Hello summoners! I am Skinny Mage. I am here to show you guys how I play Pantheon. Pantheon is categorized as a melee caster, meaning that he deals most of his damage through abilities, but still resembles a bruiser in that he is a melee auto-attacker, and has some tanky qualities. This guide will show you how to play Pantheon in a variety of different roles, with the main of the guide geared toward top lane (other roles are in their own special chapters). In this guide you will learn the proper runes, masteries, item builds, and strategies to be successful with Pantheon, as well as lane opponents and how to properly deal with them. But before we begin, you should be aware that listening to this song while playing Pantheon will increase your performance drastically!



Why play Pantheon?
Pros:

• Very high early damage, both long and close range
• Extremely manly
• Gap closer and stun in one move
• Powerful passive for dueling bruisers
• Large map presence with ult

Cons:

• Not that strong late game
• Mostly single target damage
• No sustain
• Possible mana issues
• Lackluster ultimate, not useful in a fight and misses a lot

Greater Mark of Strength
These Marks synergize well with your great scalings to increase your damage output and improve your last hitting. They give you the highest damage output early in the game and the best farming which are the two things I feel are most important on Pantheon.

Greater Mark of Desolation
These Marks are an alternative to AD Marks. They won't improve your last hitting, but they will increase your damage output against enemy champions by a good amount later in the game.


Greater Seal of Resilience
Always take these to reduce the damage of enemy champions and minions. Now that the flat armor mastery is harder to get and you can't get any minion damage reduction, these are especially important.


Greater Glyph of Shielding
These are you standard Glyphs which will reduce the damage you take from AP champions later in the game when you need it.

Greater Glyph of Warding
Take these as an alternative if you lane opponent deals a lot of magic damage, for example .

Greater Glyph of Focus
These are an alternative if you want to play extremely aggressive. You disregard defense, but you will be able to harass harder and do more damage with your decreased cooldowns.


Greater Quintessence of Strength
Take these Quints because they synergize well with your great scalings to increase your damage output and improve your last hitting. Don't take Greater Marks of Desolation because they aren't as mathematically effective in your Quintessence slot (armor pen Quints and AD Marks give 10 armor pen and 8.5 AD, 6 armor pen Marks and 3 AD Marks and Quints give 10 armor pen and 9.6 AD).

This will be a calculated analysis of the damage output of Pantheon's abilities in hypothetical situations. For these situations I will be using a squishy person who doesn't build any armor, like a dumb mid lane opponent, and a normal bruiser person who builds some armor, like a standard top lane opponent. All calculations will be done using by 9/14/7 masteries with logical item paths.


You only have at level one so all I am doing is calculating your spear damage against squishy and normal opponents. This will be calculated with a flask opening so no outside stats are taken into account.

ARP
65 (level 1 spearshot base damage) + 1.4 (bonus AD ratio) * 7 (lvl 1 bonus AD) = 75 Raw Damage

AD
65 (level 1 spearshot base damage) + 1.4 (bonus AD ratio) * 16 (lvl 1 bonus AD) = 87 Raw Damage


Lets say squishy person has 12 armor and bruiser person has 40 armor. The .92 is the 8% armor pen mastery and the formula for determining how much damage you deal is 100/(100 + armor).

ARP
Vs Squishy: (12 * .92)- 12 = 0 armor = 100% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: (40 * .92) - 12 = 24.8 armor = 25 armor = 80% damage dealt

AD
Vs Squishy: 12 * .92 = 11.04 armor = 11 armor = 90% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: 40 *.92 = 36.8 armor = 37 armor = 73% damage dealt


All we have to do is multiply the raw damage by the damage reduction caused by armor.

ARP
Vs Squishy: 75 * 1 = 75 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 75 * .8 = 60 Real Damage

AD
Vs Squishy: 87 * .9 = 78 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 87 * .73 = 64 Real Damage

conclusion


Now I shall progress a bit in this hypothetical game to where you are level 5 and have purchased a longsword to see how your damage is affected at this point. For this demonstration I will be using a combo but will be excluding from the damage calculation since it's damage in both scenarios will be the same.

ARP
[2 * (145 + 1.4 * 20)] + (78 + 3.6 * 20) = 496 Raw Damage

AD
[2 * (145 + 1.4 * 29)] + (78 + 3.6 * 29) = 554 Raw Damage


Let's say squishy person hasn't bought any armor items yet so they are at like 25 armor but bruiser person bought like a cloth armor or something and has like 70 armor.

ARP
Vs Squishy: (25 * .92) - 12 = 11 armor = 90% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: (70 * .92) - 12 = 52.4 armor = 52 armor = 66% damage dealt

AD
Vs Squishy: 25 * .92 = 23 armor = 81% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: 70 * .92 = 64.4 armor = 64 armor = 61% damage dealt


Again just multiply the raw damage by the damage reduction.

ARP
Vs Squishy: 496 * .9 = 446 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 496 * .66 = 327 Real Damage

AD
Vs Squishy: 554 * .81 = 449 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 554 * .61 = 338 Real Damage


I am going to define mid game as completing and and being around level 13. This is again going to be a combo ommiting the damage. Keep in mind that for this calculation the Bloodthirster will have full stacks and the enemy will have full stacks of the cleaver passive on them.

ARP
[2 * (225 + 1.4 * 167)] + (318 + 3.6 * 167) = 1837 Raw Damage

AD
[2 * (225 + 1.4 * 174)] + (318 + 3.6 * 174) = 1882 Raw Damage


For these calculations I will use a squishy guy with 75 armor and a tanky guy with 150 armor.

