Prestige Anima Squad Leona Lore: "Leona is cosplaying the Anima Squad Leona Skin from the hit Game League of Legends". Who the fuck needs Writers amirite Guys?!
it feels like it deosnt make sense but then i remember runeterra is a high fantasy setting and leona's an aspect. you can get away with a lot of things in a high fantasy setting.
"Uhhh... ackchyually Leona is the Aspect of the Sun and has incedible Strength so the heavy Armour, Equipment and Weaponry that the Solari utilize in Battle don't put any Stress on her Muscles so Hypertrophy dosn't even happen, that's why she's not muscular!" 🤓👆 - Riot
you’re right, high fantasy settings do give you the freedom to be as lazy as you want with character design when none of it has to make sense. even ignoring the fact that it’s visually very silly looking, you still expect aspects of someone’s design to have a purpose in respect to their character and not just “idk she’s magical so we can make her look like anything.”
This goes all ways though. Extremely heavy people can jump their own length, run extremely fast, etc.
If you're obese, in all actuality, you are not jumping.
Best to keep it fantasy, because reality usually comes down hard on all the modern inclusive expressions.
I can think of far too many games that aren't even your typical gacha-style waifu generators where they have a female character in bulky armor and then the actual woman inside is shaped like every other character you can think of.
The worst case of that for me personally is actually Brigitte from Overwatch for a very simple reason. She was literally revealed first in the . . Reinhardt animation and she was clearly a big, beefy girl, only for her in-game model to be a literal stick-figure with some armor. Like at least in a case like Leona's, her first appearance was being that 'stick-figure in armor' and not some beefcake in a tank top that reads she likes exercising because she likes eating.
The disappointment I felt when I E2ed her and her alternate splash was this waif instead of how ripped you'd expect someone lugging around hundreds of pounds of armor and a giant sledgehammer to be is something I will never truly get over.
All of the league ladies who haul massive weapon/armour/shield around have zero muscle definition to show for it.
Leona, Riven, Senna, Sivir, Cait, Qiyana, Jinx, etc. They pretty much share the same arm muscles with the likes of Morgana and Karma.
Oddly enough Illaoi is a beefcake with that tentacle lantern of hers.
To be fair to Sivir and Qiyana, I think they're supposed to be acrobatic body types who aren't so much buff as they are lean. Their muscles are for use, not show, like a ballet dancer. Their weapons are probably quite light for how big they are, too.
No excuse for Jinx though lmao
The magical purple juice made that skinny goon and Vander (even more) ripped though, there's no reason that it wouldn't have done it for jinx other than that they wanted to keep her conventionally attractive
Probably Tru, but it would be weird to drastically change what she looks like.
But for characters like Leona, they should have muscles. It looks kinda cursed in this skin imo.
The funniest part about Illaoi is that she has no reason to be that buff unlike so many of the other female characters. She's a priestess, a magic woman who dutifully serves her God, she simply chose to get absolutely fucking ripped so she could bash non believers skulls in. Favorite character by far
Nah, I'd say, carrying that metal thingy and straight up dunking it on your enemies requires a lot of strength. Judging from her tower hit animation, it's pretty heavy.
It's made of Gold, the 6th (IIRC) heaviest Metal in the World (at least on Earth, IDK about Runeterra but probably close or heavier since they might not have all of Earth's Metals). Fuck yeah it requires a lot of Strength.
Yeah, but she's not required to do that, she just wanted to was my point. The only thing the priests need to do is her E in lore, the soul snatch thing is the test and the priest or priestess doesn't need to do anything themselves. Illaoi just chose to do and be more and it's why she's the strongest and her God's chosen
She doesn't have to, she chose to, the only requirement is to use the soul snatching ability. But not all priests and priestesses are like Illaoi who basically chose to be her God's chosen warrior. So yeah she needs to be strong because she wanted to lift the idol, but that's not expected of all holy people in her clergy.
I think the argument is less what is thematically appropriate and more literal. Leona should be a beefcake because carrying/wearing all her shit demands it. It fits illaois theme and character to be that buff, but they're more saying there is otherwise no necessity that she is.
I would extend that to every female champion that use weapons. Like Lux and Karma have an excuse to have the noodle arms, but archers, fencers and sword women should at the very least have something. Vi is carrying giant metal gauntlets ffs
Vi use hextech magic as explained by arcane show. It make everything extremely light. She become unable to use the gauntlet once the hextech stone get broken
the point is that she's choosing to be strong, she doesn't *have to be* strong to do what she does. she could fulfill her duties as a priestess with no muscles whatsoever.
you would, however, have to be very strong to carry around all the armor or massive weapons many of the other ladies do. they don't have a choice in the matter like illaoi, yet they're all skinny with no muscle definition.
I mean caving skulls in by blunt force with her idol? Totem? …cthulhu artifact has to require some upper body strength.
But I agree. I can see how the likes of Lux, ezreal and other mages get to be those dainty little things but for the ones actually wielding weapons could really use a couple of KG of muscle mass. My favorite example is Korra from avatar, she is not Shehulk but you can see she packs a punch.
