Though Varus has already taken over. When Rhaast takes over, Kayn's lines stop which would explain why Valmar and Kai can't speak. They no longer exist.
@@Wabinator No, he hasn't completely taken over. This is from his bio: "Even so, the human and darkin elements of this imperfect form are in constant flux, with each managing to wrest control for a short time before being reined in by the other. Varus fights to silence the two mortal souls once and for all, and wreak vengeance for the destruction of his race. Still, Kai and Val struggle against his malevolent influence, hoping against hope that their love can overcome the darkin’s hatred."
my headcanon is that it works like a steven universe fusion, when all the members of the fusion dislike or argue with each others the result is the voices are not fully merged, the mind too, so its like 3 people in a body trying to fight the others
I don't think it's Void, just evil semi-sentient goop in need of a host. Like Venom but more parasite and less personality. It makes you much more powerful but steals your life essence over time and makes you more aggressive and prone to violence.
He wasnt even corrupted. He was tasked with protecting the "magic evil goop" during the noxian invasio and what better way to protect the goop AND fighting the noxians at the same time than taking the goop inside you?
@@mohammadnaghizade3544 He successfully protected the goop, failed to protect his family, and then went to the goop and went "Hey I want to get revenge on all of these Noxians, that cool with you?" to which the goop responded "Yeah a'ight."
I think the chest strap is supposed to be an archer's chest guard, so the recoil of the bow string can't hurt you. And you'll probably need protection if you're going everywhere shirtless and sexy.
@@terry_the_terrible Yeah I'm not the biggest fan of League's design choices. The actual art direction of that chest strap is silly, but I can acknowledge that there is a point to it at least.
I just wanna take a moment to acknowledge just how fun of a phrase "chest strap" is for no reason. I think it's purpose was just to look cool, really. His original story had some liquid evil power eating his arms and legs and his sons broken bow to produce his powers, and they never gave him a visual update when they changed his story. I expected the original story to give me some way to explain it as a visual sell on his source of power- but that's his arms and legs and bow- Not some kind of magic coming from his chest. But it sure looks like a hole leaking magic from his chest. Imagine Tony Stark needing a chest strap.
Its also a left over from Varus' previous lore of having noxious kill all of his loved ones and willingly merges with the bow. As he had lost everyone he loved the cracked part is over the were the "Heart" was symbolically shown in the past. So its a visual indicator of his broken heart...Which he no longer has. Also RIP the only Symbiotic/True Merge Human/Darkin duo in League of Legends with the retcon.
In the song it shows how Varus shoots both Valmar and Kai in the same spot and then the darkin is created hence the hole in the chest, you can also see that the hairstyle of Varus is a combination of them too, (Kai’s or Valmar’s hair is tied up in the cinematic), I also thought that Varus created his arrows from the chest hole but im not quite sure about that.
Just really convenient that the "chest guard" covers the hole made by the piercing arrow in the cinematic. Made it easier for Riot to put off a visual rework for another 2+ years, eh?
Varus lore: Two lovers, desperately trying to fight a demon that possessed them. Varus voice lines: "The guilty will know agony." 😈😈😈 "Deliver them to their end." 🗡️🗡️🗡️ "Bloodshed carries a price." 🔫🔫🔫 Varus suffers from Yone syndrome in the sense that I can't hear his voice lines without laughing at how edgy they are. Mans really needs a VGU.
i find it annoying that when they updated his lore they never actually updated him in game. so he still has vo lines about how he has a poison slowly killing him or whatever related to his original backstory
God such a weird thing to put all this effort into making a music video then not actually using it as a chance to update the character in the game. Along with Annie who had a full blown 10 minute animation but still wears her 2000s kitty headband and backpack.
@@Dramatic_Gaming ironically, it was probably expensive lip service then. The animated cinematic is long and involved, would have been way easier and cheaper just to write it down. That said, yeah, he needs a VU, but not as badly as some other older models.
@@Jeddy027 and a short story. Really, the way they did it, you would expect a rework at this point. Some reworked champs get less love that what Varus got
Valmar and Kai flirting on the back when Vaarus carrying the battle. It was Vaarus when he fight the bad guys, but before he aimed at a kid they would say something like: "Vaarus, you know the limit." or smt.
I think a really simple way they could add just a touch of his lore into his character would be to give the hunters two distinct hair and eye colors, and then have Varus proper have two eye colors and his hair split down the middle with their two hair colors. It’d be a pretty minor but recognizable way to represent the split identities merged into orn body without needing to actually give him different bone structures on either side of his face or anything else drastic like that.
I realise this is a year old video, but I really don't like the retcon to Varus.. He was a straight married man and his wole drive was that he lost his wife, his kid, his village, he lost everything. "Beware a man with nothing to lose" And because he had nothing to lose he entered a deal with the demon bow, he took it willingly and he never faught it, he just wanted vengance, and in turn ended up with a symbiotic realtionship with the bow where they want the same thing and work together as one neither fighting for control, which had a different Dynamic to Aatrox (the darkin who has fully taken control) and Rhaast (The darkin fighting for control that can go either way). It made him stand out as having a different dynamic to the other two. Then the Retcon happened.. and Riot, LITTERALLY made a song and dance about having a gay character, except.. the retconed a straight man to do it and it's not reprisented in game atall. It's one of the worse cases of reprisentation coming across as shallow pandering/publicity that I have ever seen, and yet it's in the same game as one of the best cases of reprisentation having been done right with Twisted Fate/Graves who come across as authentic, charming and not defined by their relationship yet also shaped by eachother.. How did they do Graves/Fate so well, yet flop so hard with Varus? Ontop of that, the retcon also ruined his motivations, he still says "beware a man with nothing to lose" except Kai/Valmar have everything to lsoe, they have a loving familly and their village was saved, and they are even struggling for control to not lose eachother.. which also gives them basically the same dynamic as Kayn/Rhaast it's the same story just told worse, where as before they had a mutual understanding more like Venom/Eddie brock, which was far more interesting. Long rant and a year late but.. yeah.
I don't get why riot hates lethality Varus so much. Like, Katarina can have 6 viable builds but Varus building pure AD is an abomination that must be purged for some reason.
