There is a severe lack of basic/miniscule knowledge in League Lore

ModCaptainMårvelous·4/29/2018, 6:57:19 AM·113 votes·22,616 views

I'm not talking huge stuff like "Who are the final two darkin" or "Are the demigods of each land known across the world?"

Rather, I mean basic stuff: We don't have basic champion height/weights and in-game model comparisons are moot points. We don't have a world map. We don't have basic tech levels (I asked a Rioter once and apparently Piltover has gunpowder/machines but not cameras or video record. Which I assume places their tech either in super hardcore radios or...?). We don't even have basic foods of the nations.

Before Riot takes steps to tell sprawling, epic stories or reworking champions, we should get some basic stuff out of the way. A size chart. A map. Trying to guesstimate all these ideas is painful for the average lore fan.

78 Comments

Dysnomia4/29/2018, 7:05:26 AM52 votes

Yes. Lore fans find "Jax likes eggs" tip very informative.

Singularitea4/29/2018, 2:25:24 PM15 votes

imo the size chart should be measured in Teemo s

Zero Shingetsu4/29/2018, 6:59:08 AM12 votes

I second this motion. I'd love to have a fully fleshed out map, and size charts in general amuse me greatly.

Whyte Lyon4/29/2018, 9:52:45 AM7 votes

Excuse me but I wouldn't say the what of things in League are actually as important compared to the why.

World Building is basically raising the mythology of League's narrative. As they go through the history and (slowly) saying why are things the way they are. The mythology acting for the foundations/ building blocks telling us things like- why is Zaun situated beneath Piltover? So on and so forth.

Here the audience is learning about the past, which can form a loose structure for how the future might go. AS things progress with more stories, we (the audience) gradually understand core truths about this overall world. All you need to do is be observant and absorb the knowledge you are reading.

Instead of saying, here's all the very specific truths- so Yordles have 4 fingers on each hand, their max height is 90cm and all have coloured fur x,y, z. Instead focus on giving us the bigger, more far-reaching truths. Like how Yordles are attracted to Runeterra cultures and enjoy manifesting around certain human ideals. Here the audience can take that broad truism and think about how it effects stories and characters.

But I dont want to be told exactly what specific Yordle is like, I'd rather learn of the generality's of Yordles, backed up with mythology that explains why they're certain ways. Because League is a mythic universe, gods exist and people can interact with them, theoretically you can meet the person who made Braum's shield, you can meet Ornn. Because the makers of this universe exist, so mythology is much more important and should be very vivid.

Once you know the mythology you have that frame work, a new lens you can use to understand things. Built upon that you can start changing things- I know what Yordles are like in general, but the future has room for a variety of different Yordles that could expand the knowledge of the world.

I think asking for trivia to then be confirmed or made official, like a champion's height or what's the cuisine like in this universe, is asking the really wrong kind of questions.

FloRaider424/29/2018, 3:34:36 PM6 votes

Having a clear worldmap prevents retcons or new regions from being added. For example the old map had Piltover and Zaun on opposite sides of the sea, wheras now they are just districts of one whole.

Having a basic tech level could be interesting, but since champions are often genius inventor, users of prototypes and one of a kind artifacts, that information has no real impact on any champion.

Knowing the basic foods of nations seems also really irrelevant to be honest. Why would it matter if we knew Ironbacks are a delicacy, or the best recipe for Razorfin soup, or that Wharfrats are poor mans food?

The only usefull information is size comparisons, but even that is only really important when talking about the titanic champions.

I know that for lore enthusiast a fleshed out world is appealing as they then can weave their own tales or imagine the world better, but for a lot of people this information is completly irrelevant as it doesn't add interesting stories.

I am kinda suprised that there are people who expect detailed worlbuilding from a MOBA game.

TL;DR: Those informations would be interesting to have, but every retcon would require rewrites and new publications and for a lot of people that information isn't even all that important.

IAintDarius4/29/2018, 1:08:23 PM6 votes

Breast comparison chart.

Noxxarian4/29/2018, 7:41:36 AM6 votes

Agreed. These details could be listed but they could also be provided within lore and biographies itself. Certain descriptions of size, technology, etc. but it varies so much due to gaps in it, it becomes uncertain to solidify an answer. I don't see a problem with them sitting down and writing up the basic info. Like, gimme the exact body mass fo Aurelion Sol :D

Also, Illaoi likes mangoes.

I would also add that there is a bit of an... annoyance with lore itself. I just did a Lore Spotlight for Annie, and her data - I feel like it's hovering on the line between "mystical" and "simply needlessly vague." Their biographies could be, I suppose, used to convey such basic information about them. I liked the old lore style where they would include some logical reasoning as to how they ended up at the League of Legends. I appreciate the current lore too, but it's just so divided.

Tesla Effect4/29/2018, 4:08:59 PM5 votes

Champions basic age, height, weight, full names (name and surname), names of other family members. All of these things while small are very important.

YoNightmare74/29/2018, 5:21:36 PM5 votes

Something tells me someone saw my 140 champions size comparison, correct me if i'm wrong! ;)

https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/skin-champion-concepts/HjhYj9Ri-size-comparison-every-champion

Star Guardían4/30/2018, 10:43:01 AM3 votes

These minute details are less important than getting meaningful stories on a regular and consistent basis. Who cares how tall Draven is, I would rather see his interactions with Swain and Darius.

