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This might not be the right timing, but I want to ask why there is no Voodoo Champion

darkdill··7 votes·3,107 views

Before you say Annie, she doesn't count as she doesn't give off a Voodoo vibe. She's the pyromaniac loli with a giant flaming pedobear as her pet. There, I said it.

Now back to the topic at hand: Why is there no Voodoo Champion?

When we had DotA, there were two Voodoo-esque heroes to pick from: Rhasta and Witch Doctor. Both filled the vibe pretty nicely. League also had one prototype Champion in the works about five years ago, Tabu, but he got scrapped and his kit was made into Swain. Since then, I don't think Riot's made any attempts or even entertained the idea of making a Voodoo Champion come to life.

Why is that? Is it considered "offensive content"? Is it tech issues? Or is it something else?

EDIT: If the idea of a Voodoo Witch Doctor is too vanilla, I have an idea to get around that. What if you weren't a Voodoo man, but a Voodoo GOD?

Something like... THIS! http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130615204745/donkeykong/es/images/a/ac/Tiki_tong_listo.png

This is Tiki Tong, the final boss of Donkey Kong Country Returns. Big, evil, and definitely with a Voodoo vibe. Now imagine if our Voodoo Champion were an expy of this bad guy? That'd be awesome, right?

21 Comments

Leggie13 votes

Voodoo is an actual religious belief, which is problematic.

2nd Fiddle4 votes

To my knowledge, Smite's never had any problem with Hindu deities. Voodoo shouldn't be more of a problem than that.

Sharjo4 votes

Not so much it being a religion but doing it well is the issue I see. Voodoo (or Vodun as it's sometimes known) has a lot of shit going on in it, and if Riot was gonna do a voodoo/vodun champ, I feel like they should do it justice, and not something that goes around saying "Spirit's be witch'a mon!".

2nd Fiddle2 votes

I think if that ended up being a problem, the champion would feel like it mismatched the whole game.

You simply could not make a good voodoo champion and not put real thought into voodoo.

Dreamspitter1 votes

[{quoted}](name=2nd Fiddle,realm=NA,application-id=6kFXY1kR,discussion-id=9h2oEyOp,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2014-12-11T16:47:40.971+0000) To my knowledge, Smite's never had any problem with Hindu deities. Voodoo shouldn't be more of a problem than that.

#Actually

If I recall SOME people DID complain about the way some deities were portrayed. But then again some people will complain about anything, and literally everything will offend SOME one. Question is, how many becomes enough that it's actually "contraversial"?

GreenLore1 votes

actually they had some problems with the hindu gods,Kali got a visual update to make her more modetst(ironically she is naked in the original religion) and they stopped releasing hindu champs for quite some time because there was an outcry(coming with threats),however after a while,they noticed that the ones who oppose the inclusion of hindu gods were actually a minority and that those threats were completely baseless.

So yeah I think it should be possible,but they should definetly handle it carefully.

EDIT: dang it ninja'd

Rainbowgasm2 votes

{quoted} Voodoo is an actual religious belief, which is problematic.

they can just call it something else and then base it on voodoo. Sort of like how Shurima resembles Egypt just a little bit.

As for what Voodoo is, zombies, curses, fire, charms, etc.

SaltyToplaneGoat9 votes

Well, looking at it from Lore side it would be no problem (especially since this would be the PERFECT chance to tell us something about the voodoo lands and actually expand on Annies rather nonexistant lore)

The problem lies more in the gameplay tho... you brought up Swain - guess what, that guy is up for a rework, both visual and gameplay, so we can't really base anything on whatever that Tabu prototype has been. This is from back in the day where riot still had to learn how to design champs...

The actual Problem is: just WHAT THE ACTUAL F*** IS VOODOO. If most people who are reading this think about this outside from ridiciously wrong pop-culture references they come to one answer: muh, I don't really know... But don't they have these dolls? Oh yeah, they have, but these are/were actually used for HEALING - and you don't ram needles into them.

If I had to kick this into some kind of direction, I would make that champ after the "Old witch" stereotype (just mixed up with some parts that scream more Voodoo instead of "Medival European Magic") - this would be actually a first for the game to have an old female champ. And no, Kayle and Morgana don't count for that. I want a old shaggy hag that sometime babbles nonsense but is a mercyless pro at putting out curses or mixing potent potions - and maybe slaughter a chicken and use its blood to summon the great whatever... I don't really know much about voodoo too...

To answer your question why they aren't doing that: They have, probably, filled their shedule with tons of other stuff... Just look at the current champ release speed: Gnar->Azir->Kalista->Rek'Sai. I think there will be a Voodoo champ in the future, but they aren't currently working on one - probably because they can't really think of how to translate the theme into gameplay.

2nd Fiddle2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kyoki Shinkuro,realm=EUW,application-id=6kFXY1kR,discussion-id=9h2oEyOp,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2014-12-11T09:22:04.012+0000)

If I had to kick this into some kind of direction, I would make that champ after the "Old witch" stereotype (just mixed up with some parts that scream more Voodoo instead of "Medival European Magic") - this would be actually a first for the game to have an old female champ. And no, Kayle and Morgana don't count for that. I want a old shaggy hag that sometime babbles nonsense but is a mercyless pro at putting out curses or mixing potent potions - and maybe slaughter a chicken and use its blood to summon the great whatever...

I would go Slavic for that. Maybe a member of the Gray Order?

I don't really know much about voodoo too...

A quick look at Wikipedia shows us the loa: intermediary entities between a creator and humans. Seems like plenty of potential champion ideas lie within.

