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(VERY LONG) I need some enlightment about the League of Legends lore.

Prozac Horseman·11/16/2017, 10:36:34 PM·7 votes·4,387 views

THIS POST IS GONNA BE PRETTY LONG, IT'S NOT THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE WORLD, BUT I'M A HUGE LORE NERD IN GENERAL I HOPE A RIOTER MIGHT BE ABLE TO HELP, I DON'T THINK THE LORE IS DEVELOPPED ENOUGH FOR THAT, THOUGH, BUT YEAH, LONG POST

So hey summoners, and Rito, I've been asking myself more and more questions about the League lore lately, now I know it's infamous for being, a bit messy, but still, here goes (BTW I'll be focusing around Demacian champions since we have seen a recent update in their lore, 3 of them got recently reworked, I prefer Demacia too but that doesn't mean I'm not confused about other things in the lore):

First off, my biggest question, how strong are humans there, really? See, I've always seen Garen as a completely normal Joe, with just better training and etc... But after seeing the recent music video for the song ''Legends Never Die'' (absolutely amazing song by the way, Rito always makes the best music) where we can literally see Garen dragging a GIGANTIC stone statue around like it's not much, now I don't know for you guys but that thing must've weighed a few tons, at least, which brings the point, Garen is actually terrifyingly strong, comparable to Hulk, are other humans in the lore like Xin Zhao, Lee Sin, and even marksmen like Jhin also alot physically stronger than humans from around here? The thing is, me and my friends always had this thing where we thought no way in hell Garen or Darius could ever fight the likes of Veigar or Yorick, but after seeing that and Garen's recently added (I think) special armor, I'm not too sure....

Speaking of which, Demacian Steel, according to the lore (again I do not know if Demacian Steel is a recent addition), drains magic very fast, making Garen a nightmare for any mage wanting to fight him, I guess, but what are the limitations and exact properties of Demacian Steel?

And, while we're on the Garen subject, let's talk about his ultimate, is this canon? I mean lore-wise? See, once again I do not know if this is a recent addition I don't remember reading that before the whole Demacian lore revamp, but Demacians REALLY hate magic and mages, right? Garen is no exception, but he DOES use one of the most powerful magic spells one could hope for? In my head I assume Garen got this power from Kayle or something, but yeah... Is his fast regeneration also canon?

Fiora, Xin Zhao, and Jax, now what do they all have in common, one might ask? Why Jax, all of a sudden? last night I had trouble sleeping for whatever reason, and I started thinking about this: the lore claims Jax to be literally the most powerful melee fighter, right? I mean he is SO stupidly powerful that he is the only one who couldn't use his own weapon, correct? Then we have Fiora, girl claims she has never really found a worthy opponent (Now I don't know much about Fiora, I might f*** up something here and there, correct me if I'm wrong), so could Fiora stand a chance against Jax? What about Xin Zhao? This man amazes me, he was put into a Noxian gladiator match where he'd have to fight until his own demise, he ended up pretty much massacring hundreds of Noxians, all, by, himself, before finally being saved by Jarvan the Third, I think. Could Xin Zhao actually stand a chance against Jax? Also, returning to Fiora, she's never found a worthy opponent, would that mean she could easily crush Garen/Jarvan/Xin Zhao etc... if she wanted?

What about scale? actual physical scale. Now I kinda know my way around it when it comes to League's lore, but the physical scale of the champions, in the actual lore is always something that's been, to say the least, confusing for most people, especially because they're not portrayed on their real scale in-game, I know champions like Malphite and Galio are super HUGE in the lore, Cho'Gath too, and obviously Aurelion Sol, but what about Yordles and Humans? On his splashart, we can see Teemo jumping over roots and stuff, which makes me assume he's small enough to fit in the palm of my hand. But then you got Poppy, first off, she fought alot of humans herself and is considered very strong, physically, so she kinda HAS to be way bigger than Teemo, on her splashart/login animation we can clearly see she reaches most of the surrounding soldiers' waists. And humans, well they're humans right? well not so fast, we've already established how superhuman characters like Garen and Xin Zhao are, how tall would they be compared to us? what's the average height in Valoran, for humans? Would be nice if we could get a full fledged chart concerning all of the champions' sizes.

