The biggest reason why you go pyke support over other engage hook supports like Nautilus or Thresh or even Blitzcrank is simple, he snowballs better. Unlike tank hook champions Pyke doesn't gain hitpoints from his items so instead he damage items directly. Early game Pyke can roam faster, clear vision better and execute enemies which was never seen before he came into the game from the support role. Majority of enchanters have to play carefully around Pyke's position in lane because if they get caught by him early, that could lead to a snowball effect. Pyke doesn't stop catching his prey.

Gift of the Drowned Ones

There are good things and bad things about his passive, for one he cant gain hp from his items, instead it converts it to damage, every 14 hp becomes 1 ad, but he still gains hp from leveling up so its not all bad. He also gets grey health when he gets hit by enemy champions and the more attack damage you have to bigger your pool of grey health can be, and his lethality he builds makes it so more of the damage he takes gives him grey health. This it heals him when his out of vision of the enemy so it also helps to know where vision is, if there is a ward in the bush he walks to, he wont heal the grey health so you know the enemy has vision of you.

Bone Skewer

Pyke's first ability his Q is a key feature of how he catches opponents out if position. Its a charge ability that when held down gains range of the ability and it pulls the enemy towards you, though if you are close enough it could pull them behind you. It also has a tap feature where as instead of charging it strikes immediately and stabs forward hitting the first creature in front of him, but if theres a champion in range it'll hit the champion instead. It also comes with a 90% close as well. Recently in patch 12.9 they made changes where if you hold the channel of his Q and dont let go it'll go back on cooldown and refund 75% mana cost of the ability, but if you hit your Q on an enemy champion the mana cost is refunded, making it not to bad for poke and trading depending on the adc.

Ghostwater Dive

Pyke's W is his camouflage ability that lets him slip around the map. He uses this to move around and gets a jet of movement speed when he cast it, and it decays over time. It even scales lethity making you have more speed the more you buy. He uses this ability to get close to enemies and slip away from them as well. It also activates his passive letting him heal, even through ignite. It does give a warning to the enemy if you are too close when you activate it so you have to move fast.

Phantom Undertow

This is his dash ability that he both uses to move around the map quickly and perform his combos. Anyone in the line he dashes to will get stunned if his phantom touches them, they get stunned longer the more lethality you have.

Death from Below

His ultimate ability which marks an X on the enemy causing him to blink to the center of the X when he hits an enemy champion. This is his bread and butter, the biggest reason he is both feared on the rift and loves by him teamates. Pyke is one of the support characters that people dont mind when he takes kills because of this ability. This ability when you execute and enemy gives a coin to one of the teamates and aids in getting the takedown by giving them a coin worth 300 gold or less if the enemy is worth less. If you do get a take down with the abiility you have 20 more seconds of having access to it before it goes on cooldown, and while its in the reset mode the cooldown still ticks down anyways. If the enenmy dies before you slam down with the X dont worry you'll still get your reset if they die while in the hitbox, instead of giving your teamate the coin gold, you'll get it and still have the reset.

Duskblade works with Pyke passive and will allow you to go for more risker plays. Such as diving into the enemy team to get your execute off and being able to leave without being seen. Unlike his W Ghostwater Dive its true invisibility so even when enemies are close or right on top of you dont worry you wont be revealed. So while you're invisible with duskblade you'll heal.

Domination Tree Primary

Hail of Blades
Gives you a burst of attack speed for 3 autos giving you some good burst. A staple rune for domination tree primary on Pyke. Good for early beatdowns.

Cheap Shot vs Sudden Impact
Cheap Shot gives you a bit of extra true damage so when you Q then auto or Q then E or E than auto or E then Q it'll give you just a bit of extra damage. Sudden impact however gives you a bit of extra lethality when you use your E so it'll make you stun loneger with your E make you heal more with your passive and increase your ult execute range for a couple of seconds.

Zombie Wards or Eyeball Collection
Zombie wards will give you the ability to flip vision to your side works especially well with umbral glaive making so you 1 shot basic stealth wards immedately giving your team vision. Eyeball Collection is more situational, while more times than not you'll want to run zombie wards, you run eyeball collection if you feel you'll be getting alot of kills and you'll get it finished faster than your zombie ward quest. Eyeball Collection is better for lower elo and Zombie Wards are better for higher elos, since they will ward more.


Treasure Hunter or Relentless Hunter or Ultimate Hunter
Each finsher rune in domination tree has its good sides. Treasure Hunter will give you extra gold for each person you get a takedown for during your quest gaining more gold the further you are to completing it, similar to rengars passive, works once on each takedown of a champion. Relentless Hunter gives you good out of combat speed which would help you move around the map faster making your roams happen faster and get you where you need to be sooner. Ultimate Hunter is good as well though, because Pyke ult is what makes him the character he is, having it up more fequently is always a plus.

Resolve Tree Secondary

Bone Plating or Second Wind
Pyke isnt a tank character but with bone plating you'll feel a whole lot tankier while its active. Second Wind is great if you're in a match up where you feel the enemy will poke you, works good with his passive healing him as well.

