Continuing my series of posts on LOL I present to you – Pantheon! Anyone who is a fan of Spartans, the movie 300, or just general Manliness loves this guy. He is a mid-game beast in League of Legends, and helped me make my best move of the entire season last night.
In LoL there are neutral jungle creeps that give gold and some give buffs. One in particular – Baron Nashor (a giant worm-like creature) gives the best team buff in game – so ensuring the other team doesn’t get it later in the game is really important. We were winning early game, but our bottom lane was doing fairly poor. We tried to help them out but everytime we walked away they were dying. By mid game we were dominating every lane EXCEPT the bottom lane. In LoL this is bad – the bottom lane contains your Attack Damage Carry that, when properly fed with kills and farm, usually wins you games – regardless of how other lanes are doing. If you can keep them alive.
Their AD Carry was really strong and as we transitioned into late game we were at a severe disadvantage suddenly – our earlier gains negated. We were pushed into our base to protect our Nexus (the ultimate objective to destroy in the game) and, as expected, the enemy team went to take Baron while we protected our Nexus. They had him down to 2% when I timed my “Ultimate” move (every player has one – Pantheon can leap half way across the map, and damage everyone within a certain radius) perfectly. It was timed perfectly.
I used my Grand Skyfall (official name) right onto the Baron, stunned their jungler, and threw one spear at Baron – stealing the buff for my whole team. We then ‘aced’ their team right after, and caught up on some towers.
We ultimately lost, but it was one of those plays that are fun to pull off and you tend to remember. It’s like hitting a half court shot at the buzzer in basketball, an impossible hail mary pass in Football, etc. etc.
The frustrating part for me of it all was not that we lost, but the *way* we lost. By all accounts, if our bottom lane had just played safe we had the advantage – but they kept pushing their lane and dying needlessly, lowering their own power and raising the power of our opponents. Even more frustrating is that I was one win away from playing my ‘promotion’ games – which is a three game series where you can move up a league. Two losses in a row and now I am three games away from that – and only if I win all three. (LoL has an odd way of granting and taking away points on their random matchmaking.)
I have had extremely bad luck with Fizz, my preferred mid lately and I am feeling like he isn’t the right mid laner for me to be good at right now. My wins with him have been dramatic but I have been less useful than I had hoped in most of my matches. I may try with Pantheon mid as well (he is doable there)- as I have had great games with him lately despite my win loss with him.