Pantheon Analysis: "I've always wanted to be a Jungler"

(Analysis based off of Patch 4.2)

Since the introduction of the new Jungle items and changes, it made Pantheon more viable in S3 by helping him maintain his clear speed and kill power. But at that time both past and present, he was considered as a risky pick, where his "sustain and clear issues were so vast that his incredible ganking was seen as a trade off" - Stonewall008. It was not until the revised change of Spirit Stone's passive "Butcher", consisting of 20 / 30% (when upgraded) bonus damage as well as restoring 8% health and 4% mana as damage dealt that helped give that final push. With the S3 Jungle remake and Spirit Stone passive change in S4 that contributed to Pantheon's sustain and later clears, his only main drawback of sustain and clear speed after the first clear became negligible, effectively turned him into a Jungler with amazing gank potential, global pressure, high damage and gap closing stunning ability with a passive that makes him deceptively tanky.

Throughout the article, I will be explaining how specific aspects of Pantheon's kit and the current state of the game allows him to thrive as an excellent Jungle pick.

Curse's Jungler IWillDominate was one of the first Junglers to introduce Pantheon as a staple Jungler pick.

Aegis Protection

The most important thing to note with Aegis Protection is that it will only block if the attack is a basic attack or turret shot that would deal more than 40 physical damage to him. This means that only the attacks from the "boss" Monsters of a camp will actually be blocked instead of the "slaves", until a certain amount of time has passed where the "slaves" will be able to damage Pantheon for at least 40 physical damage (however by the time this happens, it will be ignorable due to how late it is in the game).

To sum up, this increases his resilience in the Jungle. By reducing the amount of attacks you take from the Monsters, you have more effective health in the long term and therefore you have extra Health Potions to use. As a result, this allows you to afford to duel the enemy Jungler without suffering the consequences (having to back early due to the consumption of Health Potions to sustain the duel), gank (while ganking you tank Minions and potentially take damage from the enemy players themselves, losing health in the process) and counter gank, further increasing the amount of early presence and pressure Pantheon can put on the map before backing.

In addition to allowing more "Jungle time" with an extra amount of total health from blocking the Monster's attack with his passive, it also allows him to take one turret shot in the first few levels of the game to either secure a kill, or do extra damage to reduce the enemy Laner's health even more (the best action to take if killing them is out of the question as Flash is mostly available when ganking the enemy Laners early on in the game), which will usually force them to back, use their remaining Health Potions or play passive. It also enables Pantheon to perform sustained turret dives that I will talk about later in the article.

Spear Shot

Let us get this straight. Spear shot is one of the best damage ganking abilities in the game. Why? Because Pantheon is the ONLY champion with a non-ultimate, ranged execute ability (critically strikes under 15% maximum health - 150% damage, when you have at least one point in Heartseeker Strike) that does not displace you as well as being accessible pre-6. This ranged execute makes him a superior ganker over other Junglers, as it will secure many kills that other Junglers would otherwise not be able to if they manage to escape under their turret or jump over terrain with a small amount of health. In addition, it is also a targeted ability (with a range of 600 units; think of Annie's abilities), making it an extremely reliable source of damage as it is guaranteed damage that cannot be juke or avoided compared to other damage abilities like Lee Sin's Sonic Wave. Furthermore, its low cooldown (and high base damage and scaling) allows it to be used more than once when ganking, making it an efficient damage output.

Now that the ganking aspect of Pantheon's Spear Shot has been dealt with, let us talk about Spear Shot's effectiveness in the Jungle. Spear Shot's base damage and AD scaling can be considered just as good as another Jungle assassin's clearing abilities, such as Kha'Zix's Taste Their Fear. At level 3 (I chose this specific level as this is where clearing the Jungle is important and relevant at this time in the game), Spear Shot does 145 (+ 140% bonus AD), costing 45 mana with a cooldown of 4 seconds whereas an unisolated and unevolved (due to being level 5 at this time in addition to the "slaves" of a Monster camp cancelling the isolation effect) Taste Their Fear does 130(+150% bonus AD), costing 25 mana with a cooldown of 3.5 seconds.

Talking damage-wise only from these numbers, this gives acknowledgement of the relative clearing power Pantheon has compared to other Junglers. This combined with the new Spirit Stone ( 20 / 30% when upgraded bonus damage, +8% health and +4% mana) will give an enormous amount of health and mana back. In addition to its low cost of 35 mana as well as mana and health gained as a reward from killing the Monsters, it makes the cost of casting Spear Shot almost null. As a result, this ability is spammable within the Jungle, allowing Pantheon to keep a hearty amount of health. With an extremely high damage due to the 20 / 30% damage buffer, 0 mana cost due to a high amount of mana gained overall (4% mana and Monster reward) and low cooldown, it is obvious that Spear Shot is an effective Jungle ability, destroying camps with ease while sustaining Pantheon.

