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Lore community, help me out: what do other nations do when Bilgewater is invaded by the Black Mist?

CupcakeTrap·11/27/2014, 4:18:18 AM·6 votes·3,472 views
Bilgewater sails out to attack the Black Mist

I recently posted a joke thread about it being silly for Bilgewater to send a fleet of ships to shoot cannons at a bunch of ghost-fog. A more serious discussion started in the comments, with one key topic being what other the other nations of Valoran are doing while Bilgewater's getting flooded year after year by the Mist.

Ideas ranged from "they are helping, but it's not much use" to "they don't care about Bilgewater" to "they're getting invaded themselves and can't spare the manpower".

Carnival Knights posted this response:

I can add a little context here.

Like everything else on the Shadow Isles, the Black Mist was at one point a lot less black (it might not have even been a mist, though no one's old enough to remember). With the corruption of the Islands it transformed into the Black Mist, which is now a kind of traversal mechanism for the growing number of ghosts/spirits/creatures that inhabit SI. They can 'hitch a ride' on the mists, as it were, and travel inside them to populated areas brimming with unharrowed souls - souls which the things that inhabit SI are preternaturally drawn to. The mist only comes off the island during The Harrowing, though no one yet knows why.

The Mists are a local problem, but they're a growing local problem - every year the mists get bigger as more and more people/things are consumed and integrated by the Isles. Like Graves said in that bookend piece, the mists are likely powerful enough to travel anywhere at this point, not just the closest most populated region (Bilgewater for you cartography fans). That means far-flung population centers like Demacia, Piltover, and even Shurima are all potentially at risk. And while concentrated drives against the things lurking around in the mists can kinda-sorta repel the stuff (thus decreasing the spread and therefore the risk), it only staves off the threat for so long.

So in conclusion, no, it's not a military invasion. It's more like an El Niño... full of skeletons.

Skel Niño.

While enlightening as to what exactly the Mist is, I'm still not really sure what other Valoranian nations do this time every year. If it's just a local problem, and the Mist contains a lot of quite killable skeletons and zombies and such, why isn't someone sending aid? Bilgewater's a major mercantile center; even setting aside altruism and compassion, many states would have a vested interest in helping them out. At the very least, you'd think you could count on Demacia to be all heroic and come charging in, and Noxus has an established privateering relationship with Bilgewater, so it seems they'd also have a stake in this.

So. Ideas? How do you imagine the other nations of Runeterra reacting to the Mist?

24 Comments

LordHippoman11/27/2014, 5:51:43 AM5 votes

Huh. This is a good question. I think it's worth looking at the various citystates to examine them closer.

Shurima- Probably have enough to deal with, and most of the citizens are made of sand anyway, it seems. I don't think Azir is really worried about zombie invasions of his neighbors.

Ionia- Could see them helping, if not being directly caught up in it already. Naval nation, trying to keep "balance".

Bandle City- We just don't really know enough about them, I think. You could sort of do whatever you wanted here, really.

Freljord- Depends on Leadership. I don't think Ashe/Trynd would ignore a request for aid (and a potential ally). Sejuani and the Claw would probably consider it, since it's a chance to go test their fighting prowess against horrific monsters in a huge battle. Lissandra would laugh and freeze the messenger.

Noxus- Do they stand to gain anything? If not, it's not in their interest. If anything, a weaker Bilgewater is an easier target.

Demacia- This one depends on how severe you want to take the "purge the unjust" thing. Bilgewater is full of sin and scoundrels, the more severe Demacians might think they deserve the Harrowing. But I find it hard to imagine Garen or Galio sitting around waggling their fingers at them while innocents are dying. They'd be there, I think.

CupcakeTrap11/27/2014, 4:44:36 AM4 votes

Wait! I think I've got it.

The Black Mist happens because the undead from SI want souls to collect. The more people are in Bilgewater, the tastier it looks, the more monsters come.

So, from a military perspective, this is a time when quality is more important than quantity. Shipping out entire legions of troops would likely trigger a proportionally larger swarm of undead. Further, morale is going to be a big problem in a situation like this. For both of these reasons, this is a time when elite units are essential.

So, many nations probably do send aid, but in the form of small detachments of their most elite soldiers.

Rextreff11/27/2014, 5:07:19 AM3 votes

The only instance of the Black Mist attacking somewhere else that isn't Bilgewater is in the year -9, where an Ionian fleet was destroyed. Most likely not a merchant caravan of sorts considering Ionia probably wouldn't send a group of lightly armed merchants since they knew about the harrowing and all. Most probable thing is that they were trying to help Bilgewater defeat the mist. However the Ionian fleet was sailing particularly close to the Shadow Isles and not Bilgewater so maybe it was just some random sailors who got off track. Strange to call a military fleet "the Flower"

I doubt that even with Bilgewater occasionally raiding Demacia, that they would just let the Black Mist kill a bunch of innocent citizens. They seem like the most likely candidate for helping Bilge, along with the other island nation Ionia.

brusque11/27/2014, 5:32:03 AM3 votes

I am about 95% certain that all other nations go the Institute of Horror while the Mists are invading.

CupcakeTrap11/27/2014, 4:21:02 AM2 votes

My default answer is that Demacia and Noxus send troops in to fend off the skeleton hordes. But you'd think that would have been mentioned in some of Narrative's Harrowing material. Is there something they're not telling us about the Harrowing that would explain the lack of a response?

I'm asking in part because my initial intuition leads me to envision a pitched battle between the nations of Valoran and an undead horde. (Perhaps it looks more like "urban warfare", with ghosts and monsters popping up unexpectedly, so it's more like search and destroy than a pitched battle.) But is there any reason to think that it wouldn't play out like that?