Here comes one of my biggest concerns about the LoL lore: The League itself. I think this might have been a controversial topic too, but is the ''League of Legends'' still canon? If I remember well it was created to put a term to political conflicts and etc... But, let's be more specific even, are the ''Summoners'' still canon? My problem with this is that if they are, and they are controlling the champions, then this means the champions aren't really all that cool, or real, while we're at it... Do the champions even exist? Or are they just ''Legends''?

There are also alot of other questions I have, those aren't all that important and you can really just ignore them unless you're interested:

Braum: Would he be able to kill? He's a very nice man who just wants to protect people, but could he be provoked to a point of reaching physical violence?

Some abilities: I've always wondered what abilities like Jarvan's ultimate, or again, Garen's looked like in their actual universe, I expect Jarvan's ultimate to be alot more devastating in the actual universe, what about Lux? or Taliyah's whole kit, really.

I was surprised to learn not long ago in the League Universe site that Darius has a girlfriend? Do most champions have a close one like a lover that we just never knew about?

What exactly is the Void?

Or even the Shadow Isles?

Is the forbidden love between Garen and Katarina still a thing? This one's always kinda confused me to be completely honest, especially how they fell in love in the first place.

Is Jarvan dead? I think it's Garen's, but in one of the last lore updates in the LoL Universe page, there's a passage that may refer to Jarvan IV's death.

Do champions usually all know each other? not necessarily personally, but if the League is canon, then one would assume they all know eachother, from Garen, to Graves to Janna, to Mordekaiser, to Warwick

Hextech makes me ask myself alot of questions, how far can Hextech go? and what EXACTLY is Hextech? Can you create complicated communication devices with it?

Just so much more questions I have that I'm just not thinking about right now...

31 Comments

Epicurus11/16/2017, 11:15:51 PM6 votes

These are very brief answers. If you want me to expand on any just ask.

Legends Never Die was made to promote eSports. I wouldn't really consider it a canon depiction of the champions. Regardless, I'd say Garen is a strong a human can possibly get through exercise and training. Could probably hold his own against Yorick (Yorick fights mainly through physical force), and his anti-magic armour might let him stay alive against mages like Veigar. We don't really know the properties of his armour.

In the new lore Jax _claims _ to be the greatest fighter, but htat doesn't mean he can't be proven wrong. Likewise Fiora has never lost a duel so far. Amusingly, the two have actually met in Jax's short story, but it ends on a cliffhanger before we can see who is victorious.

Not sure about average Yordle and human heights.

I think this might have been a controversial topic too, but is the ''League of Legends'' still canon? If I remember well it was created to put a term to political conflicts and etc... But, let's be more specific even, are the ''Summoners'' still canon? My problem with this is that if they are, and they are controlling the champions, then this means the champions aren't really all that cool, or real, while we're at it... Do the champions even exist? Or are they just ''Legends''?

The League of Legends and the Institute of War are not canon. Riot has hinted that there are still things called "Summoners" in the lore, but it's not us anymore, so for now lets assume they are not canon. The problem you cited is one of the main reasons that this retcon occurred.

Some abilities: I've always wondered what abilities like Jarvan's ultimate, or again, Garen's looked like in their actual universe, I expect Jarvan's ultimate to be alot more devastating in the actual universe, what about Lux? or Taliyah's whole kit, really.

Jarvan IV and Garen are both non-magic people, so I'm pretty sure each of their ultimates are only in-game abilities, and don't exist in the lore. Taliyah and Lux can likely perform their abilities though. They are both quite powerful mages, but still learn the full potential of their power.

What exactly is the Void?

Who knows?

Or even the Shadow Isles?

The Shadow Isles were once the Blessed Isles, an idyllic land that grew around a font of magic in the form of sacred water. Then Hecarim ruined everything.

Is the forbidden love between Garen and Katarina still a thing? This one's always kinda confused me to be completely honest, especially how they fell in love in the first place

It's not currently a thing, but Rioters have hinted they will add it back later. Garen and Katarina needed compelling stories of their own first, before devolving into a Romeo and Juliet cliché.

Is Jarvan dead? I think it's Garen's, but in one of the last lore updates in the LoL Universe page, there's a passage that may refer to Jarvan IV's death.

No. Garen's lore implies that he is dead, because Garen thought that he was dead. But Jarvan IV has since returned to Demacia.

