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The Problems with Lore and How to Fix Them - From the Writer of "Facts, Myths and Theories"

dialMARK4acti0n·4/11/2016, 7:03:02 PM·79 votes·12,012 views

So, maybe you know me from an old written series of lore theory threads here in the Boards a while ago, in which case... Hi! How've you been? Nice to see you. Sorry I stopped posting theories, but life got in the way. You know how it is. Anyway, to those of you who aren't familiar with my work, I went pretty in-depth about the old lore, before it was retconned and made some theories about lore and such, but that's not really the point.

I've seen a lot of people criticising lore for sucking right now and I have to say I agree and disagree with you. In this post I'll be going over how what we've been getting of lore has been a good step in the right direction and the problems lore has right now and why it seems to be going nowhere, as well as proposing a fix for this.

Lore has been somewhat infrequent after the retcon, which is odd due to their addition of a Warhammer writer and I assume some others. We have been getting updated bios for champions in events and in reworks or new champion releases and honestly they've been quite good. They're long, detailed, explain the champion's story, motivations and goals very well and they even have some short stories at the end, showcasing the champion interacting with others and the world of Valoran.

We got the Bilgewater: Burning Tides story and The Harrowing story, which I believe were both very good. The first one in particular finally did what we in the community thought was unimaginable: a resolution to someone's story. In fact, two of them!

Graves finally found and confronted TF and both of them made peace with one another and became partners once more, last seen heading to Piltover to get Graves a new gun, since his old one, Destiny, was lost at sea after the climactic destruction of Gangplank's ship (which, fun fact: his new passive after the rework was named after his new gun, "New Destiny").

The other resolution we saw was that of MF's story. She finally got revenge on Gangplank and killed him, leaving Bilgewater in chaos. Or so she thought...

The best thing about these events, was not only seeing champions interacting with one another (Olaf and Lucian, MF and Illaoi, Gangplank and Graves/TF), but also how dynamic they felt.

Bilgewater: Burning Tides ended with the prologue revealing GP was actually alive, minus the arm, which was then adapted to the game by giving him a second classic, which was very cool and fresh to see League interact with the lore like that (even though people didn't like the disabling of GP, but hey it was just a week).

Then, the Harrowing event was practically a direct sequel to Burning Tides, by having GP's funeral, the aftermath of his death and its effect on Bilgewater, all the while MF is trying to gain control over Bilgewater and protect him from the Harrowing.

We also had a confrontation between Lucian and Thresh (FINALLY) and new details about what happened to Senna. Not only that, but Illaoi was part of the story, before she was even released, which was very cool and gave us something to expect when she was revealed.

And then, in Illaoi's bio, the short story dealt with what happened to Gangplank after his ship was blown up and how he regained purpose and was "reborn", having him interact with Illaoi.

This was something League's lore had been lacking. That feeling of being dynamic, consequences and continued stories and some resolutions along the way. In fact, I believe that those two monts were probably the best the lore in League has ever been. The Bilgewater event even had some cool interactions with the lore, like the icons and Butcher's Bridge showing up in the event and everything.

Before this, we only ever had some new champion's lore reveal something we didn't know on another champion's lore, with mystery leading up to nothing and so on and forth. I remember at the time of the Shurima event, a lot of people were disappointed when the new lore that was being developed led to nowhere.

But now, the way they've been going about this, there's the possibility we'll get something new. Maybe we'll find more about the Kinkou and Zed. Maybe we'll discover Vi and Jinx's past in Piltover. Maybe we'll finally see Yasuo finding the true killer and redeeming himself. And heck! Maybe we'll finally figure out what happens next with Sivir and Azir.

However, with all of this said, there is ONE big problem with lore right now. Two, actually, but they kinda mesh together.

The main problems with lore right now, is how inaccessible and infrequent it all is. Before, when you clicked on a champion page and went to the Lore tab, you saw something like this:

http://i.imgur.com/MCA2Zqy.jpg

which explains what that champ is all about in two paragraphs, setting that character up very well. But now, if you click on a champion with actual updated retconned lore, you see this:

http://i.imgur.com/hh5iKwb.png

A casual LoL player could easily be confused and disappointed by this, thinking that was it. But there's a problem with this even to more hardcore players.

