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Massive inconsistency with Riot's Lore

D E Merry··3 votes·1,124 views

So everyone knows how the Institute of War is now a non-canon part of the story, correct? So these characters are allowed to have more fleshed out backstories that don't require to force them to enter the Institute of War?

Of course, there are some jokes that break the 4th wall, like Mordekaiser saying you only need to click once. Understandable, it's just a joke.

Then why does Sona still call you Summoner? "Only you can hear me, Summoner. What masterpiece shall we play today?"

If you really want to stick with "In-game, players are still referred to as summoners - but summoners won't be part of the story." (quoted from Carnival Knights on Dev Blog: Exploring Rune Terra" Then sure whatever, you explained that inconsistency. Then answer me this question:

Then how does Summoner's Rift exist if there are no summoners? Isn't it just a Rift? If Summoner's Rift is non-canon, how are we expected to believe any of the other maps (including the ones that are only in the story like the Shadow Isles) to be canon? Why does the Crystal Scar and Skarner have to be canon or the Twisted Treeline and Maokai have to be canon if there is a rift in a world without summoners that is called Summoner's Rift? In the sense, how are any of your stories canon if the world presented most often to us is, in fact, non-canon? Or do you just get to pick and choose like the Bible where we have literally believe it's the word of God but we refuse to follow Deutronomy 21:18-21 where: "If any man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey his father or his mother, and when they chastise him, he will not even listen to them, then his father and mother shall seize him, and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gateway of his home town. And they shall say to the elders of his city, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey us, he is a glutton and a drunkard." Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death; so you shall remove the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear of it and fear."

So pretty much you're like a cult that gets to pick and choose your story?

15 Comments

Sharjo4 votes

I'll have a stab at some of your questions, if I may.

***Why does Sona still say that line? *** Because doing the VO is one of the hardest parts of a champ or skin because not only does it have to be drafted, then people need to audition, then any altering to the voice needs to be done, they lines need to be hooked up, and then this process is repeated 15 more times for every language League is played in. This is why we're seeing more VUs but less VO updates across the board; redoing the VO would push those VUs back considerably. They'll get to it when the the time's right, which will likely not be any time soon due to priorities for the Champ Up team.

How does Summoner's Rift exist if there are no summoners? Isn't it just a rift? Because the concept of the Summoners of the Institute of War was removed, not the concept of actually summoning things. If that was true, Malzahar would be removed from the game, because he summons, as does the Zz'rot portal, as does Azir and Yorick. Summoner's Rift can refer to the history of the area; The rift is the land between two bases that were once held by some people who summoned stuff. Maybe they summoned Baron from the Void, and Summoner's Rift also refers to the rift created to bring him through.

If Summoner's Rift is non canon, how are we expected to believe any of the other maps are canon? Because they have lore and history. Demacia and Noxus went to war over Kalamanda even though there was no League to intervene. It was a battle for resources stopped (presumably) by Zilean. The Twisted Treeline is a place on the Shadow Isles, there are undead on it (the spirits of the shrines) who talk about it. They are canon characters in the game world, just as Greyor and Lyte are canon on the Howling Abyss. Just because they aren't Fields of Justice in the lore doesn't mean these places don't exist at all.

In the sense, how are any of your stories canon if the world presented often to us is, in fact, non canon? The world you are shown is canon. The items exist as actual things in Runeterra. The Maps are locations in Valoran. The creatures on the maps are living creatures of their current habitats. The champions are important people in the world for one reason or another. The gameplay isn't canon, everything else is. Our games don't affect the lore, but everything in them is a part of the League of Legends universe.

So pretty much you're like a cult that gets to pick and choose your story? This one makes me scratch my head. They're the people who write this story for a living. They're not allowed to pick and choose what is a part of the world they created? If cult means the guys deciding what makes it in to the story, then yes they're a cult, because it's their job, and it's their game's universe.

Hope that answered some things. Maybe it did, or maybe no one will care, I dunno.

D E Merry1 votes

Answer me this: How is the world canon when the official league of legends website presents us this: "Nocturne did not take his introduction to this world kindly. He slaughtered everything he could find before summoners were able to magically confine him. After a period of intense study, League experts divined that Nocturne hunted summoners in their sleep, attacking them in a place where their magic was useless. This seemed to be his only purpose. The families of the victims demanded justice, but League officials were concerned that death might only return Nocturne to the place from which he came. They bound him to a nexus fragment, trapping him in the physical world." So summoners aren't canon yet they were attacked by Nocturne. The Institute of War isn't canon yet they still binded him to a nexus fragment. How exactly is this canon? http://gameinfo.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/game-info/champions/nocturne/#champion-lore

Look at Skarner's Lore: "Skarner, the crystalline guardian, defends the entrance to a realm deep beneath the Shuriman wastes. The few who survive trespassing his domain describe a creature of terrifying intelligence, anger, and precision. What this merciless creature protects, no one knows." Where did the Crystal Scar vanish to from his lore? His entire backstory has been eradicated.

