Some Discussion on the New Swain
Another VGU is on the horizon, and as a casual League of Legends Lore Nerd I usually have some pretty strong opinions about them. This time it's our old Master Tactician Swain.
Swain is one of those Champions who's lore and character I really like a lot but never really played him in-game. The original JoJ storyline, his involvement and subsequent rise to power was one of the coolest things I've seen come from League story-wise. He seems fun from the few times I've played him, and he fills a unique gameplay fantasy with his ult. I also like how Beatrice was involved in some of his abilities. The new Swain seems to keep a lot of the fun aspects of the ult (the drain tanking, the low CD but long duration) but also make it less frustrating to play against. His new W also gives me a sense that they are definitely trying to capitalize on his "Tactician" theme, which was something I was worried they would drop in favor of a more badass ruler theme.
Moving on from gameplay, lets talk about what I have a tiny bit more experience in: the lore, theme and visuals
What I Like
There's actually some good stuff here. Unlike many Swain fans I've seen on Boards lately, I don't mind his new appearance. He has this Claude Frollo haughty villain thing going on and I think it works for his theme. The long hair (which is apparently a point of contention) I'm pretty indifferent on. The color scheme was adjusted to match the other Noxian Champs, which is to be expected. I LOVE the coat he has, and the animations to go with it. The coat simultaneously tells us about his rank (it's a general's coat) and about his personality: he will revert to a stance where he has his hands under the coat, when he doesn't NEED to get his hands dirty, but it also shows us the source of his power is his hand and he flicks the coat aside in the coolest way possible when it's time for him to attack. Whoever had the idea for the coat and whoever worked on the animations: Bravo. Really good, suits Swain, even old Swain.
His quotes are also pretty solid. Again, something I feared was they would forget that he gained power through mainly his intellect, and his quotes are well aware of that. He's refined, cool, calculating, a bit of a smartass at times, and dark. His interactions with the other Champions are not only perfect for new Swain, they would have suited old Swain as well. It's also a bit of a relief to hear about some lore points of interest that were in retcon limbo get brought up again: he mentions things like Katarina's father and the mystery of who killed him, Darius' support of Swain, Demacia's relationship with Noxus (that many consider them "rivals" even if Swain doesn't), Swain's tense connection to the Black Rose, even good ole Grand General Darkwill gets mentioned. He also has some real zingers too:
To Draven: "Fame has gone to your head and found ample room within". When LeBlanc is on the enemy: "An assassin is due at any moment. It is how I know LeBlanc cares." - love this line, teases at LeBlanc's desire to get rid of Swain, but also how Swain doesn't take these attempts on his life as unexpected.
He has plenty of quotes to reinforce his theme and personality too. He has quotes for when his team is ahead or behind, something very General-like that we haven't seen before. He has assist lines where he'll offer his ally a promotion or comment on how useful they've become. He also has plenty of quotes alluding to his tactics for the match like when he places a ward. I don't know if I just really like this type of character or if Riot just did a good job with this dialogue but I think new Swain's dialogue is great and faithful to the original.
What I Don't Like
Before I launch into my complaints I think on the whole: this is a pretty good realization of old Swain's theme. New Swain comes off as calm, cool and collected, intelligent, but intimidating and powerful. He comes off as a man who is constantly planning and he also comes off as ruler of Noxus and no where else. He does have some pretty obvious omissions, however.
First of all, there's something missing from his splash art, isn't there? In fact, she's not on his model either. Beatrice somehow isn't a part of Swain's persona any longer. This is probably the most baffling decision to me: the most iconic part of Swain, at least visually, was Beatrice. Why remove her? And sure, ravens in general are still a big part of Swain's visuals and abilities, which is good, but specifically the raven that sat on his shoulder and through which he channeled some of his magic is just gone.
To me, Beatrice was a cool aspect to his character, something kind of quirky that seems like it doesn't suit Swain's character to have a pet bird that literally goes everywhere he goes. But she was like this Mrs. Norris-type character: she was just supposed to be a pet but you got the feeling that she sort of reported back to Swain, so he had eyes literally everywhere. She even had multiple eyes. Generally a pet's presence is something that would soften a character's edge, but Beatrice was disconcerting enough to enhance it.
To some, Beatrice's omission may not seem like that big of a deal, and I suppose it IS relatively minor. She's not as integral to the character like Willump is to Nunu, or Lamb and Wolf being two halves of Kindred. It's more as if Riot removed Fishbones from Jinx. Like yeah, her character can function without the auxiliary "character" Fishbones, but do we really want that? Fishbones serves to enhance Jinx's character, and I view Beatrice as a part of that too. Swain befriends the eerie and unknown in order to gain the information needed for his plans to work. Beatrice is the physical representation of that: she's not an enemy to him, he carries her everywhere he goes.