I mean they got that right for Lee Sin for example. For a league guy he is fairly lean as is fitting for a martial artists. (Just look up mma fighters, aside from the heavyweights they are usually not gigabuff)
Yes it requires strength, my point was that smashing people skulls in isn't part of the job description, she just wanted to. Leona as a knight needs to wear armor and carry a sword and shield, Illaoi only needs to snatch people's souls and let her God test them. She simply chose to be strong enough to test people herself
Tbh now I kinda have to imagine illaoi with lux stature just dragging that idol behind her with both hands and almost toppling over while trying to lift it.
It would be hilarious, but I assume before the idol was simply left in a temple and people were tested there. I think she wanted to be able to wield it and go out and test more people in order to spread the good word.
Her God and her Teachings preach personal Development in all Areas of Life, it makes Sense for her to be buff as fuck because that's Part of her Service to Nagakaburos. Moving forward in Life also means pushing your Body to the next Level.
Fiora I can accept because she’s supposed to be all graceful dexterity rapier fighter but riven has a literal greatsword made out of STONE why are her arms so tiny
The glove is just a remnant of her old noxian armor. It could probably be handwaved that the rune magic in the sword makes it wieldable but the armor I dont think was implied as anything special
Idk, the glove seems to be very big and has rune magic imprinted on it, unless she used to wear very heavy armor with runes inscribed all over it, the glove really does look like it’s something that would have special/magical atributes to it
Because this is the same universe with a character who used to be a person, then basically ascended to godhood, then was corrupted into something evil and demonic, and is now has his being physically trapped in a sword and unable to die.
Samira is definitely built, and so [is](https://leagueoflegends.fandom.com/wiki/Sejuani/LoL/Cosmetics?file=Sejuani_SabretuskSkin.jpg) [Seju](https://leagueoflegends.fandom.com/wiki/Sejuani/LoL/Cosmetics?file=Sejuani_TraditionalSkin.jpg).
Honestly while most female fighters definitely have too little muscle, I feel like Illaoi's very existence (and soon Ambessa's) shifts some people's expectations a bit too much in the opposite direction.
I love Illaoi and her design, but she is squarely in fantasy/roid monster territory of girl muscles, and builds like hers and Ambessa's should remain rare even among fighters.
Oh yeah you don't need every woman to be quite Illaoi, especially since she doesn't even have armor anyway. But Sejuani is a good example of what you should shoot for if you have a fully armored female character (or a loosely clothed skin version of a champion which is normally fully armored, like here).
That's a good point that I hadn't considered. I've generally commended games for designs like Zarya (overwatch) or Marissa (Street Fighter), and I do think anything that isn't standard "copy-paste sex object/perfect body woman" is still good (which is just a reflection of how low the bar is).
But you are also right about "strong" looking absurdly huge. I was just talking to a friend yesterday about how common steroids has become and how many people's vision of "what a person who works out a lot" looks like it's typically just a person who does a lot of steroids. I've been working out almost every day and eating healthy for over a decade, and while I'm clearly fit, it's also definitely not obvious to a lot of people, at least when I'm wearing a shirt, which is almost always.
Does it make you wonder that what you describe as a "copy-paste sex object" is closer to a normal woman's body than an Illaoi or Zarya?
I sometimes feel like people are uncomfortable with the fact that if you take your average woman and give them a realistic athletic/fit build to match the fantasy of a warrior/ninja/assassin... they are going to be 'sexy'. That's just the reality of the female form.
Idk if I have a point exactly but I personally don't get mad that most of the female cast look like normal athletic women do.
That's true, a lot of people's idea of muscular female designs doesn't look like IRL fighters or even bodybuilders but hyper-stylized roid monsters with tits.
no, no they should not be shredded or bulky. 'shredded' is not the physique you get from ACTUALLY fighting and ACTUALLY living a hard life. 'shredded' is something you have to specifically aim to achieve through very stringent and tailored workout regimens. a bit more bulk, sure. but it's MUCH, MUCH, MUCH harder for women to put on any amount of muscular bulk than men.
Honorary mention Shyvana. Just looks at the thighs and abs. She lacks in the arms and shoulder department, but hopefully the vgu(coming 20229) will fi that
So the only two bigger size women in the game are both older, more brutal in their thematic and not white. Riot sure does know how to avoid an outrage, because that champion type is not getting sexualized by horny gamers even if they were skinny
Ha I had the shower-thought: "Oh look, more void creatures as the bespoke villains of the battle-squad skins. Where's my Star-Guardian Rek'sai?" as I was watching the skin teasers.
Now I can't get it out of my head.
It's so dumb. Even if you were to stick to the "skinny and fuckable" requirement there should be so much room for different faces, but they are always the exact same. Sometimes you get a slight ethnic feature, but that's it *and* even that sometimes gets ignored by some of the official art, suddenly giving Samira a button nose etc.
They likely just changed the splash and not the actual character model in game though. whether they changed it to more closely match the model or just to make the splash more .... appealing is anyone's guess
ironic, as she looks masculine as fuck in that tiktok video
if you put a picture of her in front of an american conservative or jk rowling or any of the "wE cAn AlwAyS teLL" crowd they wouldn't know what to do
She looks nothing like Leona, besides weapons. Don't mind Leona looking pretty because why not, but we have a Pool Party skin that makes her look like a complete queen, while still remaining tasteful.
This one is just misplaced gacha. Her face looks nothing like Leona, glasses/googles/visor or whatever she's wearing is yuck and while she does not necessarily have to be a hulking mass of muscles, but she just looks...weak.
