A Response to "Champion Update and the Flawed Fencer"
I just read through the article, and there was this one thing that I REALLY did not think that we as a community got through to you Riot (Not pointing fingers here, either we weren't clearly conveying what we wanted, or you weren't listening, or maybe both, I don't know). You talked about how during Fiora's visual update, you had a vision of "her haughtiness and her better than thou attitude" and how you didn't feel like you accomplished this when you released her, and wanted to try again. You tried making everything about her sharp, as you stated, and you were surprised on how unanimous the community detested the new ideas. And then here's where the problem shows up
You believed this to be because the community had a different vision of Fiora than you
Now it in part could be corresponded to this, but that is not what we hated, not even close. We just thought it was flat out ugly, and little more. Let me give you an example
I main Garen, I think he's pretty cool, and (for this example) let's say his model and splash art is too outdated, and needs a tune up, so you go out and try to find what Garen players think of Garen. Personally, I think of Garen as this man who fears nothing. He'll go in for a 1v5, he'll dive straight past 4 enemy team members to smite the villain, wading right into the fight, he will never fall, and will chop through every enemy into the name of Demacia!
Armed with this information, Rito Games goes out and tries to the best to re imagine what Garen players think of Garen, and ends up making this:
http://s18.postimg.org/hutpn3dbt/gayrone.png
He fits the criteria for what he was imagined to be, he don't fear nothing, and he will not falter, but it's just... ugly. There's no other way to say it.
In your attempts to make what makes Fiora Fiora, you made her a caricature, her face looking like that one lady from 101 Dalmations, her spine approximatly having as many vertebrae as Zac, and just in general, looking more like a joke than anything.
At least those were MY thoughts after reading the article
