Overview
This is a simple guide in understanding how Penny the Fox works, strategies, and fighting against Penny.
Penny Overview
Penny is a “high risk, high reward” character. Penny is an assassin, somewhat like Leon but much stronger. The early game is when Penny will shine the brightest and it will, more likely than not, decide whether or not you will win the rest of the game. Penny has strong attacks at the beginning of the game so she can easily take down her prey, anyone is vulnerable to Penny. Penny is the weakest at the mid-game. Anything useful will be very expensive and it takes many kills to get her to get past that crappy mid-game and into her late game. Penny is more or less unstoppable because she will be way stronger than you are and anyone who tries to 1v1 her will be destroyed.
That’s not saying Penny is “unbalanced” or “OP”. All of the Awesomenauts are OP in the right hands. Penny is more like the snowball effect. She will slowly start off strong and get a little bit stronger until she is unstopabble and she’ll almost always bring victory. However, Penny can easily be stopped early game and the snowball will be crushed before reaching it’s max speed.
Penny’s Fighting Style
Penny can triple jump!
Penny is a glass cannon throughout the whole game. Her relatively low HP is vulnerable at any point of the game. Even maxed out she can easily be killed from a group of Awesomenauts. Penny’s short range attacks make her weak against most fast moving enemies than can shoot at her (Froggy G, Vennie, Raelynn, etc). The most important asset Penny has is her charges if you see a low HP Penny with no charges, that’s a sitting duck. She’s useless and will most likely get herself killed. Teleport back to base as much as possible to keep your charges up (or kill some HP creatures).
The Energy Pulse is her strongest asset, The Energy Pulse is a faster moving Coco’s Ball with shorter range and can cut defense. A fully upgraded Energy Pulse will completly destroy enemies on the touch, or at least wound them enough to make them run for the hills.
Penny’s Pounce…. isn’t great. The pounce should, more often than not, be used as a method to catch up to a wounded enemy, or running away. Using it offensively has left me…. lacking compared to using the Energy Pulse.
The most important feature of Penny’s claw is that she must upgrade the attack speed as much as possible. The faster she swipes, the faster she gets her charges back. The energy pulse is what will make the claws more powerful.
Penny Strategies
Hide in the shadows often. Wait till an lamb is weak and is running away from the heard to strike and finish off the lamb. Then quickly run back into the shadows or to base.
If I ambush them I usually start off with an Energy Pulse then start clawing at them, that will usually finish them off, if it doesn’t, and they are getting away, send another energy pulse to finish them off.
If the enemy is dumb enough to rush a turret on their own, sneak up behind them and Pounce the ‘naut in the turret, they will usually not see it coming and have to run away, but you can keep up with them and finish them off with an energy pulse (assuming you’ve been clawing at them, which you should be).
Start killing early, you want that snowball effect to happen as fast as possible.
DO NOT fight 3 Awesomenauts at the same time. Your HP is too low to do that. You’ll die in an instant.
DO NOT fight turrets when there are enemy Awesomenauts present near the turret. You will die very fast.
Single out enemy ‘nauts and if you happen to be ambushed, us your Pounce to run away.
Working with a Penny
To anyone who ever has a Penny on their team, there’s one thing you need to know: Penny is the star of the show. You need her to shine the brightest if you want victory, you need that snowball effect to happen as fast as possible. You must always be aware of your Penny’s location AND if you hear her ‘calling’ for help, GO HELP. She will more likely than not, be in danger.
The best teammates Penny can have are ones that are patient and understanding of Penny. She is a lone Fox and needs you to damage enemies so she can swoop in for the kill. Penny is bad at defending turrets, but she can defend teammates very well. If you need to run away from an enemy, call for help and a Penny can usually move fast into your position and Pounce the enemy away from you. Penny might be fighting an ‘naut on her own so it’s not always a gaurantee.
Follow Penny’s lead, she needs lots of kills.
DEFEND, when you defend, you are putting a lot of space between your enemies and their turrets, when their HP is low Penny can swoop in and get the finishing blow.
Fighting against Penny
You have probably read the previous parts of this review so I’m sure you know how to fight her by now, but in case you need more specifics, here we go:
Stick with your teammates. If you get wounded and need to heal. Stay near them when teleporting. An early/mid-game Penny can’t take on all 3.
DON’T rush a turret by yourself. You’ll get pounced into it by a Penny that came out of no where.
If you see a Penny coming for you and you are by yourself, RUN. Even if you are at full health, Penny packs a punch and can get your HP down fast. You cannot 1v1 unless it is late game and the ball didn’t roll.
Author’s Notes
I’m not an expert on Awesomenauts, I am just a guy who loves playing as Penny and found these strategies the best when fighting online.
If you have better strategies, please feel free to post in the comments and maybe I’ll add them, if you want (and if the comment isn’t rude).
If I forgot to mention anything please feel free to leave a helpful comment addressing the issues I failed to inculde.