Hmm I suppose so, I've just become so disenchanted with the community in general that I sorta lashed out a bit there, I apologize.

np, as you can see i'm at least as disabused by the community than you... You came out and said to Katsuni that you appreciated her thread and that she wasn't really wasting her time since some people actually enjoyed reading it and are telling her...

On my part, I actually told her that some peoples actually READ it... I've been on this forum (on and off) for nearly a year and there are things that never change... There will still be peoples that come to this subforum only to create a champion based on their favorite champion (and most of the time the champion can be guesssed by looking at the one they present us). I tried a few times to interact with that majority but still had no feedback from them (and obviously I got feedback from the best designers imo...).

Sill, I'm not giving up, only changing my approach. I,m trying to befriend 3-4 reds (and at least 2 of them as game designers) to understand better how Riot works and how we could actually use the concept forum to influence (read as help) them, similarily to how the way PBE works, but for concept creation. So basically, instead of trying to raise the average level of concepts (what Katsuni is doing), I'm trying to help the good concepts shine. However this is still a WIP, more details will come once I manage to plot it out...

Soon : Occupy CC

Well, maybe I guess, but thanks. People rarely are grateful for things given to them, especially when it comes to the LoL community. I'm surprised, mostly, that I've only had one person actively complain and insult me for trying to help.
I would argue that the designs we can achieve here are probably not more complete than those in game, but it will provide more consistently good quality, if nothing else.

The lore on a lot of the most recent champions, for example, leaves something to be desired... mouthwash, specifically, when it comes to Jayce.

Still, there's so much more that goes on behind the scenes in creation that isn't visible to us. After all, many people on the forum here, honestly still believe that Riot actually makes champions in 2 weeks, from the time they announce them, to the time they're released.

Regardless, on the matter of champion preferences, that's a personal topic which tends to rely on the individual, and some things just don't really count fully; I think we can all agree mundo is awesome and that a Gentleman Cho'gath plush toy to squeeze would be <3 no matter how "manly" yeu think yeurself to be XD

As for the "wall of text" syndrome, in a way, yes, yes it is just as yeu said. The original "small" version was put up on the front page by several requests (including one from RiotAmes) for a "small" version that could be browsed over quickly and give the reader at least a quick, brief overview if they just needed the basics.

The full length articles are more or less much of the same, but often go into far more detail, much of which isn't actually covered in the original short versions. Some of it's just expanded concepts, some of it's new stuff, it depends on the topic as some are easier to say the core points in short detail than others =3
Yeah... a lot of people are growing frustrated with it. I know our "council" for reviewing champions pretty much died when over half of them just gave up on the community entirely.

I will confess that there is a certain truth to the idea that it's not worth the effort. In other ways... there are a handful still here that do deserve the effort, and while it may be likely less than a dozen total, it feels wrong to me to just abandon them because they're stuck sharing space with others who don't care.

It's sad to see people like Echoing, ElementSteel, Villanova, and a lot of the other people who I used to enjoy reading the posts of just... poof. It's disappointing, in a way, but I don't fault them for giving up, either. It's a harsh crowd, and most don't give much hope for redemption; the majority are self-interested with no care for anyone else, they won't lift a finger to help someone else unless they're paid upfront (I'll only review if yeu review me first! kind of mentality -_-; ), and for the most part, it's painful to realize just how little interest the community has in the better ideas on here.

As I was telling someone else earlier in this thread... good ideas get ignored. People don't say "nice work" or "good job" on something that's done well normally. If they do comment, it's very brief and more or less useless. The only time people tend to swarm to an idea, isn't because it's good, but generally because it has pictures or a red post to draw them in, and then they stick around mostly to complain about how bad the actual idea is, and it mostly just goes back and forth between those who blindly say it's awesome, no matter how bad it is, simply because it has pictures or icons, and those who point out how terrible the idea really is without those.

That's... how you get attention around here, as quality work doesn't earn you praise.

Despite that, there are those who want to better themselves anyway, and learn to be more than they are, without simply catering to the "ooh pretty pictures" crowd. There are some on here that legitimately want to consider really getting into the business, and though the chances are that my time's up, and my career over before it got to really begin due to circumstances outside my control, I'd like to at least kindle that spark of creativity in them and give those who deserve it a fighting chance and a goal to dream higher than they thought otherwise possible.