ARP
Vs Squishy: (75 * .92 * .7) - 22 = 26.3 armor = 26 armor = 79% Damage Dealt (approx)
Vs Tanky: (150 * .92 * .7) - 22 = 74.6 armor = 75 armor = 57% Damage Dealt

AD
Vs Squishy: (75 * .92 * .7) - 10 = 38.3 armor = 38 armor = 72% Damage Dealt
Vs Tanky: (150 * .92 * .7) - 10 = 86.6 armor = 87 armor = 53% Damage Dealt



ARP
Vs Squishy: 1837 * .79 = 1451 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 1837 * .57 = 1047 Real Damage

AD
Vs Squishy: 1882 * .72 = 1355 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 1882 * .53 = 997 Real Damage


Now I want to see the damage difference given a level 18 Pantheon with a full build of doing a combo of again ommiting the damage of since it is the same. Since it is late game the hypothetical opponents we will be bashing have 100, 175, and 250 armor respectively.

ARP
[2 * (225 + 1.4 * 276)] + (318 + 3.6 * 276) = 2534 Raw Damage

AD
[2 * (225 + 1.4 * 282)] + (318 + 3.6 * 282) = 2573 Raw Damage


For the damage reduction calculations I will assume you have full stacks of the Black Cleaver passive on the opponent.

ARP
Vs Squishy: (100 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 22 = 19.86 armor = 20 armor = 83% damage dealt
Vs Medium: (175 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 22 = 51.225 armor = 51 armor = 66% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: (250 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 22 = 82.65 armor = 83 armor = 55% damage dealt

AD
Vs Squishy: (100 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 10 = 31.86 armor = 32 armor = 76% damage dealt
Vs Medium: (175 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 10 = 63.225 armor = 63 armor = 61% damage dealt
Vs Tanky: (250 * .92 * .65 * .7) - 10 = 94.65 armor = 95 armor = 51% damage dealt



ARP
Vs Squishy: 2534 * .83 = 2103 Real Damage
Vs Medium: 2534 * .66 = 1672 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 2534 * .55 = 1394 Real Damage

AD
Vs Squishy: 2573 * .76 = 1955 Real Damage
Vs Medium: 2573 * .61 = 1570 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 2573 * .51 = 1312 Real Damage

Based on this data I can conclude that without items, AD marks will provide more damage and easier last hitting against ALL amounts of armor. However ARP marks scale better the more AD and ARP you get from items, making them stronger later in the game, surpassing AD marks about when you get . AD marks are stronger for about the first half of the game and ARP marks are strong for about the second half of the game. But since AD marks provide easier last hitting, and a stronger early game which is Pantheon's strength, I think overall they are superior to ARP marks.

Summoner's Wrath: Gives you 5 AD when is on cooldown for only one point, really good.
Sorcery: You can choose between cooldown reduction and attack speed, and I think after you hit around level 3 cooldown reduction is much better because not only does it increase your damage (at a range as well unlike attack speed), but it also let's me have my utility move up more like for more stuns and for more ganks.
Deadliness: More attack damage and leads into Weapon Expertise, fairly obvious choice.
Weapon Expertise: Solid % armor penetration for just one point, also fairly obvious.


Durability: Scaling health, good overall mastery and used to unlock later tiers.
Perseverance: Give you health regen based on how low you are. OK mastery mainly used to unlock later tiers.
Hardiness or Resistence: Flat armor or magic resist to help dominate your lane opponent (switch them based on opponent).
Veteran Scars: Good early boost to your health for one point, build out of Durability.
Unyielding: Basically like old Indomitable only it doesn't work on minions, but it is still very strong, particularly on champions with DOTs like .
Block: One point in this and you take 3 less damage from champion auto-attacks. This is extremely strong and will let you DESTROY auto-attack reliant champs in combination with .


Summoner's Insight: Reduces the cooldown on flash by 15 second for one point, and lets you get to the next tier.
Meditation: Mana regen in the first tier is a plus, it helps you out a good bit to keep your mana up, and the Wanderer mastery only works if you are out of combat so it sucks now.
Mastermind: I mainly take this to counteract the increased cooldowns on and , but if you plan on taking you may switch these points into Tenacious in the defense tree so you have some tenacity.




The reason I don't take this as my default mastery page is that I have to put point in "OK" masteries like Havoc to get the ones I really want like Brute Force and Sunder. Use this if you want to get really aggressive early and try to deny you opponent ().




Summoner's Wrath: Gives you 5 AD when is on cooldown for only one point, really good.
Sorcery: You can choose between cooldown reduction and attack speed, and I think after you hit around level 3 cooldown reduction is much better because not only does it increase your damage (at a range as well unlike attack speed), but it also let's me have my utility move up more like for more stuns and for more ganks.
Butcher: Help you last hit and unlock later tiers.
Weapon Expertise: Solid % armor penetration for just one point, also fairly obvious.
Havoc: I know this mastery isn't the strongest ever but it got buffed and I think 2% increased overall damage helps more than 3% increased auto-attack damage (3% more outgoing attacks).
Brute Force: Flat AD to help your early game damage and unlock more tiers.
Sunder: Flat armor pen to help your early game damage and unlock Executioner.
Executioner: Helps you finish off low health things. Also only costs one point.


Perseverance: I think two points in this will help you out more than two point in Durability. It let's you regen your health faster then you are playing aggressive as opposed to a bit of late game health.