With the "spammability" of Spear Shot allowing high damage output along with the blocking of the Dragon's extremely slow, animated attacks with Aegis Protection and the renewal of his passive with Aegis of Zeonia (increasing Pantheon's tanking capabilities), he is both an excellent Dragon tank and killer, giving Pantheon high objective control presence which is a major factor to consider for competitive play when picking a Jungler.

The critical strike execute component of Spear Shot also works against Monsters along with Heartseeker's Strike passive applying on Pantheon's auto attacks, giving him a stance as a competitive Jungler, as timing Smite with other damage abilities is extremely important when getting the kill reward or steal for the Dragon or Baron objective. With a critical strike auto attack, Spear Shot and Smite in one go (or a potential steal with Spear Shot and Smite only), it will give him a fair chance to secure objectives over other Junglers with execute effects such as Elise and Lee Sin.

Aegis of Zeonia

Aegis of Zeonia's simple point and click ability makes it a contender as one of the best crowd control abilities even though it has a stun duration of 1 second, as its targeted mechanic makes it extremely reliable. The ranged component (600 units) of this ability gives Pantheon an edge over other champions; he does not have to be in melee range in order to use this ability (particularly being melee himself, meaning the amount of usefulness he can get from this ability is very high, making it a potent ability overall). With an on demand, ranged crowd control ability (that is also a gap closer), it is not surprising that Pantheon is the Artisan of Ganking.

In addition to Aegis of Zeonia's ability to renew Aegis Protection, proper use of this with correct execution of timing of abilities along with weaving auto attacks in between abilities will allow Pantheon to block at least several turret shots. This allows him to turret dive, increasing Pantheon's ganking potential and explains why he is picked as a Jungler; being able to turret dive Top Lane to slow down the late game hyper tank's scaling, Bot Lane for Dragons or just in general for ganking or downing Turrets is what makes him a good Jungler.

As well as renewing Aegis Protection while turret diving, it can also be cast on the Monsters to renew Aegis Protection, further increasing Pantheon's resilience in the Jungle.

Heartseeker Strike

In my opinion, Heartseeker Strike is probably weakest ability in his kit overall. This is because it only deals a third of its total damage to Minions and Monsters, making it a liability when clearing the Jungle (until you gain enough damage where the "slaves" will die with one hit after). This also makes the health and mana gained with the Spirit Stone less effective even though it will heal for 50% due to being area of effect, its damage output being cut to a third still makes the heal and mana gain low, further giving less incentive to use in addition to this being maxed second after Spear Shot (making its damage low).

In addition to it being a channelled ability, it forces Pantheon to stop closing the distance (by auto attacking and moving at the same time) between his enemy and himself which could potentially allow the enemy to escape. The damage done or range it is done at has to be justified for the distance that is not closed out, therefore meaning that Heartseeker Strike would only be worth using in the early game if there is more than one enemy champion (such as ganking Bot Lane, counter ganking or early skirmish) or onwards from mid game where Pantheon will have some items and levels in it, increasing its damage so that it is worth to use (wave clearing or team fighting).

As a result, Heartseeker Strike's usefulness is only relevant in the mid and late game, where clearing Minion waves becomes much more important later on due to your average time of a game becoming longer, as well as 5 man team fights becoming a major aspect late game. Overall this makes Heartseeker Strike's area of effect damage useful. With the early and mid game being the most powerful stages of the game for Pantheon, it goes to show how weak Heartseeker Strike is if you compare its relative power to his other abilities.

Grand Skyfall

Ultimates that apply global pressure have always been considered as one of the greatest assets you can have in your team. Following on from this, champions such as Shen and Twisted Fate, who have been in the light of competitve play due to their notorious ability to apply global pressure by teleporting directly to fight, makes Jungle Pantheon a similar champion. With Pantheon's ability to both Jungle and provide deadly ganks in addition to having global presence (which is amplified due to being a Jungler) is what makes him a great Jungler pick. The only other champion that can Jungle and apply global pressure is Nocturne, but his extremely short ranged ultimate at level one just makes it a long range gap closer instead of a semi global teleport, not necesssarily making Nocturne a global pressure champion until level 2 Paranoia. However, Nocturne's Paranoia is still extremely outranged by Pantheon's Grand Skyfall, making Pantheon outshine Nocturne heavily (well Nocturne is an Eternal Nightmare, duh). He is a reincarnation of Twisted Fate as a Jungler.

