League of Legends can be quite a challenging time even with the correct build, so make sure to use this Pantheon Build Guide to have an easier time running the rift.
Builds in League of Legends can be a difficult thing to understand for many players even without the added chaos of the current preseason – which has thrown out all the collective built up knowledge of the community with Patch 10.23 and its nigh-complete overhaul of the shop.
A lot of games during this preseason madness can be won purely through the early game, and that’s where Pantheon shines brightest – having been known for being a dominant force early that tapers off in the late game, aggressively paced fast meta’s are his favourite by far, making this an ideal time to try him for the first time – and this goes double given his recent changes in 10.25 making him all the more powerful.
Roles
Pantheon is actually quite a diverse champion, capable of being played well in at least three, arguably four of the game’s roles – and I’m not going to stop you playing him ADC as well, but you may get some question mark pings from your team for that one. This Pantheon build guide, in particular, will focus on Top Lane.
Skill Max Order
In the vast majority of cases, Pantheon should level his Q first, as it is a huge source of damage, both for trading and poking – so with that said, that’s precisely what this Pantheon Build Guide recommends. It’s an extremely strong skill, and to make it even more potent it will even automatically crit on low health targets. In some difficult matchups, you might want to invest some early points in lowering your E cooldown for defensive reasons – but with that said, Pantheon is strongest in the early to mid-game. Sacrificing power to survive a bad lane puts you in a very bad spot. In short, for a typical game, your skill priority should be R>Q>E>W.
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Pantheon Build Guide: Runes
Keystone
For his keystone rune, Pantheon takes either Conqueror or Press the Attack, both found within the golden Precision Tree. Press the Attack lends itself more to a quicker burst gameplay pattern, while Conqueror shines more in any extended trades. Trying out both to discover a preference would be wise.
Row One
Triumph is an easy choice here, as healing on kill will enable aggressive plays early that might snowball you to a win outright. Additionally, free gold per kill doesn’t hurt this choice.
Row Two
Legend: Tenacity to have some baseline tenacity helps you escape crowd control faster – which will be particularly important if you focus on building damage, as prolonged crowd control would be certain death in that case.
Row Three
This row can mostly be down to your personal preference. I would personally suggest Coup de Grace as it’ll combine well with your critical damage on low health targets – other options are acceptable if you prefer them.
Secondary Runes
For the Secondary tree, Pantheon often takes combinations that provide healing, damage, or speed. Examples of this include going Discovery (blue) and taking Time Warp tonic alongside Biscuit Delivery for sustain and movement speed, or taking Domination (red) with sustain focused choices such as Taste of Blood and Ravenous Hunter or a more aggressive focus with additional damage from Cheap Shot and move speed from Relentless Hunter.
Minor Runes
Minor runes should typically be double Adaptive force, and resists tailored to the opposing team – with magic resist for magic damage heavy opponents, and armor for physical ones.
A complete example page is provided:
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Pantheon Build Guide: Items
Start Items
Pantheon players will want to decide whether to start with a corrupting potion for a more sustained aggressive lane phase, or a Doran’s Shield / Blade to make their laning experience a bit simpler. It should be noted that while learning a new champion, it’s usually an easier time using Doran items for the raw stat advantage. This start also applies to anyone playing Pantheon Mid.
Core Build
With start items out of the way, Pantheon’s build begins to look very similar across all of his different roles. Each flavor of Pantheon decidedly enjoys Eclipse as his mythic item, to the extent that it seems he builds it regardless of role. With a stat line focused around easily activated damage and sustain, it suits him well, so this is quite justified.
After Eclipse, fully upgrading boots for movement speed to aid in chasing down opponents and further abusing your dominant early game is a priority. Plated Steelcaps or Mercury’s Treads are the most common choices, though Mobility boots also have a place.
Sterak’s Gage and Black Cleaver are both excellent follow-up items, and can be built in either order – you may wish to try it either way around and develop a personal preference.
Late Game Items
With these items out of the way, it is important to remember that Pantheon excels at closing out games quickly – that’s not to say he can’t use other items, but that Pantheon may fall off around here, or indeed, might have fallen off already by this point.
Regardless, late-game item choices typically start to introduce more durability and utility to the build to slow down and try to negate the falling off Pantheon usually suffers at this stage. Good options are items such as Guardian Angel for the revive on death, Chempunk Chainsword to provide a healing cut alongside a solid stat line, or Umbral Glaive to help your team control vision while continuing to boost your damage.
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