[Champion Concept] Imoen, An Honest Thief (Yordle Support / Marksman)
This is some preliminary work of what is to be my gift to Riot. She's an adorable yordle thief who plays with vision and wields a giant magical key. She's intended to be League's premier Support / Marksman. Check out her page on the LoL Wiki!
Imoen is part of the October 2016 CCOS!
#TABLE OF CONTENTS
- OVERVIEW
- ABILITIES
- CONCEPT ART
- PERSONALITY & LORE
- ITEM BUILDS
- GAMEPLAY & STRATEGY
- DESIGN PROCESS & NOTES
- FAQs
#OVERVIEW
| Attack |
| Defense |
| Ability |
| Difficulty |
Imoen is a Support-Marksman and a crafty thief. Wielding her magical key, she is capable of picking locks and opening doors from a distance, letting her travel unseen down dark and mysterious corridors. She can also spy on enemies from afar through special keyholes and stealing potent spells http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/a/a2/Dark_Binding.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/20?cb=20160608032328 en route to your allies or those aimed at her. She is adept at hiding, capable of attacking without being revealed - although her attacks give away her position - and very lucky. Always seeking to have fun, she can find treasures deep in enemy territory, rewarding both her and her allies, and hide secrets to bamboozle the bad guys!
#ABILITIES
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/5/5f/LivesByProxy_Whisper_AltColor2.png/revision/latest?cb=20160719174756 P: Unlocked & Loaded Imoen's gun is a giant magical key! With it (and a little luck) she can open any door or lock opponents in place for a short while!
- Imoen requires time to fire and must reload after every shot. However, her basic attacks don't utilize projectiles, nor do they break her stealth or reveal her from cover!
- Imoen cannot critically strike unless she has 100% critical chance. Each of her attacks grants her bonus critical strike chance for a moment, with this bonus being dramatically increased if the enemy doesn't have sight of her. Upon reaching 100% critical strike chance, her next attack will strike critically for modified magic damage and lock her opponent in stasis for a moment.
http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/6/64/LivesByProxy_DoorToNothingness.png/revision/latest?cb=20160425200742 Q: Rogue's Passage Imoen opens a magical door at a distance. Beyond the door is a dark hallway - units that pass through the door and enter the hallway are invisible to enemies, but cannot see beyond its walls!
- Imoen fires her key in the target direction, opening a door and creating a one-way-in corridor that turns all units (including enemies) inside invisible and nearsights them. Anyone can leave the corridor at any time, with allies retaining their stealth for .75 seconds, and Imoen remaining stealthed for 1.5 seconds.
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/a/af/LivesByProxy_Netrunner_Keyhole.png/revision/latest?cb=20160331230522 W: Keyhole Imoen uses her gun to make a keyhole. She'll then crouch to peek through it, letting her spy all sorts of things!
- Imoen nearsights and roots herself as she channels her sight into a far reaching, but narrow line of True Sight in the target direction, that follows the cursor but is bound within a cone in front of her. Taking any action will end the effects, leaving behind a Keyhole that remains for a long while for future use. (She can R-Click a Keyhole to look through it!)
- If Imoen uses Rogue's Passage on a Keyhole its cooldown is reduced significantly, but the direction of the corridor is restricted to the direction of the Keyhole.
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/b/ba/LivesByProxy_Chronobreak_Pink.png/revision/latest?cb=20160408025730 E: Spelljack! Imoen is pretty slick and quick on her feet, capable of stealing spells with impeccable timing for her friends and at the most inopportune moments for her foes!
- Imoen dashes forward, gaining a burst of movement speed and a special shield that decays over the next second or so. The shield is special in that it blocks damage AND crowd control effects. Any enemy ability that damages her shield will briefly silence the ability's caster.
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/b/b0/LivesByProxy_DibsE.png/revision/latest?cb=20160901014127 / http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/c/c2/LivesByProxy_MTG_VoidmageHusher.png/revision/latest?cb=20160410064507 R: Treasure! / Secrets! Imoen has a knack for finding all sorts of hidden treasures! She also enjoys hiding secrets to surprise those who find them!
- Passively, Imoen can find Treasure! Spheres randomly scattered throughout the enemy side of the map, with four Treasure! Spheres always being located inside the enemy base in the same positions. Only Imoen can open a Treasure! Sphere and only by critically striking it. Upon opening a Treasure! Sphere Imoen gains bonus experience, a permanent increase to her critical strike chance, and a sum of gold that she divides evenly amongst her nearby allies.
