest, i have less on a problem when Pyke has it, Ekko and Rengar can just proc it like that, Pyke needs to have his W up first or be out of vision, and his W is mostly used to engage, making him a pretty risky candidate.
Additionally, Pyke isn't really all that good as a bruiser or tank, he can only gain resistances but no HP, and a Malphite with 400 Armor and 120 MR and 1.7k HP is still pretty squishy when focused.
Aptest8 votesto be fair towards Rengar, he was not designed around being an obligatory assassin.
He was supposed to be a champion who had options, from tank to bruiser to assassin, and who could play a range of builds. And at the time, the idea of sustain as a necessary jungle / top lane mechanic was pretty prevalent (even though this was never a truth)
Rengar being known specifically for being an assassin stems from his assassin pattern being reliable enough, that his players wanted to play him exclusively for that. i,e, if a champion can have an assassin play pattern, its players will heavily push towards the champion to be balanced around being an assassin. (same as happened with Ahri)
basically a singular identity, because it was very popular and desirable, took over the entire thought around a champion that is originally not designed to be constricted to it.
The Yetii Rider6 votesI disagree with that entirely.
He's a hunter. That aesthetic heavily leans towards assassin. The idea that you chase someone down (heavy out of combat mobility/repositioning), use stealth (a mechanic closely related to assassins) and deliver a crushing blow out of nowhere (burst) all scream assassin.
Honestly, the fact that he has stealth is enough reason for me to call bullshit on you saying he could be a tank. The only champions in the game with stealth who are not 'assassins' all have very assassin-like play patterns (
)
PB4UAME4 votesHe was right in everything except the roles Rengar could perform, and also forgot to mention the hybrid playstyles.
Rengar could go AD assassin, AP assassin, AD diver, or AP Battlemage.
Rengar could never tank, period. "Tank Rengar" was never a tank, the community is just fucking dumb when it comes to names, and calls anything that has a lot of hp a tank, despite tank being a performative role (just like every other class) rather than a tickmark for a stat threshold or whatever the fuck they think it is.
Humans are hunters, only, (unaided by technology or tools) we're classified as Persistant Hunters where we injure and track down animals over days or weeks, staying hidden until we catch up slowly, encountering our quarry multiple times, slowly injuring them until they cannot get away. Does that sound like an "assassin" to you? this was the style of hunting Rengar was based off of, with his net to slow down his prey, and MS boosts and CC cleanses to be able to follow along and keep up with his prey.
It doesn't fucking have to be a 100-0 instagib skilless-snoozefest just because he's tracking people, jfc. Can we purge this cancer of an idea from League already?
Sahn Uzal1 votesMultiple weapons, one of which is decently large. Covered in pieces of different armor, pretty damned big shoulderplate; Dunno man, his visual design tells me he's a cat guy who doesn't mind brawling it out with his prey.
The only thing about his appearance that tells would suggest he wants to get the job done in an instant would be his secondary weapon, but that's a stretch.
Fair point on the fact that he goes invisible though.
HaIlMonitor1 votesRengar isn't an assassin...
Meep Man7 votesLike hell he isn't.
HaIlMonitor2 votesRiot calls him a diver. And his kit is exactly like other divers... Kind of tanky, a good amount of damage, and no real escape.
Edit: Curious at down vote? Does rengar play more like Zed, talon, Fizz? Or more like J4, Vi, Xin Zhao.... Don't kid yourselves lol.
Nanuk Pihoqahiak1 votesA good amount of damage? If he catches any squishy they are dead. Worst case he goes 1 for 1 and removes an ADC from a teamfight in exchange for himself.
HaIlMonitor1 votesYeah and J4 doesnt... Like I love how dense people are but holy cow lol.
SithesisLord1 votesHe really isn´t. He can´t get in and out like assassins can.
Bârd4 votesHis empowered abilities give a sizable movement speed boost.
He's not on the level of somebody like Zed in terms of his ability to retreat, but it's definitely not nothing.