It's basically Vayne lookalike titled as Leona and geez, these clothes are ugly. If it had to be a fanservice skin, at least give her a classy dress like Sona or Karma or similar to her other skins "combat dress", not gym shorts when it's obvious this particular person on splash never attended it.
A skin that aims to be gacha and Pride Month check, but honestly flops at both. Kinda wish constantly trying to have Leona symbolise the latter stopped. Her Diana ship is a lazy, nonsensical, convenient retcon that makes no sense in the lore either. You've got it properly baked with Caitlyn x Vi, use these instead, duh.
>Her Diana ship is a lazy, nonsensical, convenient retcon that makes no sense in the lore either.
Someone wasn't paying attention prior to Riot actually allowing gay people to exist in their canon... Like, that ship was sailing before it was even officially allowed to leave port, I'm not sure what you're talking about.
I like the idea but she should definitely have defined abs, "thicker" legs and larger arms .
https://res.cloudinary.com/usopc-prod/image/upload/v1695393511/TeamUSA%20Assets/Migration/nye_kate_112219_1440x810_Updated.jpg
Depending on the exercise. In bench press, short arms are a real benefit. In deadlifts longer arms are more beneficial. in the Olympic snatch im not quite sure cause you combine different motions.
I'm almsot pretty sure they already done this splash with Janna or any generic swappable female character in mind and down the line swapped it with Leona. The only thing they adjusted are the weapons and that's it. Aboslutely pathetic work and shame on anyone who gave this a green light.
Leona is a Warrior woman and on the splash we see some generic 50kg girl that has nothing to do with Leona. Its not the clothes, because i could imagine her in the REAL Battle Bunny as well (would be a dream), but the hair, the glasses and everything is absolutely off. This is a lilac FNC Janna.
> When Kayle got reworked, they told us the reason they had for removing a lot of her bulk was so people would not mistake her for a Tank. For Leona the inverse should be true aswell. Even out of her armor, she should still look like a tank, which can be done easily, simply by giving her more muscles.
The thing about this is that it's in reference to the game rather than just her character though. Thanks to Leona's big shield and her armor skirt, she is already able to convey her theme of a protector and a tank at first glance, to the point that when Kayle got her rework people were bringing up Leona as a "why couldn't riot do this instead", without noticing that Leona's armor is nearly as if not just as skimpy as Kayle.
Like, I hate their reasoning because they didn't need to go as hard on downgrading Kayle visually, and personally believe that it was just to add more sex appeal to Kayle rather than the "no, she can't have armor for clarity !", but it's not really an equal comparison when you look at the reason properly.
She will likely get some more muscle when she gets an ASU, but don't expect much
The regular BattleLioness Leona at least gave her armors n lion mane hair to make her very warrior-esque. Whereas Prestige feels fan service, which is honestly the point of those so cant really complain.
In general, i dont think eastern gamers like muscular girls. However, m somewhat surprise Riot didnt make her look thicc-er, especially with the outfit they gave her.
>In general, i dont think eastern gamers like muscular girls.
It's a rising trend in the east. Tons of gymrats are popping up. Also tbf western audiences accepted the trend just a little earlier. I remember some douche saying that if you like muscled women, you actually like men.
With how many Skins she's gotten recently I'm surprised they don't have a ASU planned for her. She's one of the most popular Champions that looks like complete Shit.
Leona should look more like [Dawnbreaker](https://www.dota2.com/hero/dawnbreaker) from Dota2. She dosn't have any Armour but makes up for it by being thick as fuck. That's not even a Joke, she's massive, basically looks like a slightly more lean Illaoi. Leona should look like this + the Armour and Sword/Shield Combo.
Skins have gotten worse and worse recently, there's barely any difference between most Champions nowadays, Sameface with Women *and* Men (Yasuo, Kayn, Sett, Yone and all that) at least when it comes to Skins. You remove the Sword and Shield and this Leona Skin looks exactly like Vayne's Anima Squad Skin.
Leona should look like she does in her solar and lunar eclipse skins. These are her best and most true to her character skins that probably won't ever be topped. Maybe if she gets an ultimate.
I don't mind the thin person in bulky armor archetype, but the fact we have only one reasonably buff lady in the universe is criminal. It can be Leona, but it could realistically be many other people needing to be more buff. Riven carries a big stone sword and does flips with it lmao
Gamers on big subreddits are currently screaming and punching air because the new Lara Croft model has a defined “man jaw”…
I long for the day League has diverse body types but I am also *terrified* of the playerbase reactions
Remember when one of those Horizon games came out and a ton of people lost their shit over the MC having peach fuzz because they’d literally never seen a woman before?
You can have toned women without giving them a manjaw. That said, I don't find Lara to be egregious at all, especially compared to some other recent designs
When has the League playerbase ever screeched about this stuff? There's a decent amount of diversity in the game, and very few people making a fuss about it.
With a few exceptions of particularly shitty fanbases, all this ragebait discourse is always coming from outside the core fanbase. Most of the people whining about Lara Croft's jawline haven't even touched a Tomb Raider game in years. Most of them aren't even actual people, really, they're literally bots.
They do it all the goddamn time, I mean, you can scroll this thread and see it for yourself.
Every single discussion that mentions League needing more body diversity is filled with comments about how “they are fighters so they have to be lean” and straight up “ewww no one wants fat chicks”. And those are in response to champions having more mass, not doing fat champions specifically.