Do champions usually all know each other? not necessarily personally, but if the League is canon, then one would assume they all know eachother, from Garen, to Graves to Janna, to Mordekaiser, to Warwick

League is not canon, so most champs have not met each other. They might know each other by reputation though, as a lot of them truly are legends.

Hextech makes me ask myself alot of questions, how far can Hextech go? and what EXACTLY is Hextech? Can you create complicated communication devices with it?

Hextech is technology powered by the magic of Brackern soul crystals. Theoretically, it can do anything that magic can do, but is limited by the design skills of its inventor.

Jarrantheon11/16/2017, 10:55:31 PM5 votes

This was quite nice to read and see your interest. I also am a huge lore enthusiast. At one point I read every single champions lore. After some research I can answer one of your questions which is the whether the League is still Canon? I have found in past posts around the year 2013 that Riot decided to rid of the League and summoners. This was done because having the league was hindering on the creation and development of champions. Creating a reason for everyone to join the league was limiting. Which is why lore updates no longer mention it. A big example of this would be the old and updated lore of Fiddlesticks and Nocturn. Hope that helps! As for who would win duels that's really all up to you. I doubt Riot will ever confirm who can win between champs. In my opinion I feel that Jax can beat most melee champs with a weapon except my main Pantheon cough cough

GreenLore11/17/2017, 12:01:29 AM3 votes

So I try to answer a few things here:

1.Yup humans can become a lot stronger than real life humans in the league lore.Braum for example punched through a mountain.However we don't know the true extend of the human capabalities.Though I think that most marksmen are closer to real life human standards,at least in terms of physical strenght

2.Demacian steel has magic dampening effects,so it likely can't negate magic completely,but at least weaken it.It is also possible to harm the normally incorporeal undeads with demacian steel.

3.We don't know how Garens ultimate works within the lore.Maybe it is actually magic and he just hides the ability from others or maybe it is something else.

4.Jarvans ult might be simply Jarvan smashing the ground so hard that it creates a small crater.

5.Jax being the strongest melee fighter isn't canon anymore and it is implied that he was corrupted by the void.

6.Well Fiora and Jax had actually a confrontation,but we don't know how it ended.Keep in mind that Fioras VO is pretty outdated and may not reflect the actual state of her within the lore.

7.Actually Xin was saved by Jarvan II not Jarvan III

8.The league isn't canon anymore,anything that still refers to the league is simply not up to date.

9.I do think that Braum would use violence in extremely dire situations,though I doubt that he'd ever willingly kill someone

10.Well most champs aren't in any special relationship,though Kassadin had a daughter in the old lore(but that might not be canon in the new one),Xerath had a girlfriend in his old lore,but that was retconned,Lucian had his wife obviously,Camille had once someone she loved and almost married,but he is dead now,Rumble is obviously in love with Tristana and then there are obviously Xayah&Rakan.

11.The void seems to be a realm that lies between dimensions or at least something like that.It produces lots of monstrosities and corrupts those who enter it.The icathians(the people to whom Jax belonged to) seemingly tried to use the void as a weapon,before they were destryoed by Ryzes master.

12.The shadow isles were once the blessed isles,where sages gathered dangerous artifacts and locked them away,the ruined king invaded the blessed isles to resurrect his wife,but they were unable to do so causing the already mad king to order an attack on the isles.Kalista tried to defuse the situation,but Hecarim backstabbed her.And when the king tried to resurrect his wife,it failed horribly and accidently created the shadow isles.

13.Garen x Kata is currently not a thing,but it is pretty likely that it is going to be a thing again eventually.

14.No Jarvan survived,he managed to escape on his own during Garens attack and then met Shyvana who helped him to get back to demacia.In general I think the only dead Jarvan is Jarvan I who was killed by Sion.

15.Nope.Since the league is not canon it is unlikely that every champion has heard of all the other champions.

16.Hextech is essentially magic powered technology.It uses magic crystals(originally harvested from Skarners kind,but if I remember correctly they can now make synthetic ones as well) as its power source and can do a lot of things(though we don't know the exact extends).The big advantage of hextech is that it essentially makes magic accessible to everyone.

Ebonmaw Dragon11/16/2017, 11:08:35 PM2 votes

{quoted}

... but what about Yordles and Humans?