Summoner's Insight: Reduces the cooldown on flash by 15 second for one point, and lets you get to the next tier.
Meditation: Mana regen in the first tier is a plus, it helps you out a good bit to keep your mana up, and the Wanderer mastery only works if you are out of combat so it sucks now.
Mastermind: I use this to have my and up as often as possible to be in a position to pick up more kills.

First Summoner Spell

Always get flash. It has so many uses, especially on a champion like Pantheon who can easily kill or target if he gets in range, and you can also use it to flash over walls to get away, chase, well there are just so many things that you can do with flash. Take flash.

Second Summoner Spell

My #1 choice for your other summoner spell would be ignite. Ignite let's you pick up kills you would otherwise not get, and reduces healing which is great against champions like ). It just makes you super scary early and mid game, and lets you pick up a lot of kills, which is pretty important on Pantheon.


I personally think that teleport is unnecessary because of your ult, but it's a decent pick. It doesn't give you the killing power of ignite, but it does give you great map mobility, and you can set up some good ganks at bot or dragon, as well as stop split pushes. It's your choice, I don't get it that often.


I don't like this summoner a whole lot on solo lanes. It doesn't give you the killing power of ignite, unless your jungler is camping your lane because the slow lets two people whack at your opponent. I would only get it with a gank happy jungler against a close range melee carry like .

After attacking or casting spells 4 times, Pantheon will block the next normal attack that deals more than 40 damage to him.




is in my opinion possibly the strongest passive in the entire game. What? The strongest passive in the whole game? Yea, you heard me. You completely block damage from incoming attacks and some spells as well. It's not even hard to get up. Just get some last hits and boom! Damage gone. Oh and did I mention is comes back instantly after ? Wielding this passive determines how well you play Pantheon. The basic concept of it is to completely destroy your opponent in small skirmishes through and then back off, and then if they slip up go for a kill. More detail on how to use the shield refreshing ability of in the section. You know Pantheon's passive is up if he has tiny yellow shields circling around him and he runs with his shield in front of him.


Pantheon hurls his spear at an opponent, dealing 65/105/145/185/225 + 140% of his bonus attack damage in physical damage. Certain Death causes Spear Shot to critically strike for 1.5x damage

Cooldown 4 seconds
Cost 45 mana
Range 600


is very simple. It's a ranged poke attack. What most people don't know is that it actually does more damage, costs less mana, and has a lower cooldown than , although it has slightly lower range and doesn't apply on-hit effects (that would be way OP). There isn't anything tricky to be said, use it whenever opponents are in range and you have mana to spare. Or in the rare event that you can't get close to minions to farm (should never happen) you can always use it last hit. If you go for a combo, first check if you are in range for . If so, use it before so that after you and it will nearly be up again. Also the nice ratio is a great reason to pick up tons of AD. While you are retreating, make sure you use it whenever you can as long as you aren't in imminent danger of dieing because it doesn't really slow you down and if they chase you for long enough you could turn around and kill them.


Pantheon leaps at the target enemy champion and deals 50 / 75 / 100 / 125 / 150 (+100% of ability power) magic damage and stuns them for 1 second. Pantheon also instantly refreshes his Aegis Protection.

Cooldown 13/12/11/10/9 seconds
Cost 70 mana
Range 600


Yes, it's a gap closer. Yes, it's a stun. But the thing most people overlook, and perhaps the most important thing of all is that it refreshes . How do you use this to your advantage? Against an auto-attack champion like , you can destroy him by trading blows, and after he takes out , use to not only stun him and do extra damage, but also block another attack, while dealing huge damage through , , and auto-attacks. He will have no choice but to back off because you are unscathed and he is heavily damaged that if he tries to stick around you can easily kill him, and if he backs off you just kill a few minions and is back up again, and you can do it all over again! This skill is also instrumental in landing . Also it is good on defense if you are being ganked or tower dived. If the enemy jungler is coming up from behind, you can hit them with a to jump to them and stun them so you can get to your turret without taking a scratch. If you are being dived wait until they are under the tower and is down and hit them with to give you an extra block and stun them under the tower, dealing lots of damage (people trying to tower dive me as Pantheon usually end up netting me a kill).


Passive: Pantheon gains 100% critical strike chance against targets below 15% of their max health.

Active: Pantheon focuses and deals 3 swift strikes in front of him for 13/23/33/43/53 + 60% of his bonus attack damage as physical damage per strike. Deals double damage to champions. Channels for 0.75 seconds

Cooldown 10/9/8/7/6 seconds
Cost 45/50/55/60/65 mana
Range 400


Despite the small numbers, this skill does the most damage out of your entire arsenal. Take a moment to think about it. If each strike deals 13 (+.6 Bonus AD) at level one, and it deals double damage to champions, the damage increases to 26 (+1.2 Bonus AD), and then it also hits three times, then the damage just at level one is 78 (+3.6 Bonus AD), 318 (+3.6 Bonus AD) at level 5! Put that on a 6 second cooldown and that is a big part of your mid-late game damage. The main flaw though is that if an opponent is on defense, you first have to use in order to land , making more mana efficient for whittling down enemies playing safe. If they are making aggressive moves you can hit them with while they are attacking you without the need to use . There is also an extra part of that makes you crit low health things. It goes great with the executioner mastery to finish people off. The best part of it though is that when you kill low health minions you deal double damage so you lifesteal double the health, meaning a little lifesteal goes a long way.


