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Let's talk biographies!

RiotCarnival Knights·10/10/2014, 9:32:49 PM·52 votes·45,367 views

Continuing an interesting discussion from this thread here, I'd like to talk about some characters we'll be taking a crack at soon as a natural course of the revamp. As pointed out earlier we still have a lot of champs that have outdated lore, but for the sake of keeping a clear focus I'd like to hold this discussion primarily to champions whose biographies are completely dependent or intricately entwined with the Summoners/the IoW. Without the aforementioned institutions, where did they come from? Why are they here? What do they want? Nocturne, Fiddlesticks, Lee Sin, fourth example. All the champs. All your favorite champs (I make a lot of bad jokes, by the way. I apologize in advance).

To give you some insight into our motivations, we're looking at stories holistically, rather than storytelling in a vacuum. What that means is, our goal is to preserve core personality aspects of characters while reinventing the how and why of their stories to create an interesting and vibrant world. For the sake of this discussion, you do not have to adhere to those rules. Offer any crazy idea you can think of! I'll try and check in as often as I can and respond as often as possible.

A couple points of note: this is not a promise to act on any of these suggestions. As well, I'd like this to stay as positive as possible - if you have criticisms feel free to voice them, but I'd rather have a friendly, focused discussion of these champs. Besides their core personalities, they're almost blank slates! Mostly blank. Kind of sort of blank. Ish.

I'll get it started: where should Nocturne come from? Is he a living shadow that kills people in their dreams and impresses nightmares on the waking world in the form of hallucinatory episodes? Or something... more? Share your thoughts! Lets do it!

371 Comments

2nd Fiddle10/10/2014, 9:56:13 PM39 votes

For the sake of Jax I am going to point out four facts

  1. Jax is labeled as being affiliated with Ionia

  2. Ionian champions are often defined by what they did in the Noxian invasion

  3. When civilizations got invaded IRL they nearly always have weapons taken away by the invaders

  4. The invaded then proceed to use otherwise mundane objects as weapons.

Just throwing those out there.

CupcakeTrap10/10/2014, 9:59:42 PM37 votes

Wow. A Narrative thread seeking community input early enough in the design process that it might influence something.

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/2013/05/Ron-Paul_Its-Happening1.gif

ModCaptainMårvelous10/10/2014, 11:13:04 PM23 votes

Fiddlesticks

Fiddlesticks is a problem. Here are some things about him:

  • Fiddlesticks has a strong tie in the fact that he's a murderous sociopathic killing machine. He's like Shaco without the reasoning of 'it's fun!'. He kills because it's all he knows.
  • Fiddle, themeatically, has a lot going on with the scarecrow motif.
  • Birds and crows, lots of that.
  • No actual reason for his power outside of "Hey he got experimented on"

So here's my interpretation of this:

There is a story passed down from farmer to farmer, from Bandle City to Noxus to Demacia and beyond. Ages ago, in a small farm town, there lived a young man. Proud of his family's farm, he always cared deeply for it and tended to the crops. On the day his father passed, he inherited the farmlands and loved them deeply as he had always...except the fields had gone dry. The soil was rough, nothing grew for long and crows swarmed the fields. Time after time, the young man put scarecrows up to ward the birds from his horrible harvest. One...then two...four...eight...eventually the field was a field of scarecrows. Yet still, nothing grew. Fury welled in his heart as his fellow villagers mocked his decaying farm.

*One day, the man snapped. In a fit of rage, he set every other crop in his town aflame, cackling madly as those who mocked him saw their food drown in flame. Furious at their lost harvest and seeking revenge, the man was hung for his crimes and his body was used in one final humiliating act as one of the scarecrows he had amassed. Something...changed, however. Months passed, yet no birds dare camped at his scarecrow. As his body decayed, the villagers eventually tried to put a sack over his body and head. Doing so sparked a terrifying change. The scarecrow came to life, a murder of crows circling it as it slaughtered every single person in town. *

To this day, that deathless monster roams the world, moving from crop to crop to bask in a bountiful harvest. Thus the legend goes: When you see Fiddlesticks in your field, you lock the doors and stay away. For trying to take his harvest will be the last thing you do.

