While the Bilgewater Event Is Cool and All...

blacknerdtaku··2 votes·1,055 views

And everyone is praising Rito for WRITING OF GODS or whatever, need we all forget that these characters still have NO reason to be fighting each other?

The Retcon of the Institute of War was still a horrible Idea. This Bilgewater story still could have been told with the IoW in place. All we got from this whole retcon (and it's been 11 months now) is that these people are from different places, and fight on randomized teams that could include enemies to kill another team that could include allies.

Riot initially said that the IOW story was too restricting, which is pure BULLSHIT. It wasn’t restricting. It was a central plot device that could have EASILY evolved. The IOW's power could have begun dissolving by the influence of a new champion changing the status of the game as a whole. This was eon's better as a story telling medium, But instead of letting the lore evolve through natural means, Riot ditched it, because giving a motivation of joining the League was apparently too hard.

In no way shape or form does adding a reason to join the League take away from any of that character’s interesting story. This is because motivations are all different. Money? Status? Power? Searching for loved ones? Destroying/ securing something? Abolition of Laws? Glory? Revenge? The list goes on…

Good characters are 3 Dimensional. They have a Personality, Motivation, and a Backstory. Good games with an existing lore facilitate this by having the characters interact with the plot in some way or another.

AS OF NOW THIS GAME DOES NOT DO THAT. When you ditch a motivation a character becomes 2 dimensional. This game as a whole has no stated motivation. Meaning every character that you play is 2 dimensional. Why? Because none of the characters, have any reason to be in this game. And what riot initially called something that was ‘Limiting’ is actually a very CORE important aspect of writing a game with a narrative, and without that crucial point, all importance, and sense of urgency within the characters is lost. I understand this is a competitive game, but if you had a perfectly good lore, why would you trash it and then only return with ONE good story a year later?

Another very good thing was that it allowed for us, the player to be involved via the story. We made a difference. That is gone now

Until Riot presents us with a GOOD reason why the Legends fight each other, this Event, as awesome as it was still just doesn’t cut it, and lowering your standards to praise Riot because riot finally did something with the lore, which they promised on a year ago, and they should have been doing all along Just feels like they don’t care, and that We as a community have grown to just accept the bullshit presented to us.

**Now Don’t Misconstrue: **I loved this event. It was a really well done lore event, that a lot of people really enjoyed, but at the very same time this event for all the thrills in the world, still only focuses on just Bilgewater, and explains none of the logistics of the game from a narrative perspective, that have now been missing for far too long.

Imagine for a second if somebody were to write a story taking place on a random planet, with the same name of a planet from Star Wars, and they then presented this story as part of the Star Wars canon with no actual context clues to existing within the world to indicate that it actually is. HOWEVER this show’s being a part of the SW universe, is its biggest marketing point. There are no Jedi, the force is never mentioned, lightsabers don’t make any form of appearance – and everyone is wearing modern day (Earth 2015) clothing with modern day technology – BUT IT’S STAR WARS STILL. Get the problem?

No matter how good the story is, without the elements crucial to the namesake, it’s not a Star Wars story. Similarly without any reference to the LEAGUE OF LEGENDS, or even anything relevant within the story called the “League of Legends” then it’s a good story, but it’s not a good LoL story.

11 Comments

Jamaree2 votes

To be fair, half the champions had no reason to join the League before hand. Vi and Caitlyn are cops, they should be watching a city. Jinx as well because she just wants to make things go boom, which she can only kind of do while on the Rift. Irelia and Karma, Lee Sin, etc had no reason to be in the League at all. While it is fair to be mad at the retcon, you can't say it is good story to just be forced into the IoW was a good one either.

GreenLore1 votes

I'd say Jinx kinda makes sense,it offers her some political protection and she can still destroy stuff while she is fighting in the league,over and over again.

But yeah,then we have cases like Rammus &Lulu "I'm weird,so I join a bloodsport,where my face gets melted by a little child over and over,makes sense!"

blacknerdtaku2 votes

As i said. the IoW was this series' central plot device. was it really that difficult to think up a reason why people like Jinx would want to join?

  • also in canon these matches are not coccuring that frequently, as they're being usded to settle magic disputes. People like Vi and caitlyn can be there simply to represent Piltover's power via their police force.

Jinx can cause as much destruction as she wants and play with strong opponents and even DIE with no consequence.

as is this game has no context in it: No Institute of War = no League of Legends No League of Legends = no summoners

as of right now Sona "Only you can hear me Douvakin" makes just as much sense as what she says now.

and now summoner 4 summoner 7 summoner 21 the "Ninjutsu spells" also have 0 context.

A motivation to join the League does not have to be immediate... that's what makes a story evolve. Motivation becomes unraveled as the story goes on. for instance:

Vi wanted to seek her previous gang members and make amends either by stopping them or turning them off their life of crime. She has no idea where to start looking for them in Zaun. This is because she heard they had abandoned their old hideout with some intelligence she'd gotten from a Piltover detective currently stationed as a citizen in Zaun. With no other leads, Vi decided to register for the LoL, as Caitlyn had already done, to see if she could draw out her old teammates. Shortly after vi entered the LoL, jinx made her first attack on piltover. Vi could never catch her.