Pantheon gathers his strength and then leaps high into the air for 2 seconds, crashing down at the target area 1.5 seconds later. Deals up to 400 / 700 / 1000 (+100% of ability power) magic damage to units at the center (down to 50% at the edge) and slows them by 35% for 1 second.

Cost 150 / 250 / 350 mana
Range 5500


My least favorite move of Pantheon, your ult, despite the big numbers, is just a map mobility move (like without map vision and a longer channel time). The only time you will ever hit anybody with this move is if they are occupied in a fight or they are asleep. Even if you will land right in their path, they have plenty of time to change direction and get out of harm's way. You should use it to box in opponents by placing the ult behind them (put them about on the rim), then they are trapped between landing in the middle of your ult or in the middle of your team, but ever with perfect placement, it only goes the way you want half the time or less. Apparently Riot also removed the part where if you mashed you could land a stun before you landed in the August patch notes. A few extra things you can do with it is that you can use to get to a fight or back to lane faster, and if the enemy has no channel breakers, you can even use it to escape a gank like .



Level 1: or
If you can effectively use to destroy your lane opponent or you are going for an invade, is great because it refreshes your passive and stuns your opponents from a distance so you can beat them down together. If won't help very much (AP opponent) or you are sure your opponent won't try to do anything to you, take for the long range damage.
Early Levels: Take whatever you didn't take at level 1 at level 2. If you took at level 1, you pretty much need before , so get next, and if you took you will still be able to come way out on top with just at level 2, you already are every strong in trades, so don't feel rushed to get . Basically max until you can dominate trades so much that they are afraid to get near you (2-3 levels is almost always enough), then max for more mana efficient poke damage.
Mid-Late Levels: You may notice that I max / over getting more points in . That is because you don't get a whole lot out of getting more than one point, since you almost never hit anybody with it, but because it's an ult it's still better to spare two more points in it instead of , so max last.

- Super Pot

• Saves 49g every charge
• Better then old flask after 10 charges
• Always have regen when you want it

- Playmaker Pot

• OP stats
• Cheap
• No slots used
• When you gotta get stuff done

- Sword of Agression

• Many build paths
• Lots of early damage
• Does not wear off

- OP AD Slayer

• Better then chain vest at only 50 armor
• Cannot be penetrated
• More effective the more armor you have

- Dream Boots

• One of few good MR items
• Only good tenacity source for Pantheon

- Early Game Slaughter

• Cheap
• AD
• Armor Pen
• Cooldown Reduction
• Easy build path
• What else do you want?
• Late game upgrade

- Tons of AD

• Sustain
• Most AD in the game
• Easier to stack

- Armor Piercing Bow

• Not very expensive
• Most Armor Pen in game
• Lets you kill anything

- Vlad Slayer

• Cheap
• Late game upgrade
• Good damage and survivability for APs

- Gotta Live

• Not that expensive
• Tankyness vs all damage types
• Only one counter (BOTRK)

- There Is No Escape

• Good armor and health
• Awesome passive
• Awesome active
• Makes you very hard to kite/peel
• Best counter to true damage / attack speed

- 1UP Mushroom

• When you die you don't die
• Stats are pretty weak so sell for something else when you use the revive

- Blitz Proof Shield

• Solid MR item
• Shield cooldown lowered
• Blocks game changing moves ()

- Makes Malzahar Useless

• Get out of suppresses
• Get out of long cc's
• Cheap MR

- Bad Red Pot

• Takes up item slot
• Horrible resell value (you lose 285 gold)
• Passive weaker then old lifesteal
• Just get a playmaker pot

- Frozen Nerfed

• Mana stat useless
• No HP = GG
• High cost

- ManaIDONTHAVEALLDAY

• Needs to be stacked
• No damage until item is finished
• Scales off mana, you don't build mana
• Gives less mana and therefore less damage in S3
• Only redeeming factor is the upgrade which again, takes forever to stack on Pantheon

- Useless Force

• The three elements of useless combine to form one item of ultimate uselessness
• Useless stats
• Useless passives
• High cost
• Useless

- Cold Kiddie Hammer

• Useless passive
• Expensive
• No damage
• Outclassed survivability

- Boots of Noob Trap

• The item itself isn't that bad, but you forgo lane dominance (tabis) and teamfighting viability (mercs) to get it

- You must be pretty bad if you still get this

• Builds into junk
• Super nerfed stats
• Need to have it for over 10 minutes just to go positive for selling it
• Takes up a slot
• You need early game

- ADC Sword

• You are not an ADC

- Quick Silver Sword

• How do you have enough money to buy this

- The Nerfed Cleaver

• So much nerf
• Needs to apply stacks
• Just get

- Bankwrecker

• Hexdrinker does same thing for cheaper
• Only does lots of damage when you are dead
• You can't afford this

- Spirit of the Nerf Lizard

• Burn passive got nerfed and is now weak as hell
• 2000g for 35 AD? I think I will spend my money elsewhere...

Since Bloodthirster and Black Cleaver cost about the same so I will directly compare them without any other items using a combo omitting the damage since it is unaffected by items. They cost about 3,000g so lets say Pantheon is level 10. For this calculation we will be using standard runes and masteries. Assume bloodthirster is at full stacks and the enemy has max black cleaver stacks.



Bloodthirster
[2(225 + 1.4 * 112)] + (198 + 3.6 * 112) = 1365 Raw Damage

Black Cleaver
[2(225 + 1.4 * 72)] + (198 + 3.6 * 72) = 1109 Raw Damage


You are level 10 so for a squishy opponent I will say 50 armor and for a tanky opponent I will say 125 armor.