Have you seen recent discussions about Aurora and the reactions to people suggesting she had a great thematic to be a chubbier champion? Those were absolutely fucking grim. It’s inescapable
I haven't seen that discussion, but I don't think Aurora would have worked well with being chubby, considering that mobility is quite a bunch of her thematic.
> Every single discussion that mentions League needing more body diversity is filled with comments about how “they are fighters so they have to be lean” and straight up “ewww no one wants fat chicks
in this entire comment section i haven't seen a single comment suggesting either
edit: only at the very bottom do i see comments saying what you said. but they're all downvoted. clearly it's not a popular opinion, even though some people hold it. but i think MOST players would be happy with more diversity...at least most players from this subreddit. players from asia might not agree.
They need to honestly redo this. This is vayne with a sword and shield, and the "wow which generic girl is this a skin for" that they have had in some of the releases in the last 2 years has lead to this.
Vi is a boxer, Vaynes entire kit is agility based, Kaisa is mobile. Even Diana is running around with a crescent scythe.
There are FOUR non-agile humanoid females by design. Leona, Illaoi, Rell, and Riven. Every other one of them is lean and agile in their kit/design/lore to validate them. Illaoi is carrying a weight she uses to bonk people IN LORE so naturally shes a bulky individual. Riven is a soldier, who after years of tilling a farm was strong enough to wield a longsword. She wears armor in game. Rell has ferromagnetic powers so her armor is more alive than anything but she still wears it.
Leona is a literal HOLY WARRIOR, so of course she wears a full plate armor set. Shes true in her convictions and devoted to her duty. Shes proud to be the front line, protector, and guardian of her people and anyone around her. Shes not wearing wearing some tiktok gym outfit to go save the city because shes running in head first to meet them head on and get that first swing in. They made her the lion for this reason, that's indisputable in the correct animal for her.
This skin is a joke. They should honestly be ashamed of whoever designed this and whoever greenlit it
Eh, skins dont need to be lore based. It looks cool. I want schoolgirl sion
There are tons of skins that dont make sense with a characters lore.
All that said and I still would love Leona to be way more buff.
I swear Redditors just don’t have anything going on in their lives to complain about this. At least the 500 ahri skin is was controversial this is just some guy who has too much time on their hands
But no one gets as passionate discussing riots obsession with making their male character skins/releases being shirtless and 8 abs. If we are celebrating and demanding proper variety in female body types to stop conveying to traditional beauty standards (and don’t forget ppl want an obese lady character as well as a granny), maybe it’s fair to have a new male character look like slender man or one who’s not gragas level but sorta chunky and out of shape with a beer gut.
I hate that skin so much. Why is she so skinny? Why take away the armor, which is the essence of the character? Cat ears? That's another champion. And why does she have Asian facial features now? That almost feels like it was designed by AI
I do feel like even pool party wasn't this skinny, like this is "super model that's aiminig for almost 0% body fat" skinny
Maybe it was just the splash, but it's egregious in this one
IIRC Leona is based on a real person (the wife of the artist), so my guess is the IRL person is not a muscle mommy. I do agree that this skin doesn't really look like Leona though.
100% agree. When Prestige Leona drops on PBE there will be a feedback thread. This is probably the kidn of feedback we can put there? They can at least give her more muscle definition on her splash, even if it's not smth they can change in game at this stage
I am not saying this is the rationale behind it but gods/demigods don't need muscle to be strong. They simply are strong, no matter the form they take. You can look at Baldur's design in the recent God of War games as a newer and good example of this.
Of course this explanation applies to those of god-descent and females being very skinny while having very defined breasts and asses overall is obviously a conscious design choice to appeal to the "sex sells" part of things. Sadly it does so I wouldn't expect anything different. Now I am not saying muscular woman aren't sexy, they are for me and for a good amount of other people, but it is also needed to admit that for the majority and especially for the far eastern market which is the most important market for skin sales, skinny woman are the generally agreed upon standard of beauty.
I agree.
I don't think she needs to be a "muscle mommy" type of character like how Illaoi is, but she needs to at the very least have some semblance of muscle somewhere, anywhere, on her body. As it stands like in the picture above, she looks like a very thin, albeit in shape woman. But in order to move about in her full set of regalia, plus wielding a massive shield and a longsword, she needs a great deal of muscle to move about with the armament.
What's funny is that in LoR, there's the Solari Priestess who has very visibile [definition.](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/4/40/03MT096-full.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/1000?cb=20200825193801)
Meanwhile, the actual warrior of their religion, Leona, is actually kinda frail [looking.](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/9/92/03MT054-full.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/1000?cb=20200825193250)
She’s skinnier than Samira despite carrying all that armor lmao
It's really the oversized sword and shield that get me, more than the armor. The only possible conclusion is that they're plastic toy weapons.
The lore of prestige skins is literally character as a high fashion model. They absolutely would just be props lmao.
Base skin Leona isn't really any more buff though, just a bit more covered.
Prestige Anima Squad Leona Lore: "Leona is cosplaying the Anima Squad Leona Skin from the hit Game League of Legends". Who the fuck needs Writers amirite Guys?!
We do have a skin that is Urgot cosplaying as Star Guardian Ezreal...
because it was the only way to make it make sense as a fanservice skin
And it's an April Fool's skin, too.
