This is actually both true and false - variety is great, but within a range that has grey edges. Making something that's a rolling snail is different for the sake of different, it's not both different AND cool, which would be the goal here.

Fiora is popular? I am actually very surprised by that. I haven't really seen anyone play her past the release hype.

My response to this is a pondering of a potential middle ground?

I'll return to my Lord of Change example. A Lord of Change is certainly more grotesque and darker than most champions in League, but he's still very distinct and not TOO grotesque. A Lord of Change is a very palettable "monster" that, if adapted for League of Legends, would really fit in quite nicely I would think, particularly with the number of "bird champs" in the game?

I mean, the idea of something resembling a Lord of Change coming from Morgana-land, or the Void, makes a whole lot of sense to me. It'd be darker but not unpalettable. I think you'd see a lot of reception to it, especially if it had a cool kit.

I mean, I agree with what you're saying 100%, but I'm curious if you have metrics to indicate what % of the population that owns "grotesque" champions own 1 or more skins for that champion?

I know I personally definitely have most of my skins on grotesque, monstrous champions or champions that can be grotesque/monstrous (I don't think I've ever played Shyvana or Cho'gath with their default skins, for example, because I like their skinned aesthetics so much).

Do you even play this game? I see WAY more Lulu's than Fiora's. In response to the person you were responding too, I see a lot more Naut's, Ali's and Amumu's as well. Why? They are cool champions with unique strengths. People will pick up on champions strengths more so than they will being "personable".

Look at the Rammus "Ok" thread. I think that goes to prove that even one of the most bland non humanoid looking champions is INCREDIBLY popular for that reason alone. Not so much anymore since his last nerf, but he's still banned/picked a lot...more so banned than picked lol.

This is also my experience but metrics are metrics. Certainly in ranked play Fiora is nearly non-existent -- I've seen one maybe since her release and she lost pretty badly.

I do see her on Dominion a bit because she's pretty powerful there, but Dominion is also less popular than SR if we go by queue times as an example (And I think Morello's own admission in another thread).

I don't know if grotesque or monsterish is the right way to describe it, but I do agree that I like non-human champions way more than human ones. I play more Kog'maw, Amumu, Malphite, and Blitzcrank games than anything else. They're not grotesque or disgusting looking, but they are unique in that they're not human and I like that. I think more people probably do than you realize, but I could be wrong.

Sure, the half-naked female champs with huge breasts are appealing to very many people that play this game, and that's because of the age demographic. I'm sure those same people would enjoy another non-human champ though

What's wrong with a huge collection of champions to choose from? And I mean in the hundreds number, not just one hundred. Why not make them all and have a huge collection of balanced heros with unique skills? That way we could fit in everyone's tastes and people could play their favorite type of hero, be it monster or gun-toting, skimpy female humanoids.
Also, I don't play LoL to personify myself with my champion. That's RP material and I tend to stay off RP realms in WoW. I play LoL for the strategic and competitive play style of each champion. I've played HoN, Dota 1/2 and LoL and there are certainly a lot of unique heroes/skills in LoL that makes me like it over the others, not to mention the fact there are unique player tweaks ala masteries/summoner spells. I'm digressing, but the point is that the character doesn't matter to me so much as his skillset. Hell, I can't even name where half of my 10 owned heroes hail from, I ignore the Lore altogether.

But the good kind of variety is also being killed off. I think Pulsefire Ezreal is the one legendary skin as of late that falls outside the purview of grimdark legendary skins. Blood Lord Vladimir, Gatekeeper Galio, it's turning really fun or tongue-in-cheek champions (Vlad is based on puns and vampire stereotypes, for god's sake) into dark edgy blood death satan monsters. It's completely ruining their character nature. I'm going to be seriously PISSED if, when it becomes my main's turn to get a legendary skin, I get Hellhound Blood Death Nasus, or Vengeful Spite Killing Lee Sin. It really, really sucks that fun, imaginitive skins like Pulsefire Ezreal are becoming incredibly few and far between, and that the tongue-in-cheek skins like Bunnygirl Riven literally require thousands of pledges of "yes I will buy this" before it gets made. Know what's awesome? Chief Justice Trundle. Know what's not awesome? That it will never be made because A) Trundle isn't popular and B) Because even if he was popular, seething revenge massacre Trundle would sell better. I'm tired of every skin being blatantly catered to baby's first fantasy experience. Irelia, the very champion you said in another thread was very non-sexualized, got a skin this patch where's she's sticking her ass out at us. Why? Because people want that. Even though it's completely against the character, and you know that.