_Yordles are sexually dimorphic and much shorter than humans; both genders rarely exceed 1 meter tall, with most averaging around 0.8 meters. _

Its safe to say that the mushrooms and roots of the splash art of Teemo are huge.

http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Yordle

Here comes one of my biggest concerns about the LoL lore: The League itself. I think this might have been a controversial topic too, but is the League of Legends still canon? If I remember well it was created to put a term to political conflicts and etc... But, lets be more specific even, are the Summoner still canon? My problem with this is that if they are, and they are controlling the champions, then this means the champions aren't really all that cool, or real, while were at it... Do the champions even exist? Or are they just Legends

This is the most important question that you made, because it answer most of the questions: No, the game and the "League of Legends" is not canon anymore. Nothing that you see in the game actually happens in the canon. Some people say that Kindred is only a legend and its not real, but im not sure about it.

Some abilities: I've always wondered what abilities like Jarvan's ultimate, or again, Garen's looked like in their actual universe, I expect Jarvan's ultimate to be alot more devastating in the actual universe, what about Lux? or Taliyah's whole kit, really.

Just talking about Jarvan, Lux and Garen in particular: Here are a few videos created by Riot:

https://youtu.be/Ltf7Ii8smE4?t=188 Here you can see the ult of Lux and Jarvan https://youtu.be/tEnsqpThaFg?t=147 Here you can see the ult of Garen ((The videos are a representation of in game matches and are not really canon, but the way that they use their skills are))

And here is a canon video of Taliyah using her ultimate: https://youtu.be/H1nRIX-qvbo?t=32

Is Jarvan dead? I think it's Garen's, but in one of the last lore updates in the LoL Universe page, there's a passage that may refer to Jarvan IV's death.

Jarvan I and Jarvan II are dead, but Jarvan III and Jarvan IV (The champion) arent

Do champions usually all know each other? not necessarily personally, but if the League is canon, then one would assume they all know eachother, from Garen, to Graves to Janna, to Mordekaiser, to Warwick

No, they dont... because the league is not canon anymore. Some of them are myths, some of them are normal people and some of them are political figures. Just because a champion has a quote towards someone, it doesnt mean that the champion has ever met that other champion in the canon.

Anyways, there are some champs that knows each other... for example, Olaf meet Lucian and Miss Fortune in Bilgewater during Harrowing.

I was surprised to learn not long ago in the League Universe site that Darius has a girlfriend? Do most champions have a close one like a lover that we just never knew about?

Darius had* a girlfriend: https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/comic/darius/bloodofnoxus/

PS: Kassadin had a daughter.

What exactly is the Void?

https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/region/void/

Or even the Shadow Isles?

https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/region/shadow-isles/

Solidair311/19/2017, 9:53:57 PM2 votes

To answer your question about Garen's strength, one of the narrative writers once phrased it something like this: CAN Garen truly summon a massive magical sword from the sky to smite his enemies? Probably not! But perhaps fighting against him really FEELS like, you know?

I think the average human of Runeterra is similar to a human in our reality on our earth; but the champions are all champions for a reason; they all go above and beyond and are the best of the best among their kind. This extends beyond humans; Rek'Sai is the queen of the Xer'Sai and is the largest and most powerful of her kind. Skarner, similarly is the most powerful Brackern.

There are levels, however. If Miss Fortune got into a fight with Aurelion Sol, I'm willing to bet she'd lose. But she's still incredibly powerful and dangerous in her own right. And frankly, everyone in the roster would lose to Kindred (maybe not Bard????)

And as for knowing each other: Most champions don't, but some do. Caitlyn and Vi work together, for example. Jax and Fiora have met canonically. Many other know each other by reputation, I'm sure. But the vast majority have never met and many WILL never meet, I'm sure.

Cetri11/16/2017, 11:24:10 PM1 votes

Scale: Yordles seem to come up the between knee and waist length of the average human. Check out the comics featuring Poppy (https://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/site/poppy-comic/) and Ziggs & Donger (https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/comic/jinx-ziggs/paint-the-town). I never got the vibe that Teemo was any smaller than the average yordle? Certainly not palm-sized. Just that those were big roots. Now humans.... we know that they can be more varied in size. While the average human seems to be the same size as in our world, we know gigantism is a thing that can happen (just look at how big Urgot is compared to his flunkies in his splashart; yeah, some of that is due to the cybernetics, but you can tell he was a big boy even before those).

League canonicity: Short answers here, The League doesn't exist, the champs do, and summoners are a thing but we don't know what they do yet.