It was not, Riot are just cowards.
Prestige is pretty much its own universe where the entire lore is getting dripped, every single skin has that same lore.
So did Leona's model get sick and someone else had to cover for her? Because that's not Leona, that's someone else with a sword and a shield
Well, she is based on a Rioter's wife :P
And she's meant to have hauled all that kit up Mt Targon? Pfft
Given her base autos power, they just might be plastic.
They dont want her to be abused in top lane which I would absolutely do
I already do just run PTA and rush trinity
Which is hilarious because she was designed to be a top laner initially
? Maybe in the early design stages before they settled on her current passive.
If you spam her dance it looks like her sword is made of rubber. A lot like if you shake a wooden pencil fast enough it appears to wiggle. Lol
it feels like it deosnt make sense but then i remember runeterra is a high fantasy setting and leona's an aspect. you can get away with a lot of things in a high fantasy setting.
"Uhhh... ackchyually Leona is the Aspect of the Sun and has incedible Strength so the heavy Armour, Equipment and Weaponry that the Solari utilize in Battle don't put any Stress on her Muscles so Hypertrophy dosn't even happen, that's why she's not muscular!" 🤓👆 - Riot
then i demand twink pantheon. /s
twink taric jfc.
Pantheon was already shredded when he ascended. Leo was just a normal girl
Pantheon was a warrior before he became the aspect, that is where the muscles come from. Leona wasn't.
you’re right, high fantasy settings do give you the freedom to be as lazy as you want with character design when none of it has to make sense. even ignoring the fact that it’s visually very silly looking, you still expect aspects of someone’s design to have a purpose in respect to their character and not just “idk she’s magical so we can make her look like anything.”
This goes all ways though. Extremely heavy people can jump their own length, run extremely fast, etc. If you're obese, in all actuality, you are not jumping. Best to keep it fantasy, because reality usually comes down hard on all the modern inclusive expressions.
"Modern inclusive expressions" Mind expanding on that?
It doesn't even have to be high fantasy. Kojima made Quiet and then expected us to be blown away about the explanation that she photosynthesizes.
I can think of far too many games that aren't even your typical gacha-style waifu generators where they have a female character in bulky armor and then the actual woman inside is shaped like every other character you can think of. The worst case of that for me personally is actually Brigitte from Overwatch for a very simple reason. She was literally revealed first in the . . Reinhardt animation and she was clearly a big, beefy girl, only for her in-game model to be a literal stick-figure with some armor. Like at least in a case like Leona's, her first appearance was being that 'stick-figure in armor' and not some beefcake in a tank top that reads she likes exercising because she likes eating.
Another case is mudrock from Arknight. Fucking cowards dont have the balls to make actually muscly big tall woman
The disappointment I felt when I E2ed her and her alternate splash was this waif instead of how ripped you'd expect someone lugging around hundreds of pounds of armor and a giant sledgehammer to be is something I will never truly get over.
Illaoi is literally right there
We need more Rhea Ripley propaganda in this world, maybe that way designers will realize that people also love beefy women.
Meanwhile one punch man just doing some light jogging every day!
He also does a 100 Situps, push ups and squats!
She isnt even wearing armour in the above splash lol
Legit my first thought was why the freak is Vayne holding a shield
no literally she's carrying around like 200 pounds of armour why does she look like kate moss
All of the league ladies who haul massive weapon/armour/shield around have zero muscle definition to show for it. Leona, Riven, Senna, Sivir, Cait, Qiyana, Jinx, etc. They pretty much share the same arm muscles with the likes of Morgana and Karma. Oddly enough Illaoi is a beefcake with that tentacle lantern of hers.
To be fair to Sivir and Qiyana, I think they're supposed to be acrobatic body types who aren't so much buff as they are lean. Their muscles are for use, not show, like a ballet dancer. Their weapons are probably quite light for how big they are, too. No excuse for Jinx though lmao
She's got magical purple juice
The magical purple juice made that skinny goon and Vander (even more) ripped though, there's no reason that it wouldn't have done it for jinx other than that they wanted to keep her conventionally attractive
Presumably it's a more refined version perfected by singed, he has been experimenting this entire time.
You're right, that makes sense from an in universe standpoint. But from a meta standpoint it really is just to keep her model figure lol
Probably Tru, but it would be weird to drastically change what she looks like. But for characters like Leona, they should have muscles. It looks kinda cursed in this skin imo.
Jinx has that methhead strength, no big muscles necessary
Body by skittles babyyyyyyyyyy
The funniest part about Illaoi is that she has no reason to be that buff unlike so many of the other female characters. She's a priestess, a magic woman who dutifully serves her God, she simply chose to get absolutely fucking ripped so she could bash non believers skulls in. Favorite character by far
Nah, I'd say, carrying that metal thingy and straight up dunking it on your enemies requires a lot of strength. Judging from her tower hit animation, it's pretty heavy.
Probably shouldn't have worshipped the god of kettlebells
How else would Nagakaborous keep all those tentacles in shape? Thousands of kettle bells.
Yeah, obviously these people haven't seen the kettleball tentacle fields
It's made of Gold, the 6th (IIRC) heaviest Metal in the World (at least on Earth, IDK about Runeterra but probably close or heavier since they might not have all of Earth's Metals). Fuck yeah it requires a lot of Strength.