@@marvinafonso7713 I think they're afraid of Lethality Draven. A good middle ground for Varus would be to give his arrow crit chance that scales with distance travelled. It moves him into the same class as like "Galeforce/Collector/IE" Jhin
@@meow6750 i mean he can probably kill anyone who doesnt have healing in lane but he instantly dies if you come close to him. He has no way to run from you(except his ult) and is incredibly squishy. Also it is very difficult for him to carry games because he is very single target
As always, my complains with riot resumes in: They retcon the character in lore but in game they do not give a f*, so the champions almost ever looks out of place in SR.
@@terry_the_terrible Yeah, but it's so sad to see something about a character and be hyped about it, then you go play with and it's just... Eh? Feels like immersion breaking to me, they could do the whole package, I would wait and be happy with the results, honestly.
Yeah, it's a bit baffling that they did this Sion/Galio tier update to his lore. Which completely changed everything about his character & backstory. But does absolutely nothing to anything else about him. Varus needs an entirely new design & voiceover(s). Not have his previous stuff slapped onto this new lore.
They will never add in the two hunters game wise to keep China happy. They're happy to get brownie points for the lore update and will take the pats on the back but when it comes to pushing that lore or making it actually part of the game they won't.
If I were to design a League of Legends champion, it would be an ancient avian Ascended (Vulture or Secretary Bird-themed) who hunts Darkin and carries killed and/or sealed Darkin weapons she addresses as her siblings (and perhaps uses the echoes of their powers as her abilities). Maybe a bit of a classic Swain aesthetic, hunched with a walking stick, using ragged mummified wings like a cloak, fragments of the slain weapons chained into them (possibly partially or fully encased in gold). She could have an interesting relationship to Azir, warning against the dangers of rampant Ascended power but at the same time urging him to restore Shurima no matter the cost to mortals. I also just want something that even remotely resembles Isis representation in Shurima. Horus/Ra, Anubis and Sotek are great, but Isis' relevance lasted well into the Greco-Roman period and beyond. It likely would not work for one reason or another, even if I did one day magically start working there, but I have a character creation addiction so I cannot help it.
Finally, I have found my people... the ones that make their own champions and have like 20 note sheets with ideas that will probably never happen! God i wish Riot would make a fan-champion contest...
@@perapapic3683 I know what you mean, lol. But honestly, wouldn't mind seeing some new ideas for monster champions, especially after Riot openly admitted that we will probably get a new one once every few years because "it is a niche design" For example, I would love to see a new void creature, or hell, even the smallest of watchers taking over/transforming itself to look like the body of a frostguard soldier.
Setaka. You literally want them to make the Warrior-Queen SetaKa. She is both related to Azir, and has called upon Aatrox and the other Sun-Born during the void war. One problem I have with this is that you want her to kill the darkin and use their weapons, which is impossible due to how few darkins there actual are, and how neigh-immortal they all are (and the weapons have no power if the darkin dies). (Only darkins known to have died were from before they were trapped in a weapon). So for her to kill darkin and still manage to use their weapons, she would canonically have to be one of strongest characters in all of runeterra. Only way for that theme to work is to have her be a darkin that resisted the corruption and didn't go insane to thousands of years of solitude, and turned on the others instead of some darkin slaying waifu
The fact that Riot basically retconned a character into being Bury Your Gays, TWICE somehow, and expected to be applauded by the LGBT community for it is so sad it almost becomes funny. Almost. Also love that Taric (who was always treated as something of a homophobic joke by fans and devs) pretty much also continues to be that even after his VGU. Just absolutely fuckin disastrous
"Varus, *V-A-R-U-S* , your name should have an A and then another A... There was a memo Varus, *There was a memo!* "We all agreed on the double 'A' thing, Varus. *The double 'A' thing!* "
I forget who pointed it out but some of his skins like Arclight and Heartseeker seem to resemble Kai and Valmar from the comics and cinematic. Its not much but kind of cool they reference them or at least pointed back to existing skins.
He needs it tho, both redesign and a new lore, like, kayn is already all about fighting for his body, varus not only repeat that but makes the hunters almost irrelevant, since varus is the one in charge of the body.
Actually since they haven't updated his in-game voicelines yet, it's not even the darkin speaking, technically. It's the original Varus who is neither Valmar nor Kai nor even the Darkin.
Wouldn't it be neat if Varus, having possessed two people, had some body parts from both of them? Like, an extra arm or two that he uses to draw arrows while he's shooting with the other two, or two heads looking at each other, or something?
I feel like for characters in this situation you should discuss their OLD lore, the one that actually was supposed to inform their design, rather than their new retconned lore.
As much as I love him and don’t ever want him to change as my main, when they changed his lore from the lone Ionian guard who took up the corruption from the Pit of Palace (I’m certain I misspelled what it actually is, but the word palace will get across what it’s supposed to sound like) in a fit of vengeance and retribution against Noxus, to what it is currently, a model update needed to be accompanied to help really drive in the idea that Varus is a Darkin, as well as the amalgamation of three separate entities all vying for control
I believe the chest strap comes from when in the cinematic ‘as we fall’, Varus tears an arrow out of the chest of one of the hunters, and shoots it into the other, to bind all 3 together, and it leaves some sort of magical scar that needs covering.
Convenient scar cover? Yes. But the chest guard was there from before the lore rework, from before the man got shot through the heart with a Darkin arrow.
The thing I don't get about Varus's lore rework is that, like... the old lore was good? Real good? And more importantly, completely compatible with the two things that were apparently important to add, I.E. the link to the Darkin as opposed to a generic sealed evil and the Archer (Varus was the human in the original lore as opposed to the bow) being gay. Literally all they had to change was "The evil sealed away was a Darkin and also the family Varus is avenging included a husband instead of a wife." Bam. Done. Great, classical story of grief and loss driving people to dark actions and the path of vengeance costing your humanity literalized in Varus slowly losing his body and mind to a sapient evil bow who's stoking his rage and hate. But instead we get... Ménage à Trois body conglomerate, with one gay man *successfully saving* his lover, completely undercutting the corruption part of the story, and also any semblance of relationship between the Archer and the Weapon because the two *don't want to wield him and only ever wanted healing, not harm.*
How is it raast and aatrox get cool voicelines in their character and varus….”the bow awakes” “ I rarely miss” “the soul something” like bruh teemo sounds more threatening and interesting then this champ whole voice line collection
I remember this being quite the complaint when they rewrote him. It always felt like lip service to inclusion rather than a genuine attempt at making a lore the fit the in game. Or vice versa. It feels like an aspiration with no follow through
If I recall that's where the arrow struck the one Ionian hunter. The upper body is because the Ionian hunters keeps the darkin somewhat in check as they made an agreement, so the blood magic morphing focused on what varus need to use for mobility and fire power.