He is considered by professional players as a competitive Jungler, as the huge range of Grand Skyfall and knowledge of the player will allow him to be at the right position at the right times, in addition with his flexible skill set opening up both reactive (passive, responsive or defensive play) and active play (aggressive play). Reactive play can consist of: reactive or pre-meditated counter ganking, split pushing with Heartseeker Strike (while your team is sieging or doing nothing while still being "with" the team) or pushing out a pushed lane while a dance is going on or your team is getting sieged on.  On the other hand, active play can consist of: forcing team fights as enemies within 700 range are slowed by 35% for 1 second (this with a Randuin's slow and stun will ensure a fight happens), turret diving or ganking. Overall, he is an excellent competitive pick, as Grand Skyfall will allow the player to react accordingly in addition to the player's knowledge, allowing the best possible event to occur out of any situation from the player's hands, which can offer the best chance of winning the game.

Itemisation

Because of Pantheon's damage itemisation building from Long Sword components (Spirit of the Elder Lizard and Brutalizer made Long Sword components), it will mean that he will get the most bang for his buck from his gold pool by purchasing these cheap, but extremely gold and stat efficient items just by buying the components, and increasing his early game potential. This means that it allows Pantheon to make full use of his early game, quickly gaining momentum and power. In addition to the cheap total gold cost for Brutalizer and Spirit of the Elder Lizard with the amount of stats and power you get from (making it extremely gold efficient), it further increases Pantheon's ability to make the most use out of his early and mid game power. The Black Cleaver follow up from the Brutalizer also prevents Pantheon from scaling off too much in the late game, as the channeled attacks will quickly apply armour penetration stacks to increase his utility in a late game team fight, adding more importance and value to Brutalizer.

On the other hand, due to Pantheon's flexible skill set, he can adapt to the current situation and pace of the game with his multiple build paths to fulfil different roles in the late game. This is why he is picked competitively, as being able to make full use out of yourself by adapting accordingly in order to increase your chances of winning the game. For example, if he is behind or a beefy front line is required, he can build tank to become an initiator (Grand Skyfall and Aegis of Zeonia) with the Randuin's Omen slow to force a fight and a front line bruiser after. Even though as a tank he may only have Spirit of the Elder Lizard as his damage item, Pantheon's high base damage and threat with his stun can easily partner up with the Top or Mid Laner to kill the enemy carrys. Apart from initiating and assassinating, he can also act as a peeler with his extremely reliable and efficient stun to protect his carries.

Other non Game Factors

Due to Pantheon's skill set consisting of a straight forward passive including his four abilities (with a Heartseeker Strike that is easy to land to get the maximum amount of damage, in addition to a semi-global teleporting ultimate that is placed correctly with game sense rather than mechanical skill), it is no wonder why that after IWillDominate's performance of the Pantheon Jungle pick in a professional environment, other professional players started to use him.

With just a few solo queue games of Pantheon, one can become very comfortable with him due to his straight forwardness, which is one of the main reasons why he has been picked up a lot by many professional Junglers. The obvious power that one can see from Pantheon in the Jungle is also a factor, and his play making ability Grand Skyfall, is dependent on the previous coordination between the players instead of the skill or champion itself, further contributing to the player's decision to use him.

Conclusion

Overall, Pantheon is regarded by many professionals as a Jungler picked to brute force kills and objectives early to mid game, gaining a massive early advantage for his team in return before the enemies' late game scaling starts to take into effect as Pantheon has a semi-weak late game. With a passive that blocks attacks that can also be renewed with an ability (making him deceptively tanky and a dangerous ganker with turret dives), a reliable and efficient ranged damage ability due to its high base damage and scaling, as well as it being a targeted and execute attack (contributing to high damage output when ganking) along with it being a good sustain ability with Spirit Stone, access to a mobility spell that is a dangerous crowd control ability as it is both a ranged and targeted gap closer (making the likelihood of a successful gank very high), area of effect ability that contributes to high damage in team fights and wave clear late game, and finally an ultimate consisting of a global-like teleport that suddenly increases his global pressure post 6, it is no wonder, why the perilous, precarious Pantheon himself, is the Artisan of both War and Jungling (and Baking).

Inspiration to analyse Pantheon came from the first impressions given off of my recent "spamming" of Pantheon. It fascinated me on how strong he was, due to the amount of games I was winning in addtion to how impactful I felt in those games. I would definitely advise Junglers to consider picking Pantheon up as part of their roster.

 

- Raymond "Masurai123" Poon
- If you want to read more of my articles, here is my previous one: The Legend of Kassadin: a Riftwalk to the Past
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