@Riot Is Elderwood Leblanc at all inspired by Midsummer Night's Dream?

Cool to hear! :) Elderwood is a cool theme; i don't play Hecarim but that's a boss skin. I also like to hear about the stories/worlds behind skin lines like this, such as with the Slaughter Fleet.

I was partially convinced that this LB skin was inspired by Rosine from Berserk, but it sounds like there's lots of other fantasy characters with a similar theme :P

Will we reach a point where we will have truly official Lore for skin lines?

There are often threads like this one where the skin team talk about the story behind a skin line (I remember a really cool one about the Rogue Slaughter Fleet with Garen, Quinn, etc.), but it's very little compared to the core Lore.

On the other hand, I wouldn't want these side lores to detract from and slow down the core Lore. Damn, it's hard to chose... x)

I think we all know who needs a Great Deku Tree skin.

{quoted}

We were inspired by a fan concept by Mist XG to explore a druidic/fairy space for LeBlanc. We ended up moving away from the Druidic aspect as it doesn't fit her character as well as the Faerie Trickster archetype. Some references I was inspired by were Titania from A Midsummer Night's Dream, Oona from MtG, Pan's Labyrinth, Penny Arcade's Thornwatch (Hecarim was influenced by this one too), young Maleficent in Maleficent (again Hecarim too) and the Sylvari from Guild Wars. LeBlanc was designed about the same time as Hecarim, after we fell in love with the Bard skin we wanted to expand the Elderwood (and you can probably find some of my player-probing in old threads), and they were designed with a greater story setting in mind;

In the core LoL lore LeBlanc is a schemer manipulating things from behind the scenes - so too in the Elderwood. I see Bard and his Meeplets as her emissary, reporting to her on the movement of intruders to their magical realm. While Hecarim is an ancient and powerful enforcer, protecting the forest from all who dare trespass. It was important for us to establish the Elderwood as a place were humans dare not go, for the magical forest is filled with powerful magical protectors. For this reason I tried to design LeBlanc as a fusion of both fae, animal and plant elements to emphasise that she is a creature of pure magic that simply looks like the forest she is the embodiment of. Bard has coloured cloth and Hecarim has hewn stone that hint at Elven crafts from a forgotten time, but LeBlanc is pure forest magic!

To that point I think that it's also important that we push the breadth of design in our skin lines so that each champion brings something new to the setting. I've seen some beautiful fan concepts for possible Elderwood skins but they reuse too many elements from previous designs - in my mind these worlds are large and aside from specific cases such as Warden/Marauder I think each one is an opportunity to see something that combines some familiar motifs with something fresh.

Thanks so much for playing League of Legends and it really warms my heart to hear that players are enjoying this one. Working on this skin was something really special for me >:)

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/story-art/5znbQoiy-suggestion-make-elderwood-leblanc-flutter-with-homegaurds

Since the skin is not finalized, could we maybe have that awesome fluttering animation on her W be her 'run fast' animation! The animation team put a bunch of work into a flutter on her W that you can barely see for half a second! It would be an awesome addition and would more than likely just be a recycled animation <3

Elderwood is one of my favorite skin lines! Thank you so much for responding to my feedback. I really enjoy noticing things and inspirations for things like that! There are so many pieces to an enchanted forest: the insects, the flora, magical mushrooms, forests in the fall, hidden caves and dark and scary underbrush and what lurks below the canopy that blocks out the mundane world! Elderwood is definitely a skin line I could see with a lot of varying, yet still cohesive skins. There is so much room to play and I can't wait to see what your talented artists come up with. I really enjoy that Mist XG person's art and hope you pull from more of the various fan artists. I have no talent for visual art, but I do enjoy writing. Again thanks for your time, and keep up the amazing work in creating this wonderful game. :)

I am so definitely getting this skin! Thank you for the comment! :) I figured it was one of them, but the phrase trickster fairy instantly made me think of Puck. I can totally see Titania too. I am in love with this skin! More Shakespearean inspired skins please (Romeo and Juliet Kat and Garen?)! I think fairies are usually less benevolent than we'd like to believe, they are pretty devious little things haha

Immediate buy. Waiting for it to come out.

That's an amazing name! I feel like poisoning Mac N Cheese would be a great way to kill someone in a modern Shakespearean Tragedy. At least, if your target was me, I love Mac N Cheese as much as Desdemona loved Othello.[slayer-jinx-wink]