The Gladiator |A comprehensive Attikus Guide

Hi guys, long time lurker but I felt that my favorite champion was not getting the love and fear he deserves. In my opinion and experience a mid to late game Attikus will never lose a one versus one engagement with any battleborn in the game. I hope this guide will not only show you but if you are on the other end of his meat fists teach you how to shut him down and not call on GBX for a nerf. Please don’t nerf him.

Rules of engagement

When playing as or against Attikus you need to remember these rules at all times

• Before level 3 Attikus is a giant punching bag, forget player kills and focus on experience (I’ll explain below)

• When at half health start looking for a way out you are losing the battle

• Never engage two battleborn at the same time you will lose most of these battles

• Unless you can guarantee the kill don’t engage with leap, you need that to run or secure kills

• Full charges give your primary attacks shield pen, this will melt most battleborn without them realizing they are in danger. Hold onto your charges

• Body blocks are your greatest asset, learn them well and you can kill anyone and make a meat shield for your squishy teammates

• On a stationary or ground level target aim for the head, getting consistent crits will shorten your time to kill and allow you to move to the next target that much faster

Recommended Gear

This is the gear I run with and have had the most success, you don’t need the exact same setup but the closer the better

• Attack speed, passive with more attack speed on melee hit

• Damage reduction, passive does not really matter but more attack speed can’t hurt

• Attack damage, passive with more attack speed on melee hit

• No legendary gear or even epic is needed, the faster you can get these in a match the better

Melee Attacks

• Primary (Barefist Brawling) – pretty straight forward, your bread and butter for damage. Hold the button down and aim for the crit spot. With full charges you get 25% shield penetration

• Secondary (Charged Hook) – a chargeable single hit attack that is useful as the first attack against a target. That’s about it, don’t waste time trying to charge an attack after stunning an opponent

• Quick Melee – Like most melee battleborn Attikus’ quick melee has two versions, sprinting and not sprinting. When sprinting you do a quick hop forward and swipe, this is very good at closing gaps. His regular quick melee does a decent knockback, very good for a defensive tactic or to move a target closer to a wall.

Abilities and skills

• Hedronic Collector: Attikus gains 1 charge per kill 5 for majors (battleborn). You want to focus on having full charges but if you need to use a skill don’t worry about losing them. Also killing a Deande clone gives 5 charges, everyone likes free stuff.

• Pounce – using this will have Attikus leap to a target location and knock back any enemies where he lands. If a knocked back enemy collides with a wall or character they will be stunned. This skills greatest strength is not the stun but the mobility it grants Attikus. Use it to jump over walls to get away from death or push into the enemy base and steal their shards or thralls. The only downside of this skill is where you land in the target location sometimes seems to be random. If trying to chase an enemy down and secure a kill aim the skill in front of them opposite any wall they are running past. This will have them run right into your back or next to you securing the stun. If you want your team to love you and not feed kills don’t pounce into the enemy team or base, you will die. Also if you find pouncing to be super disorienting stare at your mini map to see where you land and where you knocked your enemy for quicker reactions.

• Hedronic Arc: Charges Attikus and makes all his melee attacks place a damage over time effect on his target. The damage is forgettable the main draw of this skill is the life steal you can get and extra damage to shields. But the best thing this skill grants you is vision, if a target stealth’s you will still see hedronic arc proc on them.

• Hedronic Eruption: Attikus throws 10 shockwaves and if fully charged each wave knocks an enemy into the air. You only want to use this when you are fully charged because the damage is good but the knockup is better.

Helix options

These are my personal preference and are suited to my playstyle. Take these with a grain of salt but try it out once then tell me how terrible it is.