- Actively, Imoen hides a Secret! Cache at the target location, to be accessed at a later time. She can critically strike these Secrets!, activating and consuming them for an AoE heal for herself and her allies.
#CONCEPT ART
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/6/68/LivesByProxy_YordleImoenNewest.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/480?cb=20160724030810 http://pre08.deviantart.net/743d/th/pre/i/2016/252/8/1/imoen__an_honest_thief_by_drugsforrobots-dah12w2.png http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/a/a1/LivesByProxy_Imoen_KeyholeConceptArt.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/480?cb=20160906001024 http://img05.deviantart.net/d159/i/2016/280/d/9/imoen_clothing_concepts_by_drugsforrobots-dak7bxk.png http://pre15.deviantart.net/dcbd/th/pre/i/2016/290/f/2/imoen___key_design_explorations_by_drugsforrobots-daldh7a.png http://img00.deviantart.net/8628/i/2016/293/b/2/imoen_sketch_collection_by_drugsforrobots-dalob9y.png http://img08.deviantart.net/fdc2/i/2016/343/0/9/imoen_and_sauna_by_drugsforrobots-dar2tcu.png
#PERSONALITY & LORE
Imoen is still very young by yordle standards. In her century of life, she's gone on many, many adventures and seen a great deal of the world. Unlike other yordles, she prefers to stay in the Bilgewater archipelago, since the humans there are so much fun!
She's this brazen little yordle who is equal parts cutely naive and cruelly clever when she needs to be, but one of League's most light-hearted champions. Let me put it this way: if Braum is the champion who jovially jumps in front of that Morgana Q to save you, laughing it off with ease, this girl is the champion who jumps in front of Braum - stealing Morg's Q - just so she could see the look on their faces. To quote Riot Wrekz (talking about Braum, who she shares a lot with) she is 'causally invincible... not a reckless disregard for person safety, but a complete non-acknowledgement that other things are threatening.' She is still very innocent, and her world is viewed through a lens of child-like wonder.
Legend has it that:
-
once wagered his deck for Imoen's key. Imoen accepted the bet, not realizing TF for the swinder he was. The challenge was to race up Gulligan's Lighthouse, which Imoen did exceptionally quick. However, TF was already there waiting for her, and, having won, took her key. The gambler unfortunately found himself unable to use her key, which Imoen stole back from him later that day. The story goes that the two had quite the friendly rivalry from then on out, each trying to one-up the other in the grandiosity of their heists. Imoen has since made it a habit to steal as many of TF's http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/8/8d/Gold_Card.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/20?cb=20150312021301 as she can, with the hope of stacking her own deck one day. -
Imoen tried to convince
not to smoke, since tobacco is bad for you. Graves reassured her that it wasn't tobacco. Imoen, not happy with this answer, made it her mission to steal Graves' cigar any time she caught him with one. The story goes that Graves hasn't been able to smoke since. -
Imoen, much to the ire of
, routinely rescues any Ocklepods caught by goons and brigands, preventing them from being sold on the Black Market. The Ocklepods, forever indebted to her, offered to keep a lookout for her as she liberates Bilgewater's wealthier denizens of their secrets and treasures. She gladly accepted. Imoen then went undetected for 2 months as a stowaway on The Dead Pool and consumed most of GP's citrus fruits and rum, even stealing some http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/9/9c/Remove_Scurvy.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/20?cb=20150707190028 right out from under his nose! The pirates were forced to return to port sooner than expected, as scurvy and sobriety threatened the entire crew! -
and
both spent some years trying to catch Imoen, in Piltover and the Bilgewater, respectively. After 23.8K worth of treasure from Bilgewater went missing, the bounty on Imoen's head was the highest in the land and MF couldn't resist the chase! Cait, after investigating how the 1st Bank of Piltover could've been emptied without any sign of forced entry, decided she would lay a trap for the elusive thief. Imoen thought these two ladies were silly, and that it would be fun (and delicious!) to replace the cupcakes in Cait's traps with various sums of gold, relics, and artifacts from the Bilgewater. She then took the loot from Piltover and made it rain on MF's ship! Over the course of the next year, she had returned over 50K in valuables to both cities and consumed 1,851 cupcakes.
#ITEM BUILDS
Hybrid (Recommended)
Actives4Dayz
Mega-Magic Crit
Big Shields, Big Heals
Psuedo-Carry
#DESIGN PROCESS & NOTES
I said this was a gift to Riot, and it is. I really want to see a thief champion in game, but the concepts I've seen put forward fall into the trap of making the would-be thief into just another assassin. I wanted something different, something that escaped the generic leather-clad, dual-dagger-wielding, hooded, back-stab-y rogue archetype that we've seen a million times in WoW and DnD and other media. At the same time, I've been itching for Riot to develop the vision game and give us more cool ways of getting sight and info on our enemies.
