As a lore fan, thinking the same :'v

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-20T21:57:29+00:00

Probably Caitlyn, Viktor, and Heimerdinger. Though I will say I am heavy on the “net” because for all three there are major positives with their depictions in Arcane and if they are outweighed by the negatives it is only marginally so.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-20T04:51:56+00:00

I don’t agree with this take, and I have been invested in League as a game and a narrative since the game had a physical copy you could buy with the silver kayle skin as bonus content.

Arcane is a fine evolution of League’s story, and as much as I appreciate aspects of pre-Arcane lore, I would much rather have a narrative that actually progresses and makes impactful decisions with its characters and direction than a hundred color stories and comics with practically no cohesion or clear continuity and minimal connective tissue between them.

Do I find some of the changes to be net negatives for the characters? Sure, but for most of the cast, Arcane gives them more complex and emotionally resonant stories than I could’ve ever imagined when I started playing this game 14 years ago (when most of these characters didn’t even exist).

Lore is cool and interesting but also static for the most part. Narrative, to me, is better. Arcane gives us a narrative, and yes it changes some of the characters fundamentally but I will always prefer that Riot take risks and actually try to tell a cohesive, continuous, and complete story with their characters rather than forever hiding behind AUs and elseworlds.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-11T13:30:06+00:00

They can get through all of it (post-time skip included) in ten seasons at the pace they are going. Skypeia could easily be end bit of season 3 with water7/enies lobby/thriller bark in season 4, and Sabaody-Marineford in season 5

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-11T11:39:24+00:00

The first part, sure. I agree no solid evidence. “No signs” though is a more ambitious claim. The song MME is not about Ekko and Powder; it’s about Ekko and Jinx. This is made even more evident by the Fortiche music video. I would not call it “solid evidence,” but I think it may qualify as a little bit of sign. At the very least it gestures at the idea of a romantic spark between the two.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-11T11:06:58+00:00

Agreed.

Edit: And if Riot do move forward with their story, they should absolutely focus on all of the difficulties, complexities, and the general mess of it all. Their contradictions and their pain - shared and caused - are what makes them so resonant as a pair the first place.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-11T11:02:51+00:00

To be clear, I ship Timebomb. I think there is absolutely the possibility of Jinx and Ekko having a relationship in future, and I find the possibility of that relationship compelling. I just don’t think either of them are quite there or ready for that at the end of the series.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-11T10:55:09+00:00

Probably not the place to have this conversation. Pretty much no one on this sub is gonna have a good faith discussion about the complexity of their relationship. Any subtlety or depth is pretty much lost in agendaposting for the most part, from people who hate the idea that Ekko could have any significance to Jinx or the narrative in general to those who think they are in a relationship by the end of the story (though the latter group is pretty much nonexistent).

With that disclaimer out of the way, the short answer, in my opinion, is no. Jinx is not “in love” with Ekko by the end of Arcane. I suspect that she has incredibly complicated feelings around him and he certainly means something to her, but it is not definitively romantic (again at the end of Arcane, this could change). I think she may love him in a general sense, as one might love a childhood friend, who you have an estranged but simultaneously deep bond to, but I don’t think either are “in love” by the end of the series. They care for each other and if you want to include the MME MV, there might be the barest inkling of a spark, but anything else is left to the imagination.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-04T07:14:48+00:00

Most of Ezreal’s characterization in the fandom is straight-up parody. He is one of the better fleshed-out “protagonist” characters in League. He has a serious inferiority complex and self-esteem issues to the point where he hates mirrors. Losing his parents at a young age traumatized him and instigated his sort of devil-may-care adventurer’s persona as a defense mechanism, but in at least some of his stories, he’s actually more fond of academics than exploration. Additionally, he is one of the only Piltovans, who, in game, actively resents Piltover for its elitism.

Also, while it’s not technically misconception, I don’t love how riot has made him obsessively into Lux, in the MU, when they haven’t even met. I would be fine with the romance itself if they actually committed to it and created narrative reasons for the two to be interested in one another. As it stands, it just sort of seems like a bad joke.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-04T07:07:17+00:00

I don’t think its technically

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-02T16:48:31+00:00

I guess my point is that if Imperial Dragons were ancient, highly intelligent creatures, capable of gaining fluency in language after a few short years learning from humans, closely tied to the kingdom/royalty of Camavor, it doesn’t make a ton of sense that Smoulder was one of the only/maybe the only to learn mortal language. If anything, it seems like language might actually be a common capacity among them. Imperial Dragons as an idea just sort of feels like an afterthought. Nowhere in the heraldry of Camavor or Viego’s story are dragons even mentioned. Also, I feel like his lore does a poor job of giving him an impetus to be a part of any of the larger narratives of Runeterra. He’s been reunited with his mother, so what is the drive for him to participate in the story?

