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@Riot - Anacoluthons in skin bios

Flagg·3/21/2019, 1:21:31 PM·8 votes·12,270 views

3/8 PBE Update: Skin Tweaks, Skin Bios & More!

Hi! I was reading the new skin bios, and I noticed a few anacoluthons. English is not my native language, so I don't know if it's accepted in American English, but the anacoluthons create some pretty funny/strange sentences. :)

Masked Shaco: A practitioner of masked dance drama, many of Shaco's performances begin as social commentary...

To me, it means that Shaco's performances are a practitioner of masked dance drama.

Groovy Zilean: Consistently in a near-comatose state from peering across the space-time continuum, Zilean's more recent hobbies include being terrible at hacky-sack

His recent hobbies are in a near-comatose state? ;-p

Vandal Vladimir:Leader of the notorious Vandals, Vladimir's exposure to residual radiation has given him control over the blood of living organisms

Vlad's exposure to radiation is the leader of the Vandals?

Blood Moon Thresh: A demon summoned on the night of the Blood Moon, Thresh's insatiable urge to torture and kill is fueled by thousands of vengeful spirits drawn to his lantern

His insatiable urge to torture and kill is a demon?

Blood Moon Diana: A child chosen by the Blood Moon itself, Diana's mind has been opened to the lost ways of the cult

Diana's mind is a child? :)

Happy Elf Teemo: An elf renowned for his unflinching happiness in all things, some people once believed that under Teemo’s merry exterior lay the heart of a killer

Warring Kingdoms Nidalee: A wild, untamed fighter steeped in myth, it is difficult to know what is true of Nidalee and what is legend

Dreadnova Gangplank: Once a high ranking admiral in the Royal Space Military, Gangplank's reign of terror began when he stole and proliferated blueprints

So, are anacoluthons okay in English? [sg-lux-2]

15 Comments

GreatUnknown3/22/2019, 6:11:07 AM6 votes

Please, for the love of Poro, refer to Riplakish's response. This is NOT grammatically correct. It has nothing to do with "feeling" you get as a NS, it's just incorrect.

To reiterate, since the modifiers separated by the comma only have impersonal verbs or other grammatical structures which do not signify who is performing the action or being in the mentioned state, the quality of the modifier is ascribed to the first MAIN noun in the noun phrase...

So, in "A practitioner of masked dance drama, many of Shaco's performances begin as social commentary", that part before the comma is modifying the noun "performances", since "Shaco's" is just another modifier to "performances". Instead it should be sth like this: "A practitioner of masked dance drama, Shaco intended many of his performances to serve as social commentary."

summoner 4

WTBeGirl100EUhr3/21/2019, 5:04:23 PM4 votes

Yeah, these are acceptable sentence structures in English (including English English and Australian English). It's possible that if you were at a very high level of studying the language then it would be different, I don't know, but it's a fairly common way to write things.

RiotRiot LegendLarry3/21/2019, 5:50:28 PM4 votes

TIL what an anacoluthon is.

Here's how I make sense of it:

"As a practitioner of masked dance drama many of Shaco's performances begin as social commentary..."

versus

"A practitioner of masked dance drama, many of Shaco's performances begin as social commentary..."

That comma replaces the "as" at the beginning of a sentence. Granted that doesn't work with the Zilean bio aaaaaaand my grasp of English grammar is... well, poor at best lol.

Now I'm gonna go ask one of our editors to see if that makes sense or if I'm just completely wrong. Woo! Learning something new everyday.

giannishannibal3/21/2019, 5:02:23 PM2 votes

Yes, they are ok. There is "," that you ignore. e.g Leader of the notorious Vandals**,** Vladimir's exposure to residual radiation has given him control over the blood of living organisms -> Its means Vandal Vladimir is the leader of the group hence he has the title. The later part is some small bio details of how he got his power. Maybe they should use dot instead of comma. eg Leader of the notorious Vandals**.**Vladimir's exposure to residual radiation has given him control over the blood of living organisms All the skins bios use commas , so the first part is part of their identity like King Trydamere the Valiant ( its random example) while the second part is s short story or facts about them.

Terozu3/21/2019, 6:55:02 PM2 votes

Yeah this is normal. lol

Its a specific type of introduction often used in narrative devices and video games. It's very common in RPGs in general.

Don Pasquale3/21/2019, 9:37:51 PM2 votes

Yeah these are all acceptable/logical sentences. I don't think any of them even classify as an anacoluthon. I don't think any native English speaker would even think twice about any of them.