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Why is Teemo a rat and not a snake? Why is Cassiopeia a reptile at all?

Carrimi·12/29/2018, 3:28:04 PM·1 votes·877 views

This is something that most will laugh at but while I do adore League (best MOBA by miles, understand human brain and how to attract noobs while keeping game just hard enough that pros and tryhards stay stimulated as well as having fantastic artwork etc) I don't think they quite understand how to build Lore or how to formulate characters as a whole.

This culminated, to me, when Neeko who is not AT ALL what a chameleon is was assigned that due to character development team that clearly isn't educated in biology, history, mythology or anything other than some easily Googlable surface-level interpretation of legends like that which Yorick is based on.

While I think Lucian's body and backstory are incredibly well done, all other ADCs are so utterly shallow relative to what their story could be and their bodies do NOT match their personas at all (why is Vayne even a female? I don't know how to say this non-sexist but wouldn't she make more sense as some hermit hunter of the woodland type and woad ashe skin be removed to avoid Lore overlap?). Vayne is based on Batman officially, but if you actually look into the story of Batman, nothing adds up. Vayne is based on the character Rambo and is a brutally masculine character in storyline and just style of ADCing. She should be throwing knives instead of bolts and her E should be simply named and skinned better to be a physical arm-push and trap-setting move much like Caitlin's Q except a stealth-form that rewards landing it well heavily (so you push the person into a trap like Rambo, not into a wall with some superbolt nonsense weapon that Batman never used in the entire Comics).

This aside, let's get to Teemo and Cassiopeia. Teemo is a reptilian fighting-styled being. He is sneaky, struggles with up-front combat but is brutally efficient if he times it well and has his enemy at a loss as to handle his style. This is a reptile's playstyle, not a cute little mammal. In fact, apart from Tristana and Poppy, all Yordles are meant to be reptiles or birds of prey like Kennen is so blatantly supposed to be a... Wait for it... Kite [https://www.britannica.com/animal/kite-bird]. Donger is clearly based on owl-mentality and could even be a Leesin-esque blind Guru who is 'in tune with his Turrets' so to speak and lets his enemy's anger work against them. Renekton is supposed to be what Tryndamere's body is and looks like (a massive mammalian Barbarian type) and in fact would make a great Tiger unlike Udyr. Tryndamere should actually be a slender, Yasuo-bodied sleek and calculating swordsman... It's so obvious if you look at the playstyle, skillset, raw mentality of players who play the champion etc... Sure, there's that Trynda main I forgot the name of who was quite a madman but even he was a calculating guy. Udyr should be an amphibian, not a damn Tiger, Bird whatever else he is. Udyr is the king of adaptability and switching between terrain and situations, he struggles to ever dominate any one scenario and is designed to be a 'cross map' role like Jungler or hyperroaming top. Trick2G as a person and mentality is utterly adaptable and brutally fast to adapt to how the enemy is moving and attacking, this is not what a Tiger does and not how whatever bird Udyr's other skin is (is that a phoenix?) operate. Cassiopeia is taking 'snake' when Teemo is so blatantly the snake of the characters. How on Earth is she a snake? No, really, tell me how someone who is so utterly based on brutal, fast-moving, ninja mechanics is snake-like (snakes have the worst body for fast movement, that's why they have no feet so Riot thought it would be funny to give her bonus movement speed and therefore to not need boots...)? Cassiopeia is actually supposed to be a Yordle. She is a tiny ninja-like uberhamster warrior or whatever.

1 Comments

SelinaTheLeaf12/29/2018, 7:22:20 PM2 votes

I'm only really going to say one thing about this, and please don't take this the wrong way, I don't mean to be rude, but this is my opinion.

I can understand where you come from but think of it this way. The characters of League, as League has evolved, have become more and more dynamic and unique to League of Legends on its own. Yes, the beginning of designing a character will likely start from a concept that we know in the real world, such as a person, or creature, this allows features of the character to fit into our world, and give them a sense of place to the player, as if they could possibly be real, and something that players of the game could connect with. One of the many goals of league's Champion pool is to have a character for everyone. Everything from the seductive traits of Evelynn to the cutesy cheerful characters like Zoe and Gnar, to the edgy Kayn, and even a giant monster the size of a lane like Cho'gath.

Back in the early days, League suffered from the syndrome of stereotypical character traits, for example, original Gangplank. He was everything you'd expect in a pirate, from voice lines to visuals, but as your audience grows, and your character pool becomes as wide as League's, stereotypical, and predictability isn't going to cut it. Each character should be distinguishable in its own way and will have its own story the way it's written.

Back on track, the whole idea behind all these characters and how they look, comes from being able to take what exists in our world, and expand upon it. Sure, Vayne's original idea may have come from Batman, but that doesn't mean that she is Batman. She is her own character, her own story, she is Vayne. Take Gnar, for instance, sure his rage concept may have come from the hulk, but he's still Gnar, he's still a fuzzy creature with the ability to throw a boomerang and hop into fights, he still has his own story.

Everything starts from some belief, some real thing in this world, and it's expanded upon with people's own ideas, and own artistic/narrative flair. Not every video game character who's sneaky and shoots poison is going to be a snake. Not every character that can shield, is going to have a shield. The fact that we have people with the open-mindedness in this industry to make these dynamic concepts, and stretch the boundaries of reality so that they still seem real enough to fit into a universe of their own, is honestly mesmerizing, and respectable.