Is funny I remember the old lore of varus before the update one and that also doesnt explain why he is half naked... It only explain why is purple instead of red darkin
To me Varus is an example of bad LGBT representation in the game. Everything outside the main thing is great, he got his own music video showing his story for Christ’s sake. However, in the area where people will have the most interaction with him, there’s nothing
There's actually interaction within them. just not currently on the surface. My guess is that Riot will create the other darkins(it was mentioned that there are 5 darkins, Aatrox, Rhaast(?), and varus were revealed) in order to complete them and make an event (just like ruination).. I think they're just taking it slowly like how they eventually unveiled the Shadow isle story after so many years
@@javxion6576 No character was made for a gender. Characters were made for their own story.. their gender is not smth that everyone should be bothered about because it's not all of who they are. To me Varus being formed by two gay couples does not change the fact that it is a well written story that give depths and hints about the Darkin war.
I always interpreted the necklace as a momento from his dead family back from his old lore. You know, that stereotypical-revenge-plot old lore. There was also something about an owl symbolizing protection that was once a part of his model as well (I think it's a tattoo on his non-dominant arm?), but I don't remember all of the details. His design never felt like a total Ionian monk type. He seemed more like someone from the surrounding village who was born into defending the Pit of Pallas or was picked to defend it due to his archery skills. In old old lore, he had a family (wife and son) who had nothing to do with the Pit before their deaths, so...
Varus still focuses me. All this promotion with an amazing, hauntingly beautiful music video and riot going "HEY GUYS VARUS BE GAY YAY" and then.... Nothing. Did they ever stated if Varus is getting a visual update anytime soon?
I miss the previous story. When Varous was a family man who wanted revenge from noxus because his family was killed and grabed the bow and his soul turned black
As someone who didn't know anything about him, my first impression seeing that splash art is that something happened to his heart and the glowey thing was keeping it alive with dark magic sorta like iron man, but that dark magic was slowly corrupting him
I don't play Varus, but I would love to see him being reworked. Not only with ability kit, but design. Making him look more corrupted looking, ravenous and a bit more darkinish (with red and black colours), because purple is unique choice, but for me he's not looking like a darkin/half possesing darkin at all. Also I would love to see them making unique interactions with each other, maybe with three different voice actors, or just one who would accent each of the voices just a bit differently. Maybe Val and Kai trying to talk to each other during the long walk with darkin telling then to shut up, during clear of the camps, Val and Kai would reminescent their past lives as hunters. Even interactions with other champions, three of then could talk, share their oppinions, comment one another midtalk, it could be so much interesting, unique and different from what we have seen already in league. There are so many open possibilities for Varus. I guess we just need to wait, for the rework like in 5 damn years.
His old lore made his design make sense, something about a really good archer who left his post guarding black ooze to fight only to come back and find his station totally wrecked by the noxians- as they do so well, where he differs from yasou is that instead of being framed varus takes a dip in the black ooze and that’s why voice lines like ‘ I’m on borrowed time’ make sense, he’s on a ticking clock and he’s gonna let the black ooze burn him up but not before he gets his revenge. If riot was patient they could’ve tied this black ooze to the same thing inside the special box the kinku order was guarding, the same box zed used to gain his shadow powers from, the same box the order of shadows’ master used to go tentaclely ape. creating an interesting plot device on the MAGICS of Ionia, the natural vastayan, the other worldly shadow realm and whatever else, the contrast between discipline and vengeance, playing out in both zed and varus’ lore could’ve been cool, to see the same powers mature in different ways (which you see in the comics to be fair but an in game representation would’ve been cool too) varus could’ve become an entity that fleshed out the world of Ionia rather than try to play foil to the rather eccentric extremes of rhaast and aatrox who’s personalities are uncomfortably distant from the cold calculating fury of varus. But I suppose he can be a darkin too…meh
The half body corruption has more sense with his oldet story, since it was a soldier that Submerged on a cursed pool protected by his village, which got destroyed in the Noxus invasion along side with the soldier's family, who decided to take the power of that pool and turning into Varus
If they ever did do a rework of his abilities it would be cool if he could switch between the 2 Hunters, with each being almost like Jayce weapon swapping. One with a lower range but higher speed Short bow for the attack speed builds, the other being long range/lethality and slower speed with a Long bow.
If I were to redesign Varus while doing the least possible, I'd have the corruption spreading from his bow-wielding arm towards his heart, snaking around it, reaching both down towards his leg, and up his neck to cover part of his face/head. The corruption would protrude from his body in such a way that wearing a normal shirt/body armour would be impractical, and he would wear Ionian clothing modified to fit around but not over it. Oh, and he would wear pants. Ingame Kai, Valmar, and Varus would speak to each other (Valmar out loud, Kai/Varus the same way Rhaast speaks to Kayn) I think the lore would have to be rewritten such that Kai and Valmar were not physically fused together by Varus, because I think it'd be very hard to show that one human-proportioned human is actually two people. It's much easier to have Kai's mind/spirit/whatever intentionally put inside Valmar in an effort to keep Kai alive in some form, while Varus happens to be a third intelligence intruding on one body. Three's a crowd or something. Valmar could simply be wearing something that belonged to Kai, like a red scarf. But this is just my idea. I think Varus has this problem where they don't work as a main or even side character of any story except their inception, Varus' complete takeover, and any major plot point afterwards involving multiple Darkin in some world-ending plot. How would a clown car bowman work as part of a party, when they are always on the verge of "doing evil shit"? Who'd let that tag along? How would they survive? Living their life out in a cave in the woods, away from intelligent life? Kai and Valmar were not royalty, noble, etc., which makes them expendable/a liability. Varus, to me, is nothing more than a character concept, the kind you'd see on ArtStation. Otherwise, I'd rework Varus to have completely taken over, and have that version of Varus be the one we play in League. Riot won't (and shouldn't) do a Kayn 2.0. An idea that I thought of last (meaning I won't rewrite/re-order everything I've written again to make it flow well): In addition to my visual redesign idea, having Kai be a visible spirit that shows up in the game-start animation/emotes/recall/respawn/etc., as well as during certain ability casts (to "lend a helping hand") could be cute.