Maybe I'll get lucky within the next month, and be able to use the few contacts I have at Riot to get me work, or maybe I'll actually be able to get enough leverage at home to set up rules so that I'll be physically able to work from home on indie developments to get the experience I need to go elsewhere.

Most likely, I probably won't, but it won't stop me from trying. Most likely, those who try to reach for their dreams will falter and fail, or be pushed back by a tide of those who would rather hold them back than see them succeed, but once again, sure, there's a 99% probability that yeu'll miss all the shots yeu take, but it's 100% if yeu don't take any. And really, yeu never know. Sometimes yeu actually nail that 1%, and it turns out alright.
Well, good luck in that. I know I've spoken with RiotAmes a few times on the matter, and while Riot's pretty adamant about not using the information we have on the forum here, they are interested in giving us more tools to work with, such as a bit more information from the design team. There's a remarkable amount of red tape to cut through, however, and some strong opposition about providing anything to us, due to a variety of reasons, such as legal issues, time constraints, and competitors gaining knowledge that would otherwise be bad to have.

Technically, I shouldn't even have written the guide, as it's the kind of information that DotA2 could use to actually make itself into a worthwhile series. The designs they have are old, lacking, and for the most part just carbon copies of ideas that simply weren't designed at the level of some of the stuff on the forum here.

In a way, it's not that big a deal though; half the people who work on other MOBA games have probably worked on LoL before anyway. Such is the nature of the games industry; positions are highly temporary, with most contracts lasting 3 to 6 months, and anything you teach one individual has a remarkably high chance that it simply will get shipped off to another company within a year.

Consider things like Pixar... they've trained half the animation industry at this point due to their excessively high burnout rate due to their insane work ethic. Sure it's nice quality and all in the end, but it's fairly rare for an animator to last from one movie to the next without quitting on their own from the ridiculous stress levels of working there.

That knowledge then gets passed around, and their competitors overall grow in competency due to such as they gain more workers with that knowledge.

If you grow too large, you're almost guaranteeing such will happen, which is problematic on a company finances level, but then again, it's good for the industry overall, as well as for games as a whole.

After all, it's not like Riot employees have some magical hatred or ban against other MOBAs... take a look at Blizzard employees; they loved torchlight =3 I'm sure there's Riot employees who love DotA2 and Smite, Demigod and HoN just as much as their own game of LoL.

In any case, I kinda got off to ranting.

I guess I'd rather see all champions be more interesting, than just a few be made better, but it's also universally unrealistic to expect such, as well. Still, if both angles are worked at, it wouldn't hurt, likely.

Also... I don't understand the "occupy CC" if we are the 1% ^.~

/slowclap

Posting to give this some visibility. I'll find some time to look through it!

I thought you guys weren't allowed in these here parts. >_>

RiotAmes is different.

First off, RiotAmes has a badge of +127% increased awesome. It would've been higher but it was a signed integer and anything higher would've caused a stack overflow from the negative value ^.~

Second, QA Analyst is safe to escape from the problem of giving credit by the design team.

Third, it's not a champion, so the problem of providing attention to some champion designs over others probably won't occur so it's safer than most options would be my guess.

Regardless, thanks muchly! The post should manage to self-bump a bit easier now without paying as close scrutiny to it. After all, when it comes to posting, we all know DA RED ONEZ GO FASTAH!

<3's to RiotAmes though, hope yeu enjoy it, and hope yeu get uncluttered from the pile of work on yeur lap ^.^

It was a nice read, puts together ideas I haven't thought on; I have yet to find interest in actually creating a LoL character, but the premise of the guide is terribly intriguing and gives me a reference point that makes sense for all those 'rate my champion' threads

You have put a ton of work into this, it shows. You could do with a few more references but this isn't Wikipedia and its a more trustworthy base source than most.

and third... thank you for posting your 'about the author' section, Your story is important, I'd enjoy chatting sometime given a chance.