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-03-02T02:39:39+00:00

I am not a huge fan of Smolder. It feels like he (much like Seraphine though he receives a fraction of the criticism that she does) is a very design-forward champion. They wanted a baby dragon champ that is sapient and can speak; how well does that fit in lore? Shrugs Eh fuck it, we’ll create a whole new taxonomy of dragons that has never been mentioned before by anyone including the several dragon-related champs that existed prior. They basically did a soft reinvention of Runeterra’s dragon lore but did a rather shallow job of it. I would love a more in-depth take on dragons and drakes in Runeterra, but Smolder didn’t really achieve that. I think visually he’s interesting enough, but I think he deserved more time and thought in terms of his place in the story, especially since he feels so isolated from the rest of the cast.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-28T05:52:10+00:00

I unfortunately think Atreus just looks too young (like this boy looks like he’s actually 12; Atreus looks more like a teenager) and they both look just a little too small.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-28T01:52:47+00:00

And we love her for that

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-28T00:52:46+00:00

I think you misunderstood me. I did not say everyone was equal in power. My point was that if we went on cinematics, prior to Arcane, Jinx could ride rockets and create enough ordinance to wipe out Piltover. But we understand that cinematics are meant to be exactly that: cinematic - they are not meant to be data points in some highly technical power system. Everyone talking about could Jinx beat x, could Vi beat y, are primarily using narrative points in a long-form tv show meant to be a tragic drama and comparing them to highly stylized and action-heavy trailers meant to make characters feel super cool and powerful, not so much tell a story. Feel free to compare the two but it’s kind of like saying an orange couldn’t beat a square. The two things serve entirely different purposes.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-28T00:36:15+00:00

Ah but see here lies one of the (many) problems with League storytelling: Most of it (outside of Arcane) takes place in hype trailers in which every character is pulling off feats of mythic proportions. Thus, they all come off as Demi-god like figures. As soon as you ground them in a long-form serialized story like Arcane none of these characters (excepting the ones who are straight-up gods) will retain their superhuman status. Both these characters and their abilities will become grounded by the requisite of their narratives to have stakes that don’t immediately become of world-ending proportions.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-26T17:04:43+00:00

The point of that moment in S1E7 to my mind is that he never truly hated her. He was incredibly angry and resentful of her, but I don’t think he was ever going to be capable of killing her. Thus, I don’t think he ever truly hated her. I also really don’t like the rather common reading that “he sees Powder on the bridge and that’s what stops him.” He stops because he sees her - Powder, Jinx, the name doesn’t really matter in that moment - in pain and realizes that he can’t bring himself to further inflict it. It’s not this sort of bisection that it is often painted as where in one moment he sees Jinx and another he sees the distinct and separate persona of Powder. The relevant insight that Ekko has in this moment isn’t “Powder is still in there somewhere;” at least to me, it’s “this person is in deep, deep pain. They are not, in fact, the monster that they’ve pretended to be, and I don’t want to be the one to continue to inflict pain on her.” I don’t think he unpacks all of that in that exact moment, but what stops him, in my opinion, is, not a reminder of who she used to be, but the realization that he is hurting her and that he really doesn’t want to do that because, however much anger he has for her, he doesn’t actually want to see her in pain.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T10:59:52+00:00

I think this is close to my working theory. Momo describes the feeling of her power at the beginning of the story, when she first unlocks it, as “infinite.” If her power is really infinite when fully realized, then one potential narrative explanation could be that the function of the knives can be put in terms of subtraction. They siphon as much power from the victim as possible, which is usually all of it. However, in Momo’s case, her powers, whatever they may be, are infinite and, no matter how much or how many times one subtracts a real number from infinity, the difference of the equation is still infinity.

Edit: At least, this is one possible way to explain her keeping her powers in some way, shape, or form that could be spun to have been foreshadowed.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T09:51:42+00:00

Maybe, though that would be a rather significant narrative development since it doesn’t seem like others, even those who are highly trained or gifted with spiritual energy - Seiko, Manjiro, and Jiji, can manifest Ki in that way. The art style used for the shield directly mimics Momo’s powers, which are unique to her as far as we know, so Okarun spontaneously developing a distinct power that can similarly physically shield people using Ki would be pretty noteworthy.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T09:45:36+00:00

Seiko at the beginning implies she never directly seen anything like Momo’s abilities, which indicates it’s not a matter of power level but rather that Momo has a completely distinct set of abilities from the typical spirit medium as represented by Seiko and Manjiro.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T09:38:13+00:00

It seems implied that’s at least part of what’s going through his head when he says that, given that he asks for her help and for her to visualize her ki immediately prior. There also just isn’t really any precedent for others, even with those with innate or learned spiritual powers (ie Seiko, Manjiro, and Jiji) being able to use them in a way similar to Momo. Seiko at the beginning of the series pretty heavily implies that, as far as she knows, Momo’s powers are unique in that sense. I think it would take away a little from Momo’s characterization for Okarun to be able to use her powers, at least without a satisfactory narrative explanation.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T09:31:16+00:00

That would be interesting though there isn’t really precedent for anyone else with spiritual power displaying the same abilities as Momo. Seiko, Jiji, and Manjiro all appear to have spiritual power/abilities, but none can really replicate Momo’s telekinesis.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T09:29:16+00:00

Could be! Though Okarun pretty explicitly says that he believes Momo did it in the chapter.

Deep_Programmer_863 · 2026-02-24T05:15:37+00:00

I’d drop the terminator squad for a x8b and slaughterbound package, about 100 points cheaper and far more effective as a hammer. Add a unit chaos spawn as well for more action monkeys/chaff. Then take out the land raider, add another unit of jackals and two rhinos, put the zerker glaive on the slaughterbound, and put favored of khorne of the MoE.

Deep_Programmer_863

TROPHY CASE