Even the champions are starting to lose variety. Varus and Hecarim are typical dark fantasy badasses. Varus, the guy who supposedly hates Noxus with unimaginable passion, LOOKS LIKE HE'S FROM NOXUS. The only "fun" champions to come out any more are Yordles. What happened to the Pantheons and Twisted Fates and Olafs, who are obvious pop culture charicatures, but can still be cool? The only "serious" character of late that I have fun with is Viktor, and it's because I make a charaicature out of him myself. I like pretending that he's some crazy Soviet power hungry machine man. That's not really what he is, but at least his voice allows for it. If he ever got a skin, I'm sure it'd be some evil machine death Viktor, instead of Soviet glory Viktor.

I feel like this game is losing its appeal in the same (although opposite) way Team Fortress 2 has. When TF2 started introducing new items, they were based on the class, not the character. Pyro got Pyro stuff, Medic got Medic stuff. Then it changed, and they started playing to the characters rather than the classes. The Demoman is Scottish? Let's give him a sword like Braveheart! League has the same problem now, but in reverse. Rather than playing to champion personalities, you're playing to champion archetypes. You used to make skins that exemplified champion personalities in comedic ways. Now you're looking at your champions, and instead of saying "Vlad's a funny Twilight vampire, how could we make this even more funny and cool?" you're saying "Vlad's a funny Twilight vampire. You know what would sell more copies of him? If he was a badass evil vampire lord." Which is funny, because I remember a Riot post explaining the reason for us not getting skins like Cat Girl Ezreal or Teenage Annie being that it "took them out of character and had lore conflicts." So what, exactly, about Gatekeeper Galio screams "My father was brutually murdered in front of my eyes while I couldn't do anything, and now I fight for the heavenly righteousness of Demacia"? At least Corporate Mundo and Gentlemen Cho'Gath have the excuse of being extremely obvious community jokes. What's the excuse for all the deathly skins? I'm not really seeing one past "this is what sells well." And, to be honest, I don't think it'd be that much of a problem if it wasn't for the fact that it makes up 95% of all content we get any more. I'm okay with a couple of dark and cool skins. But when you have to make every single skin like that or it cuts into your bottom line? Now your marketing is cutting into the appeal of the game.

So dark fantasy is popular, I get that, it's why out of the 4 popular MOBAs, 3 of them are dark fantasy. But now LoL is becoming dark fantasy too, when it was supposed to be the fun, cartoony version of the genre. Now all the kids who've never played MOBAs have jumped on board, and they're begging for it to look like HoN. And you know what? That's great for your business, but it's KILLING the unique feel of champions, it's KILLING the tongue-in-cheek nature of the game, and it's KILLING the lore.

As a 2 year veteran of this game I AM NOT OKAY WITH THIS. I feel like Riot no longer values my opinion, I feel abandoned in my once varied selection of champions and skins, and I feel the surface design of this game is rapidly losing its appeal. But, I guess you guys are okay with that, since I already gave you a bunch of money for content I actually enjoyed. So I guess I don't matter any more, because there's 200 people willing to take my spot and give you money for your next hyper death killing champion or evil manly badass skin. Oh, and telling me twice that you'd get a designer to respond to my extensive thread about a champion I care very, very dearly about. That hurts just a little. Though I suppose at least acknowledging the existence is a long shot I should be happy about in this day of League mass appeal.

I'm curious Morello, I'm beginning to understand the point you're arguing here, but is the difference in champion appeal that drastic?

Do people really like champions like Sejuani or Fiora or Caitlyn, simply because of their inherent design (female, human, eye-candy)?

If you could give us some idea of how drastic the appeal is to the most popular champs than to those like Cho'gath or Urgot, it might help clarify your position.

Eh.

I really don't mind. Sure I adore niche champs ( Main's Viktor :P) With kits to match their quirkiness, But I kinda think the ratio from teen service champs and cool, unique champs is actually reasonable. Bit to much fanservice, but beggars cant be choosers. And this is coming form A person who will not play specific champs basted on aethstetic. Another point is that no matter the champion, the creative/animating teams always pulls off an amazing job. So I say, Good job morello. keep it up.

P.S 40k jokes...you screw up the fluff by one iota and I will be onto you -.-.