The reasoning behind her omission eludes me, as he still has the raven visuals...so wouldn't she still suit him visually? What reason is there to not include her? I figured Beatrice was sort of a fan favorite auxiliary character that could use some development but maybe I was mistaken. I'd like to hear how others feel about our dearly departed raven.
Enough ranting about a bird. Another "major" problem I have is his limp: that is to say, it's gone. Another interesting aspect to Swain's character was that from some perspectives, he didn't seem like he fit Noxus' ideal for the strong ruling the weak. And yet this limping old man usurped the previous Grand General Darkwill--who had ruled for possibly centuries--not through mere physical strength, but his plans and cunning as well. Swain's limp made him a walking contradiction: anyone with the strength can rule Noxus. Even this limping guy. That's not to say that he couldn't also be intimidating and cool; he just had this limp as a reminder that this guy is more than meets the eye. He's got a bum leg, but he doesn't need that leg, he's got a solid plan and enough of his own strength besides.
And finally, we come to what I now call the "Special Thing" that Riot just loves adding to new Champions and especially reworks. The "Special Thing" is that secret ingredient that no one asked for, no one likes and no one cares about a couple of weeks after release. That moment when, yes the character is cool, but characters can't just be cool on their own, they need a "thing" that makes them cool.
"Oh, New Yorick is pretty epic right now, but it's not enough that he's an old priest of the dead he needs something to set him apart from the rest of his order..." "Well, Old Yorick has a shovel?" "No, no, that'd be too obvious. I know! Let's give him a cape made of Mist!"
"Hey Shen rework is coming along ok, but being the leader of an order of ninjas intent on balance is not enough...let's make one of his swords a SPIRIT sword! And now he's a SPIRIT balance ninja leader who fights SPIRITS"
"Warwick is almost finished, but ugh, his design is missing something...he was friends with Singed right? Let's give him a chemical backpack so that he looks more ZAUN as if the color scheme wasn't good enough to indicate that."
I digress, you get my point. For Swain, it's a demon hand. I'm not opposed to the demon thing to explain Swain's powers and maybe some of his motivations, especially since it seems like he's conquered the demon in some way, which is badass. What I don't like is that BEATRICE was sitting right there BEGGING to be some representation of this demon and his relationship with it. They could have reincorporated the character in a way that makes her relevant again. Instead he just has a glowy arm, that's pretty much par for the course in League of Legends. EVERYONE has a glowy thing. Only Swain had Beatrice. Maybe it turns out this demon thing IS Beatrice once his long lore comes out, but why not just put Beatrice on his shoulder again? Why is she being held lore hostage? Also, Swain went from essentially losing a leg (or at least full use of it) to losing an arm but not really cuz he has a glowy demon arm now. Why would they just make it his leg? Am I missing something here? It would give an even cooler reason for "he limps"..."he limps because he lost his leg and now he has glowy demon leg." I feel this is a small change that is an marked improvement. Seriously, I feel like these are obvious options.
A physical description of old Swain was "older man in general's coat with a creepy bird on his shoulder and a limp." Execution-wise, not perfect, but the description itself is compelling. They nailed the coat, freakin' awesome. I even forgot to mention he wears it without the sleeves just on his back UGH so cool. The other two notable physical aspects, probably more prominent than the coat, was the bird and limp. If they are going for a lore change that requires a physical representation on his character design, these seem like obvious candidates.
Conclusion
Overall, Swain's personality was improved and enhanced from old Swain's. He still retains enough aspects of the character to say he is still Swain, but he's been given a complete overhaul, with hundreds of great lines. Gameplay, I'm pretty inept at assessing, suffice it to say that they at least retained some form of his ultimate and drain tank capabilities.
Physical improvements are a mixed bag. A lot of complaints I've seen ARE about Swain's new look and while some of them are kinda dumb (seriously, I'm not sure what the big deal about the hair length is?) I can sympathize with some of them. Failure to include Beatrice and the limp sort of rub me the wrong way, like they were obvious parts of old Swain's design that should probably be retained. The coat, on the other hand, is freakin' fantastic. Give the concept designer of that and the animator a promotion, a bonus, something. Give them a Beatrice plush--OH WAIT (too soon?)
If you survived to the end, thank you for allowing me to indulge in my dumb opinions about a video game character. I'd love to hear other thoughts as I haven't seen a ton of Swain discussion beyond Reav3 on reddit and whole hair thing. I don't even mind hearing some comments about why you disagree, but try to keep it civil down there, friends. [sg-ahri-2]