Right now Varus just kind of exist as "video game archer" as his whole character design with some kind of vague hint towards being corrupted by something.
My hot take is that the daarkin is sealed in a pair of pants and that's why it only looks daarkin from the waist down. The bow is just a regular demonic bow that it found and it is carrying around as a facade.
I'm personally still waiting for a stocky Darkin/Ascended. A comparatively small, square guy who like.... I don't know, wrestles with monsters and resembles a sacred scarab. With a bunch of shield mechanics. Thinking about it now that actually sounds kinda sick...
I think it would be very cool, if when they rework Varys they give him a thing similar to Kayn, where after a certain point he can either choose to be the hunters or Darkin. I think that would be interesting
Biggest gripe with Darkin: all Egyptian style ancestry replaced by western/christian demon motifs. Why did they have to be tied to Shurima when not a single one looks like they come from there? Like, imagine whenever Yugi transforms into Yami he whips out inverse colored black gooey papal robes and says "boy do I miss home with all the pyramids, Nile Delta, and tombs and whatnot!"
Ill always remember his old lore. Not because "wounded archer that taps into well of corruption and becomes superpowerful" is interesting, but because he (they?) Remind me of the samurai jack blind archers.
I loved when they made Va(a)rus a darkin, but always thought the same thing about the new lore not being properly connected to the ingame character. It almost looks like a VGU Rework that they forgot to upload with the lore update
Varus was protecting unknown force known only as Corruption .. During the attack he chose to adhere to his duty as defender of the temple, but when the attack ended he found out his family in the village was killed, only thing that he had left was the necklace of his dead wife.. he took it, went to the temple and unleashed the corruption on himself.. he became varus, he went out into woods found noxians and killed them, but it wasnt enough and he started roaming the land, sworn to kill every noxian he meets
Hot take, but I think they made Varus into a bad champion with this retcon. Saying this up front, *I HAVE ZERO ISSUES WITH LGBTQ PEOPLE OR REPRESENTATION OF THEM IN GAMES.* My issues stems 100% from the fact that his lore basically has nothing to do with the character's design, animations, or voice lines. It's like if they had written Trundle's current lore but continued to use his old model and voice lines, only worse in this case because it comes off as cheap lgbt lip service that doesn't actually get mentioned in the game & can be effectively ignored by the majority of players.
Ah, Varus, or as Rhaast calls him, "Demon pants"
Taric: "Are you even wearing pants?"
“How do three people wear one pants” ~ Neeko
Hmm?
Demon Paants
I hope when they update him, his voice lines will be Vaarus, Valmar and Kai talking to each other, like Kayn and Rhaast.
That would be amazing.
THE DOUBLE AA THING VARUS - THERE WAS A MEMO.
Though Varus has already taken over. When Rhaast takes over, Kayn's lines stop which would explain why Valmar and Kai can't speak. They no longer exist.
@@Wabinator No, he hasn't completely taken over. This is from his bio: "Even so, the human and darkin elements of this imperfect form are in constant flux, with each managing to wrest control for a short time before being reined in by the other. Varus fights to silence the two mortal souls once and for all, and wreak vengeance for the destruction of his race. Still, Kai and Val struggle against his malevolent influence, hoping against hope that their love can overcome the darkin’s hatred."
my headcanon is that it works like a steven universe fusion, when all the members of the fusion dislike or argue with each others
the result is the voices are not fully merged, the mind too, so its like 3 people in a body trying to fight the others
Actually it's even worse: game Varus' dialogue is not even Darkin, it's from back when Varus was just a random Ionian archer corrupted by Void mojo.
Oooohh this explains the purple glow
I don't think it's Void, just evil semi-sentient goop in need of a host. Like Venom but more parasite and less personality. It makes you much more powerful but steals your life essence over time and makes you more aggressive and prone to violence.
He wasnt even corrupted. He was tasked with protecting the "magic evil goop" during the noxian invasio and what better way to protect the goop AND fighting the noxians at the same time than taking the goop inside you?
@@mohammadnaghizade3544 He successfully protected the goop, failed to protect his family, and then went to the goop and went "Hey I want to get revenge on all of these Noxians, that cool with you?" to which the goop responded
"Yeah a'ight."
I think the chest strap is supposed to be an archer's chest guard, so the recoil of the bow string can't hurt you. And you'll probably need protection if you're going everywhere shirtless and sexy.
@@terry_the_terrible Yeah I'm not the biggest fan of League's design choices. The actual art direction of that chest strap is silly, but I can acknowledge that there is a point to it at least.
I just wanna take a moment to acknowledge just how fun of a phrase "chest strap" is for no reason.
I think it's purpose was just to look cool, really. His original story had some liquid evil power eating his arms and legs and his sons broken bow to produce his powers, and they never gave him a visual update when they changed his story. I expected the original story to give me some way to explain it as a visual sell on his source of power- but that's his arms and legs and bow- Not some kind of magic coming from his chest. But it sure looks like a hole leaking magic from his chest.
Imagine Tony Stark needing a chest strap.
Its also a left over from Varus' previous lore of having noxious kill all of his loved ones and willingly merges with the bow.
As he had lost everyone he loved the cracked part is over the were the "Heart" was symbolically shown in the past. So its a visual indicator of his broken heart...Which he no longer has.
Also RIP the only Symbiotic/True Merge Human/Darkin duo in League of Legends with the retcon.
In the song it shows how Varus shoots both Valmar and Kai in the same spot and then the darkin is created hence the hole in the chest, you can also see that the hairstyle of Varus is a combination of them too, (Kai’s or Valmar’s hair is tied up in the cinematic), I also thought that Varus created his arrows from the chest hole but im not quite sure about that.