Bloodthirster
Vs Squishy: 50 * .92 = 46 armor = 68% Damage Dealt
Vs Tanky: 125 * .92 = 115 armor = 47% Damage Dealt

Black Cleaver
Vs Squishy: (50 * .92 * .75) - 10 = 24.5 armor = 25 armor = 80% Damage Dealt (approx)
Vs Tanky: (125 * .92 * .75) - 10 = 76.25 armor = 76 armor = 57% Damage Dealt (approx)



Bloodthirster
Vs Squishy: 1365 * .68 = 928 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 1365 * .47 = 642 Real Damage

Black Cleaver
Vs Squishy: 1109 * .80 = 887 Real Damage
Vs Tanky: 1109 * .57 = 632 Real Damage

As you can see unless the enemy has a high amount of armor (150+ or so) bloodthirster will both do more damage and also provide you with a lot of sustain that is very helpful in lane.

Not even going to bother updating this for the new armor pen stats at the moment since I think at this point nobody goes BC first.

Early game for Pantheon is getting last hits while trying to kill or deny your lane opponent. Properly using is crucial at this phase in the game, it will make the difference between being overlooked as a viable top lane, and causing your lane opponents to cry themselves to sleep. Determine what items you are going to take based on your opponent, and then head to lane, giving a leash for you jungler if he is in the half of the jungle near top lane. Make sure you have up before you start making aggressive plays. Try and get them to attack you by walking torwards them and hitting them, and if they try to attack back, quickly slap them with to ensure you win the trade. If they are ranged or just generally afraid of you (try and kill them before they realize how strong you are), you just want to poke them down with , or if you have mana and they aren't at their tower, you can use to ensure they don't get near the creeps. Also if you have sent them packing back to their tower, don't push by auto-attacking unless it's to last hit, so it takes longer for the wave to get to their tower so they can farm. If they get tired of waiting at the tower and come out to try and get some creeps you can finish them off with , or, since blocks turret shots, you can turret dive low health people as long as they don't have heavy cc and you are sure you can kill them fast.

With proper laning technique, and a fair match-up, you for the most part should be up in creeps and maybe have a kill or two on them. Once you get to the point where they just sit at their tower all day you can focus on their other lanes and jungle. I generally don't poke around in their jungle on the red team because the only thing there is blue and wolves, and blue is down most of the time, and if you are at wolves and their mid and top come you are dead. If your mid lane is in trouble and the enemy is overextended you can try to gank with , but make sure you aim a bit behind them to compensate for the jump time, and if your laner has cc, it is usually successful. Both teams will be trying to get dragon at this point, and if you see the enemy doing it, gather your team around them and use to force them into your team, or take a lot of damage. Also make sure to put up some around your lane and jungle if you plan on counter jungling to track your opponent movements and make sure you don't get caught. If you do plan on counter jungling make sure you push your lane out first, and then tell your mid lane to do so as well so the enemy laners are less likely to leave their lane to try and stop you, because they will lose XP, cs, and tower health if they do, and also it is good to go together with your jungler and/or mid for safety reasons and for more damage and cc to kill their jungler with.

Late game is when Pantheon becomes a bit less manly. You have to be aware that people you dominated in lane, might be stronger than you at this point in the game (for example ), but hopefully you have played well enough that it doesn't get too far into late game. Baron will become a big part of late game, so make sure you have it warded and periodically sweep it with an oracles so that if you want to do it they won't know that you are doing it. The best way to do baron is unexpectedly, like if they are all backing after a fight and you and your team are still pretty healthy you can kill it before they can group up to stop you, but getting caught at baron when you aren't a lot stronger could be disastrous. I recommend split pushing at this point in the game, because you can enter a fight with if one breaks out and you will be constantly putting pressure on a lane so they will have to play more defensively, but make sure you put up some so you don't got caught off guard and give away a free kill. But mostly late game is about how well you do in team fights, so make sure you check the team fights section.

As Pantheon, you can have two roles in a team fight. Either you can sneak up from behind/the side or in the back lines and take out their squishies and surround them or you can protect your AD carry and take a chunk out of anybody that tries to touch him (I usually only do this late game when my AD carry is really strong). If you have your up it is usually beneficial to split push before a fight breaks out because you can jump right in at the perfect time if a fight breaks out. The most important thing is not jumping into the middle of their team until they have at least blown some spells or you will die very quickly. Try and hit as many opponents as you can with whenever it comes off cooldown to deal big damage to many enemy champions. Also you have to gauge the threat level of the enemies, don't just immediately target their AD carry. If is raping face, and their AD carry is and does no damage, then grab a and take him down. Your will become less noticeable here with all the chaos going on, so don't feel like you have to wait until it's down to use . Also be fast to use an item like if you get hit with or .

Chogath is a farm champion. He can't really hurt you at all, but is tough to push out of lane. If you can damage him to 1/3 or 1/2 health, you can finish him off with a combo and maybe if he goes for a last hit. Be aware that he can beat you if he gets enough armor and you dont have . Be wary of as it can easily lead into a successful gank, also don't get hit by too much free while he is hitting minions and keep your health up even though he doesn't do a lot of damage because can catch you unawares.


Gangplank is pretty easy for Pantheon because blocks the dreaded , but that doesn't mean you can be careless. If is up you can play agressive, but if is down, play passively until it is up. If starts running at you to try and take out to land an unblocked , slap him with and for some good damage, then when he takes out immediately use to stun him and refresh your passive, then back off after he takes down again. If he still wants more back off while trading auto-attacks and using and unless you are confident you can land a kill. Don't go for a kill under the tower unless is down or he has like no health or you could end up wasting or for nothing.