If you want to see the full bio, you have to go to the offical League of Legends site and see it in the bottom of that champion's page or visit one of these micro-sites, whose links, after a few months, you have to ACTIVELY LOOK FOR.

This is by far one of the biggest problems with Lore. "Want to read Burning Tides? You have to look it up online or look for the pdf we released on the Boards."; "Want to read Aurelion Sol's full bio? Well, there's a link to the original release on the website if you look for older news, or you could simply go to the champion page on the website."

Well, you could say, "What's the problem, you can google it or look it up in the wikia." I'd agree with you, but I imagine actively having to look for lore online is a turn off for a lot of people and even though it's easily found by fans of the lore, it's kind of sad that we have to look for it instead of having it in a compressed space where all of it can be found, in the client. It's already a bit of a turn off for me and I'm the one writing this huge post about how much I care about lore.

Any other game would've had a menu for accessing all the lore (which we used to have back at the time of the Journal of Justice, but Riot dropped the ball on that and instead of updating it for new lore, erased that sub-menu). At the very lest least have the champion pages each include that champion's full bio. And I understand there's some technical issues when it comes to that, but if you have a writing department, maybe you should make their work more easily accessible somehow? I feel like there needs to be a better compromise than having all your lore outside the client.

Then, there's the problem of how infrequent it is. There was the Burning Tides event, then the Harrowing event a couple of months after that and then nothing for, what? Five months or something like that? We've been getting the bios for new champions and for full reworks, sure, but that's exactly what we used to get of new lore before they started doing these events.

And to top it all off, since the lore team rarely communicates anything (we had no idea there would be more lore in the events coming out before the micro-sites' release), we are stuck with nothing, waiting for new champs to come out or full reworks to come out to get anything lore-based, unless out of the blue the lore team decides to release the bio for a group of champs that are related in story (like the Targon "event?" that's going on right now, which I'm not even sure is an event at this point).

My proposal to fix this? Well, here are my suggestions:

  • Put some more Lore onto the champion pages.

  • Put all the bios and event storylines in the client in a sub-menu similar to the Journal of Justice or like the sidebar button we got for Worlds. (Or at least have a button somewhere in the client redirecting to a micro-site where all the lore is easily accessible through tabs like "Bios", "Events", "Videos", etc.)

  • Communicate new lore releases better. If you're going to keep up with this seemingly random schedule at least communicate why it is like that a bit better and what you're working on or when we can expect new lore.

I honestly think the steps Riot has taken since the retcon have been in the right direction, for the most part, but it seems like they're taking way too long to take these seemingly little steps in further developing the lore.

I believe that League of Legends could grow to be a very succesful IP in general, with some very good stories in the world of Runeterra, comparing even to Warcraft or Warhammer and that is why I made this post. I wanted to start a discussion on how lore has been improving in some areas and how it's been declining in others. I'd like to create a thread we're we can share our opinions on how lore has been and what places we think Riot should take it next.

I know some people reading this post couldn't care less about lore and just play the game for fun or for competitiveness and you'd be totally entitled to that opinion. But, I think we can all agree that we want LoL to be the best possible game it can be. And that includes its lore.

Thanks for reading!

#MakeLoreGreatAgain

TL;DR: Lore and lore events have been good recently and the writing department has been taking steps in the right direction. However, due to its infrequent releases, a lack of a dedicated space to keeping all the lore in-game or anywhere really and a lack of communication by the lore team, lore has been getting a bad rep and moving at a very slow pace to improvement.

81 Comments

OurLestrade4/11/2016, 7:14:22 PM25 votes

Part of the charm of the old lore was how it was pretty approachable whilst still having a bigger story behind it. The new lore is definitely well written and enjoyable, but my issue with it is that without the League of Legends itself it's kind of just a generic fantasy world with nothing setting it apart from a billion others. Having the League as a twist to the setting was what made it different if you ask me. Also, I think the new lore tries too hard to be all grown up and junk. Too much gore and stuff for the sake of it :O

ATastyDessert4/12/2016, 1:38:15 AM12 votes

Does anybody remember the Journal of Justice? We had Shaco stabbing people, including a journalist that wrote for the Journal. We had I think, Swain sizing up for an uprising or something. There was plenty of lore that connected champions outside of the League except they rarely ever updated it and decided to just scrap it entirely after a couple of JoJ entries.

