In Season 12, top lane is widely considered Pantheon's best position. But Pantheon support still exists.

Why play Pantheon support?

He stuns people. Pantheon is one of the few champions with a point and click stun. In this age of a million dashes that makes a huge difference. Enemies will respect you, fear you, and change their entire game plan around you.

You can have a lot of impact on the game on a support budget. He is an easy champion to pick up so you can focus on game fundamentals such as laning, vision control, and roaming.

And most importantly, it's fun. Jumping out of a bush onto their carry will never get old.

Pros

• Point and click stun - What makes Pantheon the champion he is. This alone caused him to be pick/ban in professional games. Oddly, he's not popular in solo queue and norms.
• Durability - Pantheon's E allows him to absorb a lot of damage at all stages of the game.
• Burst damage - Pantheon's Q does a lot of damage to low health enemies, making him a threat even without items.
• Vision control - Can make good use of Umbral Glaive.
• Cheap build path - The items listed above are cheap and offer a lot to your team while synergizing with Pantheon's kit.
• Map presence - Pantheon's ultimate allows him to travel across the map quickly.
• Good blind pick - Pantheon can deal with most matchups in lane just fine.

Cons

• Long cooldowns - His E and W have long cooldowns, and you don't get enough XP to level them up.
• Reliant on abilities - He can't do much while his abilities are down because of his weak attacks and low HP. He also uses a lot of mana, making Presence of Mind necessary.
• Difficult to use ultimate - His ultimate is mostly a non-combat ultimate. It has an extremely slow windup and is too easy to dodge.
• Low damage late game - Aside from executing low health targets with his Q, he doesn't contribute much damage to a teamfight.
• Little mobility - No mobility in combat except his W, which needs to be saved for vital situations.

Note: there is an alternative playstyle involving Glacial Augment, but it's even more reliant on your team, so it's probably best to try that in a premade. We won't cover that here.



Now, before going into anything else, let's talk about our secondary runes first...

Hextech Flashtraption - The real core of this build. Allows you to be more aggressive in lane by using Flash earlier (more about this in later sections). When your Flash is down, the threat of Hexflash creates pressure during laning phase. As a bonus, it allows you to hop over walls in the jungle.

Approach Velocity - The rune with the best synergy with your team if they have CC such as slows and roots. Allows you to get into a fight more quickly and set up CC chains. If you don't have allies who can apply CC that you can follow up on, go with Cosmic Insight so your summoner spells are up more often.



On to the primary runes.

Press the Attack - Useful for increasing your team's damage when you focus someone. Empowered W stacks it instantly. The other keystones are not as useful on a support budget. You may run Fleet Footwork when facing poke, but you're not winning that lane anyway.

Presence of Mind - All of Pantheon's abilities are highly impactful, so you should be using them often. Use Triumph if you prefer; they are about equally effective but with slightly different playstyles.

Legend: Tenacity - Improves your ability to absorb damage and CC for the team.

Coup de Grace - For finishing off enemies or simply getting them low enough to recall. Last Stand isn't great on a support budget because you rarely want to be fighting on low health.



Customize the small shards depending on your playstyle and what laning phase demands of you. For example, if you're taking a lot of magic damage without having a chance to respond, you can use one or two magic resist shards.

The choice between Attack Speed and Ability Haste doesn't make a big difference. Ability Haste is preferred for having abilities up more often.

Now let's get into the playstyle.

First few levels (1-2)

Start with W by default. You can use it for a quick trade if the enemy steps too close.

As every support knows, there is a delicate balance between getting to level 2 first and not pushing the wave. If you reach level 2 first, level up your Q and look for an engage. Most people are aware of Pantheon's threat though.

Since you have access to Hexflash, you can afford to play a lot more aggressively than otherwise. Trading your Flash for their Flash or Heal becomes favorable. Hexflash can be used to constantly threaten the enemy from within a bush, forcing them to ward defensively, give up CS, or lose tempo in general.

As a comparison, Thresh and Alistar are champions that can sometimes run Hexflash. Compared to them, Pantheon is more reliable at landing a stun.

Next few levels (3-6)

Remember that it's okay if you don't kill the enemy laners. Maintaining your tempo is more impactful than the engage itself.

Your first powerspike will be Serrated Dirk. If all goes well you can buy this on your first back with a Control Ward. Get the sweeper as well. If you can't afford that, buy boots and Long Swords instead.

Now you should be looking to see if you can kill their mid laner, put a ward in the enemy jungle (before you get the sweeper) or invade. This all depends on how well your ADC does by themselves, and whether or not you know the enemy jungler's location.