Garen is not that difficult for Pantheon, but I hate playing against him because he is so hard to kill/kick out of lane. If blocks , then just tank and hit him with and and auto-attacks because you will out-damage him and win the trade, and when he backs off use and to further damage him and block more moves, but the frustrating thing is, he just sits in a bush or at tower or in a bush for a bit and is back on full health. Avoid hitting him when he has active because it gives a lot of damage reduction, and don't go near him with low health because and can easily finish you off.


Irelia is easy to handle early, just use to block her attacks and run around and use when she has active and your is down. But it is important to keep in mind that unless you are far ahead, Irelia will eventually be stronger than you when she reaches a certain point in items and levels, so make sure to crush her early. Do not dive her while you are on more health than her, because she can stun you under the tower with and you will be in for a lot of hurt.


Malphite is indeed rock solid. His passive lets him soak up 's fairly easily and out harass you with . It isn't long before he just has so much armor that you can't hurt him. If you want to kill him, you have to do it early, but if you do land first blood, you can possibly snowball the lane in your favor. Fortunately he isn't really a huge threat so if you feel intimidated by him you can just stick close to your turret and farm.


Nasus is going to do his best to try and farm. Your job is to deny him as much farm as possible, so constantly shove 's in his face and possibly a if he tries to get a last hit near you. After he gets and it will be extremely difficult to kill him and most likely beat you in a fight, so make sure you are far ahead at that point. Be very careful of because it is very deadly when combined with ganks. Consider taking the utility mastery page or even a to relentlessly batter him with and since he will won't offer hardly any resistance early.


Renekton can be frustrating due to his great in and out damage, but remember that his cooldowns are higher than yours and that you deal more damage. Your passive can block so unless he sticks around to take out your shield first he can't hit you with it, and by then you will have out-damaged him. Just keep the pressure up, and don't dive him when and are off cooldown. Make sure you take control of the lane at level 1-2 before he has his full combo.


Talon is honestly just an inferior version of Pantheon. He has pretty wicked level 6 burst, and superior ability to escape ganks after level 6, but other than that, you can just beat him. You can block his attacks, your poke is stronger, and you deal more damage. Just don't let him keep you at your tower with , because that will let him gank your lanes.


AD Sion is completely worthless. He just sucks so hard that you can beat him while asleep. His sustain is negative (), he has to melee to farm, and his attack speed is like 2 attacks every minute. Just poke with and use to block his attacks. Just make sure you back off after he uses because you can't beat him with it on, but that's easy because he has no gap closer (starting to see the picture?). The only thing that could possibly happen to you is get stunned by and then ganked by a strong jungler.


Tryndamere is a bit tougher than Sion because he has sustain, mobility, and a better attack speed. But he still only does damage through auto-attacks, so is your best friend. Poke with and use to smoothly win trades and back off. If you can get him to burn without using too much of your stuff, great, just make sure you don't dive him while it's up.


Post-Nerfs: I never see Warwick top anymore, but I don't think it will be that tough anymore. His got hit pretty hard, so if he uses it like 3 times he OOM, and it doesn't even hit very hard. Just don't all out on him and he can't hurt you very much, just use your abilities and back off when is down, which is easy because he can't chase without you being on half health or blowing or .


Wukong isn't too tough but can be tricky. He has a fair bit of ability based damage through and and his just drives me bananas. Try to have up when he hits you with to block it, and be quick to recognize and you will be fine.


Pantheon is one of the few champions that can take on riven and come out on top. The key is to try and avoid the moves themselves and trade while is up. However Riven is crazy strong later in the game, and there isn't much you can do about it. She is much harder to gank than you and every single move and passive she has scales great with AD (rather broken honestly), also is way better than your ult, so she can kill you easily if you aren't careful.


Oh look a weak early game champion. FIRST BLOOD. Basically it's like fighting Nasus, deny him really hard, and it's easy because he naturally pushes and has no sustain. Try to only hit the minions for the kill and the lane will push towards your side, then just keep the minions right in front of your tower. Not only will this leave you quite safe from ganks, but it makes it so Singed can't get any CS without getting his butt kicked. Whenever you can, throw some 's at him, and if he gets in range for a last hit, throw in a combo to really punish him for thinking about farming. You don't want the wave to push to his tower though, because then he can farm rather safely, and he can you into his tower, and if the jungler comes, there is a high chance you will die. If you do get flung into his tower, use on singed to get out of there faster and block a tower shot if you need to, then escape as best you can from the jungler if he shows up.


I have only done this match-up one or two times, but he never gave me much trouble. He deals damage through auto attacks and , both of which you can block with . He isn't that tanky, so you should have an easy time chunking him down, and he has really long casting animations on and , so you should abuse that. You have to be careful about the bushes though, if you are inside them he can jump to you over and over, so try to take control of the bushes to he can't engage on you. Also be careful of stealth, because it's similar to nocturn's ult, he can pop out of nowhere and be right no you.


Jax is rather popular as of late and unfortunately is really strong. You can't rely on your auto attacks to damage him because of , so you will have to rely almost completely on your abilities. However he doesn't have sustain so take advantage of this by hitting him with a bunch of early. Keep at mind that for some rediculous reason the bonus damage from hits through , so you are never truly safe. Also after 10-20 minutes into the game he will just start rolling all over you unless you shut him down extremely hard.