We are presented the Summoner's Rift as the world we experience most often, yet the entire storylines have been shattered and some never reforged.

What about Jax? " Such is the case with Jax, for whom the argument could be made that he is the most prolific tournament fighter currently at the Institute of War. Before joining the League, Jax was an unremarkable soldier-for-hire. For reasons known only to the former leader of the League, High Councilor Reginald Ashram, Jax was put on the top of the list of candidates to receive a League Judgment - the interview process that either accepts or rejects a prospective champion. His Judgment was the quickest in League history, where the Doors of Acceptance glowed and slowly swung open as soon as it began. Jax faced no recorded Observation or Reflection during his Judgment."

Why does Skarner have a completely destroyed Lore, Jax and Nocturne not even touched over the past 5 months, and we are supposed to accept the story to be "canon" where they want it to be canon? I want them to go with no story or with the full story, not this "flavor of the month will get a story and then those like Skarner and the Crystal Scar will be abandoned to never receive real storylines fixed that we have left gaping holes in"

I could care less about the Shurima story rewrite about characters who already had backstories, I want them to make a fucking story that shows actual characters doing actual shit and not just random exposition. Make Ezreal go fucking explore something again and find another item rather than just "We're introducing the ZZROT PORTAL"

D E Merry1 votes

Tell me at least, what has happened between the champions outside of the game in the actual story in the past few months? Back in season 1, they did things and it was reported in the Journal of Justice. CHAMPIONS DID STUFF OTHER THAN FIGHT EACH OTHER! What do they do now? There is no story.

Sharjo1 votes

Sion probably been kept in captivity most of the time while Swain makes plans for more war across the region.

Kalista might have been summoned a few times in the last few months, but otherwise is likely in some kind of limbo, being a conglomerate of souls and all that jazz.

RekSai being RekSai, killing, eating, being a terror of the sands and all that stuff.

Xerath likely trying to figure out how to get out of the damn sarcophagus he's bound in.

Renekton relentlessly searching for Nasus , I mean that's the whole point of his existence at this point, being a deranged Ascended.

Varus is still killing Noxians and stuff; Institute never resolved the war so Noxians are still camping in Southern Ionia, waiting to be shot dead by him.

The vast majority of characters have some kind of goal they're working towards at the end of the day. This might sound rude on my part, apologies in advance if it does, but it's not that hard to figure what they spend their time doing. Graves is looking to get revenge on Twisted Fate, so he allocates a fair bit of time to locating the card bastard. Nami's still searching for the Moonstone. Yasuo's still looking for the elder's killer, hoping to use that one solid lead to either find the murderer or get more leads.

D E Merry1 votes

And how are these characters any more round or have done anything new for the past few years they've been released? How are any of them alive and not just a cardboard cut-out abandoned by Riot? For instance, Graves is fucking terrible at following TF. We got what he does on Day One of when he was released then his entire story was abandoned. None of these characters (past release) has received any kind of story update that makes us think they're alive. 4 fucking years and these champions haven't achieved the goal they've been going for, how the fuck are these champions if not one of them can do what they've tried to do

Fiddlesticks in Institute of War to guard secrets, now he can go stand in fields and do nothing now oooooooooo Acutally I bet his story still isn't updated so he's sitting in an empty Institute doing absolutely nothing since he was first born since the Institute of War never existed

Sharjo1 votes

The onus is on the guys writing the story to deliver. The biggest story update we've had in recent memory is the Freljord stuff from 2013, which comes two years after Ashe being crowned as Freljord's queen. You assume I don't know how little Riot has done to progress the various plots of this universe, I know this. And yes, Fiddle hasn't been updated yet, so he's in the same boat as Jax, Nocturne, Kayle, Morgana and Malphite.

Whether they have or haven't though isn't my biggest concern. Like I said the onus is on the writers to deliver, and I'm a patient guy. I like the lore we've gotten thus far. I like it for what it is: the first part of something bigger. Of course I want that story and I'd love it if it just came out right here and now, but I know that's not gonna happen. Shit takes time, and even though they're very late on it, I'm still happy with what we've got, and what we've got has really engaged me and got me thinking. My interest in the lore has only gotten greater over the past few months, and I'm excited for the future. What it entails for my favorite champions I dunno yet, but I'm happy to come along for the ride.