One Day, Vi Recieved a Manifesto in jinx's messed up handwriting. and made the decision to go alone, as the letter told her to. Instead of immediately attacking Jinx when she found her, Vi instead told Jinx what she was doing, and how in the League of Legends she could cause as much destruction as she wanted, and even die, with political impunity. Jinx was still about to set off the bomb she had begun to set up under a school, leaving Vi no choice, but to try and stop it. A big explosion on the ceiling above, set off by Fishbones allowed Jinx to escape. and as she left, she uttered the words

"I'll think about it"

Now here was Vi, trapped in a basement of a school with a bomb about to go off. What actually exploded was a party popper, with a message inside saying "Happy Birthday, Vi".. It was in fact Vi's birthday, and in Jinx's own messed up way, she cared...

Took me all of 10 minutes to write this fan fiction? it gives

  • jinx even more personality, she likes to mess with people, playing messed up tricks, and cause big explosions for fun
  • Implies she does in fact at least care about Vi, and knows Vi's personality to guess she would actually go in alone
  • Gives jinx a reason to join the League, and by extension gives Ekko a story to bounce off.
  • Gives Vi implicit reason for joining the League, which just so happenes to be some form of regret

3 paragraphs. not that hard.

Ironclad Dragon1 votes

What about that part wherein the League stops champions from seriously injuring each other? Burning Tides wouldn't work as well. And if the Insititue didn't step in and stop all the attempted champion homocides, are they supposed to say "Tsk tsk tsk" on Miss Fortune nearly killing Gangplank and making him lose an arm?

blacknerdtaku3 votes

they are immune when summoned onto the fields of justice. NOT when they interact with their everyday lives.

honestly, do you people even know the old lore or are you guys just downvoting?

Edit: this is backstory. Since GP got reworked he wasn't a champion yet.

Ironclad Dragon1 votes

"Kassadin and Malzahar were arrested by League Adjudicators yesterday evening when they were discovered battling in the mountains outside the Institute of War. The Deathsinger, Karthus, was found "dead" at the scene, although League mages were able to revive him, since he was not technically alive to begin with. League officials have stated that the situation is completely under control, and while they will not be removing any champions from their roster, “[the offending champions] will be punished accordingly.”

. . .

"Rest assured, we are not taking this matter lightly. These two have a history of disagreement, which is not unusual for League champions, but violence between League champions off the Fields of Justice is unacceptable . . ." Heywan did not disclose any further information.

Well yes, I do recall reading somewhere in the old lore that the League doesn't like it when their champions fight outside the ring.

blacknerdtaku1 votes

but at this point and time GP isnt a champion. he's some random pirate dude. He's not a champ until after he almost dies/.

TheGadabout1 votes

Except at this point in time GP IS a champion.

blacknerdtaku1 votes

He's playable because he existed before a rework.

In his lore during the Bilgewater event: he would not be a part of the LoL yet, and technically neither would MF, Graves, or TF.

As evidence of the fact that he's not a champ yet, his "captain" skin is different from his classic. his classic skin is as he appears in real time to the story. fat and Missing an arm. this Bilgewater event is all backstory.

**Regardless this is all digressing from the original point at hand. **

No matter how good the story is, there is no central device to anchor these characters on the rift... they have no reason to be fighting eachorther. and the only valid explanation that would have worked was that they were summoned to fight in this arena.

until then, WHY would Garen kill Lux, (his sister) with the help of a Katarina and Darius. why do these characters die then respawn? does death suddenly not exist?

There was a plot point to explain these things. this was a GOOD plot point, and hell breaking the rules of the LoL, would be very good reason to progress the central plot.

What I'm saying through all of this is that we need some way to integrate the "league of legends" into the plot.

Here are the points addressed in the post since im guessing many of you didnt take the time to read it:

1: There is currently no central plot device to glue this narrative together. There needs to be one

2: Why would you get rid of the old one and not replace it? That's a Bad move.

3: It's incredibly lazy and a DOWNRIGHT LIE to say that a central plot thread Is RESTRICTIVE.

4: The removal of all of this takes away a significant part of this game's overall lore as well as makes champion motivations unclear - in essense this strips the champions of character dimension.

And yes, this entire story STILL could have been told with the IoW in place, because this is a BACKSTORY, and the IoW was a magical organization, not some omnipotent being. they have only as much powers as champions give them. Address the Issues at hand please.

Sneak Dog1 votes

Outside the ring near their establishments it was forbidden, which is only sensible.

They still didn't like it outside their institutions, but wouldn't stop it. They were trying to replace all wars to prevent escalation to runewars, powerful champions fighting eachother outside the fields of justice wouldn't help this cause.

Ebonmaw Dragon1 votes

Welll, technically, Graves and TF WERE fighting in the butchers bridge in a 1 vs 1 vs alotofpeople.

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