Penny – You can’t vex this Vixen! (Burst/Harasser) [v1.3]

Overview

In this fairly basic guide I will show you an easy, yet extremely effective way of playing Penny. I find that she can be played either very well, or very poorly, and I aim to make sure you don’t fall into the latter category!

The Basics

Penny is a difficult naut to use. She is slow, squishy and has a fairly weak AA to begin with, making her vunerable to burst from nauts such as Lonestar, Rae and Vinnie early game. She plays like Froggy in that she gets in there, does her damage and gets out before she is squished. Unlike Froggy though, she works in perfectly in a team fight, providing damage buffs and stuns galore. Penny also has the ability to burst, and when I say burst, I really do mean it! Using her pulse attack, she can deal an easy 64 damage to the unexpecting enemy with a few upgrades, bearing in mind, that right out the box, she can deal 40 damage AND buff your team mates damages to that enemy by 30%. Finally, pounce can be used to escape or initiate. I would recommend using it to initiate though, as you can stun and hit them with your claw, or initiate by hitting them into your turret.

The Build

Of course, there are some things that can be swapped out, and the order can be changed to the situation of the current game, but for this build, these are the main upgrades that you want to be taking. Feel free to take solar tree over regen if you want, it’s personal preference. As you can see, we rush damage on our utility early on, and survivability comes later. We do this while the enemy has lowish health and we can hopefully sneak in a few kills as a result. Don’t forget to clear the lanes though, as you’ll soon start to fall behind when not running any solar items. I’ll discuss tactics for each stage of the game in the next section.

Early Game Tactics

As you land, you want to pick up your abilities first (if running solar tree, pick up pounce and come back for pulse in a few minutes). Play it safe for now, knock some enemies who are pushing into your turret and escape before they deal any damage. Don’t be afraid to hit the creeps in the jungle for charges, because you never know when you might need to pounce to safety or grab that sneaky kill on someone. If there is an empty lane, don’t push yourself, but make sure to keep farming those droids and get solar from them. Next you want to pick up Zurian Mechanic. This doesn’t do much at the moment, but it sets us up for the next two upgrades we are going to be buying. Keep farming, and once you have enough solar, head back to base and pick up Death Lens. I like to save up a little more and get both tiers at once, as you can deal a ton of damage really early now. Once you get your boots, you’re all set for the first stage of the game.

Pounce>(Solar Tree)>Pulse>Zurian Mechanic>Death Lens>Boots

Mid Game Tactics

You want to start playing a little differently now. Take them head on with pounce, retain a charge, hit them with claw once or twice to build damage on pulse, hit with pulse and immediately follow up with a 30+ blaster shot. This is still early-mid game and you can deal 70-100 damage, plus your team mates can deal a whole ton more too with that amp. Impressive eh? You don’t want to be changing your playstyle much from now on, but you should be, for the most part, avoiding team fights when the enemy has burst. At this point, play the assassin. Come in from behind and knock them to your team mates, or alternatively you can lurk around killing droids, and use you speed to finish off wounded enemies. Either is good at this point. Next up for your upgrades, damage and survivability. As enemies get more health, you want to start picking up some nice damage upgrades to keep things to scale. Start off with pounce, after all, it is your initiation and it can set the pace of the fights to come. Pick up both tiers of damage as they are relatively cheap. For the next part, you’re going to have to farm. A lot. Damage for your pulse is very expensive and it takes time to get all three tiers, but this is your main damage dealer so it is neccesary. After you’ve done this, depending on how you’re managing, pick up 1,2 or 3 health upgrades. This should prepare you for the next batch. Now, start hammering away at your AA. Using your melee more often means you take more damage, but that’s why we picked up the health. It can also mean the difference between your target escaping with 10 health, and getting that kill. Finally, pick up some regen, this is especially useful if you are matched against a Gnaw or a Skolldir. The base of your build is now complete, and you should be buffed up enough to take part in those big game changing team fights!

Electric Bike Lock>Bug Jars>Power Pills>Cookie Monster Badge>Med-i-Can

End Game Tactics

You should now be pushing with your team and victory is on the horizon, but you aren’t done yet! Pick up some of those final upgrades to help with ganks, and ultimately, secure the victory. Speed on your AA is always handy, so pick up both tiers and claw away at those turrets! If you haven’t already, pick up those final 1 or 2 health upgrades, it just means you can hang around and support your team in the push for longer, and with all that evasion, it shouldn’t go down too low anyway. From here on, the upgrades you choose are optional. Stun is really good as it means you can get a little extra damage in, but pounce distance is also viable. Speed is great for getting back into the fight, or escaping if need be. And finally, I take the silence on pulse as it works great for initiation. You can however swap it out for range as that is also very useful, but I find it can often force your hand and make you play slightly more towards a full on pulse build if you take that.

Living Treasure Map Badge>(Power Pills)>The Nine Tails Badge>Big Bang Horn>Sentient Rock

Weaknesses

There are various things which can completely render a Penny useless, and will most likely result in your death 🙁

Here’s what to watch out for!

• Snares
  Clunk
  Skoll
  Derpl
• Swiggins
  Don’t let him anchor you! If he does, you’d better be damn good at juking!
• High Burst
  Vinnie
  Rae
  Lonestar
  Clunk
  Other Pennys

Conclusion

Finally, don’t take this guide as the bible, it’s my first one and it’s certainly not perfect! If you enjoyed this build, tell me in the comments! If you sucked with it, well, get gud son 😉 All joking aside, if the build/guide didn’t work out for you, tell me how I could improve upon it in future guides!

-Thanks for reading!

Awesome skin by Pockets on the Ronimo forums!