Okay, the Shurima Intro is ridiculously bloated with modifiers and fluff. It's redundant and amateur

After reading the new Shurima into, I was caught off guard simply by how BAD it was. It commits several sins - the most pressing being redunancy and fluff. To emphasis this, I've taken the original passage and removed the adjectives, modifiers.

Shurima was once a powerful empire that spanned the farthest reaches of the vast southern continent. After an era of expansion and prosperity, its last emperor was betrayed by his closest friend, and the empire fell to ruin. Its gleaming capital was all but destroyed in an earth-shaking cataclysm and the empire was left in ruins, its people scattered and its mighty cities devoured by the sand. Now Shurima is a barren wasteland, an unforgiving desert where only the strongest survive and its people cling to the few remaining oases and ~~strips of ~~fertile land around the coast.

In the millennia since Shurima’s fall, tales of its glorious capital and gleaming sun disc became little more than myths and debased religions among the descendants of the empire’s few survivors. Most of Shurima’s inhabitants now dwell in small tribal outposts clustered near water or built upon the bones of ancient cities, venerating the glories of the past. Some hunt buried riches among the ruins of the fallen empire or earn a living as sellswords,~~ warriors for hire who fight for rich paymasters before disappearing into the sands.~~ Others try to forget the past, looking to the future and nations across the ocean as partners in trade.

Yet the ancient myths of Shurima do not rest easy and are stirring once more. Whispering winds from the heart of the desert speak of mighty cities rising from the earth, of a golden warrior marching at the head of an army~~ of sand~~. Rumors spread of ancient heroes reborn, of a war between gods that will shake the very foundations of the world.

The city of Shurima has risen, and nothing will ever be the same.

Holy cow. This reads like an intro to a DnD campaign by a 16 year old.

Here it is without modifiers.

Shurima was once a[n] empire that spanned the reaches . After an era, its emperor was betrayed by his friend, and the empire fell to ruin. Its capital was destroyed in an cataclysm and the empire was left in ruins, its people scattered and its cities devoured by the sand. Now Shurima is a wasteland, a[-] desert where only the strongest survive and its people cling to the oases and fertile land around the coast.

In the millennia since Shurima’s fall, tales of its capital and sun disc became myths and religions among the survivors. Most of Shurima’s inhabitants now dwell in outposts near water or built upon the cities. Some hunt riches among the ruins or earn a living as sellswords. Others try to forget the past, looking to the future and partners in trade.

Yet the myths of Shurima do not rest easy and are stirring once more. [W]inds speak of cities rising from the earth, of a warrior marching at the head of an army. Rumors spread of heroes , of a war between gods .

The city of Shurima has risen, and nothing will ever be the same.

So what did we really learn? Well, there's only one pronoun (SHURIMA!), Emperor killed by best friend. Peoples scattered. Cities ruined. People trying to survive. Suddenly cities are rising out of the earth and a warrior has an army. There's also a war between gods coming.

Genericness is OVER 9000. But that's fine. That's not really the main issue. The main issue is once again: extreme abuse of modifiers/adjectives and FLUFF.

Look at these horribly composed lines.

Now Shurima is a barren wasteland, an unforgiving desert where only the strongest survive and its people cling to the few remaining oases and strips of fertile land around the coast.

BARREN wasteland. Really. We know it's a wasteland. Do you need to throw in Barren as well? Unforgiving desert? Generic again much. People clinging to oases and 'strips of fertile land around the coast'.

Unimaginative and cliche filled.

Most of Shurima’s inhabitants now dwell in small tribal outposts clustered near water or built upon the bones of ancient cities, venerating the glories of the past.

'small tribal outposts' Outposts already have the connotation of being 'small' why throw in another modifier? Built upon the bones of ancient cities. Uh, okay. I guess one problem is that the writer(s) mixed in a more scientific word (inhabitant) with more poetic lines like 'bones of ancient cities'. This makes it feel juxtaposed in a bad way that only exposes how cliche the entire thing is.

Now this is a problem you see in Azir and Xer'ath's lore.

These writers just reach for the top goddamn shelf of modifiers like its 'cool'.

Here's some advice from Louis C.K. on writing about these adjectives:

“As humans, we waste the shit out of our words. It’s sad. We use words like “awesome” and “wonderful” like they’re candy. It was awesome? Really? It inspired awe? It was wonderful? Are you serious? It was full of wonder? You use the word “amazing” to describe a goddamn sandwich at Wendy’s. What’s going to happen on your wedding day, or when your first child is born? How will you describe it? You already wasted “amazing” on a fucking sandwich.”

While Louis C.K. was referencing how we abuse modifiers in everyday language, it's even more pronounced in this kind of bloated purple prose writing. There's not much actual CONTENT here. We are given a massively broad, painfully generic image of Shurima (aka Desert Kingdom).

This kind of introduction works for Warcraft, Warhammer. League doesn't get a pass on this. Why?

Because those franchises have massive amounts of lore to back it up. They have plenty of short stories on minor characters and background information with believable if still generic secondary and background characters.

When you do these kind of things for SHURIMA. You're not showing Shurima is this awesome region, you're just making it seem more generic and cliche.

The only thing you got going for it is this war of the gods thing - even then it's generic.

Nothing's explained. There's no substance. There's nothing NEW OR INTERESTING.

The writing only gets more painfully worse in Azir's and Xer'aths lores. Holy cow... the bloat... the fluff... that modifier abuse.

tl:dr What did we really learn from this bloated intro to Shurima? That it's generic. Also the writing is poor.