Omnipherious11/27/2014, 7:37:18 AM2 votes

There are probably a lot of complications, just as there are complications in our real world.

For example:

Just because world leaders and other countries are aware of say, civil war in South Africa or ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict doesn't mean they can have their armies jump in to play hero.

Sometimes a nation needs a direct stake/to be directly affected before it takes action. Even then, it needs time to rally its' people to the cause. Consider the real world event 9/11, after the attack the US became both much more vocal and involved in Middle Eastern affairs. Soon after the attack, the people were bombarded with propaganda so that the government could get support to make the invasion of Iraq okay in the eyes of the people.

Now consider that Riot's new lore isn't just some cut-and-dry fantasy, where people heroically jump to the aid of others because "it is the right thing to do". Champions have complex motivations and allegiances.

If Garen was on a naval fleet that happened upon a battle between Bilgewater + Black Mist, I wouldn't put it past him to use said fleet to aid Bilgewater. That said, this would be but one small skirmish. What you're talking about is mobilizing troops to take part in a 'war' you don't have an immediate stake in.

Why would the Demacian leaders agree to sending Bilgewater aid if they are not allies by treaty? Why would the Demacian people support such a decision?

Battles with the Black Mist happen every year, so there is no urgency in the mind of Demacians. If it happens every year, what's the point of sending a massive amount of forces to deal with it? Especially when dealing with something soaked in local superstition.

There is the possibility that Bilgewater is denying aid from the outside. Perhaps some offers for aid were unacceptable. e.g. Noxus helps in exchange for becoming an economic partner, Ionian help requires setting up shrines to combat the Mist but that doesn't sit well with the pirates

Grim, real world comparisons aside, I think the other nations are just too preoccupied at the moment.

Freljord is basically in a civil war. Shurima is getting rebuilt from the ground up (heh.. ) Zaun isn't going to just help because... well it's Zaun. Ionia probably has their hands full dealing with Zed, Syndra, Varus and not to mention sending people out to hunt Yasuo. Tensions run high between Noxus and Demacia due to past conflicts. Bandle City has to deal with Veigar's mischief, Zigg's experiments gone wrong, the craziness of Lulu and Gnar. Piltover has problems with Viktor, Jinx and presumably other criminals who are impeding progress. Meanwhile, the Black Rose plot and scheme from the shadows just as Void monsters lie in wait around the Runeterran landscape.

So yea, things are pretty damn complicated.

My money is that we're going to get a LOT of short, unrelated stories for the various people/places of Runeterra. Once all the pieces are in place, we'll see something bigger like a war or Void invasion.

Heck, Riot has R&D now so maybe the big stories will be in some other game set in the same world.

Stars Shaper11/27/2014, 7:36:46 PM2 votes

Seeing the havoc the Black Mist brings I think the only thing other nation would do is providing support for the evacuations and the survivors. Maybe having summoners helping in the slow down of the Mist.

OuttaControl5611/27/2014, 4:16:59 PM1 votes

They hear about it and dwaddle.

They don't care about a pirating nation that's been notorious for raiding their costlines for ages.

This question answers itself.

Why the heck do people see nations intervening on their behalf? Sure, the Harrowing is growing, and it has been confirmed it can move elsewhere in Rineterra, not just BilgeWater, but the rest of Runeterra just don't give two flying fudges.

Kinjishi11/27/2014, 6:37:24 AM1 votes

List of Harrowing events

(couldn't find a list of the harrowing battles from the event on the LoL site, so had to look for a forum post) : (

Looking at the history of events for Harrowing, almost every nation has been impacted and suffered losses at one point or another (Noxus, Ionia, Bilgewater, etc.). The Shadow Isles (SI) would appear to be the central villain for the whole of Valoran. Perhaps not all the time, but it would be hard not to notice the continued attacks and their growing presence.

Some of the most impacted groups should definitely be investing resources into determining the weaknesses of the SI and how to defeat it. Outside of a serpent caller (possibly Nami) and a leviathan (possibly Ao shin) in year 3 and Nautilus in year 1, nobody else has really stalled/defeated the Harrowing - the MF/GP fleet doesn't come across as stalling/defeating the Harrowing as it only says their fleet is scattered. It didn't say that the Harrowing was stalled or defeated. Considering that there are 12 events/battles in the last 49 years, with 3 in the last year, everyone should be providing aid.

Ionia has lost a fleet and Noxus has lost an Armada. Bilgewater is threatened to be wiped off the map. These three groups at the very least, with some of those individuals that are not aligned and see the threat the Harrowing/SI poses, will band together. Losing an entire Armada is not something that Noxus will just swallow and forget. LeBlanc and the Black Rose could be investigating how to release souls captured by the Harrowing. Ionia would be sending some reinforcements to Bilgewater as the threat of the Harrowing is increasing.

If Bilgewater goes down, then the threat to the other countries/city states rises considerably.

Dotintheparadox11/27/2014, 5:46:47 PM1 votes

Zaun or Piltover would most likely send agents out to actually study the mist, under the guise of military aid.

Bandle city has tenuous relations with Bilgewater, due to the pirate raids that still apparently happen frequently.

Demacia would seem the most likely to help, since it does seem like they have an order of people dedicated to dealing with the undead. Noxus is a toss-up, since I haven't kept track of it, but most fan-canons suggest they have a secret pact with the Shadow Isles.

Shurima has no political ties to suggest they would help, Freljord is doing it's own thing, and Ionia would probably still be bitter from the occupation during the war.