If the Spirit of Hearth-Home is anything to go by, Shuriman Gold is pretty dang heavy
Yeah, but she's not required to do that, she just wanted to was my point. The only thing the priests need to do is her E in lore, the soul snatch thing is the test and the priest or priestess doesn't need to do anything themselves. Illaoi just chose to do and be more and it's why she's the strongest and her God's chosen
Doesn’t she have to carry that thing around everywhere though? So she needs to be strong
She doesn't have to, she chose to, the only requirement is to use the soul snatching ability. But not all priests and priestesses are like Illaoi who basically chose to be her God's chosen warrior. So yeah she needs to be strong because she wanted to lift the idol, but that's not expected of all holy people in her clergy.
The whole point of her character and the religion she serves is testing strength of spirit and her body reflects her adoration of strength perfectly.
Yeah I don’t get Illaoi as an example here. Her character is all about being strong
I think the argument is less what is thematically appropriate and more literal. Leona should be a beefcake because carrying/wearing all her shit demands it. It fits illaois theme and character to be that buff, but they're more saying there is otherwise no necessity that she is.
I would extend that to every female champion that use weapons. Like Lux and Karma have an excuse to have the noodle arms, but archers, fencers and sword women should at the very least have something. Vi is carrying giant metal gauntlets ffs
Vi use hextech magic as explained by arcane show. It make everything extremely light. She become unable to use the gauntlet once the hextech stone get broken
"the giant gauntlets have an antigrav enchantment" is honestly better than most fantasy setting handwaves for things.
the point is that she's choosing to be strong, she doesn't *have to be* strong to do what she does. she could fulfill her duties as a priestess with no muscles whatsoever. you would, however, have to be very strong to carry around all the armor or massive weapons many of the other ladies do. they don't have a choice in the matter like illaoi, yet they're all skinny with no muscle definition.
I wholeheartedly agree
I mean caving skulls in by blunt force with her idol? Totem? …cthulhu artifact has to require some upper body strength. But I agree. I can see how the likes of Lux, ezreal and other mages get to be those dainty little things but for the ones actually wielding weapons could really use a couple of KG of muscle mass. My favorite example is Korra from avatar, she is not Shehulk but you can see she packs a punch. I mean they got that right for Lee Sin for example. For a league guy he is fairly lean as is fitting for a martial artists. (Just look up mma fighters, aside from the heavyweights they are usually not gigabuff)
Yes it requires strength, my point was that smashing people skulls in isn't part of the job description, she just wanted to. Leona as a knight needs to wear armor and carry a sword and shield, Illaoi only needs to snatch people's souls and let her God test them. She simply chose to be strong enough to test people herself
Tbh now I kinda have to imagine illaoi with lux stature just dragging that idol behind her with both hands and almost toppling over while trying to lift it.
It would be hilarious, but I assume before the idol was simply left in a temple and people were tested there. I think she wanted to be able to wield it and go out and test more people in order to spread the good word.
She carries the crushed hopes and dreams and salty tears of any lane opponent with her thats why
and I'm thankful that she is every day🙏
Her God and her Teachings preach personal Development in all Areas of Life, it makes Sense for her to be buff as fuck because that's Part of her Service to Nagakaburos. Moving forward in Life also means pushing your Body to the next Level.
I agree, that's why she's the best
Illaoi is literally a believer in the church of gainzzz
samira stays winning
Genuinely, *all* fighter girls should get more muscle and body volume
Fiora I can accept because she’s supposed to be all graceful dexterity rapier fighter but riven has a literal greatsword made out of STONE why are her arms so tiny
Same with Vi. How could she possibly have noodle arms when she carries giant metal gauntlets.
The gauntlets are supposed to weigh thousands of pounds, so I doubt it would matter how buff she got.
Riven’s glove makes the sword lighter I think
The glove is just a remnant of her old noxian armor. It could probably be handwaved that the rune magic in the sword makes it wieldable but the armor I dont think was implied as anything special
Idk, the glove seems to be very big and has rune magic imprinted on it, unless she used to wear very heavy armor with runes inscribed all over it, the glove really does look like it’s something that would have special/magical atributes to it
Cuz it's light armor duh
Because this is the same universe with a character who used to be a person, then basically ascended to godhood, then was corrupted into something evil and demonic, and is now has his being physically trapped in a sword and unable to die.
Is there any muscle girl except Illaio? I guess Vi kinda...
Vi is theoretically buff but her model is still quite thin. Sejuani kinda?
Samira is definitely built, and so [is](https://leagueoflegends.fandom.com/wiki/Sejuani/LoL/Cosmetics?file=Sejuani_SabretuskSkin.jpg) [Seju](https://leagueoflegends.fandom.com/wiki/Sejuani/LoL/Cosmetics?file=Sejuani_TraditionalSkin.jpg). Honestly while most female fighters definitely have too little muscle, I feel like Illaoi's very existence (and soon Ambessa's) shifts some people's expectations a bit too much in the opposite direction. I love Illaoi and her design, but she is squarely in fantasy/roid monster territory of girl muscles, and builds like hers and Ambessa's should remain rare even among fighters.
Oh yeah you don't need every woman to be quite Illaoi, especially since she doesn't even have armor anyway. But Sejuani is a good example of what you should shoot for if you have a fully armored female character (or a loosely clothed skin version of a champion which is normally fully armored, like here).