(Also this ties in the fact that Fiddle has a noose around his neck in the cinematic)

Ebonmaw Dragon10/10/2014, 9:46:18 PM13 votes

I have an important question about this: Since the Institute of War never existed...*** Urf never died?!***

CupcakeTrap10/10/2014, 9:51:13 PM12 votes

I recently wrote a thread of story progression ideas for various Champions. The stated purpose of the thread was to illustrate character development ideas leveraging the League setting, but they're mostly adaptable to a non-League setting as well.

Here's Nocturne's. tl;dr: Deathnote-style thriller.

Nocturne

http://i.imgur.com/mvuILQ0.png Nocturne lends himself well to horror and psychological thriller stories. The League, and his imprisonment within the Institute, synergizes with this aspect by constraining him with a need for stealth and subterfuge. Without the League, it's much more likely that his stories would revolve around simplistic "and then Nocturne jumped into someone's dreams and gave them a heart attack. Then he did it again." plotlines. With the League, he turns into a sort of Deathnote villain who must disguise his supernatural murders.

  • Essential Lore. Nocturne is a dream-stalking phantom who materialized in the Shadow Isles, on the grounds of the Twisted Treeline. He's been imprisoned by the League because (as with Cho'gath) they suspect that "killing" him would only release him, and because forcing him to fight exacts a form of retribution.
  • Note. In Factions, and the "old" lore, the Shadow Isles have League representation. (They want representation because otherwise it's likely that sooner or later Demacia would come rampaging in to "cleanse" the Isles, and the League wants them because of their knowledge of necromancy.) I think this is a good addition for Nocturne in particular.
  • Note. A problem with Nocturne in any story universe is that he basically just wants to haunt/kill people. There's room for some storytelling of the "ghost story" variety, but to go much beyond that would require expanding his lore — and that's true regardless of whether or not there's a League to lock him up.
  • Development. Killing Summoners usually means waiting for them to leave the Institute. Annoyingly, the Summoners with the most power, who are thus the most valuable targets, also tend to spend the most time within the Institute's enchanted walls. However, Runeterran dream-magic is still very crude, and even the League can offer little protection there. Someone makes a deal with Nocturne, offering him another chance to kill the Summoners he so hates by opening a little gap in his arcane prison. But his "employer" insists that he be discreet about it: if Nocturne does his usual dream-killing, it's likely that the League will very rapidly figure out what happened and lock him down even tighter. If Nocturne wants to keep this little crack in the wall open, he'll need to be more subtle, perhaps slowly driving his target mad and making it appear to be a Shuriman curse or a Void possession. This would make a nice ghost story.
  • Development. Nocturne might become a sort of dream-assassin, allowing for a series of such stories. During their course, he might encounter another dream entity, perhaps a "guardian angel" who watches over dreamers. Their battles across the dreamscape could be self-contained stories, or could interact with other plot threads, e.g. through Nocturne's "employers". The constraint of the League adds tension here, because Nocturne cannot just go on a rampage, but must kill from the shadows, keeping his identity secret. This might take on a sort of "Deathnote" flavor, casting Nocturne as a supernatural serial killer playing a lethal game of chess with a powerful adversary.
  • Development. Nocturne could also be freed, of course. Perhaps something is brewing in the Shadow Isles, and Karthus wants to use him as a weapon. Karthus could convince the League to release him to the custody of the Isles, provided that Karthus keeps him on a leash. This could turn into a more involved plot not only through the Shadow Isles conflict but, e.g., if a Demacian or Ionian ventured to the Isles to seek evidence that Karthus isn't keeping Nocturne as "leashed" as he promised.
DG Ashabel10/10/2014, 10:22:16 PM12 votes

As fun as discussing biographies alone could be, I'd like to mention one major aspect you'll need to infuse them with. This is an aspect that the last few reworks failed badly with, and is especially a reason why nobody likes Ashe anymore.

That aspect is player immersion.

