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varus old lore vs new lore abridged and analysis

SAIZOxRYOMA·12/1/2017, 4:52:52 AM·3 votes·3,717 views

OLD: Varus is shrine guardian Shrine holds evil well of corruption Varus has wife and kid Varus home town gets invaded by noxians Every1 die Varus is last defender Varus resorts to using the evil well power to kill noxians Varus becomes the embodiment of vengeance end

NEW: ?????Varus unreleased backstory Varus is darkin Varus is sealed in well Varus home town gets invaded by noxians Every1 die Val and Kai are the last survivors. Kai is mortally wounded Kai resorts to using the evil well power to save Val's life Kai and Val fuse with Varus and they become the embodiment of vengeance the three struggle for control over one another to be continued

did not include Val and Kai's backstory because they are separate entities unrelated to varus before the climax of Dark Kin. It served only to establish their place in runeterra and shed light upon their actions leading up to and during the body fusion.

  • as u can see, the new lore builds upon the old lore, almost everything is there. the biggest difference is how there is more stories to tell: before and after the events of Dark Kin. the old lore was had a cool concept but did not age well. Old varus had a simple backstory with not much to tell.
  • Old varus's wife and kid didn't even have names. They were mentioned and then executed as fuel for varus's vengeance.New varus has relevant characters in his story to actually care about(similar to how we know a bit of Lucian's past with Senna). The old Varus got his power from some magic pool of corruption that was never explained very well. it is reasonable to assume that the well was put into varus's old story by riot solely so he could have a convenient source of power.The well in the new varus story makes sense because of the prexisting darkin and the champion bio explains why it was built. Old varus was doomed to walk the path of tragedy, vengeance, end. He really wasn't going anywhere interesting, the only thing left for Old varus was to kill X amount of noxians and then have his vengeance sated. The new varus shows darkin varus trying to persuade Kai into taking the old varus path which caused Kai to question his hunger for vengeance, he found that he did not want to walk that path.
  • When you think about it, his old story did not flow organically and did not lead to a satisfying future. With the new lore, the essence, emotions, and plot were carried over and new elements were introduced to make every aspect of the old story better.

If you take any issue with my analysis i'd be interested to hear what you have to say

7 Comments

WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOO12/1/2017, 5:05:58 AM5 votes

To be pendantic, they aren't the only survivors, the village succeeds in repelling the attack, as evidenced by Valmar's mother's survival.

Craft Zeppelin12/1/2017, 5:06:25 AM5 votes

Ok I'm going to say something VERY controversial here.

The reason why changing Varus lore into 2 dudes, makes it totally different to the old lore is that Varus had a kid. Varus was actually practicing a long old tradition of protecting the temple that was passed down on from his ancestor. And because of said weight of tradition he was not able to protect his village. When he came back home he found his family dead. His TRADITION dead as well because he cannot pass it down.

So because the tradition cannot be practiced anymore he broke it. Because he had nothing to lose. Isn't this REAL seething RAW vengeance that NEEDS to be satiated? Deleting the family element breaks this. The cross that old Varus bears is MORE heavier.

Tesla Effect12/1/2017, 4:58:23 AM1 votes

Nicely pointed out. It shows bulletpoints of both old and new lore while also showcasing the possibilities and lack of them in each statement....some overweighing than others.

Ruloh12/1/2017, 10:46:34 AM1 votes

To be perfectly frank, how and why the well's location is where it is was never pointed out in either story. The one thing that remained the same for the character Varus was that it held the source of his power for X reason. What I like about the new "Varus" coming together is the backstory of two souls whose bonds forged by love battle against the single entity of evil to keep control and harness the power they unintentionally inherited. What I don't like is that Varus went from being a mortal human with a family and a background that could be argued is just as vague yet solid as the new one, to suddenly the actual Darkin because Riot couldn't come up with an original idea that wasn't made by the fanbase to make a whole new character. Don't get me wrong, I love that Varus is getting a touch up. I don't love the fact that Varus is no longer Varus, and that the new Varus could easily have just been made into a new character with a different name but the same setup that we're getting now for a 3rd Darkin. Honestly, does anyone truly believe Riot had been planning this setup since they released the character? Hell no. This was just a show of convenience at its finest.