Just really convenient that the "chest guard" covers the hole made by the piercing arrow in the cinematic. Made it easier for Riot to put off a visual rework for another 2+ years, eh?
Everytime I see Varus, I swear I keep remembering Aatrox's interaction with him about the name lol.
Aatrox: "We all agreed on the double 'A' thing, Varus. The double 'A' thing !"
There was a memo!
@@PNNH696 Varus: Oh double Aaaaaaaa
*I thought u said Double gae-*
@@michaelharis9962 HAHAHAHA! Witty.
Then u hear aatrox’s line to Raast about the form they take..
Varus lore: Two lovers, desperately trying to fight a demon that possessed them.
Varus voice lines: "The guilty will know agony." 😈😈😈 "Deliver them to their end." 🗡️🗡️🗡️ "Bloodshed carries a price." 🔫🔫🔫
Varus suffers from Yone syndrome in the sense that I can't hear his voice lines without laughing at how edgy they are. Mans really needs a VGU.
His name should have been Vaarus. There was a memo, Riot, there was a memo !
*THIS*
Apparently, they agreed on the double A thing, but I guess Varus forgot
The problem is that Varus is hard of hearing and heard two gays instead of two a's.
@@randomgamer6352 Nice one, Made me laugh
Probably wouldn't be too much of a hassle to change his name if he got a rework. But would it be worth it to sacrifice that interaction?
"Varus. V A R U S, your name should have an A and then another A, Varus. There was a memo, VARUS, THERE WAS A MEMEO!" - Aatrox
"Aatrox, brother, the double 'A' thing is absurd and you know it." - Varus, 2023
i find it annoying that when they updated his lore they never actually updated him in game. so he still has vo lines about how he has a poison slowly killing him or whatever related to his original backstory
God such a weird thing to put all this effort into making a music video then not actually using it as a chance to update the character in the game. Along with Annie who had a full blown 10 minute animation but still wears her 2000s kitty headband and backpack.
I would say that on the rift you don't even get the Darkin, just the vengeful Ionian dude he was when he launched
Because this was cheap lip service rather than actually trying to redesign a champion.
@@Dramatic_Gaming ironically, it was probably expensive lip service then. The animated cinematic is long and involved, would have been way easier and cheaper just to write it down.
That said, yeah, he needs a VU, but not as badly as some other older models.
@@SeanBoyce-gp Not just a cinematic, there was a full blown comic for it as well.
@@Jeddy027 and a short story. Really, the way they did it, you would expect a rework at this point. Some reworked champs get less love that what Varus got
I miss this ionian sude... He was husband material.
Varus needs an Ezreal style rework where they essentially keep the character the exact same but update them to be a modern version of themselves.
I was so disappointed when I first played varus and he was NOT purple in game.
And Varus is spending a very long time reuniting with his sister.
I barely remember this lol
Shurima has so much sand
She could be anywhere
@@cartoonishidealism582 The shuriman desert is vast.
Valmar and Kai flirting on the back when Vaarus carrying the battle.
It was Vaarus when he fight the bad guys, but before he aimed at a kid they would say something like: "Vaarus, you know the limit." or smt.
I think a really simple way they could add just a touch of his lore into his character would be to give the hunters two distinct hair and eye colors, and then have Varus proper have two eye colors and his hair split down the middle with their two hair colors. It’d be a pretty minor but recognizable way to represent the split identities merged into orn body without needing to actually give him different bone structures on either side of his face or anything else drastic like that.
I realise this is a year old video, but I really don't like the retcon to Varus.. He was a straight married man and his wole drive was that he lost his wife, his kid, his village, he lost everything. "Beware a man with nothing to lose" And because he had nothing to lose he entered a deal with the demon bow, he took it willingly and he never faught it, he just wanted vengance, and in turn ended up with a symbiotic realtionship with the bow where they want the same thing and work together as one neither fighting for control, which had a different Dynamic to Aatrox (the darkin who has fully taken control) and Rhaast (The darkin fighting for control that can go either way). It made him stand out as having a different dynamic to the other two.
Then the Retcon happened.. and Riot, LITTERALLY made a song and dance about having a gay character, except.. the retconed a straight man to do it and it's not reprisented in game atall. It's one of the worse cases of reprisentation coming across as shallow pandering/publicity that I have ever seen, and yet it's in the same game as one of the best cases of reprisentation having been done right with Twisted Fate/Graves who come across as authentic, charming and not defined by their relationship yet also shaped by eachother.. How did they do Graves/Fate so well, yet flop so hard with Varus?
Ontop of that, the retcon also ruined his motivations, he still says "beware a man with nothing to lose" except Kai/Valmar have everything to lsoe, they have a loving familly and their village was saved, and they are even struggling for control to not lose eachother.. which also gives them basically the same dynamic as Kayn/Rhaast it's the same story just told worse, where as before they had a mutual understanding more like Venom/Eddie brock, which was far more interesting.
Long rant and a year late but.. yeah.
"Varus. V.A.R.U.S."
"Your name should have an A, and then, another A"
"There was a memo, Varus"
"THERE WAS A MEMO!"
Varus is in desperate need of a visual update and a new Mythic item.
I don't get why riot hates lethality Varus so much. Like, Katarina can have 6 viable builds but Varus building pure AD is an abomination that must be purged for some reason.
@@marvinafonso7713 because its broken lmao
@@marvinafonso7713 I think they're afraid of Lethality Draven.
A good middle ground for Varus would be to give his arrow crit chance that scales with distance travelled. It moves him into the same class as like "Galeforce/Collector/IE" Jhin
@@meow6750 i mean he can probably kill anyone who doesnt have healing in lane but he instantly dies if you come close to him. He has no way to run from you(except his ult) and is incredibly squishy. Also it is very difficult for him to carry games because he is very single target
As always, my complains with riot resumes in: They retcon the character in lore but in game they do not give a f*, so the champions almost ever looks out of place in SR.
@@terry_the_terrible Yeah, but it's so sad to see something about a character and be hyped about it, then you go play with and it's just... Eh?
Feels like immersion breaking to me, they could do the whole package, I would wait and be happy with the results, honestly.
