Kassadin MTU: Will He Have Legs?

Garentheon·Feb 2, 2015·6 votes·2,118 views

He's getting an MTU instead of a full blown VU. Nothing we can do about it now but hope it'll be the best MTU we've seen so far. And hope (o God I hope) he FINALLY gets legs

31 Comments

4nth0l0gyFeb 2, 20156 votes

I dunno, I kind of like him floating. If he has legs but floats anyway, that's cool with me. I'd also be fine if his legs have been lost to the void and he had some sort of cool void effect going on below his coat.

SmokinSickStyleFeb 2, 20153 votes

What, you are telling me that one of the OLDEST champions with the OLDEST models in the game isn't receiving a Visual Update but a petty TU plus?

Jesus christ Riot Hire this guy already:

http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=141677

I cannot believe it, are you sure of what you are saying?

You know you can count his VO lines on 2 hands right?

TU don't get new VO....

This is extremely disappointing if it's real.

GarentheonFeb 2, 20156 votes

I actually think that design is not good at all. Imo

But yea, check out the first Riot comment

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/s3Ae7ec8-champion-updateiupdate-13015

TwoDFeb 2, 20151 votes

Yeah that is not very good, like it looks nothing like Kass at all...I would hate it if Riot made it look like that.

SmokinSickStyleFeb 2, 20152 votes

I'd rather have that instead of the cardboard armor Kass we have now.

TwoDFeb 3, 20151 votes

I don't know man, but this isn't good at all lmao

GreenLoreFeb 2, 20152 votes

Well Kassadin has 10 lines + 3 laughs(counting the selection quote) But others have it even worse. I mean just look at alistar,the dude has only 8 lines and 3 laughs,or singed who has 9 lines(and 3 laughs)

SmokinSickStyleFeb 2, 20151 votes

In fact i'm also quite upset of this favoritism, i mean, some champs get VU but no VO despite needing it badly.

When Nasus got his (Just VU no gameplay one) he got a new VO, and ironically many people were against it because his old voice was godly, and since his VA had passed away they took another guy to do the VU's VO.

Why some champions get VO along with VU and some do not?

Singed and Alistar didn't get one, and Tristana did (Her only gameplay changes were pretty poor as 3\4 of her kit is still the same, so it's not a real overhaul like Sion's).

This seems quite disappointing of Kassadin not getting a new VO, you can totally hear he doesn't have modern quality VO.

I wouldn't be surprised if his abilities VFX wouldn't change either because they changed them with his "rework" (More like The Guttering).

GreenLoreFeb 2, 20151 votes

The thing is that they usually do a complete VU when they also change the inner model of the champ,if the champ just gets a new outer appearance,while keeping his inner model the same,then they'll just get a TU/MTU

In the case of Nasus they said that it was mostly because he got his legendary skin and they could use the new rig of the legendary skin as a foundation for the complete VU,thus making this easier than most other complete VUs.

Overall small scale updates are largely a new thing. They were rather rare in 2013(only the ones for anivia and rammus) and started to increase in number after the Karthus VU. Riot most likely realized somewhere around this time that full VUs take too long and decided to release some small scale VUs,while concentrating their resources on champions who need a full VU for more reasons than just "outdated model"(like champs who also need a gameplay update and thus need new animations/ability effects)

SharjoFeb 3, 20151 votes

The reason not everyone's getting expanded VOs is because in order to get everything out the door at some point they have to do what they can. Right now they have a lot they can work with in the modelling department so they went with that so as to bring up his visual quality now and add that VO later.

Keep in mind VOs today are hundreds of lines long and are spoken in multiple different languages, not just three or four but over ten languages. Over ten. That takes a shit tonne of time to do, more so than almost anything else involved in a VU.

DwarvenGiantFeb 2, 20152 votes

I still disagree with ChampUp Team, with that they are not giving him a full VU, but a Maokai or Singed-scale MTU. Well, since he's getting something in the lines of Alistar/Singed/Sona/Maokai, it's very unlikely that he'll receive any rig updates, which are required in order to make legs, floating or walking. They MIGHT update some of his animations (like walking/floating), with the current rig, but they'd need to remake the rig or at the very least edit it, and they've never done that with MTUs, or else they'd have been much closer to full VU. :/

Who knows, they might still change their mind about giving him a MTU and go for a fully blown VU, I'm optimistic.

GreenLoreFeb 2, 20151 votes

I doubt that they change their minds now. Keep in mind that these announcements don't mean that they are now starting to work on Kassadin&Ryze,but that these 2 will be the next ones to be finished(ryze was already confirmed to be in production in fall 2013).

So that means that Kassadins update is probably close to being finished already and if they suddenly decided to go for a full VU now,then they'd need to throw a lot of their work out of the window and start almost from scratch.

DwarvenGiantFeb 2, 20151 votes

I don't think that, theoretically, if they changed their minds, they'd throw everything they've done and start from scratch. I mean, unless they want a new design for a full VU, they would only have to make a new rig and set of animations for the model that was intended to be for a MTU but was instead made into a full VU.