Well I'm glad yeu found enjoyment in such, if nothing else =3

Still, it can be difficult for the "rate my stuff!" problem. To be honest, I'm one of those people who thinks a 100% score should be something that's near impossible to obtain; if yeu have even the slightest mistake or "less than perfect" detail, yeu should get dinged for it. Even the majority of the stuff in game would be looking at scores closer to 65-80% from me if yeu wanted a percentile score XD

It's art, after all. There's no such thing as "done", merely "ran out of time", "ran out of patience", or "ran out of resources, such as money". Yeu don't "finish" champion designs, yeu "meet the project's objectives and move to the next one". It's not quite the same thing, as yeu can always do SOMETHING to make it better.
Yarr, honestly there aren't necessarily a ton of sources anyway that I can directly quote. It's a mixture of things learned in college (so no source link available), things that have been learned from books (another lack of a source link), personal experience (there goes three in a row), interviews from various individuals in the industry (where there's no way I'm going to be able to hunt down all of the links exactly and half of them aren't online, but are instead live broadcasts that weren't recorded anyway), and things said in posts or videos by Riot staff themselves (which are about the only things I could provide as solid reference sources, and yeu guys have as much access to that as I do XD ).

The 30,000 character limit was reached more than a few times on the posts as well, so I'd probably have to cut holes in important information to squeeze such in anyway, unfortunately.

So... yeah, references are nice, but unfortunately this isn't exactly just quoting a bunch of people, either. Some of the topics in particular, are almost entirely my own opinions or experience as well, so I can't exactly guarantee their accuracy, and can only state that "this has worked for me in the past, and here is the reasoning behind why I believe it is so".

Still, there's no guarantees on anything like this; design is still an artform, so there's no such thing as an exact science to work with. If I were writing a thesis paper on a scientific subject? Sure, but considering this is literally something you'd go to a trade college for, you don't actually write papers on these kind of subjects normally, and if you did, it wouldn't be a standard university fare with a ton of references.

All references do are state that "this is whot this other person said" and yeu can then shift that burden of proof towards their own larger work. If they've written a whole book or paper on the subject, then sure, yeu can use it as a crutch. I don't really have that luxury though on a topic such as this.

Still, I do try to use examples as much as possible to make up for such; it's a lot easier to show how something's supposed to work, than it is to try to explain it without. As such, I stuck almost 100% to champions that are in game, or ones I myself have created for these.

There's two main reasons for this, though other minor ones also apply.

1: I know my own champions inside out, and have studied the ones which are in game in detail to pick apart the reasoning behind whot they do, not to mention most of the newer ones have videos detailing why they are the way they are. If I used info from a champion on the forum, it'd be problematic in that I could misunderstand or misinterpret an idea, or it may in fact just be edited, possibly in relation to this guide, which could ruin the example.

2: People will recognize in-game stuff, and there's the advantage that if it's in-game, then it can show things as a more solid "this is literal proof that this is how yeu do things the right way", or as a "we all screw up, even Riot, so don't worry about it". Calling out other people's concepts wouldn't serve much of a purpose and would just be rude, so if I do mention someone else's stuff, I typically am vague about the details, even more so if it's in a negative light, so I try to avoid it as much as possible.
Honestly I didn't think it was that important, but in a way, it sort of is as well.

The reason behind why yeu ask a question can be as important as the question itself. The reason behind why yeu say a statement can be as important s the statement itself.

My personal experience, and why I am the way I am, is, in a way, important to understanding the mindset I have going into this project. There are going to be things I'm biased about, and things that won't necessarily make full sense without some background knowledge (though hopefully I explained such with enough detail for it to not happen often =3 ).

Still, maybe it matters to some people. I think my personal life is probably the least important section of the guide, as it has nothing to teach anyone in champion design, and I think my life story would serve better as a warning of "how not to live" than anything else XD

Maybe it does though, I dunno! At the start of the guide, I wasn't sure whot I'd even put into that section. When I got near the part where I had to.... I wasn't even truly sure whot I wanted to actually do with it. In the end, hopefully it gave some insight into things, but whotever.

Anyway, chatting is fun so feel free to add me on the game. If yeu'd rather chat in other programs than LoL, such as Skype, AIM or whotever, I would be fine giving the info out over the game, but not so much on the forum itself due to the spam that'd likely be associated with such. Last thing I need is more spambots bothering me XD

SPAM ALL THE THREADS!!!!!!

I added you on LoL because having a conversation about anything on or off topic on here just seems to take forever and may be more or less spam :P

Thank you VERY much for this. I haven't even played with character design, but I'm thinking about it after reading some of this. Proud to be in the same playerbase as you.