RiotRiotJaredan4/13/2016, 5:25:11 AM12 votes

Hey, dialMARK4acti0n Thank you for your thoughtful feedback. I think your concerns are spot on.

This isn't going to be a satisfying answer, for which I apologize, as I can't give specifics on certain things that are being worked on by various teams. All I can say is that we share your concerns and we are working on solutions. By 'we' I mean Riot, not just Narrative, but we take our responsibility for delivering content of a higher quality, at an improved cadence, very seriously.

We worked hard last year to improve our quality (and we continue to do so), and to deliver on aspects of storytelling that we've had a lot of problems with in the past, as you outlined in your post. One of the ways we want to deliver improved content is through the updated champion introductions through the work done by ChampUp and Champion teams, as well as the work being done by Foundations on those Champions who aren't being taken care of by other teams at the moment. This work will sometimes be seen in clusters, such as with Targon, in a themed way that we think is cool and imparts more of the vision of the world at the same time as speaking directly to the character of the Champs. As you mentioned, this isn't particularly an 'Event' but a bundle of themed content.

The aspects (no pun intended) of delivering story content that we are still setting up are pipelines and resourced teams focused on 'pure' story pieces in various media. It's taking a while partly due to our very exacting bar when it comes to recruitment. We don't just want incredible writers (which is very difficult on its own), we want incredible Rioters, and that's a big challenge, particularly as we scale up our efforts on a number of fronts while continuing to do our best as part of the teams bringing new Champions and new visions of old favorites that are worthy of League, Runeterra, and you, the players.

It is a profound responsibility to find the right people who deliver excellence that scales while enhancing our culture for the long-term. We do this to protect the future for Riot and for the players. I understand the frustration at the cadence of specific streams of content, but we are unwavering in our commitment to building quality and sustainable consistency for a while to come.

I hope you will see and enjoy the results of some of the work we are doing in the next few months, including work from a Rioter or two that you won't have seen before.

When it comes to our story, our Champions, and our world, we absolutely want the same thing. Building the teams that can deliver improving content is taking time. But we are getting there.

Thanks for taking the time to share your feedback. I assure you, it is being heard.

Levik4/12/2016, 4:12:38 PM8 votes

The current lore is unsustainable. Now that it is character-centric as opposed to centered around the Institute of War means that it will always be infrequent and focused on a small group of Champions with a smaller "grab-bag" of supporting ones. Given the amount of Champions in League of Legends, it will be impossible to tell meaningful stories about each one in a way that is timely and satisfying. Furthermore, the "changes" they are making to the world through the new lore has lost all impact on us due to the fact that we have no idea what the world is like now. Sure, The Burning Tides was a cool story and all, but no one really cares since Bilgewater was a mystery to us. Furthermore, character growth is only as impactful as much as we already know the characters. Since we will never have enough time to really understand a Champion, any character growth is meaningless.

KING OF MASKS4/11/2016, 11:27:00 PM6 votes

I find it pretty impossible to take a game seriously when its lore and/or story content are inaccessible from the game itself.

Blue Moon Wolf4/11/2016, 11:57:58 PM5 votes

Honestly I'm worried we will never have another event like Bildgewater. Riot already said they have no plans to make Targon anywhere near as big as the Bildgewater event, I get that, but part of the reason I liked the Bildgewater event was because of how much was going on on top of the new lore (special ARAM map, Black market brawlers, the "choose your side" Icon thing they did with Freljord, Etc.). It even went so far as to temporarily remove a champ for lore reasons. All of that got me really interested in powering through the lore and read it all. I don't know if they decided to do less with the Targon event cause it seems like a smaller place (lore wise), but they aren't giving me much faith that we will have another lore event to the scope of Bildgewater.