• Level 1 – Hedronic Siphoning – I honestly don’t know if the other option works I have never noticed any benefit and the life steal on Hedronic Arc can really help with Attikus’ sustain especially with the Level 9 mutation

• Level 2 – This level is all based on the team you are facing. I tend to lean toward Staggering Pounce to make sure my targets really don’t get away. But if you find you are using pounce more to save your skin go with Pounce Recharge. The life steal mutation is good but you rarely open with pounce so it’s not as good as the other two options

• Level 3 – Tenacity - Hands down. This is where you stop playing battleborn and start playing who will I kill next? From this point on there are almost no battleborn who can take you in a one on one fight if you land critical hits. This also has a second benefit like hedronic arc, the symbol stays above a targets head for about 4 seconds even if they are invisible making them easier to track down and punch in the face

• Level 4 – Dampening Field – This is what tips the scale in your favor when engaging any enemy, lowering the damage they do means it takes longer for them to kill you. With the insane amount of damage you will be dishing out this just cements your victory

• Level 5 – Hedronic Regenration – Because you already have a massive amount of damage output from tenacity you take this to just survive even longer. As long as you are still punching you will take down anyone

• Level 6 – Disruptor Field – Chain breaker does not work most of the time and the faster you get through enemy shields the faster you can start getting crits

• Level 7 – Swift Strikes – This will be your second damage spike, if you are running the gear setup above you will be attacking at Phoebe speed while hitting harder than any melee character in the game

• Level 8 – Big Splash – At this point in time the battlefield should be covered in blood from the enemy team. This makes it easier to catch up to them as they run and makes it so you don’t have to be as accurate with your pounce

• Level 9 – Hedronic Chain – what’s better than more life steal? Life steal on everything around you.

• Level 10 – Wake of Devastation – the other options are good but this is such a large damage increase when Hedronic Eruption is activated with full charges that it’s hard to pass up

Playstyle

Attikus is not a tank, you need to be on the outskirts picking off people who strayed too far from their team and pushing the objective. If you are solo and see 2+ enemy battleborn, run. Get them when they let their guard down or you have teammates backing you up.

Remember that until level 3 you are not much of a threat to the enemy team. At the start of the game you want to stick next to your team and use Hedronic Arc to hit every minion you can to get a portion of the XP the go back to hiding.

In between engagements you want to refill your charges on minions. This should be your main objective in most game modes anyway but be sure to kill minions any chance you can get.

Thumper turrets are you true enemy, take them out first before you engage on anyone. Your first goal in any team fight is to take out the healer, then the main damage dealer. After that everyone else is open season.

Being knocked up is almost guaranteed death, try to bait out battleborn skills that knock up. We will touch on Deande below (but she will probably kill you anyway)

Matchups

These are my recommended approaches for each battleborn on how Attikus can kill them and how they can take out Attikus. These aren’t the only way and I’m sure someone else has a better method but they should give decent insight. I will also give my personal 1 to 10 ranking on kill priority based on ease of kill and actual impact to the enemy team.

• Alani – 8/10 priority - Her knockup will lead to your death and she is deceptively tanky, your best bet is to get her low without the use of pounce and wait for her to heal and run. Try to approach her head on to get her to waste her knockup then force her to run. Once she places herself in the right position to be stunned and is less than full health go in for the kill. She can kill you very easily if you approach her with low health or keeps you zoned out with quick melee.

• Ambra – 7/10 priority – Take her sunspots as a second person in the fight, as long as they are up killing her will be too difficult and a risk. Your best approach is to have full charge and burst her down before she realizes. Even with her passive overshield your penetration will pretty much negate that. But don’t take her lightly, always watch out for her ultimate to be placed and never take her on with sunspots around. Those two skills combined will lead to your death

• Attikus – 5/10 priority – This is a match of who can land critical hits better, also a bit of chicken. The first one to use their skills first will probably lose. Stay in the open to avoid getting stunned from the pounce. If you have full charge and the poser doesn’t the fight will be heavily in your favor. If you can open up with Eruption and get him low you will be in a good position to land a pounce stun. Use your quick melee to get him in position

• Benedict – 2/10 priority – He is annoying as hell, and super mobile. You will rarely get a chance to take him down unless he just gets too bold and places himself badly. Even then if he is full health you most likely won’t kill him, don’t really focus him too much. With him on the other team you need to be aware where he is, he can quickly burn you down with his homing rockets from mid map.

