One League of Legends fan discussed the Sentinels of Light event in a lengthy Reddit post yesterday, arguing that Runeterra’s lore was adversely affected by “skin politics.” And now, lead champion producer Ryan “Reav3” Mireles has responded.
The fan complained that the selection process behind which champions joined the Sentinels, like Graves, Vayne, Rengar, and Pyke, was determined by how popular they are and how well their skins would sell. While other champions, like Soraka and Taric, would be more likely to try and save Runeterra from Viego, their cosmetics wouldn’t be as successful, the fan claimed. Even though Reav3 admits that a return on investment (ROI) plays a part in the decision, Riot also wanted the Sentinels to be formed by a “ragtag group of champions of various moral alignments.”
“[Senna and Lucian] don’t have the means or time to go all around Runeterra finding the perfect Champions to join,” Reav3 said. “I think it’s a lot more believable and realistic if it feels like a ragtag group of Sentinels they happened to run into as they travel around Runeterra trying to to stop Viego. We could have easily made a group of equally popular Sentinels that were all morally good aligned, and the perfect champions to join, but that would have been predictable and boring imo and lead to a lot less interesting interactions and dynamics between the champions, especially over a 15-20 hour long visual novel.”
Reav3 compared the Sentinels to the Guardians of the Galaxy, Mass Effect 2, and even X-Men, groups of morally diverse characters that “put their differences aside to fight a world-ending threat.” This leads way for more dynamic storytelling and interactions.
Events like Sentinels of Light and Spirit Blossom take up a lot resources and time, so Riot has to make profits in return. But Reav3 asserts that the devs “would never let ROI drive us to choosing champions we felt ruined our lore, or champions we felt didn’t make sense in the narrative.” The devs had a long list of champions that they felt would be exciting selections for joining the Sentinels or being ruined by Viego, narrowing it down to a good mix of high, medium, and low popularity champs.
The Sentinels of Light event kicked off yesterday and will run until Aug. 10.
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