Every midgame may be different. Here is what generally happens in a typical game.

Warding and roaming

Once you get your support wards, this is when you can have influence around the map. Place wards in the enemy jungle to track the enemy jungler, or in the river if you anticipate a skirmish in the area. On average, you can get Umbral Glaive around level 6 and 11 minutes. This gives you a huge advantage in objective control.

Your ultimate can be used to quickly turn a 1v1 into a 2v1. You can travel to mid lane, Rift Herald, top lane, the enemy jungle, or your own lane.

After you build some components for your Evenshroud, you become durable enough to engage in tower dives. Sadly, your E doesn't block tower shots anymore... but it still helps you survive while your teammates kill the enemy.

Skirmishes and teamfights

Your role in combat will be to stun targets at the right moment so that they either flash away or your teammates finish them off. You will not always be on the front line, because you are fairly squishy at first. However, you can weave in and out of the front line by using W to jump on an enemy, then using E to absorb damage and back away.

Pantheon is great at wasting the enemy's time and resources. Combat really boils down to gaining leverage and using advantages. For example, a well-timed cast of your E can negate something like a Lux R or a Pyke R, and a well-timed W can prevent an enemy from using their Goredrinker to heal themselves.

Pantheon on a support budget isn't an effective assassin unless your target is low on health. Your Q has a fairly long range and can be used to snipe low health targets when they least expect it. But don't engage full health targets by yourself. You have a better chance of winning 2v2s than 1v1s.

As a starving support player, the game is usually over before you can complete Black Cleaver - sometimes even before your mythic. But you should have gotten good use out of Umbral Glaive, so it doesn't really matter.

If the game does end up dragging for long enough, that brings us to itemization. You will need to adapt to the situation, which comes with experience. But first you might be asking...

Why Evenshroud?

Evenshroud is designed for champions who can apply CC reliably and often. Some champions that build it include Blitzcrank, Leona, and sometimes Thresh. But most of the time they end up getting Locket.

So why is Evenshroud useful for Pantheon support? Because:

• You are not the carry. Amplifying team damage is much more useful than increasing your own damage. Pantheon's individual damage is only good when the enemy is low on health.
• Pantheon's often gets CC-ed in a teamfight (which procs Evenshroud) and he can survive being with the help of his E.
• Pantheon appreciates all the raw stats, which are the same as Locket.
• It's cheap, so you can have both Umbral Glaive and Evenshroud instead of Eclipse and half an item.
• Other options aren't as useful. Locket will be under-utilized because of the nature of his engage and his E, and Turbo Chemtank doesn't offer much team damage.

Boots choices

As the game goes on, there will be more sources of damage and CC, so think about which boots you'll buy. Plated Steelcaps is the default choice for taking less damage from AAs. Go for Mercury's Treads if the enemy has a lot of CC and/or magic damage.

You can run Ionian Boots of Lucidity to use your stun more often, but only if you're snowballing. The other boots don't provide survivability or offer much synergy with your abilities.

Last few items

After Umbral Glaive and Evenshroud (not counting your support item) the next item of choice is Black Cleaver. Pantheon appreciates all the raw stats. The armor reduction is great for your team and he can stack it quickly with E or empowered W. Don't expect to complete Black Cleaver in a typical game, though.

If your team needs healing reduction - often they do - get Chempunk Chainsword. It's cheap, gold-efficient, and adds to your mythic passive. If you're fed enough to buy a different item, or you just don't like it, you can hold on to Executioner's Calling. If you need to be even more tanky, get Thornmail instead.

Alternative choices

Here are some good alternative choices for your last two slots. These are situational, and games rarely go to this point. And since you're support, two slots is all you get, so use them wisely.

Frozen Heart - Good for fast attackers such as Jinx or Trundle.

Maw of Malmortius - Expensive for what it does, but one of the only items to build against magic damage threats. Alternatives include Silvermere Dawn for the cleanse effect, or Sterak's Gage for a more general-purpose shield.

Death's Dance - Decent choice for an armor item, but does not help the team very much. Think of it as an expensive stat stick.

Anathema's Chains - Very niche, useful only if there is a particular enemy who is far more dangerous than everyone else.

Vigilant Wardstone - Don't forget this item. A lot of stats for only 1100 gold and allows you to carry Control Wards without taking up a slot. Strong contender for the last item, if games ever get that long.

This guide has been about just one specific way to play Pantheon support, but feel free to change it to suit your playstyle. I hope you found this useful. GL & HF!