• Boldur – 7/10 priority – Try to engage him with full charge and strafe as much as you can, keep you back to the open space. Once he is low and puts up his shield use your quick melee to line him up for a pounce. Do not engage him if he has a single teammate next to him and if he stuns you the moment you come out of the CC run, if you are still alive. Bodyblocks will dictate the winner of this matchup

• Caldarius – 5/10 priority – He is another highly mobile character but most of the time easier to catch than most. Don’t worry about engaging him with full charge and if he blinds you keep punching and moving. Your hits will make a sound if they are connecting. If he blinds you and you are no longer connecting disengage from the fight, at this point you will probably be at half health which is prime for him to burst you down. Caldy players be sure to abuse your blind and mobility. With enough frustration and kiting you can easily overcome Attikus

• Deande – 3/10 priority – This is probably the hardest matchup for Attikus because of her knockup mutation and stealth. If you abuse your tenacity and arc visuals you can keep track of the original when she stealth’s. If not just kill the clone for 5 stacks of charge. If she begins to knock you up with her combo spam pounce toward the nearest escape route. If Deande engages you after you have used your pounce your only other option is full charge eruption to knock her up long enough to escape

• El Dragon – 6/10 priority – don’t fight him in his aoe effects and the match should be pretty easy. Aim for the head and try to position him in pounce stun range mid fight. Once he sprints away you won’t catch him and it’s not worth diving for. El Dragon can take you out very easily if he corners you and is using his ultimate.

• Galilea – 8/10 priority – Always engage with full charge. This will instantly remove a huge chunk of her damage. It does not matter if she silences you just keep punching. Try to approach her from the front and serpentine to make her waste her shield throw. With no stun and only her ult to run she is just a punching bag for you. As a Galilea your primary goal is to land the shield throw then burst him down before he can react, if you don’t you will probably lose the fight without a support.

• Ghalt – 7/10 priority – Approach with caution, walk up to him and make wide arching circles. He will tend to keep you lined up with his trap and if you are walking toward him you will see it before you step on it. Once his trap is destroyed he’s just a guy trying to out damage you. If he pulls you into his trap and you don’t die run. He may have another trap off cooldown and throw it at your feet when you try to engage him. As Ghalt make sure you only engage him when he is stunned or backed up by your team

• Isic – 5/10 priority – You want to focus him down enough to where he has to leave the battle, don’t worry about killing him because he is far too tanky. His plasma dash will make it very hard to kill him and his wards will negate a lot of your damage. Your best chance at killing him is when he ults but even then is a very risky move. As Isic, sustaining fire and plasma dashing when he breaks through your shield will often make him double guess taking you on.

• Kelvin – 9/10 priority – There is really only two things that will keep you from killing Kelvin, if he is has a teammate or if he has sublime. If no to both a kill should not be very difficult. But like most matchups if he has support avoid the battle. As Kelvin you best bet is to take him out when he is low by opening with sublime and killing him before he can turn on you.

• Kleese – 10/10 priority – He is huge, has a huge critical hitbox and very low health. If you engage with full charges it’s almost a free kill. Almost, don’t underestimate his rifts. Those should be the first thing you kill in any match you are facing a Kleese. Even if you don’t want to kill him, kill the rifts. As Kleese you need to have a full rift network to keep you safe and abuse quick melee

• Marquis – 2/10 priority – You will only get one real shot at killing him and it will involve the use of your pounce most of the time to stun him. His slow field and godly quick melee will shut down most engagements pretty quickly. Meaning most engagements you won’t have the passive shield pen to burst him down. The best chance you have is to make him waste his slow field as you approach from the front and stun him into a wall. That should make him easy enough to chase down or bodyblock for the kill. As Marquis the moment Attikus engages quick melee and place a slow on top of yourself. This will save you from death a majority of the time.

