Vipaka

Here is a character concept I created in the vein of the video game "League of Legends".

League of Legends Manaless Fighter Young African American Woman Role: Tank, Bruiser, Melee AD Carry (all mutually exclusive)

Design Concept

Inspiration

Gameplay

Vipaka was designed as a complementary character to Riven, the Exile. Like Riven, she will be a female manaless fighter with high mobility, no magical attacks, and AD scaling. The main difference between the two is how their passive interacts with their abilities. Where Riven’s abilities empower her auto-attacks, Vipaka’s auto-attacks will empower her abilities. Functionally, the interaction between abilities and auto-attacks will be similar to Rengar and Renekton. All abilities can be used at any time, but they will be made more powerful with her secondary resource. Riven’s kit was somewhat based on the Super Smash Brothers kit of the Fire Emblem character Marth. Vipaka’s kit is based on the SSB kit of the pokemon Lucario. There will be an emphasis on charge attacks, positioning, and throws.

In the tank case, it is expected that Vipaka builds 100 Fury to convert into Focus immediately to gain the maximum defensive bonuses. In the bruiser case, Vipaka is expected to shift from Fury to Focus frequently to gain relevant advantages (Greater power and manuverability of Fury vs. greater defense and team presence of Focus). The carry case is meant to have Vipaka use her abilities very frequently to stay in range of and attack an enemy, generating and regenerating Fury to keep her Fury-powered movespeed bonus high.

Itemization

Vipaka’s build path is meant to heavily influence what type of role she is capable of playing. Statistical bonuses and turned to prevent a Lee Sin ubermensch situation (that’s the plan, anyway). The dynamics of Vipaka’s abilities, especially her ultimate, allow a small amount of simultaneous defensive and damage stacking to be acceptable (bruiser). Since Focus bonuses affect only bonus stats and not total, you much stack defensive stats to make it powerful, which prevents heavier damage stacking. Due to being a Fury champion, Vipaka will probably scale better with Att Speed than Riven, but Vipaka will still have very high AD ratios which encourage straight damage. The carry case will probably be the one with the most room for experimentation, since Att Speed, Move Speed, and AD can all be used to enhance her innate strength.

Aesthetic Inspiration

I see Vipaka has a lithe African American woman between 19 and 26. In her fury state, she has abrupt, forceful movements in line with harder, faster martial arts. In her Focus state, her movements are smoother, more deliberate and acrobatic. Graceful. Visually, I believe the best comparisons for her emotions in her Fury state would be Juri Han from Street Fighter or Roronoa Zoro from the manga One Piece (specifically when he puts on his black bandana, shown here), only with less malice. In her Focus state, one of the better comparisons would be to Makoto, also from Street Fighter.

Narrative History

(Note, this uses much of the established League of Legends Lore. I am adhering to what is canon and taking liberties with small holes between events) Vipaka was born in Ionia as the younger sister of the nation’s paragon of balance, Karma. During the noxian invasion of their island nation, Vipaka was caught in the middle of a counter attack against Noxian troops led by a woman with a large rune sword she would later know to be Riven. As the ionians were able to attack the squad of noxians, the entire field was doused in Zaunite bio-chemical gas. Zaun is an ally of Noxus and everyone knew it. Vipaka was far enough away to escape the brunt of the poison, but close enough to see the look of pain and anguish on the faces of her people and the Noxians.

Realizing that this madness was causing her to feel sympathy for the very nation that had been terrorizing her people, Vipaka became more angry than she had ever been. After being found and rescued by the rest of her family, the fury only grew. Even after training at the Monastery to understand and channel her anger, it only grew and grew. One day, as all were afraid it would finally consumer her, she bellowed to the heavens in a great and terrible shout. The clouds opened and the ground poured wisps of blue aether. Vipaka had tapped into the very heart of Ionia, its most primal, raw, and pure energy. She understood then that the fury she felt wasn’t just hers, it was that of her people, her land. By understanding it, she could finally control he roiling emotions of an entire nation. Vipaka had become the Wrath of Ionia.