To summarise, shit's broken, we all know this, narrative knows this, we're all just waiting right now, and I'm patient so I don't mind. I waited 8 years for the stuff I truly cared about in World of Warcraft to get developed, so yeah.

Also how do you expect Graves to easily track down a guy that sodding teleports?! I mean come on cut Graves some slack, TF's a tricky bastard!

Sharjo1 votes

Ok then, so in order here's my answers:

Nocturne Nocturne: His lore isn't canon anymore, same for every champion with lore that is intrinsically tied to the Institute of War. He will receive an overhaul some time in the future to cement his place and role in the League of Legends universe.

Skarner Skarner: His lore was intrinsically tied to the Institute, and as such has been changed. The three or four lines is a short version of a longer story we haven't seen yet. The plan by narrative, which has been delayed by tech issues (I don't know what those are right now but the original issue was the website drawing information from the client) is that the client will have short summaries for champions which will have links to the League website where longer versions will be available. We've seen this lore for Azir, Xerath, Sion and Kalista specifically, but are missing it for a lot of champs, Skarner being one of them. While I can't tell you the content of his longer lore, because it hasn't been released so I haven't seen it, it's probably along the lines of "This is Skarner, but all of his history and that of the Brackern takes place in Shurima, not the Odyn Veil."

Jax Jax: His lore isn't canon at the moment. Like Nocturne they're gonna change it to solidify his place and role in the world. I'd say they're gonna stick him in Ionia, but that's my opinion, not fact.

So to summarise and answer that 4th question, Skarner's Nocturne and Jax have yet to have their lores changed in line with the Institute retcon, while Skarner's has been, but because of tech issues that have been prevalent since the Shurima patch came out, we haven't seen what it mostly entails.

So yeah those are my answers. Also don't hate on the guys who do game balance for problems with the lore; they ain't got anything to do with that. Suffice to say the guys writing the lore are busy atm, and have given themselves a shit tonne of work to do.

D E Merry3 votes

Yes, you admit their lores aren't canon and are going to be updated. So why should we accept new lore and "OH LOOK THIS NEW CHAMPION AMUMU WE MADE NEW LORE FOR--Oh wait..." "New champion every four weeks? That's so much for us--oh wait, two champs every four weeks on top of story lore was what we used to do..."

YES I get that they're going to be updated but Riot keeps saying shit all Riot does is say OH LOOK THESE ARE OUR FAVORITE FUCKING CHAMPIONS SO WE'RE GOING TO GIVE THEM THEIR 4TH NEW CLASSIC SKIN REWORK OR 8TH NEW SKIN, WE'RE GOING TO WRITE NEW SHIT ABOUT THEM AGAIN, we refuse to completely overhaul a champion's kit to the point their identity is gone but KARMA GOODBYE YOUR OLD FANS ARE GONE All Riot fucking does is write new lore and update Summoner's Rift and abandon all the old "unpopular" stuff (remember when Dominion was going to have ranked? But so much people hated it they chose not to because it's a "casual game mode"? Why not just fucking fix the game mode?)

Look at what happened to Karma and to Trundle. Trundle was the Troll who had a disease. That's why his entire kit was about stealing stats. Now they made him a king and he still steals stats? Why would a King steal stats from the lowly? And he's a king because he stole a magical bat--so since he doesn't even have royal blood, and he's just a fucking troll, they is no lore-related reason for him to be stealing stats. And this was for the Freljord rework. How exactly are you saying that their lores will be reworked when they seem to be completely lacking communication between story and game?

Look, the game team is doing what they're doing--I just want to know what the fuck happened to the story-writing team that used to do the Journal of Justice and why we can't have a real world where real things happen, such as conflicts and people dying. Hell, with how much fighting goes on in the story, I would of expected one fucking champion to have died within the past 4 years if the Institute of War has never been created.

Remember when Riot said they didn't want to make Elise because "no one has a power fantasy about playing a spider queen?" As if someone had the power fantasy to play some old fart like Zilean? Yeah as if we can rely on them to know what's best for the story...

Sharjo1 votes

If I'm honest, I can barely understand your argument because it comes across as you essentially raging. I'd love to debate you on stuff, but when one or both sides are kicking and screaming nothing reasonable's gonna be said.

So on the first point, about frequency of champion releases: before we got a champion, a small comic, a background lore, and a judgement. They'd get alluded to in the JoJ quite often as well. Now we get promos with a much larger scope. Sion got a big promo site, Kalista had a big old video, Rek'Sai had a video and a journal that detailed her and Shurima as a whole. Champion releases are also not only the job of the writers, they're the job of the modelers, animators, programmers, game designers, artists and more.

