Why do another tree-based champion? I mean we've got Maokai. Zyra is plant based as well. Why go back to that kind of specific theme again when riot isn't doing that many champs right now and there are probably a ton of other things riot could touch on? Even if you wanted to stick to a plant theme you could have gone to serebii and gotten some other inspiration for a champion.
They're more into the sylvan nature for Ivern it seems, but Maokai is this stubborn, vengeful treant dedicated to gathering nature spirits to overthrow the unnatural undeath in the shadow isles. Ivern definitely seems more on the whimsical side. It's like comparing Kled to Sejuani just because they ride something.
Riot has made several champions that are human, no complaints there eh? I don't mind another tree in league.
Yeah I wonder how they'll differentiate Ivern and Maokai.
However I wouldn't be too judgy before he gets on the pbe.
Follow-up: Any chance Ivern is characterized as female?
It'd be awfully nice to have a female plant-based champ who isn't wearing the equivalent of lingerie.
What's wrong with another Treant? What you've suggested doesn't make much sense, and here's why: Riot is trying to establish a living world of lore. Characters like they were done in the early days, where it's like "I like this. I'll make this." left the game with 40 different characters who were randomly put together in the same arena. Riot is avoiding that style of creation and attempting to make champions that flow and fit better into the established lore, and in the cases of Kindred and now Ivern, they're expanding into entities that were random one-ofs and trying to show that the world is full of creatures that operate very differently from the previous entities. In Zyra's lore, it all but tells us that she's the last of her kind, so having more plant creatures like her wouldn't fit without considerable changes, and just adding other random plant things would just add one more piece of disjointed lore to the mess they're already trying to harmonize.