This is a for the most part skill matchup (with much less skill required on his part obviously). Basically you want to beat him in poking and small skirmishes because he will beat you on a full on fight, particularly after he gets level 6 and gets . If you see him walking up to try and land a hit him with a and immediately back off so you don't get hit by the edge. Also do not engage on him, let him engage on you, that way you can safely back off after a few trades. If you go in on him after you want to leave he will pull you right back in with and get a 5 stack combo ready to go, which means if you don't have you're toast bro. The important thing is to just poke him down and fight when you have the advantage.


Maybe you can beat Yorick after the nerfs. Nope. After he gets there will be so many ghouls in your face you'll be ranting on the forums in minutes. Don't even think about trying to poke him down, he will poke right back and heal at the same time. Want to go in and kick his butt? Oh wait he out trades you also, and even if you are ahead and DID out trade him, it doesn't matter because 5 seconds later he is back on full health and poking you down. You though laning against Malphite was bad, wait for him to get a good mana pool and he will be mindlessly mashing buttons until your champion gives up and refuses to follow your orders. There is only one slim ray of hope for this lane. You have to get down on your knees and beg your jungler to camp him pre-tear and hope you can farm a few kills to have any chance. And then 10 minutes it doesn't even matter...




Mr. Buggy is not that difficult. Early just poke down his health a bit with since his sustain is pretty weak and mana intensive. Eventually he will try to trade you and when you do you can beat him pretty easily with your passive and overall higher damage output (try to stay near minions so his Q doesn't hit that hard) and you might even be able to score a kill if he is far enough out from his turret. If you get an advantage all he can really do is sit back and farm with because he can't trade with you and will take a lot of harass for coming in melee range. His harass gets really annoying after level 6 because it applies his passive so it does good damage, and let's him farm, but after you get you can heal it back rather easily and you will gradually build a gold lead because you can get all the creeps while he can only get half or so due to only being able to use W every 10 seconds or so. The best part of all is that he isn't significantly more useful than you late-game, so even if you don't stop him you can still be confident that you didn't let your team down.




You are one of the few champions that can trade with lee sin early and come out on top. When facing him a few tips can ease fights in your favor. Try to dodge when he is ranged so he doesn't get free damage in when he engages. Poke at him with and whenever his shield is down so you have a health advantage if he tries to engage on you. Also in a 1v1 fight try to save for when he has on you so the attack speed debuff won't affect you as much. He is pretty annoying to catch down and kill but it is somewhat even lane overall.




Zyra is basically a skill match-up because of how she is basically all about skillshots. How well you do in lane is dependent on how well you and the Zyra position yourselves. As with virtually every mid lane match-up, if you get in range she will be in some serious hurt, but you can't just charge straight in. If you go in without a good angle you will be rooted down with and suddenly be sitting in a lot of plants and AOE which hurts a lot. Ideally you want to avoid her attack when she goes in and then go in for an attack if she doesn't back off immediately. However if she doesn't have (pre-6 or cooldown) then even if you do get hit by her combo if she still sticks around in range then you can go in and kill her without worrying about the threat of being killed.




After the resurgence of Jayce popularity I got a chance to play against him some and I have to say, he was easier than I though he would be. His strengths are that he is really pokey, has high burst, and can disengage if you try to do something about his poke, but Pantheon can deal with all of these things really well. blocks his auto attack poke and you can answer with a just for him trying, and will also take the brunt of his burst and allow you to out trade him if you decided to go in on you. Also since your gap closer is also a stun you can land your fully channeled on his before he can have any chance of knocking you away so it is hard for him to keep you off him. As long as you don't take too much 's for free (TIP: Stand away from your creeps so he either has to not be able to hit you or try and hit you and miss out on farm because you can deny him while it is down) you should be fine.

Why jungle Pantheon?
Pros:

• Very strong ganks
• Good at dueling against almost all junglers
• Ult gives you good map control

Cons:

• Falls off extremely fast without successful ganks due to lack of farm
• Jungle clearing isn't that strong

Marks: Take some attack speed (6-9 marks) for a faster clear and to activate more often so you take less damage in the jungle and proc more. The rest should be AD because your moves scale well with AD.
Seals: Armor. No discussion, you need armor to effectively jungle, fight enemy champions, tower dive better... just take armor.
Glyphs: I like magic resist per level. 5olid uses attack speed, but you only get like 5% attack speed, and in team fights I felt that I was way too easy to kill for just a bit of attack speed. I think the 24 magic resist is better overall than 5% attack speed, but attack speed is a good alternative.
Quintessences: For quints you should take AD because you just do a whole lot more damage.



I use 21/8/1 masteries because utility doesn't really help much so I only put 1 point for the flash cooldown reduction and past 8 points in armor doesn't help much either so I put most of the points in offense for scarier early game ganks and stuff. I also take attack speed over cooldown reduction in the jungle for more procs.



You swap out ignite for flash because you are jungling, no need to explain really.




The role of your passive in the jungle changes from blocking enemy laner damage to blocking jungle camp damage. It also blocks attacks so from stronger mobs like dragon and baron so you can tank them very effectively with a .


Use your spearshot in between auto-attacks on jungle camps to maximize your damage output with it. Don't use it too much without blue buff on jungle camps because then you might not have enough mana for an easy kill. Also remember that it does not apply red buff, so make sure you get in auto attacks on an enemy to slow them.