Why *didn't* they update his looks or even give him a new VO? Did they ever clarify that?
Because riot is a small indie dev company who can’t afford to put money into improving their game 😔😔😔 very sad.
[is this sarcasm readable enough? LOL]
Yeah, it's a bit baffling that they did this Sion/Galio tier update to his lore. Which completely changed everything about his character & backstory.
But does absolutely nothing to anything else about him. Varus needs an entirely new design & voiceover(s). Not have his previous stuff slapped onto this new lore.
@@Takapon218 people need to stop pressure riot smh 😭
*whispers* it's the homophobia *winks and disappears*
@@Greenwren low quality bait is low quality
They will never add in the two hunters game wise to keep China happy. They're happy to get brownie points for the lore update and will take the pats on the back but when it comes to pushing that lore or making it actually part of the game they won't.
If only he was ace, then he'd be an ace marksman.
An Arrow Ace, so to speak
Aace
In my head canon he is ace and aro and will be entering a platonic relationship with Val and Kai.
If I were to design a League of Legends champion, it would be an ancient avian Ascended (Vulture or Secretary Bird-themed) who hunts Darkin and carries killed and/or sealed Darkin weapons she addresses as her siblings (and perhaps uses the echoes of their powers as her abilities). Maybe a bit of a classic Swain aesthetic, hunched with a walking stick, using ragged mummified wings like a cloak, fragments of the slain weapons chained into them (possibly partially or fully encased in gold). She could have an interesting relationship to Azir, warning against the dangers of rampant Ascended power but at the same time urging him to restore Shurima no matter the cost to mortals. I also just want something that even remotely resembles Isis representation in Shurima. Horus/Ra, Anubis and Sotek are great, but Isis' relevance lasted well into the Greco-Roman period and beyond.
It likely would not work for one reason or another, even if I did one day magically start working there, but I have a character creation addiction so I cannot help it.
First of thats grate idea i know how you fell i made like 10 champions and made full kits for 5 of them.
Finally, I have found my people... the ones that make their own champions and have like 20 note sheets with ideas that will probably never happen! God i wish Riot would make a fan-champion contest...
@@georgesdragon8722 to be honest like half my champions are way worse then new Fiddelsticks and should be in a horor game.
@@perapapic3683 I know what you mean, lol. But honestly, wouldn't mind seeing some new ideas for monster champions, especially after Riot openly admitted that we will probably get a new one once every few years because "it is a niche design"
For example, I would love to see a new void creature, or hell, even the smallest of watchers taking over/transforming itself to look like the body of a frostguard soldier.
Setaka. You literally want them to make the Warrior-Queen SetaKa. She is both related to Azir, and has called upon Aatrox and the other Sun-Born during the void war.
One problem I have with this is that you want her to kill the darkin and use their weapons, which is impossible due to how few darkins there actual are, and how neigh-immortal they all are (and the weapons have no power if the darkin dies). (Only darkins known to have died were from before they were trapped in a weapon). So for her to kill darkin and still manage to use their weapons, she would canonically have to be one of strongest characters in all of runeterra.
Only way for that theme to work is to have her be a darkin that resisted the corruption and didn't go insane to thousands of years of solitude, and turned on the others instead of some darkin slaying waifu
"Why is he possessed from the waist down?"
..I mean there are two dudes inside him-
I"ll see myself out
It make sense
I actually never realised he wasn’t wearing pants… he’s just… all demon down there. Fuck LOL
I loved the original concept of the Darkin as interdimsional fae like creatures.
Riot also fails to name him 'Vaarus' apparently
Wait wait wait wait wait! Are you telling me Varus is League of Legends's Garnet?
They can be inside each other for eternity now aww🥰
He is on the same species as Nasus, Aatrox, Renekton but still looks like Sephiroth with bow.
They should of never retconed him and instead just made a new character with his current lore
the scarf makes him fashionable, gayfashionable
Yeah, when that lore retcon happened I just felt it as a cheap "look, whe have gays here too" strategy.
Nah the Story makes sence but ingame varus is Just Not Canon
That cinematic absolutely blew me away when I first saw it, the artistic direction is just amazing. Easily in my top 3 riot cinematics.
Two gay dudes chilling in a darkin, but they’re 5 feet apart because they’re not… wait.
The fact that Riot basically retconned a character into being Bury Your Gays, TWICE somehow, and expected to be applauded by the LGBT community for it is so sad it almost becomes funny. Almost.
Also love that Taric (who was always treated as something of a homophobic joke by fans and devs) pretty much also continues to be that even after his VGU. Just absolutely fuckin disastrous
what exactly is wrong with taric?
"Varus, *V-A-R-U-S* , your name should have an A and then another A... There was a memo Varus, *There was a memo!*
"We all agreed on the double 'A' thing, Varus. *The double 'A' thing!* "
Good thing the voice lines just released.
I forget who pointed it out but some of his skins like Arclight and Heartseeker seem to resemble Kai and Valmar from the comics and cinematic. Its not much but kind of cool they reference them or at least pointed back to existing skins.
Well at least the story is one of the reason I’ll call any future lover of mine “heart light”
He doesn't need a redesign, just a change in his color scheme to resemble more the darkin palette (red&black) and new voice voicelines
That is the barest minimum that riot need to do. He needs more for sure but that will suffice until a full visual overhaul.
He needs it tho, both redesign and a new lore, like, kayn is already all about fighting for his body, varus not only repeat that but makes the hunters almost irrelevant, since varus is the one in charge of the body.
Actually since they haven't updated his in-game voicelines yet, it's not even the darkin speaking, technically. It's the original Varus who is neither Valmar nor Kai nor even the Darkin.
Wouldn't it be neat if Varus, having possessed two people, had some body parts from both of them? Like, an extra arm or two that he uses to draw arrows while he's shooting with the other two, or two heads looking at each other, or something?
I definitely predict an aesthetic rework whenever riot starts working on shurima/ascended/darkin lore, just like they did with Caitlyn
Yeah, Varus was the beginning of "lets give old characters fresh lore with no visual changes."
I feel like for characters in this situation you should discuss their OLD lore, the one that actually was supposed to inform their design, rather than their new retconned lore.
