The Black Cleaver vs Last Whisper: A...

[quote=RaNuD][quote=Searz] [quote=Jungl3y3tt1e] Personally If the enemy team doesnt have anyone buldiong significant ammounts of armor than go with Last Whisper. Simply because Black Cleaver reduces armor and Last Whisper penetrates excisting armor.[/quote] Read it again. Again and again until you realize how wrong that comment is. [/quote] Or how much he made a typo. He made a typo, right?[/quote]

[quote=animorte]Nobody in this entire game will have less than 45 armor by the time you can get Black Cleaver. Everybody gets more armor as they level up...[/quote]

[quote=Turbo Punz][h1]TL:DR The threshold at which Last Whisper becomes more effective is 112 Armor. Black Clever is good early-mid game Once people start stcking on armor, Last whisper will be your choice[/h1][/quote]

[quote=animorte]Yes, unless you don't auto-attack.[/quote]

[quote=DuffTime][quote=Turbo Punz] TL:DR The threshold at which Last Whisper becomes more effective is 112 Armor. Black Clever is good early-mid game Once people start stcking on armor, Last whisper will be your choice [/quote] ohhh muh gawdddd. It's not this black and white. Armor pen is a deep complicated topic, and a lot of people have the wrong general idea. The simplest way to put it is this. You can run an ArP rune page, get your 25 ArP, and buy a TBC, and with the extra 6 in a looot of games, that's PLENTY armor pen/reduction for a generic right clicker. (45 when stacked + 31 = 76 armor pen granted the 45 is reduction, but for this equation it's almost irrelevant.) That basically means that between runes/masteries and TBC you're removing base armor from most targets. They might have 5 armor left over on their base stats, and they have to buy whatever other armor they want to use. The other route is to use a full AD Red/Quint page (popular right now) and get your 15 AD, and use the 10% armor pen and buy a Last Whisper. I think they stack with diminished returns, so it'll be somewhere between 45% and 50% armor pen. Probably around 47%, I don't know the math/formula. The flat pen combo will peak mid game, and the % combo with those runes will have the better early game and deep late game generally speaking. Things also to consider, the enemy champion line up. Do they have a Shyvanna and/or other champions who have built in armor? Taric? Jarvan? Will they build and Aegis? Each tanky armor champion makes flat penning less effective. % is better against those targets. However the flat pen + TBC combo really does crush early mid game if those armor buffing champions are not present. TBC + a PD on Vayne for example, with a flat ARP page, will do more damage to her targets than any other carry can dream of dealing at that point of the game. She'll deal true damage with ALL of her attacks unless they build some armor, not just with her SB procs. And she'll attack FAST. So it's complicated, it's subjective, but if you want the easy, "Every game answer" then just take the AD pages and the % pen mastery and items, Last Whisper.[/quote]

[quote=lifebaka][quote=DuffTime] The other route is to use a full AD Red/Quint page (popular right now) and get your 15 AD, and use the 10% armor pen and buy a Last Whisper. I think they stack with diminished returns, so it'll be somewhere between 45% and 50% armor pen. Probably around 47%, I don't know the math/formula. [/quote] It stacks multiplicatively. So if you have both the 10% mastery and a 40% item, your % penetration equation will look like this: (1 - .1)(1 - .4)(Armor_after_other_stuff), which simplifies to (.9)(.6)(Armor) = (.54)(Armor), meaning that when you stack them you get exactly 46% penetration. For further reasons why the TBC vs LW question is complicated, note that they give different stats and have different prices. TBC gives more damage and also attack speed, while LW only gives damage (and less of it). Because things like AD and AS stack additively but interact with other damage factors multiplicatively, you can't just factor them out to make the math easy; you actually have to compare the exact numbers of different builds to figure out which is better in different situations. And because the TBC costs more, LW pretty much automatically does more damage if you have enough money for it but not TBC.[/quote]

[quote=DuffTime]I know all of that, but I'm expressing points that people repeatedly forget to consider. It's champion reliant, gear reliant, rune reliant, match up reliant, team comp reliant, etc forever.[/quote]

[quote=RaNuD][quote=lifebaka] [quote=DuffTime] The other route is to use a full AD Red/Quint page (popular right now) and get your 15 AD, and use the 10% armor pen and buy a Last Whisper. I think they stack with diminished returns, so it'll be somewhere between 45% and 50% armor pen. Probably around 47%, I don't know the math/formula. [/quote] It stacks multiplicatively. So if you have both the 10% mastery and a 40% item, your % penetration equation will look like this: (1 - .1)(1 - .4)(Armor_after_other_stuff), which simplifies to (.9)(.6)(Armor) = (.54)(Armor), meaning that when you stack them you get exactly 46% penetration. For further reasons why the TBC vs LW question is complicated, note that they give different stats and have different prices. TBC gives more damage and also attack speed, while LW only gives damage (and less of it). Because things like AD and AS stack additively but interact with other damage factors multiplicatively, you can't just factor them out to make the math easy; you actually have to compare the exact numbers of different builds to figure out which is better in different situations. And because the TBC costs more, LW pretty much automatically does more damage if you have enough money for it but not TBC. [/quote] Oh wow. Nuances are something so incredibly rare from a gamer in general. Gotta love it when you get some.[/quote]

[quote=Whirlnami7]Armor Reduction is before Armor Penetration because Armor Reduction can reduce a targets armor below 0.[/quote]

[quote=Whirlnami7][[The Black Cleaver]] works with [[The Brutalizer]] and [[Youmuu's Ghostblade]] and flat armor penetration runes since these items reduce the armor by a fixed amount. Since [[The Black Cleaver]] reaches it full effect on the 3rd hit you can put this on an Anti-Carry since Carries are focusing on pure damage. You use [[Last Whisper]] on a target with lots of armor and Armor Penetration based off of percentage is kind of situational. [[Last Whisper]] is a Tank killer so if there is a tank then use [[Last Whisper]] if there aren't any than you can go with [[The Black Cleaver]] if you don't care then you can use [[Trinity Force]].[/quote]