Unflinching or Revitalize
The Unflinching rune is a good choice if you're fighting a match up that you feel will hit you with crowd control abilities alot, and helps you make clutch plays and get out of the enemy cc faster the lower health you have left. Revitalize works well with Pyke passive making you heal even more. Also works even better if you also run it with Second Wind.

Resolve Tree Primary

Aftershock
When going the bulky Pyke build path you'll need this rune for sure. Pyke has really good resistances that at base beat many tank champs resistances. Makes your dives still strong but makes it so you can also be a pseudo tank for your team.

Demolish or Font of Life
Demolish is great for helping your team with their sieging though it wont do too much damage since you cant get alot of bonus max hp. Font of Life is good for when you cc the opponent your team can heal a bit while they fight the enemy.
Conditioning or Second Wind or Bone Plating
These runes are a toss up condition if you want a bit of defensive scaling on a timer, after the 12 minute wait time you will get a 12 armor and magic resistance as well as 5% bonus armor and magic resistance. Second Wind again is good into poke team compositions does even better since you will be tankier the healing will feel bigger. Bone Plating early game it'll make you feel tanky while giving you time to build your resistances.
Revitalize or Unflinching

Revitalize works well if you're running second wind for those poke comps, but it also helps with your font of life healing as well helping just that little bit more with the team fights, and healping you heal more as well with your passive. Unflinching makes you feel just a juggernaut during fights if you're going the bulky Pyke path making you harder to lock down while you give peel to your teamates.
Domination Tree Secondary

Zombie Ward
Unlike with the assassin Pyke side you'll only want this if you choose the domination tree as your secondary, you'll only have 2 lethlity items with your tank build so you will most likely want to flip wards than anything else.

Relentless Hunter or Ultimate Hunter
While Relentless Hunter will give you that roaming advantage, its probably better to go Ultimate Hunter with the bulky Pyke set up you'll need that ult up as often as possible so you can afford the tank items sooner to turn yourself into the juggernaut.

Precision Tree Secondary

Triumph
Triumph is good to for those closer call fights healing you after a takedown, and will give you some extra 20 gold too.

Legend: Tenacity
This rune is really good if you combine it with Unflinching but it's not required if you want to go down the precision tree secondary path let you go for different boot options even while in a heavy cc team.

The biggest difference between bulky Pyke and assassin Pyke is that one will do alot more damage than the other, and one is very situation. Assassin Pyke is the more standard Pyke build and rune sets you'll use 9/10 times you play, but when you run into a team comp with 3 or 4 ad champs that are and you feel you dont have to worry about that ap champ, go the bulky Pyke build. Exeample, Nasus Top, Nocturn Jg, Talon Mid, Lucian Adc, Nami Support. That 1 enchater champs ap damage wont be enough to break down the bulky Pyke, so if you see 4 attack damage champions feel free to go bulky Pyke. Its a build that relies on his great base armor and scaling side, and the fact that there are alot more armor items than mr items. If you run into alot of mages and ap champs dont go bulky Pyke it wont perform as well, assassin Pyke will do better into that team comp.

Your early game is your strongest point in the game so you need to use your time wisely. If you're using the hail of blades Pyke you will have insane early burst to help weaken to enemy for a full dive. Level 2 advantage is really important for you so you can get your hail of blades off safely and for the biggest impact. Be aware that you dont take too much damage getting the level 2 advantage because you wont be able to take advantage of it if you dont have the health. Enchanter Supports are easy victims of Pyke if they aren't careful so standing in the bushes to make them step away from minions is a good use of your theatening pressense in laning phase. Make sure you are healing using your passive when they try and poke you out or focus you during your engages. Bone Skewer is very important pulling people out of position and ganking up on them with your ADC. Once you reset and start moving from base, look around the map to see if its a good time to roam around and make an impact. Typically it's best to path toward mid bot side of the map so you can be available in case something happens. Mobility Boots are a great item for this allowing you to roam further while still not missing any waves of minions from your bot lane. Even if you roam and dont end up getting a gank off placing a deep ward will also be a good use of your time. Mainly you will be playing around your ADC, Mid Laner, and the Jungler for this portion of the game, but don't be afraid to help out your Top Laner if you find the time todo so. Just make sure you dont spend too much time away from the bot lane because duing that time your ADC will be in a 2v1 situation and the longer you are away the higher chance he can die or fall behind because of it.

Now your laning phase is over. So what is important changes only slightly. You will still need to roam around the map and secure vision around objectives. You will be nearing completion of your support item quest around this point of the game, so you wont need to worry about that for much longer. Rotating around the map will still be important and being around your jungler will play a bigger role at this point in the game, as well as whoever is mid at that point. Around this point in time teamfights are more common and you need to collect as much money from them using Death from Below to expand your teams lead. At this point in the game your damage hasn't quite fallen off so you are still a threat damage wise.

Your late game on Pyke will be different from the other points in the game. For the most part instead of going out of your way to roam around and try and get your lanes ahead instead you need to now focus on peeling and catching people out, as well as securing vision on objectives. Your damage at this point in the game will have fallen off for the most part, so focus on using Death From Below to execute people to keep your money up but be careful not to fall out of position trying to lane the ability. Bone Skewer will still be used to catch people out of position, but becareful who you pull and who is around you when you do pull. Pulling a tank Malphite on your ADC could just get them killed to be mindful of your surroundings.