The Void & Shadow Isles: The Void is an alternate dimension of some sort filled with horrible beasties that is bleeding into Runeterra's universe. The Shadow Isles was what happened when an act of necromancy corrupted a blessed spring and caused a localized zombie apocalypse, in a nutshell. Here's a good resource for all the regions: https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/regions/ For the Shadow Isles in particular, Kalista, Hecarim, Thresh, Maokai, and Yorick's bios shed a good deal of light on its backstory.

J4 isn't dead, but 1 and 2 are. There was a time when he was presumed dead though, after he had been captured by a group of Noxian soldiers.

Some champs do know each other, generally only within their factions however. The League, as previously stated, isn't a thing, so there's no convenient meeting place. That said, MF once fought alongside Lucian and Olaf during an incursion by the Shadow Isles into Bilgewater, and Taliyah trained with Yasuo for a time. Those're the most significant inter-region interactions I can think of off the top of my head.

Hextech is based on the soulstones of the Brackern, Skarner's kind. It's still fairly mysterious, though a lot of Piltover-related stories (Progress Day and Camille's stories come to mind) feature it.

Grimm Howl11/17/2017, 4:17:31 PM1 votes

But after seeing the recent music video for the song ''Legends Never Die'' (absolutely amazing song by the way, Rito always makes the best music) where we can literally see Garen dragging a GIGANTIC stone statue around like it's not much.

So, as you can read in Galio's lore. Demacian's drag massive statues like these onto battlefields to hinder their foes using magic. You can see in the music video that it is portraying how Ashe, Garen, and Lee Sin trained and trained to get to where they are now. Garen at first in the video couldn't even budge the statue as he pulled on the chain. After more and more training to become the skilled warrior that he is now, he managed to start dragging it. It usually took a platoon to drag Galio to the battlefield, and he's 300 tons.

Speaking of which, Demacian Steel, according to the lore (again I do not know if Demacian Steel is a recent addition), drains magic very fast, making Garen a nightmare for any mage wanting to fight him, I guess, but what are the limitations and exact properties of Demacian Steel?

Demacian steel is a result of mixing Steel with Petricite, the anti-magic stone from the petrified trees surrounding Demacia and why it was founded there. It gives their armor and weapons anti-magic properties like Galio, absorbing or weakening its effect. Petricite is a new addition to Demacian lore, but the Demacian steel/silver is carried over from the old lore, given an explanation with the petricite.

so could Fiora stand a chance against Jax?

At the end of Jax's new short story, it describes Fiora stepping up to challenge him, but we never get to read the fight or how it turns out. In case you were interested in reading the story. https://universe.leagueoflegends.com/en_US/story/jax-color-story/

Here comes one of my biggest concerns about the LoL lore: The League itself. I think this might have been a controversial topic too, but is the ''League of Legends'' still canon? If I remember well it was created to put a term to political conflicts and etc... But, let's be more specific even, are the ''Summoners'' still canon? My problem with this is that if they are, and they are controlling the champions, then this means the champions aren't really all that cool, or real, while we're at it... Do the champions even exist? Or are they just ''Legends''?

The League of Legends aka the Institute of War is no longer canon, but Summoners are in fact still canon they just don't control any of the champions. The champions do physically exist within the world of Runeterra, and are not simply legends. You could simply call them the heroes/villains of Runeterra.

Do champions usually all know each other? not necessarily personally, but if the League is canon, then one would assume they all know eachother, from Garen, to Graves to Janna, to Mordekaiser, to Warwick

No, they know of each other within each faction vaguely. Even Warwick who exists in Zaun is a scary story that turns out to be real once encountered by criminals. Mordekaiser is thought to be long defeated in Valoran after the proto-noxians claimed the Immortal Bastion at the end of a war that they allied with every other faction in Runeterra to bring him down. No one knows he's back, chilling on the Shadow Isles, growing in power. We haven't seen Garen interact with anyone other than Jarvan IV, Xin Zhao and Lux really in his lore, so he might not even be familiar or know of Lucian, Vayne, Shyvana, or Sona. I can only assume he knows of Fiora because she's from another noble house, and probably Poppy/Quinn because they're part of the Demacian military. Janna doesn't know anyone to be honest because she's a wind spirit. Graves interacts with MF, Gangplank, and TF in lore, and that's all we have mostly on him.