Sneak Dog1 votes

Personally, I think it's great to dive into the voodoo lands once we know more about current post-retcon Kalamanda, Noxus (currently being worked on), Ionia, Demacia, Bilgewater, Bandle city, Piltover and Zaun. Perhaps first also do the Kumungu jungle, seeing how that does have a champion. So yeah, not really the right timing unless Riot wants to flesh out a lot of areas at once or be safe with fleshing out a new area before an old established one.

This retcon is going to take time. It'll also take a lot of characters and replace them apparently. I'm not excited one little bit.

GreenLore1 votes

There are seriously so many themes that can act as the base for a champ,sure they could do a vodoo champ,but they could also do a master of the 4 elements,a hydra,a magical artist,a thief,a blacksmith,a harpy,etc.

In the early days they more or less based their champs on the dota-champs,but nowadays they look out to make them more different,so just because dota has something they don't have doesn't mean they need to add a champ like that.

Also I think it is a bit difficult to find unique abilities for a vodoo champ,I mean there isn't much that clearly defines vodoo abilities. A vodoo shaman,would have probably some kind of totem-ability and some kind of curse(vodoo puppet maybe?But that could be too much of a cliche),but thats about it,it doesn't deliver that much for a kit(granted it is by no means impossible as we have champs with the same problem already in the game,but it does make it a bit harder to design abilities for the champ)

darkdill1 votes

Here's a thought that I just added to the opening post: What if the Champion weren't a Voodoo man, but a Voodoo GOD?

Something like... THIS! http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130615204745/donkeykong/es/images/a/ac/Tiki_tong_listo.png

Credit goes to Nintendo for making Tiki Tong.

2nd Fiddle2 votes

Wrong side of the continent. Tiki is Polynesian; voodoo is Haitian/Louisiana. Completely different aesthetics.

Voodoo doesn't so much have gods so much as saint-like(sort of) entities known as loa. The most commonly depicted of these entities(in pop culture anyway) is Baron Samedi.

darkdill1 votes

Hey, I know as much about Voodoo and Tiki as the average street schmuck. Can you blame me for getting it wrong?

2nd Fiddle4 votes

I understand, but this just illustrates the bigger problem here: the first part of making a voodoo based champion is knowing what voodoo is.

Currently what I know is limited to a few Wikipedia articles.

darkdill1 votes

Well, Riot could call it something else but make it seem like Voodoo.

GreenLore1 votes

funnily enough there was once a concept for a tiki champ(but it doesn't look like he ever made it past the concept-phase) http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130208152037/leagueoflegends/images/thumb/e/ed/732px-Tiki_concept.jpg/585px-732px-Tiki_concept.jpg

God is AFK1 votes

There actually is one, but his corpse is stuck in old summoner's rift

Dreamspitter1 votes

I WANT THIS and DInosaurs

At the same time.

http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2010/246/4/1/voodoo_dinosaur_by_planetdarkone-d2xy2uh.jpg

aaronconlin1 votes

The idea is cool, and it doesn't even necessarily have to use the term "voodoo" if it's a religious problem. Just a champion that focuses on controlling the enemy and other "voodoo" elements like blood, raising the dead, etc

They could have a fear, voodoo is kinda scary and there's only a couple champions that make use of it A bleed effect, Damage over Time Raising the dead, maybe making "zombies" out of minions or something similar to Yorick's ghouls A "curse" causing reduces magic, armor resist or a grievous wound

The passive could have something to do with the doll, as a passive item like Kalista's Black Spear and Rengar's necklace.

This would also give us a champion from the Voodoo Lands and maybe expand on the lore from that area of the world.

Veragoot1 votes

You could go for the idea of Witch Doctor which has a voodoo vibe without being explicitly related to voodoo by name.

In terms of abilities, we get problematic. Shadow Man from Princess and the Frog could make a pretty cool kit, but there's already a shadow champ (Zed ) so that's out.

In which case we should move more to curses and hexes. What if we get a voodoo support who is focused primarily on debuffing opponents as opposed to buffing allies? Health cost abilities (signifying dark pacts between human and demons) and varying debuff effects such as slows, stuns, damage reduction, armor reduction, mr reduction, health reduction (a sort of reverse shield if you will, temporary max health reduction), AS reduction, etc.

The problem with this support is quite simply, he sounds rather boring to play on paper doesn't he? Not to say this is a problem that can't be overcome though. Adding in skill shots and AoE's as opposed to straight targeted abilities tends to open up more creative and fun gameplay opportunities. So let's try out a drafted champ shall we?

Q: Black Bones

Sends out dark trail of bones in a direction that deals damage, lingers and slows, targets at the end of the trail are briefly rooted. Health cost is partially refunded for each champion hit by Black Gaze on the initial cast.

W: Hexing Fog

Places a dark patch of fog in a specific area, initially fearing and continuously slowing units that enter the fog. Enemies in the fog lose allied vision, and enemies outside the fog lose vision of the champion.

E: Burdensome Curse

Places a curse on target champion that slows a target's attack speed, movement speed, and casting speed. Attacking a burdened enemy who is attempting to cast an ability or perform an auto attack causes them to flinch, canceling their cast or attack.

R: Face Your Demons

Summons a circle of demons to surround and root a target enemy, reducing his max hp, armor, and magic resist by a large amount and reducing the attack damage and ability power of any nearby enemies.

Granted, probably not the most balanced champion on paper, but I believe this is a viable idea if you tweak the values and effects enough.

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