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Armor Penetration vs Scaling Attack Damage Marks

THExJACKAL·12/29/2013, 7:28:16 PM·1 votes·2,180 views

So I was thinking, wouldn't it be better to get the Scaling Attack Damage runes, vs the flat armor penetration? According to what I've read, and even reading on the Armor Pen items themselves, all armor penetration does is increase your damage, by the armor pen amount.Meaning, an item giving +25 AD and a passive giving +10 Armor Pen, is the same as +35 AD. Correct? If so, wouldn't it be better to get the scaling attack damage, which gives you a +2.43 (at level 18) vs a flat +1.28 armor pen? Case being, if I get 9 marks, all armor pen, then i'm looking at a +11.58 armor pen, which is essentially the same as +11.58 attack damage. Whereas if I get 9 scaling attack damage, it'll be +1.17 attack damage at level one, but by level 10 I'll already surpass the armor pen, with the scaling giving me +11.7 attack damage, and by 18 I'll have +21.06 attack damage. So based on all this being correct, the scaling would give a better output of damage, vs the flats, and overall just being better. Yes?

6 Comments

Terchio12/30/2013, 1:53:39 AM3 votes

Flat Armor Pen is not the same as AD. I don't know where these values are coming from. Armor Pen drops the enemy's effective armor, and the more you have, the higher the shred. For instance, if the enemy has 15 Armor, you naturally deal about 13% less damage to that guy. With 5 Armor Pen, you deal about 9% less damage to him, and with 5 more, you deal about a smidge less than 5% less damage to him, with 15 Armor Pen raising it finally to full 100% damage on the enemy. Armor Pen is actually stronger the more you have. On the other hand, AD decreases in value. 10 AD makes a 50 AD character 20% stronger, but it makes a 100 AD character only 10% stronger.

Overall, it's best to have both stats improving one another, but if you were to stack only one indefinitely, Armor Pen would eventually win out. With the limited methods to obtain it, though, it's not a one-size-fits-all situation. Some champions do better with AD because they have lower natural AD values they are working with, such as Attack Speed champions, where as others prefer to do more damage with the AD they have, especially those with large physical damage base values on skills, such as Pantheon, Talon, and Zed. It's all dependent on who you're playing. Considering that most popular physical damage characters rely on high AD values nowadays, Armor Penetration will still be a commonly good path to go toward.

JOÊMAMAMAN12/29/2013, 8:50:53 PM1 votes

I was just thinking the same thing too because I wanted to set up my AD runes into something that can probably harass an opponent early game but I was actually messing around with my runes with armor penetration marks and attack damage marks, I even blend them both together if that makes any sense. I played adc in a normal to test out my runes and I felt like armor penetration and attack damage marks were pretty useful since I did only have 2.1k IP just to get about 4-5 armor penetration marks. I was playing Vayne, too. I actually thought it kinda worked because of Vayne's W so I felt pretty good about it. I tried the same runes on Riven and it was just easier for me to farm and harass my lane. I don't know what other people would think, but I think armor penetration is pretty good instead of attack damage since you're not only having the same attack damage scaling, but it can also help fight off tanks during game without having to get Last Whisper or any other item with armor penetration till mid or late game.

Coknuckles12/30/2013, 10:11:13 PM1 votes

But you're also bringing up 2 seperate points. Attack damage vs armor pen, and flat vs scaling runes. No matter what you decide, there are always flat runes, and scaling runes. The flat ones are better for champions you're having trouble with early game. The scaling ones help later late game, but do nothing in the first few lvls.