• Melka – 5/10 priority – Her mobility makes her hard to pin down but once she uses all her skills as long as you have a solid amount of health a pounce stun should secure a kill. As Melka you want to use your quick melee first then skills as a last ditch effort to get Attikus off. With enough harassment you can take him down

• Miko – 9/10 priority – No shield means crits should come quickly. You want to take him out first in any engagement even if it means forcing him back to spawn. As long as he can’t heal his teammates you won the battle. You don’t always have to kill to win a fight. As Miko you need to use your quick melee to create space then spore to ensure you can escape. Be aware of the pounce as that will lead to your death.

• Montana – 5/10 priority – Only engage when he has no support and keep your back in the open. This fight will be a toss up based on positioning and whoever lands the most critical hits. For both Montana and Attikus your stun will determine who walks away use quick melee to give yourself the advantage

• Orendi – 5/10 priority – You will want to engage her enough so she uses her nullify and once she has used her escape skill go in for the kill. Avoid her aoe at all cost, if she gets you low enough her ult will instantly turn the tables in her favor. As Orendi your shadowfire pillar will be the best deterrent for Attikus. Once low enough he is just a large target waiting for your ult. Don’t forget to use quick melee

• Oscar Mike – 6/10 priority – You will have to take advantage of your tenacity and arc visuals to ensure you can kill OM when he stealth’s. Never engage him in his aoe, you will die. As OM you will need to chunk away his health with your skills then burst him down with critical hits. You can quick melee to try and keep him in your aoe or to create space for an escape

• Phoebe – 3/10 priority – She is deceptively tanky and highly mobile. If you cannot land critical hits consistently this will be a very very tough fight. Her aoe slow will cut your damage drastically. Whenever she engages you look at the ground to make sure you are not standing in her ultimate. She is one of the few battleborn that you want to use your pounce stun on before she trys to escape, try to stun her once her shields are gone and shes at 75% health. As Phoebe abuse your mobility to walk circles around Attikus and keep him trapped. Use your warp slow to chase him down or cut his damage if you feel he is getting the upper hand.

• Rath – 4/10 – Don’t get knocked up, approach him from the front and bait it out. Without his knockup it’s just like any other engagement. When he ults pounce away if you can. Don’t use pounce to try and secure a kill against him unless you know you will kill him before the stun wears off. As Rath knock Attikus up and walk under him, he is so large that getting down is almost impossible

• Reyna – 7/10 – Try to only engage when you have full charge to negate her over shield. She is pretty easy to chase down so using pounce when her health is low can’t hurt. Pounce would best be used to knock away any of her teammates trying to rescue her from death. As Reyna quick melee and run. If you took the slow that’s also an option. Never engage him alone.

• Shayne and Aurox – 7/10 – Dodge the grab and the fight is like taking on any other stealth battleborn. Abuse your arc and tenacity to keep track of her and punch away. Shes not much of a threat with full charge. As Shayne try to engage him when he is low on health or when you have teammates with you, you won’t win a one on one fight most of the time. Kite him with your boomerang and tag team

• Thorn – 5/10 – If you can get the jump on her and burst her down it’s a very easy battle. You will have to really body block her to make sure she does not get away. As Thorn use your quick melee to create space and bunny hop to victory.

• Toby – 10/10 – Walk up and punch him in the face. This is your easiest matchup other than a solo kleese. If you have full charge even better. Sadly the only way he can resist your assault is quick melee or the stun on his mine. As toby you should never let him in on you or place yourself near a wall if you have Attikus in your line of sight. Quick melee can help but with how huge your hitbox is it does little if you don’t get rescued by your teammates. The moment you see Attikus in the other team lineup you should be prepared to take the stun on your mine.

• Whiskey foxtrot – 4/10 – He is very VERY tough to approach if he sees you coming. Do not underestimate his damage and you should probably avoid fighting him if you are under 70% health. If you can get the jump on him the fight is fairly straight foreward. As WF abuse the knockback of your shotgun and quick melee to keep Attikus out. With proper use he will rarely hurt you.

EDIT 1: formatting