SociopathFriend4/30/2018, 5:34:26 AM3 votes

While I agree to an extent, I don't think you made the best case here.

We don't have basic champion height/weights

I like to think I'm a fairly passionate person about series I love: video games, books, a select few anime, etc. Despite that, I would not know how tall pretty much any of the characters I love are, nor would I care despite spending hours and hours investigating their worlds even outside of the media itself. Furthermore, if I did care, seldom will most of the series have something like a size chart. That is not a common thing to have at all.

It's made even muddier when releasing such a chart, if they did, will only further make a disconnect from gameplay and lore if it mentions how tall something is. You may recall something of the sort happening when Galio was released? Fans were taken aback at his size and many were confused as to how any of the human champions, or even his rival, Sion, could manage to fight him and win. Speculation is good, confusion is not, disconnecting gameplay and lore is typically not the best thing either. A Rioter responded and basically said Sion would tackle Galio's foot really, really hard, and fans were seemingly not all that ecstatic about how obviously silly this idea was.

We don't have a world map.

I did say I agreed to an extent and this would be it. It should not be difficult to make a world map, you could easily have a rough map "found" in an archive or make it something Ezreal made up in his spare time (he doesn't need it after all so losing it wouldn't matter) if you don't want to use the resources to make a very good version. It's not the best, but it's something if you're holding out on the "big" map.

We don't have basic tech levels

I disagree that this is a good thing to have, especially in a setting as weird as League. There's plenty of settings where the technology they have available doesn't always add up to what you see (Attack on Titan has space-age 3D gear, black powder cannons, plus the Titans). The more detail you add, the more evident contradictions start to be once the gaps in technology start appearing. This area is one best left vague imo.

Call Me Nana4/30/2018, 12:13:23 AM2 votes

twitch has stats in his lore.

Foxynth4/30/2018, 2:56:22 AM2 votes

It's respectable that you have these kind of expectations for a hugely successful and WIDELY popular craze that has been league of legends since its debut back in 2010 or so. However, you do have to remember this is an entire WORLD they're building here. And to be totally honest, I like to go by a bit of a personal theory of mine that I'm pretty sure not a lot of people tend to take into account; whether or not you agree with me is up to you.

In a fiction world affected by stuff like magic and whatnot, it can make "progression", put lightly... tricky. In other words, if you think of our world and the way cultures equate to one another, how do we fight wars? Well, with tanks and guns that were developed by all of us. An American tank functions almost the same as a German or Russian tank, but their designs, intricacies and inner workings are all slightly different, but at the end of the day we're all on the same level. In a world like Runeterra where some places have an abundance of magic (Ionia), no innate magic at all (Zaun), or even places that despise magic (Demacia, not sure if retconned), it would take a TON of thinking and analysis to make those kinds of relationships accurate, because strictly speaking, Ionia should technically be ruling the world if they had access to the most valuable resources (assuming that's magic).

Not only that, but the concepts that league of legends brings to the table are pretty easy to link together because they all share a common theme amongst their traits: they're all based on older depictions of LEGENDARY tales. Pirates, ancient Egyptian rituals and religions, Nordic cultures and religions, ninjas and angels and demons, and even the age old ideas of chivalry, steampunk and Castlevania-esque themes come into play here.

Now I know I kind of went off on a whim here and for that I apologize but here's a more generalistic approach to the situation that I'm hoping you can at least understand, if not agree with. It's so difficult to come up with specifics until you come up with a baseline first; that's why I think they never come out with a hard set depiction of Runeterra for example. Artists never EVER start on the miniscule details on a piece because if you find something unsatisfying, it ruins the whole work for you. You start with a base, and add details as you get more and more specific. That said, League is constantly evolving. The problem with Riot making a specific decision in those areas is that it makes VGU's and other updates so hard to follow through with because they have to basically reinvent all of this unnecessary fun (sorrynotsorry but it's true) for... the story. Example: Old Urgot to new Urgot. Do they look the same? not really. Do they look like they would weigh the same? For sure the hell not! But it would be unsatisfying to see and that's frankly a pain in the ass to deal with. Same goes with things like traditional foods and such across Runeterra. I mean, sure, you could go grab a Big Mac in piltover if you want but that would uh. Kill the vibe a little bit. It would be too much work for them though if they constantly had to put out stuff besides Yordlecakes, Honeyfruits and Rotten peaches.

Darius Strada4/29/2018, 11:17:05 AM2 votes

About the technology level, Riot told me they are at Industrial Revolution second phase level, which would make sense if didn't already robots and shit

YoNightmare74/29/2018, 10:06:30 PM2 votes

https://imgur.com/MAASBbG

edit: it was brought to my attention that i might of messed up Rek'sai (too big) and Nautilus (too small).

Stupafly4/30/2018, 12:38:01 PM2 votes

While playing the game, I care much more about gameplay than lore.

Hell... even while not in-game i care about gameplay more than lore.

Nylisa4/30/2018, 12:11:47 AM1 votes

World map is a must that much is clear. food, technologies, currencies ,cultural and social constructs, those are all great in helping us create a better picture of Runettera.

But do we actually need height and weight? if yes,why?

Although i understand the need of age and date of birth , to pinpoint some of the events in the lore.