You can't use it on jungle camps, so don't try and use it to refresh your passive. It does help you duel enemy junglers though, so if you do end up in a fight with an enemy jungler, use it to get the extra block. Otherwise just use it as a standard gap closer/stun.


You won't be relying on this skill as much in the jungle. It doesn't do much damage to jungle mobs, so don't bother using it on them unless you have it leveled up to rank 4 or 5, have some good AD, and there are many things to hit (wraiths or wolves). During ganks, since you want to constantly apply red buff, it usually isn't worth standing there to use it unless you laner has them stunned or something. Do NOT do a straight up combo, because you won't have red buff on them and then they can just run away since doesn't apply red buff.


It gives you some more map presence, and with some laner cc, can set up some really scary ganks from across the map (for example if you have a bot lane you can get a kill pretty much every time both of your ults are up), and you can jump on an enemy team doing dragon or baron to deal them all a lot of damage. But overall, I still don't like the move, half the time it accomplishes nothing due to the huge channel time.




Max because it will help you clear your jungle the fastest, and is just a good solid source of damage (it is ranged and can't miss). Max second because it doesn't do much damage to jungle mobs and sometimes you don't want to stand still long enough to use it during a gank. Get on point in at level 6 and then don't get any more points in it until and are maxed because all you really get from leveling it up is a lower cooldown. Get one point in at level 2 for a level 2 gank or invade.


Start:
Unfortunately you can't start without these items in the new jungle basically. Your early ganks won't be as strong as with a doran's blade, but if you start with a dorans blade you can't jungle past blue at all.
Early Game:
You can upgrade your machete into a spirit stone for some faster jungle clearing and nice regens. Boots make you go a bit faster, and brutalizer gives a big boost to your early game damage.
Mid Game: or
Spirit stone upgrades into spirit of the lizard elder which gives you some really fast jungling and pretty good damage ( applies the debuff to everybody it hits). I upgrade black cleaver earlier than usual because I don't have as much gold and want to help my team earlier since I'm the jungler. Boots are normal.
Late Game:
Round out your build with some defensive items like warmogs and randuins and if you still need more damage pick up a bloodthirster. The reason I pick up defensive items before bloodthirster is because as the jungler you usually take on a more supporty tanky role and soak up more damage and don't have the money to invest in both damage and defense, also spirit of the lizard elder and black cleaver is already like 200AD which is a pretty solid amount.
Example Build: ()

Jungle Route and Play

Blue = Blue team Red = Purple team

Have your team spread out to cover the four jungle entrances before the game starts so nobody slips in without you noticing. At 1:40 wolves spawn, so be there to kill them (your team should put some damage on them to help you out) then when those are dead, go to blue, which spawns at 1:55, and kill it with a leash and . Next head to one of the adjacent lanes and gank it. After that you can back if you need to, then go to wraiths and do that, then golems, then red (), and back to wraiths and you should be level 4. From there gank if there is an opening, hold towers when you need to, and the rest of the time farm, help out people in need... you know, standard jungle stuff. Also remember that the buff have a 5 minute respawn time, so be ready to take them for you or your team when they are up. Heading into mid game, dragon starts to come into play, so make sure it's warded. Hopefully you have helped your lanes enough that they are winning, so that you can get some objectives. It's your job as the jungler to have good map control (that means place wards, clear wards, roam) and it's up to you to smite dragon/baron, so don't mess up! Otherwise it's just normal pantheon play.

Example Game

So one of the perks of learning a champion is that you also learn how to play against them, let me share with you some of things I hate going against when I play Pantheon in case you end up going against him, and also the best methods of beating these counters if you are playing Pantheon.


Oh the cloth armor. My ongoing nemesis. A smart enemy should always take this against you. First of all your harass is basically doing nothing to the endless chugging of health potions, and the armor just reduces all your damage in general which makes it hard to kill things. Your best best when playing against an opponent with cloth armor is to either a) tell your jungler to get over here because this guy has no boots (very effective against champions with no escape) or b) save up or mana for an all in kill if you opponent starts to get ballsy because you are playing so scared. This basically applies to any combination of armor and sustain, it becomes very frustrating when you aren't shutting down what you aim to shut down, and they out-scale you later in the game.



Destroying my laner? NP I'm just gonna camp your lane. At some point junglers realized that ganking an agressive champion with absolutely no escapes was pretty easy kills, so as a result, when you play Pantheon, you will get camped. It's incredibly annoying that most lane opponents that ever beat only do so because Mr. Lee Sin had to make it a 2v1. Because you have no escape if you get ganked by a jungler with red buff without flash you almost always die. You can always use wards, but you don't always have one up and aren't effective against certain junglers like Rengar. A lot of the time when you get ganked you should look for an opening for a kill, because it lulls the enemies into a sense of security since you are outnumbered. A quick ignite combo can land a kill on an unsuspecting opponent and you might even get away. As you play Pantheon you learn to spot openings for kills in ganks and take it. It is often the only way to make your death worth something. Another method is to get your jungler to counter-camp. You should be able to 2v2 most of the time because of how strong you are, but some junglers are unwilling to help you out, so turning a gank into kills is a good skill to have.

??? - Guide Released
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2/13/14 - Fixed a few calculation error that caused Bloodthirster's damage to be too high and also updated the section to account for the new Black cleaver armor shred
2/13/13 - Rounded all calculations to the nearest whole number for simplicity and to better reflect the actual damage being dealt.
5/8/13 - Did a few changes on the items section
5/29/13 - Fixed a few things and removed changes to Pantheon section (it's old)
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