Ethereal3114/11/2016, 7:32:42 PM5 votes

So you're suggesting the same thing that everyone else has for the past year? It's seriously a circlejerk at this point and there's nothing that we can do to stop it besides more waiting. Need I remind you that we're still waiting on the replay systems?

Darrosh Jewfist4/11/2016, 11:59:06 PM5 votes

I agree that the infrequency and having to tie lore releases to major events is a downer. There should be more regularly/systemic way of releasing lore. Like it or not, the Journal of Justice had a consistent release time that was bimonthly or monthly? I can't remember.

I think a big issue for me, and you touched on in your post, is that Riot does a poor job communicating who/what/where of the lore. For example, who expected Caitlyn and Morgana to get skins that communicate part of the Lunar Revel lore of the Wolf and the Serpent? Not to mention because the lore is so infrequent, it's almost impossible to get consistent info on champs.

Say a guy likes Udyr or Volibear. Those two basically haven't had any lore progression or updates since the 2013 Freljord Event _three _ years ago. At the current pace, it's very unlikely it will be approached again in the near future. How can you invest into a character when you know that once that open-ended story, only a few thousand words long, is told that they're tossed aside and left forgotten for years? YEARS.

Over all, I think it's just inexcusable that the infamous Dev Blog was 1.5 years ago and we still have Lee Sin with League and summoners in his lore despite comments saying those have been retcon. That inconsistency and poor pacing is embarrassing for a Riot's paid writers.

Rito Staff4/11/2016, 8:50:32 PM4 votes

Yup pretty much.

It could easily be fixed with an Explore Runeterra link in the header at the front page.

Having "Boards" next to "Community" is kinda dumb, you could make a drop down menu when clicking "Community" leading up to "Boards", " Facebook" etc

Giving space for something else more interesting in the header ("Story n' Art" which could lead to "lore", "champions design", " the new map of runeterra" etc etc)

Kubox4/11/2016, 11:42:34 PM2 votes

I think it'd be great to have all lore accessible from the launcher. Not only for veteran players, but new players as well.

Imagine a new player who finds himself really enjoying Gangplank on a certain free week. He builds up the IP to buy him then plays him some more and eventually, either through his quotes or simply out of curiosity, wants to know more about his lore. He opens up his page, reads some of it, until he reaches the part about the Bilgewater event.

From there, the client can offer a link to the complete event lore. The player can ignore it, or click on that link and get some more juicy tidbits about his champion. And then he discovers new champions : Graves, TF, MF, etc. He can go visit these champions now. Or, if the story itself interested him, he can read up on the aftermath, the Harrowing events, etc.

I feel like having lore be something anyone can casually get immersed into with a slight shred of curiosity rather than be the player himself having this need to know more would be such a huge difference for the game.

Placentas4/12/2016, 6:37:03 AM2 votes

I agree so much! There needs to be easier access to the lore via the actual game. It doesn't make sense. One of the reasons I got hooked on the game was due to the vast number of champions and their lores and the easy access to it.

Kadavik4/12/2016, 9:52:58 AM2 votes

Do you guys think that with the new client we might get better champion bio pages were everything is there? That would be a dream come true.

Ralanr4/11/2016, 10:27:25 PM2 votes

More interaction with the lore team would be nice. Even little tidbits like Twisted Fate's people are nice.

kitcat3004/12/2016, 5:14:01 PM2 votes

As far as I know, the reason that the lore is so inaccessible is because of tech issues. Even one of their lead writers keeps complaining about it.

Hopefully the problem will be addressed with the new client.

Ultimate Deadpoo4/11/2016, 7:08:58 PM2 votes

Even though lore isn't exactly the reason why I play this game, I do enjoy having a fleshed out character, as it makes the game that more fun to play as you can connect with the champion. This is why Aurelian Sol is one of the best champions to date as he has a fleshed out character and a lot of dialogue, which makes the game interesting. Personally I think riot should make every champion that gets reworked or new one get new dialogue like Aurelian Sol has, in addition to have a more fleshed out story.