Player immersion is generally an aspect specific for people who enjoy the game's lore, because they are the ones who like to live in the game's world a little. People who play the game for purely gameplay reasons don't care and won't start caring; they wouldn't have shorthands for champions with long names if they did, neither would they refer to skills entirely by their hotkeys instead of names. But to players who want to immerse themselves, such as lore junkies, it's important to create a small window that allows them to enter the world through that champion.

In the past, that immersion was provided entirely through the summoner-themed GUI. Now it will need to be provided through the characters themselves, as associating themselves with the characters they currently play is the only remaining window for players. Here is an example...

Ashe Her old lore provided both opportunities for immersion. As a summoner, I would like to support a major and well-respected political leader who is leading her third-world country onto the global scene. As Ashe, I'm the badass queen who may not have much power on her own but I can lead my team to victory with a well-placed word, a dash of utility and a helpful arrow across the map. Both of those are cool angles...

Now her new lore is... basically a cowardly King Arthur. That could still be a decent immersion angle for a summoner because it means they're supporting a young and inexperienced queen with whose ideals they agree, and hope she'll grow through their guidance. On the other hand, associating yourself with this Ashe's character is just... not very fun. She's flimsy and kinda incompetent and there is no reason to really want to be her. She is a huge failure on that regard.

With that in mind, let's look at the champions you mentioned.

Jax His lore will likely need a complete overhaul. A mystery wrapped inside an enigma is just not much for a player to associate with. While the old Jax was fun to play from the summoner angle because you were essentially radio support and drinking buddies for this unstoppable badass who is cocky but lovable, from the point of self-association, he is a complete blank slate. There's nothing going for him.

For the sake of a rework, I would recommend looking at Wolverine from Marvel Comics. You'll probably want a character who is somewhat mysterious in that only shreds of his past are known (just enough to connect the dots into a vague outline, but not a complete image), whose experience shows through his lines and actions, and whose lack of association with specific factions is made up for via numerous connections with people here and there. Essentially, turn him into a gruff, weary guy who everyone knows and either fears or respects. I know people brought up making him an arena fighter or a mercenary, but I think he'd flow smoother as a vagrant who'd been both but moved on to other things.

LeeSin Overall, he's much easier to associate yourself with because he's a very "normal" guy, so let's talk story. A lot of people are attached to his summoner past, so you might want to rework him alongside another mage character. Making him someone's failed apprentice who moved on after a terrible failure is one good angle. Maybe claim that he's the one who summoned Nocturne in front of many people, and is out to atone for his old actions?

Oh, and you'll need to look into his old history with the Noxus vs. Ionia war. Like many people said, that war makes no logistical sense right now. Basic tactics 101 dictate that Noxus should've been wiped off the face of the planet during it.

EDIT: I thought I'd continue in part 2, but there's a perfectly fine Nocturne discussion thread that I'll chip into instead.

MrBuffington10/10/2014, 11:04:45 PM9 votes

This came up in a different thread (that I can't seem to find), but I really like the idea of having Alistar moved to mount targon, he could reprise his guardian role over there, I think.

Vellich0r10/10/2014, 9:50:06 PM6 votes

Zed needs to be nocturne. nuff said :D

Skiren10/10/2014, 9:59:48 PM4 votes

You said Nocturne to start with, but I don't really know Nocturne well, and Fiddle is easier to think of stuff for. I think it's pretty obvious that Fiddle would have been created by someone, considering what he is.(sticks and straw and ropes don't just randomly put themselves together) And Fiddle's quotes heavily imply that he's meant to be a servant, with his job most likely being to protect something.(he does have a key around his neck in his splash, assuming that would stay) He either turned on his master(not strange, as it was probably some heavy dark magic that brought him to life), or was abandoned and went bad over time. And, though this would be taken out, him being a guard of some sort does explain why he only attacks people who come near him(or maybe his key) in his current lore, rather than seeking them out, or even moving at all.

Well, those are my thoughts about him.

Ramza Paradise10/10/2014, 9:40:32 PM2 votes

lets talk about fixing the constant "Attempting to reconnect" issues plaguing thousands of players

would be nice to finally get a response so people can actually play the game