As much as I love him and don’t ever want him to change as my main, when they changed his lore from the lone Ionian guard who took up the corruption from the Pit of Palace (I’m certain I misspelled what it actually is, but the word palace will get across what it’s supposed to sound like) in a fit of vengeance and retribution against Noxus, to what it is currently, a model update needed to be accompanied to help really drive in the idea that Varus is a Darkin, as well as the amalgamation of three separate entities all vying for control
He looks better in the splash art
I believe the chest strap comes from when in the cinematic ‘as we fall’, Varus tears an arrow out of the chest of one of the hunters, and shoots it into the other, to bind all 3 together, and it leaves some sort of magical scar that needs covering.
Convenient scar cover? Yes. But the chest guard was there from before the lore rework, from before the man got shot through the heart with a Darkin arrow.
The thing I don't get about Varus's lore rework is that, like... the old lore was good? Real good? And more importantly, completely compatible with the two things that were apparently important to add, I.E. the link to the Darkin as opposed to a generic sealed evil and the Archer (Varus was the human in the original lore as opposed to the bow) being gay. Literally all they had to change was "The evil sealed away was a Darkin and also the family Varus is avenging included a husband instead of a wife." Bam. Done. Great, classical story of grief and loss driving people to dark actions and the path of vengeance costing your humanity literalized in Varus slowly losing his body and mind to a sapient evil bow who's stoking his rage and hate.
But instead we get... Ménage à Trois body conglomerate, with one gay man *successfully saving* his lover, completely undercutting the corruption part of the story, and also any semblance of relationship between the Archer and the Weapon because the two *don't want to wield him and only ever wanted healing, not harm.*
So evil Garnet.. aight I'm down
How is it raast and aatrox get cool voicelines in their character and varus….”the bow awakes” “ I rarely miss” “the soul something” like bruh teemo sounds more threatening and interesting then this champ whole voice line collection
I remember this being quite the complaint when they rewrote him. It always felt like lip service to inclusion rather than a genuine attempt at making a lore the fit the in game. Or vice versa. It feels like an aspiration with no follow through
If I recall that's where the arrow struck the one Ionian hunter. The upper body is because the Ionian hunters keeps the darkin somewhat in check as they made an agreement, so the blood magic morphing focused on what varus need to use for mobility and fire power.
Varus is one of those champions who looks amazing jn every single skin EXCEPT base
Is funny I remember the old lore of varus before the update one and that also doesnt explain why he is half naked... It only explain why is purple instead of red darkin
To me Varus is an example of bad LGBT representation in the game. Everything outside the main thing is great, he got his own music video showing his story for Christ’s sake. However, in the area where people will have the most interaction with him, there’s nothing
There's actually interaction within them. just not currently on the surface. My guess is that Riot will create the other darkins(it was mentioned that there are 5 darkins, Aatrox, Rhaast(?), and varus were revealed) in order to complete them and make an event (just like ruination).. I think they're just taking it slowly like how they eventually unveiled the Shadow isle story after so many years
@@javxion6576 No character was made for a gender. Characters were made for their own story.. their gender is not smth that everyone should be bothered about because it's not all of who they are. To me Varus being formed by two gay couples does not change the fact that it is a well written story that give depths and hints about the Darkin war.
He needs a visual rework
This is the first time I've seen Varus ingame model up close
I always interpreted the necklace as a momento from his dead family back from his old lore. You know, that stereotypical-revenge-plot old lore. There was also something about an owl symbolizing protection that was once a part of his model as well (I think it's a tattoo on his non-dominant arm?), but I don't remember all of the details. His design never felt like a total Ionian monk type. He seemed more like someone from the surrounding village who was born into defending the Pit of Pallas or was picked to defend it due to his archery skills. In old old lore, he had a family (wife and son) who had nothing to do with the Pit before their deaths, so...
Wish they'd put some priority on updating VOs to match new lore
Varus still focuses me.
All this promotion with an amazing, hauntingly beautiful music video and riot going "HEY GUYS VARUS BE GAY YAY" and then.... Nothing.
Did they ever stated if Varus is getting a visual update anytime soon?
I miss the previous story. When Varous was a family man who wanted revenge from noxus because his family was killed and grabed the bow and his soul turned black
Belt strap is for that gem on his chest which is where his energy bows (like the one on his q) comes from.
As someone who didn't know anything about him, my first impression seeing that splash art is that something happened to his heart and the glowey thing was keeping it alive with dark magic sorta like iron man, but that dark magic was slowly corrupting him
I don't play Varus, but I would love to see him being reworked. Not only with ability kit, but design. Making him look more corrupted looking, ravenous and a bit more darkinish (with red and black colours), because purple is unique choice, but for me he's not looking like a darkin/half possesing darkin at all. Also I would love to see them making unique interactions with each other, maybe with three different voice actors, or just one who would accent each of the voices just a bit differently. Maybe Val and Kai trying to talk to each other during the long walk with darkin telling then to shut up, during clear of the camps, Val and Kai would reminescent their past lives as hunters. Even interactions with other champions, three of then could talk, share their oppinions, comment one another midtalk, it could be so much interesting, unique and different from what we have seen already in league. There are so many open possibilities for Varus. I guess we just need to wait, for the rework like in 5 damn years.
Can you please do a redesign video on varus? I think it would be really interesting and would like to hear your take on what he should look like
One of the hunters got shot in the chest before they both turned into Varus, it was in the music video As We Fall
His old lore made his design make sense, something about a really good archer who left his post guarding black ooze to fight only to come back and find his station totally wrecked by the noxians- as they do so well, where he differs from yasou is that instead of being framed varus takes a dip in the black ooze and that’s why voice lines like ‘ I’m on borrowed time’ make sense, he’s on a ticking clock and he’s gonna let the black ooze burn him up but not before he gets his revenge. If riot was patient they could’ve tied this black ooze to the same thing inside the special box the kinku order was guarding, the same box zed used to gain his shadow powers from, the same box the order of shadows’ master used to go tentaclely ape. creating an interesting plot device on the MAGICS of Ionia, the natural vastayan, the other worldly shadow realm and whatever else, the contrast between discipline and vengeance, playing out in both zed and varus’ lore could’ve been cool, to see the same powers mature in different ways (which you see in the comics to be fair but an in game representation would’ve been cool too) varus could’ve become an entity that fleshed out the world of Ionia rather than try to play foil to the rather eccentric extremes of rhaast and aatrox who’s personalities are uncomfortably distant from the cold calculating fury of varus.