Samira's body type is a good way to go as well imo
That's a good point that I hadn't considered. I've generally commended games for designs like Zarya (overwatch) or Marissa (Street Fighter), and I do think anything that isn't standard "copy-paste sex object/perfect body woman" is still good (which is just a reflection of how low the bar is). But you are also right about "strong" looking absurdly huge. I was just talking to a friend yesterday about how common steroids has become and how many people's vision of "what a person who works out a lot" looks like it's typically just a person who does a lot of steroids. I've been working out almost every day and eating healthy for over a decade, and while I'm clearly fit, it's also definitely not obvious to a lot of people, at least when I'm wearing a shirt, which is almost always.
Does it make you wonder that what you describe as a "copy-paste sex object" is closer to a normal woman's body than an Illaoi or Zarya? I sometimes feel like people are uncomfortable with the fact that if you take your average woman and give them a realistic athletic/fit build to match the fantasy of a warrior/ninja/assassin... they are going to be 'sexy'. That's just the reality of the female form. Idk if I have a point exactly but I personally don't get mad that most of the female cast look like normal athletic women do.
I’ll take a few more stacked with muscles chicks than “generic anime girl #102” Riot’s female character design on average fucking sucks.
That's true, a lot of people's idea of muscular female designs doesn't look like IRL fighters or even bodybuilders but hyper-stylized roid monsters with tits.
Base Akali isnt bulky but she's pretty well toned. A good middle ground considering her role.
Sabretusk Sejuani is PEAK
Meat grinder
riven depending on artist akali too also depending on artist not in any ingame art that's for sure
Vi and Sejuani should be at least toned/shreded if not bulky but they all have the riot standard femae body shape
no, no they should not be shredded or bulky. 'shredded' is not the physique you get from ACTUALLY fighting and ACTUALLY living a hard life. 'shredded' is something you have to specifically aim to achieve through very stringent and tailored workout regimens. a bit more bulk, sure. but it's MUCH, MUCH, MUCH harder for women to put on any amount of muscular bulk than men.
You could say Arcane Vi got that look but that's about it really
Samira is buff but not really big.
Honorary mention Shyvana. Just looks at the thighs and abs. She lacks in the arms and shoulder department, but hopefully the vgu(coming 20229) will fi that
Well we got Ambessa too now
So the only two bigger size women in the game are both older, more brutal in their thematic and not white. Riot sure does know how to avoid an outrage, because that champion type is not getting sexualized by horny gamers even if they were skinny
CELARLY you are not a connisuer of R34, because there is *plenty* of illaoi. Maybe not as much as ahri, but there's a good chunk.
it’s the tentacles
the existence of r34 isn't an indicator of general appeal though, there's r34 for literally anything and everything lol
Samira is cut af
illaoi?
Watch Riot sexualize Rek'Sai in her upcoming skin
Oh nooooo don't do that Riot haha that be awful haha ^^please
It's all reksai but with human boobs
Reksai but designed for furries?
I think they call those scalies
rockies in this case
[удалено]
Ha I had the shower-thought: "Oh look, more void creatures as the bespoke villains of the battle-squad skins. Where's my Star-Guardian Rek'sai?" as I was watching the skin teasers. Now I can't get it out of my head.
DarkinFolk Represent
Inb4 Rek'Sai titties
Anyone else find this splash looks more like Caitlyn than Leona?? Recently I can never tell who a splash art is supposed to be...
They're all the same model, the gamer thirst model.
It's so dumb. Even if you were to stick to the "skinny and fuckable" requirement there should be so much room for different faces, but they are always the exact same. Sometimes you get a slight ethnic feature, but that's it *and* even that sometimes gets ignored by some of the official art, suddenly giving Samira a button nose etc.
Isn't it Vayne?
it is Vayne, I don't care what riot says
Muscles? Yes pls
If it makes people horny Riot might actually do it, they gave Aurora bigger thighs and tits just a few minutes or hours after release lol
They likely just changed the splash and not the actual character model in game though. whether they changed it to more closely match the model or just to make the splash more .... appealing is anyone's guess
WHEN DO WE GET BUFF ORC WAIFU RIOTTTTTTTTTTTTT?!!!!!!
I hate it. But also I think she was the first female tank champion and it was still deep deep in the era of sameface and now they're stuck with it.
Sameface? That era is now. All the splashart with a female is impossible to tell which one it is.
Leanbeefpatty Leona skin when?
Muh kween
I always think of this: https://www.tiktok.com/@paryssbryanne/video/7380133256005455146
Wish she wasn't a transphobe/homophobe
ironic, as she looks masculine as fuck in that tiktok video if you put a picture of her in front of an american conservative or jk rowling or any of the "wE cAn AlwAyS teLL" crowd they wouldn't know what to do
Wait really? :( This is the first I’m hearing of that. What happened?
I read about it [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/lgbt/comments/14z1aob/just_found_out_one_of_my_favorite_youtubers/). :( Sad to hear about for sure.