With these things in mind, I knew she had to be a support. In the classic dungeon-delving parties of DnD, the thief was always a supporting character, one that rounded out any adventuring group. She was there for her utility: the ability to find and disarm traps, pick locks, pick pockets, scout the surroundings, and occasionally be a distraction. And intrinsic to being a thief was a lack of combat ability. She's not a fighter, or a mage, or an assassin. A thief shouldn't go toe-to-toe with her enemies, or even fight them at all if possible. But League is ostensibly a game about dealing damage, so how can we have a thief work in this context?
My solution, thanks to inspiration from Willbachbakal on LoL Wiki, was to give her a passive that rewarded her for remaining out of sight and undetected, for actively trying to have a hit-and-run play-style. It's like a game of tag to her, a game of hide and seek. She's not your typical marksman - she'll never reach the DPS of a Vayne, Cait, or Ashe. In fact, her overall damage is lackluster unless you're actively trying to proc her crit, which means hiding, avoiding detection, and being conscientious of where the enemy was, is, and could be.
But why is she a marksman? Most thief concepts put forth here and elsewhere make the thief in question melee. Nothing wrong with this, but somehow I got the idea in my head that our thief needs to use a giant key as her weapon. That idea had already been done though, in the form of a melee weapon. But wait! What if the key was a mystical fire-arm? What if she pointed and fired it like a gun? I like metaphors and there is no rule that states a champion's firearm must be feasible in the real world. And besides, what better tool could a thief have than a key that opened any door, fit any lock, broke any seal?
I had it in my head that this thief was a girl, but after a random encounter with LoL Player MouseGirl, it dawned on me: our thief should be a yordle! The idea of a mousey yordle thief was too good to pass up. There was also some precedent for yordles with tails such as Rin and Gnar. The yordle-fication of Imoen made her even more thematically resonant in my mind, as now she was even more playful, even more light-hearted. She didn't steal because she was greedy, or because she needed to, she stole things because it was a game to her - because it was fun!
I also designed her Rogue's Passage and Keyhole to deliberately invoke the feeling of being in the dark. THIEF started it. The use of darkness was critical to making a thief feel like a thief, and League had the perfect mechanic for it - nearsight. Her Q creates the feeling of running down a dark corridor, and her W again gives her this feeling of being in the dark, while also working as a 'drawback' for an incredibly powerful vision tool. With her E, I was trying to capture the feeling of her being quick and agile, able to snag spells flying through the air.
Her Ultimate ability was the last I designed, and it didn't come to me at first. Yet, I had to go back and evaluate what it was that made thieves feel like thieves. It's not just the act of stealing, it's the act of being somewhere you're not suppose to be and the vulnerability that comes from that. The guys at Extra Credits did a wonderful vid about stealth games that's pretty insightful. So, gradually, I came up with her current ultimate that requires her to go into enemy territory, and gives her mini-objectives to find and unlock. My hope is that this reward the player, and captures the feel of exploration and danger associated with being a thief.
One thing remained though, and that was her title. Her name (which is a placeholder) was already a homage to the character Imoen from the Baldur's Gate trilogy. Initially I just called her 'the yordle thief'. But as I watched CertainlyT talking about stealth, and rewatching, and rewatching, I realized the perfect title had been staring me in the face the whole time. AnHonestThief, I owe you one. ;)
I could go on and on about stealth and vision in video games, and I've tried to elaborate on how, over many months, I made this champ. I'm still not done. I'd like to do a mock 'champion reveal' to practice my PS skills and art. Until then, I can only hope Riot gives the stealth crew some much needed love.
Until next time,
GL;HF

and the items that build from it (but without the movement effect, natch), to let her go for the normal AP-Support build. Add a 'breaks on dealing damage' clause to her Q to at least make an attempt to avoid cheese. I'd also personally either replace Spelljack's shield with something like Fiora's W or rework the ability altogether. Make Treasures Sphere spawn over time (if they don't already), and vary their spawn locations based on what turrets are dead (if your opponent's are dead, they spawn closer to enemy base, if yours are dead, they can spawn near your base).
her AA wouldn’t benefit as much from AS since the Animation has to finish each time).
AA not breaking stealth seems kinda powerful, but it mainly depends on her kit how strong this really is.