Riot works with departments and teams. The guys doing the writing don't make skins or visually update champions or work on servers. There's overlap of course, but people do different things. Complaining about a new skin or a visual update in the place of new lore is nonsensical, because the people making the lore don't even have a hand in the stuff you're complaining about.

Also look in to why they didn't put a ranked mode in for Dominion. There's way more to it than what you've brought to the table.

Trundle and Karma did get replaced essentially yes, but you're complaining about their kits in a game where the gameplay itself isn't specifically canon. Why does he steal stats? Gameplay mechanics. Gameplay and lore got divorced months ago now. And if you want a reason as to why, thematically these things are the case, why not look to the champs and what's going on with them? Trundle has a True Ice club, ergo he has a magical club. He's draining stats? Then it's probably something to do with the club.

The guys who wrote the JoJ may or may not be a part of Riot anymore. Some Rioters have moved around departments internally and some have found other jobs. As to real stuff happening, well stuff did happen recently. Azir got resurrected, Xerath and Renekton got released, Shurima's capital rose from the dust, Sion was ressurected, the twelfth Harrowing happened, forcing Miss Fortune and Gangplank to unite if they wanted any chance of surviving it, a dude went to Shurima and documented it's wildlife, people and Rek'Sai in particular. How has no one died? They're champions for a reason, they're not gonna die so easily, and their stories haven't been developed yet; who's to say some of them won't die?

On the subject of Elise, I'm almost certain that's false. You probably know about Priscilla the Spider Queen, and while I can't say why specifically she was canned because of "no one has a power fantasy about playing a spider", it was likely not this, it was likely down to her thematic being poor or feeling poor, her kit being bad or otherwise. Azir as a champion concept was the "Sand Mage" and sat in a development cycle that lasted for 3 years before they settled on what he is now. It took them time to figure out how they would deliver that spidery experience.

And finally on Zilean's power fantasy, his power fantasy is "time mage", not "old fart". Pretty sure that's a sodding compelling power fantasy if I ever heard one.

As I said, you're assuming Riot is one amorphous blob that makes this stuff and puts it out, but Riot is a company, made up of people, and those people do different things. The Rioters in the narrative department write, the Rioters on the live design team deal with game balance, the maintenance Rioters deal with tech on servers, websites, the client and the like. Things like Esports don't affect the lore and how it's delivered, it's down to the people at Riot who make the lore. Riot's design philosophies are prevalent throughout their company, but everyone's got different jobs over there. They're people you know, like us, like anyone else.

sigh Hope I got something across there.

redniwediS2 votes
  1. We'll know more when the new lore comes out.
  2. Just because they announced that certain parts of the old lore are no longer cannon doesn't mean everything's been updated yet.
D E Merry2 votes

It's been 5 months since they announced that Institute of War and Summoners are non-canon. September 2014. Meanwhile, the Journal of Justice got shut down after its last Issue on July 22nd, 2011. Can we even trust Riot to continue with their new storyline if they couldn't even bother to continue the older one?

D E Merry3 votes

There was a time when Ezreal was more than just a skillshot bot. He was an actual explorer, not just by name, but actually found stuff. One of the Journals talked about how Ezreal got his hands on the Wriggle's Lantern and that's why it became a new item in the game, not just fucking "balance" issues. Riot once upon a time took the time and effort to really show personality and stories of the characters through the living lore of the Journal of Justice. There was a time when you really cared about what happened in the world and why it did--including Lee Sin burning himself until Ionia was free. The Ionian Boots of Lucidity still exist to mark an era where story and the game evolved side by side and Guardman Bob's Godyr made such a heavy impact on the game and we can physically SEE that and feel it. There was a time where story and game lived together. Now, Riot fully seperated it and the game evolves outside of the story except for "oh we have a new champion"

redniwediS3 votes

Perhaps we can trust Riot, and perhaps we cannot. Only time will tell. One thing is clear from their posts, and that is that things will be correctly updated.

MarkedOfKane2 votes

I hate how riot deleted the lore.

The other day, I read braums and it gave me a completely different look at him. Then I read a Shurima character's lore and it tells me nothing about them.

D E Merry3 votes

I miss the days when Zuan was a real place to the players. That's where Warwick became a beast after using chemical weapons and then got turned into a beast by Soraka. Singed, his body deformed by chemicals, now takes Warwick's place... Mundo, the Madman of Zaun... etc... But now who cares where Warwick or Mundo or Singed comes from? Zaun is ignored and the characters are barely remembered to be related...

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