Tools of League

This started out as a bit of a rant, .. and feel free to take it as one, but then it really has just turned into a personal project for me to try and list and group champions in different categories regarding their weapons, tools, themes, ... and so on. At this point, it is incomplete, but I am needing to save it so that I can work on it later. Unfortunately, the boards do not have any sort of draft feature that I am aware of, so the best thing I can think to do is to post it and come back to it later. Feel free to leave any comments, questions, suggestions, or corrections relevant to what I have so far.

Now on with the actual post

I'm getting a little annoyed by people who claim "That's been done before" when it comes to champion concepts with similar utilities, weapons, attack ranges, .. anything really, to other champions that already exist in the game. Yes, there does come a point where there are too many similarities, but I really believe that you have to make some assumption when trying to read and understand someone's concepts that they are trying to make a champion who will attempt to be unique, even if it is only aesthetically, mechanically, and/or thematically.

I wanted to illustrate two of these that really get under my skin.

First is basic attack range types, There are two attack range types that any champion can be at any given point, ranged or melee. There are 3 ways in which a champion can be described, ranged, melee, or both.

Ranged (59 champions) And I'm going to go ahead and include Ivern

Melee (69 champions)

Both (5 champions) All of these champions have an ability or passive that modifies their basic attacks to function in either melee or ranged attacks, including their function with specific masteries, passives, and items that are range type specific.

That 59 ranged champions, 69 melee champions, and 5 with both ranges, to a total of 133 champions.

So, when I come up with a champion concept who does both, .. please don't give me shit about it being 'too similar to Jayce' Yes, this is a bit of a personal rant inspired by a comment someone made, but it is something that has been bothering me for a while.

That isn't to say that I don't think there couldn't be a champion who doesn't attack in one of these forms. I actually have a few ideas as to how there could be champions who essentially do not have any auto attacks. They could essentially rely completely on abilities (which would almost certainly need to be resourceless), or they could have something like a permanent Sunfire cape. .. but that is for another post.

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The other thing I wanted use this post to illustrate is the fact that many champions use very similar weapons as a part of their theme.

*Some of the champions placed in the following categories may be debatable, but I believe it helps to illustrate my overall point. *

First of all, I want to list all of the champions who do not use weapons as part of their theme. These champions use their physical body, pets, and magical abilities that are not augmented, enhanced, or channeled through some sort of item as a noteworthy part of their theme.

Next I want to list champions who use century or stationary pets, mounts, or tools as a notable part of their theme (some champions will overlap in different categories)

Now for specific weapons

Swords, knives, daggars

Magical Staves and wand-like items

Physical shields

Martial Polearms

Thrown weapons

Projectile weapons Bow and arrow, crossbow, blow dart

Guns