But who knows, they might change their minds, and they might not. I mean, they are doing MTUs instead of full VUs because rigging and animating takes a lot of time of the process, so they decide to ship smaller-scope VUs (the MTUs and sometimes simply TUs) from time to time, and I don't think that they'd change Kass' design much whether he'll have a MTU or a VU. What I mean is that if they had a new design for Kass in mind, in which he'll have (that is just an example) a huge pair of hands and a machine gun, they'd make a new rig, which (if you combine particles and Voiceover) will make his update more or less a full VU. If he'll have a few changes in colors/armor (Design-wise of course), they would go for a MTU, and that's what they are aiming for, meaning his anatomy and design (armor, weapons) won't change much after the MTU, meaning that it wouldn't be much of a problem to take back what they said (in theory) and give him a full VU, re-rigging him and making a new set for animations, for the model that was supposed to go with the MTU (since this is the final design they have in mind for him).

Also, GrumpyMonkey did finish only a model for Ryze in fall 2013, but they never continued his VU until recently, so he wasn't really in production for a year and a half. Same thing happened with MF- One of the ChampUp Rioters (probably IronStylus) confirmed that she had some assets ready for a MTU at the very least, but that they put her on hold, if I'm not wrong.

(I hope I didn't make my point too many times. Sorry if I did.)

SharjoFeb 3, 20151 votes

Technically they could add legs and then just not animate them, I mean Malz's legs barely move at all when he floats. And while new animations are unlikely, he'll probably have some tweaked animations to make them cleaner and be more prominent.

DwarvenGiantFeb 3, 20151 votes

Yeah, you're right. Tweaked animations are very likely, though if they wanted to give him legs without it looking awkward, they would have to rig and animate them.

KingsgraveFeb 2, 20151 votes

I thought that they confirmed that he is getting a full blown VU minus the VO...

I read the riot responses and none of it seemed to say they were giving him an MTU.

GarentheonFeb 2, 20151 votes

All I could say is try reading it again

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/s3Ae7ec8-champion-updateiupdate-13015

KingsgraveFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

All I could say is try reading it again

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/s3Ae7ec8-champion-updateiupdate-13015

Also when they're themeatically "safe". Nasus was done in this way. The legendary skin enabled his VU. These MTU's are usually built on what we have, existing rig, tweaked animations, etc. The reason being is that if we made them as high scope as full large-scope projects, you wouldn't see them for a year or more. We simply can't accomodate doing 8 Sions a year.

While yes, a lot of these champions could benefit from complete tear-downs, we have great opportunities that present themselves. In Kassadin's situation, Tokkelossie, being a big Kassadin fan, had made a completely new model on his own time. So boom, we had a start. Additionally, we started working with an outsourcer that has proven really, REALLY effective in making quality models, and we've begun to leverage them on skins, especially existing skins for VU's.

This alone makes me think that they are actually giving him a VU with new particles and new animations, the only thing they aren't doing is a new VO. If Nasus was basically an MTU with Voice, and Maokai and Alistar got MTUs with new animations and particles its not too hard to believe they are doing the same for Kassadin.

GarentheonFeb 2, 20151 votes

Nasus was not an MTU. He was just used as an example where they were working on something (his legendary skin) so they took advantage of this opportunity to update him.

Plus you ignored the part where IronStylus said his "VFX are in a good place"

All I could say is try reading it again

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/s3Ae7ec8-champion-updateiupdate-13015

BeatzBoyFTWFeb 2, 20151 votes

Umm, sorry, but what's MTU?

SmokinSickStyleFeb 2, 20151 votes

Model and Texture update, no possible VFX or Voice lines.

Take singed, he's got a new model+textures but his abilities stay the same.

Also no gameplay changes are made.

GarentheonFeb 2, 20151 votes

Also an MTU doesn't get new animations

KingsgraveFeb 2, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Also an MTU doesn't get new animations

Alistar got new animations for his MTU and so did Maokai

GreenLoreFeb 2, 20152 votes

Like which? They got new skill effects,but their animations are the same.

Duke AnaxFeb 2, 20152 votes

The first thing I noticed about the Alistar update was how his walk/run animations looked decidedly different.

KingsgraveFeb 2, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Duke Anax,realm=EUW,application-id=6kFXY1kR,discussion-id=o40VRi5y,comment-id=000400000000000000000000,timestamp=2015-02-02T20:38:21.801+0000)

The first thing I noticed about the Alistar update was how his walk/run animations looked decidedly different.

Yeah and his auto attack animation feels different as well.

GreenLoreFeb 2, 20152 votes

huh didn't know that. But it is nothing compared to the new animations given by a full VU

SharjoFeb 3, 20151 votes

Alistar had multiple running animations added, a new animation for his passive, and new AA animations, allthough they were more tweaked than entirely new.

Maokai had his run cycle completely redone from scratch because it was god awful before.

They also both had stop animations added for when they stop moving.

Kassadin has very few animations but because he's very floaty and stuff he doesn't actually need that much work done there. Of course we'd all love new recall, joke, taunt, laugh and dance animations, but animating can be quite the task, especially if they're using the same base rig like they did with Alistar and Maokai, which will be pretty flimsy to begin with.

Duke AnaxFeb 3, 20151 votes

Yeah that I only said the run was the first thing I noticed, didn't do a detail analysis (;

Also Animations are a thing that can always be added later piece by piece. Right now leaving them out gets them to the next rework faster, there still are quite some that really need to be done fast.

KingsgraveFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Like which? They got new skill effects,but their animations are the same.

Maokai's animations were all edited and improved, especially his walking animation where his whole body moves and the pacing of his leg movement is different compared to the old model. Same with Alistar.

GarentheonFeb 2, 20151 votes

Running animations. That's barely anything seeing as full VUs get new laugh, joke, dance, running, attack, ability, death, and recall animations