But I suppose he can be a darkin too…meh
the double a thing varus there was a memo varus THERE WAS a M E M O
I miss when the darkins were aliens
Yeah that was a wild time lol
The half body corruption has more sense with his oldet story, since it was a soldier that Submerged on a cursed pool protected by his village, which got destroyed in the Noxus invasion along side with the soldier's family, who decided to take the power of that pool and turning into Varus
Someone said Varus is 2/3 gay and I still think about it a lot
Varus should be redesigned to look like a satyr. I think that would be a cool way to justify the demon pants
You know the 2 guys took over, when he builds ap
I like that you use the full minute for more hot takes but I kinda miss you explaining the grade, wish Shorts were a 1m30 long to allow that :P
He looks more like a guy corrupted by the void tbh
If they ever did do a rework of his abilities it would be cool if he could switch between the 2 Hunters, with each being almost like Jayce weapon swapping.
One with a lower range but higher speed Short bow for the attack speed builds, the other being long range/lethality and slower speed with a Long bow.
I do like his splash art by itself though :D
At least he looks like his splash art in wildrift
If I were to redesign Varus while doing the least possible, I'd have the corruption spreading from his bow-wielding arm towards his heart, snaking around it, reaching both down towards his leg, and up his neck to cover part of his face/head. The corruption would protrude from his body in such a way that wearing a normal shirt/body armour would be impractical, and he would wear Ionian clothing modified to fit around but not over it. Oh, and he would wear pants. Ingame Kai, Valmar, and Varus would speak to each other (Valmar out loud, Kai/Varus the same way Rhaast speaks to Kayn)
I think the lore would have to be rewritten such that Kai and Valmar were not physically fused together by Varus, because I think it'd be very hard to show that one human-proportioned human is actually two people. It's much easier to have Kai's mind/spirit/whatever intentionally put inside Valmar in an effort to keep Kai alive in some form, while Varus happens to be a third intelligence intruding on one body. Three's a crowd or something. Valmar could simply be wearing something that belonged to Kai, like a red scarf.
But this is just my idea. I think Varus has this problem where they don't work as a main or even side character of any story except their inception, Varus' complete takeover, and any major plot point afterwards involving multiple Darkin in some world-ending plot. How would a clown car bowman work as part of a party, when they are always on the verge of "doing evil shit"? Who'd let that tag along? How would they survive? Living their life out in a cave in the woods, away from intelligent life? Kai and Valmar were not royalty, noble, etc., which makes them expendable/a liability. Varus, to me, is nothing more than a character concept, the kind you'd see on ArtStation.
Otherwise, I'd rework Varus to have completely taken over, and have that version of Varus be the one we play in League. Riot won't (and shouldn't) do a Kayn 2.0.
An idea that I thought of last (meaning I won't rewrite/re-order everything I've written again to make it flow well): In addition to my visual redesign idea, having Kai be a visible spirit that shows up in the game-start animation/emotes/recall/respawn/etc., as well as during certain ability casts (to "lend a helping hand") could be cute.
Varus needs a voice line update so badly. His current ones don’t tell anything about well… Anything
Right now Varus just kind of exist as "video game archer" as his whole character design with some kind of vague hint towards being corrupted by something.
My hot take is that the daarkin is sealed in a pair of pants and that's why it only looks daarkin from the waist down.
The bow is just a regular demonic bow that it found and it is carrying around as a facade.
It is obvious who wears the pants in their relationship
He was designed according to his previous lore
I'm personally still waiting for a stocky Darkin/Ascended.
A comparatively small, square guy who like.... I don't know, wrestles with monsters and resembles a sacred scarab. With a bunch of shield mechanics.
Thinking about it now that actually sounds kinda sick...
"Two "A"s, Varus, not two ....! "💀
Would be sick of varus' face was half warped
Just another memo that Varus didn't read, I guess.
well the mark on his chest is where one of the hunters was shot with a bow.
I can't wait for a rework with 3 voices and a more darkin feel
I think it would be very cool, if when they rework Varys they give him a thing similar to Kayn, where after a certain point he can either choose to be the hunters or Darkin. I think that would be interesting
Biggest gripe with Darkin: all Egyptian style ancestry replaced by western/christian demon motifs. Why did they have to be tied to Shurima when not a single one looks like they come from there? Like, imagine whenever Yugi transforms into Yami he whips out inverse colored black gooey papal robes and says "boy do I miss home with all the pyramids, Nile Delta, and tombs and whatnot!"
Ill always remember his old lore. Not because "wounded archer that taps into well of corruption and becomes superpowerful" is interesting, but because he (they?) Remind me of the samurai jack blind archers.
Varus must have a lot of stamina taking on two men at once ; )
I loved when they made Va(a)rus a darkin, but always thought the same thing about the new lore not being properly connected to the ingame character. It almost looks like a VGU Rework that they forgot to upload with the lore update
Chest guard/heartlight symbolism
Varus was protecting unknown force known only as Corruption .. During the attack he chose to adhere to his duty as defender of the temple, but when the attack ended he found out his family in the village was killed, only thing that he had left was the necklace of his dead wife.. he took it, went to the temple and unleashed the corruption on himself.. he became varus, he went out into woods found noxians and killed them, but it wasnt enough and he started roaming the land, sworn to kill every noxian he meets
Hot take, but I think they made Varus into a bad champion with this retcon.
Saying this up front, *I HAVE ZERO ISSUES WITH LGBTQ PEOPLE OR REPRESENTATION OF THEM IN GAMES.* My issues stems 100% from the fact that his lore basically has nothing to do with the character's design, animations, or voice lines. It's like if they had written Trundle's current lore but continued to use his old model and voice lines, only worse in this case because it comes off as cheap lgbt lip service that doesn't actually get mentioned in the game & can be effectively ignored by the majority of players.
What this means is that he simply needs an update.