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The characters migration to the new lore

Sneak Dog·9/6/2014, 12:30:48 AM·9 votes·2,030 views

The dev blog is out, Riot is going to redo Runeterra without the institute of war. This thread isn't about whether the institute should stay or not, different thread. This thread is about how Riot retcons champions in the migration. Not about whether they should, clearly they want champions to belong to predefined factions, different thread. It's about how they do it, or rather, done it.

We've already seen the Freljord event a significant time ago. Along with it came multiple retcons, some minor like Volibear, but one major; Trundle. Since Trundle is the only retcon with the new lore that has had time to settle and was badly received (by me, I will be subjective, I am merely a player too), I will focus on him.

First of all, Riot has said that they intend to keep the core intact:

do no harm, and respect core themes.

From Tommy Gnox, though not necessarily applicable here.

But we aren't taking any champion out of the game? I don't feel like that's a fair analogy. I'm not in charge of lore, so you're all set there!

From Riot Opeli, associate writer, but I do hope it has some weight.

I'd like to point out that this has failed with Trundle. Trundle's current in-game representation oozes power-hungry brute. Look up his lines, it is just abundantly clear. His background also doesn't create a very deep character. It attempts to but falls short and describes a bullied liar that would have been a bully had he had the chance. He is supposed to be cunning but feels like a character that just lies when he can't smack the problem to death.

Compare this to the Trundle his old lore described. He wasn't power-hungry, he just wanted to be treated as an equal by his kinsmen. He tried to do this by becoming their hero. Then when he did save them, they started shunning him regardless, ungrateful as they were. It's a story about an idealistic troll fulfilling his ideals, but them turning out sour.

Now I know Riot is going to place some champions in new settings, that's fine. Trundle can be an ice troll, but he should still be Trundle, else you shouldn't name him Trundle. The previous two paragraphs described two different trolls. I do however think Riot should be able to do better. They can make this ice troll try and save his tribe, venture into the ice witch' lair, be forced into a deal with the witch herself and return to the tribe to lead them to better tides. They can make this ice troll struggle with his newfound leadership turning out to be different than what he had expected. The trolls don't see him as their equal, but as their superior. They grovel before him and his club. They follow any order without questioning, a bit too eager for comfort. I think they ought to be able to make this ice troll Trundle, an idealistic troll whose ideals turned out a whole lot different than he expected them to.

I don't think Riot should be this careless with a character. They shouldn't be content with removing a character from the league and replacing it with a new one. Because I sure won't be. It would mean all the emotional investment I did in the previous lore is at stake, it means that the characters I care about may be removed on Riots whims and visions. It would mean I couldn't trust Riot with taking proper care of my investment anymore.

The only way to convince me the new lore is going to be just fine and won't remove any of our characters, merely change their setting, is by being willing to admit when it went wrong and to fix it, because it is evident already that it's not all going to be perfect at the first try. Convince me by being willing to look back not only at the old lore but also at the new lore and fix mistakes there as well. Give Trundle new voice-overs and mildly rewrite his background, yes only mildly because they actually got close to making it the old Trundle in the background. Give me a good precedent, give me evidence that you care about the characters we all care so much about and I will be able to not see everything you do with oh so cynical eyes (oh the irony).

I don't often post threads on these forums, feedback on formatting is welcome.

Responses about whether you agree whether the Trundle retcon was good or bad and more importantly why are welcome, or even responses about whether you agree it's not the old Trundle anymore or not. Don't bother about the Shurima retcons, they aren't even public yet.

tl;dr: Riot has removed a character in the Freljord event and replaced it with a new character, setting a bad precedent for the new lore retcons.

edit: Runaan posted on the na forums:

Our philosophy with these characters is that whatever we do to re-shape them should hold very tightly to the “soul” of what a character was in the old canon. Nobody should feel like an entirely new character – their spirit, the “feeling” you get from them, those things should feel true, even if details shift in how they came to be that person.

Now I'd just like them to look back at Trundle during this retconning...

8 Comments

Zhugan9/6/2014, 7:08:33 PM6 votes

That's because retcons, by their very nature, are destructive to lore. They are antithetical to constructive due to what it means to remove something, anything, from a world/story.

I could enumerate with examples, but honestly the easiest comparison I can make jumps to my mind quite quickly...

Imagine, if you will, removing Jenova from the FF7 games. Could you have the same characters (by name anyhow) and tell a different set of stories that are arguably just as good if not better? Sure. But it sure as hell wouldn't be the same games because ultimately the core limiting factor to the conflicts in the FF7 series of games is Jenova and the corrupting influences of her cells.

The same has now been done with LoL by removing the IoW and Summoners. They, and not the various nations, were the true center of conflicts on Runeterra. And they are simply, irrevocably, gone from the lore. Not destroyed by other factions, but gone as if they never existed. Might these open up the ability to tell more and better stories? Sure. But they won't be the same characters, they will be similar characters. It won't be the same conflicts between nations, it'll be similar conflicts between nations.

All of that because the primary instigator is now gone. Gone when the lore had the ability for Demacia and Noxus (who HATE each other) to have good reason to join together to crush the IoW between them for their manipulation of the events in Kalamanda for their own benefit. Because it seemed to me that the IoW was leading the world by its nose, trying to become the only real power in a world of powerful men and women. And that would've been quite a story to tell. A story that will now, never, be told because Riot decided to do away with the central element of all conflict on Runeterra.