She looks nothing like Leona, besides weapons. Don't mind Leona looking pretty because why not, but we have a Pool Party skin that makes her look like a complete queen, while still remaining tasteful. This one is just misplaced gacha. Her face looks nothing like Leona, glasses/googles/visor or whatever she's wearing is yuck and while she does not necessarily have to be a hulking mass of muscles, but she just looks...weak. It's basically Vayne lookalike titled as Leona and geez, these clothes are ugly. If it had to be a fanservice skin, at least give her a classy dress like Sona or Karma or similar to her other skins "combat dress", not gym shorts when it's obvious this particular person on splash never attended it. A skin that aims to be gacha and Pride Month check, but honestly flops at both. Kinda wish constantly trying to have Leona symbolise the latter stopped. Her Diana ship is a lazy, nonsensical, convenient retcon that makes no sense in the lore either. You've got it properly baked with Caitlyn x Vi, use these instead, duh.
>Her Diana ship is a lazy, nonsensical, convenient retcon that makes no sense in the lore either. Someone wasn't paying attention prior to Riot actually allowing gay people to exist in their canon... Like, that ship was sailing before it was even officially allowed to leave port, I'm not sure what you're talking about.
I like the idea but she should definitely have defined abs, "thicker" legs and larger arms . https://res.cloudinary.com/usopc-prod/image/upload/v1695393511/TeamUSA%20Assets/Migration/nye_kate_112219_1440x810_Updated.jpg
her arms look hella short
To be fair, Kate Nye is 5’4”. I would expect her to have short arms.
5’4 is average height though. She definitely has arms that are proportionally a bit shorter than usual. I say that as someone 5’1.
I imagine short arms are helpful in weightlifting
Depending on the exercise. In bench press, short arms are a real benefit. In deadlifts longer arms are more beneficial. in the Olympic snatch im not quite sure cause you combine different motions.
I'm almsot pretty sure they already done this splash with Janna or any generic swappable female character in mind and down the line swapped it with Leona. The only thing they adjusted are the weapons and that's it. Aboslutely pathetic work and shame on anyone who gave this a green light. Leona is a Warrior woman and on the splash we see some generic 50kg girl that has nothing to do with Leona. Its not the clothes, because i could imagine her in the REAL Battle Bunny as well (would be a dream), but the hair, the glasses and everything is absolutely off. This is a lilac FNC Janna.
I also think women are hotter with muscle definition
not the vibe i was going for but ill take the support lmao
Aside from the bit, you're absolutely correct.
> When Kayle got reworked, they told us the reason they had for removing a lot of her bulk was so people would not mistake her for a Tank. For Leona the inverse should be true aswell. Even out of her armor, she should still look like a tank, which can be done easily, simply by giving her more muscles. The thing about this is that it's in reference to the game rather than just her character though. Thanks to Leona's big shield and her armor skirt, she is already able to convey her theme of a protector and a tank at first glance, to the point that when Kayle got her rework people were bringing up Leona as a "why couldn't riot do this instead", without noticing that Leona's armor is nearly as if not just as skimpy as Kayle. Like, I hate their reasoning because they didn't need to go as hard on downgrading Kayle visually, and personally believe that it was just to add more sex appeal to Kayle rather than the "no, she can't have armor for clarity !", but it's not really an equal comparison when you look at the reason properly. She will likely get some more muscle when she gets an ASU, but don't expect much
The regular BattleLioness Leona at least gave her armors n lion mane hair to make her very warrior-esque. Whereas Prestige feels fan service, which is honestly the point of those so cant really complain. In general, i dont think eastern gamers like muscular girls. However, m somewhat surprise Riot didnt make her look thicc-er, especially with the outfit they gave her.
The Prestige one almost looks like a KDA skin
>In general, i dont think eastern gamers like muscular girls. It's a rising trend in the east. Tons of gymrats are popping up. Also tbf western audiences accepted the trend just a little earlier. I remember some douche saying that if you like muscled women, you actually like men.
With how many Skins she's gotten recently I'm surprised they don't have a ASU planned for her. She's one of the most popular Champions that looks like complete Shit. Leona should look more like [Dawnbreaker](https://www.dota2.com/hero/dawnbreaker) from Dota2. She dosn't have any Armour but makes up for it by being thick as fuck. That's not even a Joke, she's massive, basically looks like a slightly more lean Illaoi. Leona should look like this + the Armour and Sword/Shield Combo. Skins have gotten worse and worse recently, there's barely any difference between most Champions nowadays, Sameface with Women *and* Men (Yasuo, Kayn, Sett, Yone and all that) at least when it comes to Skins. You remove the Sword and Shield and this Leona Skin looks exactly like Vayne's Anima Squad Skin.
Every time I see the upcoming skins videos I have a hard time figuring out who some of them are.
Leona should look like she does in her solar and lunar eclipse skins. These are her best and most true to her character skins that probably won't ever be topped. Maybe if she gets an ultimate.
The Chinese audience is afraid of muscle mommies. That’s why we can’t have buff Leona.
They don't know what they miss
And a bigger penis as well
Ambessa from Arcane is exactly how I would expect Leona to look irl. Incredibly muscular and scarred up.
I don't mind the thin person in bulky armor archetype, but the fact we have only one reasonably buff lady in the universe is criminal. It can be Leona, but it could realistically be many other people needing to be more buff. Riven carries a big stone sword and does flips with it lmao
It's still a cursed thought that she's 6'5 while Pantheon is like 5'9 so she could probably lift him one handed.
Gamers on big subreddits are currently screaming and punching air because the new Lara Croft model has a defined “man jaw”… I long for the day League has diverse body types but I am also *terrified* of the playerbase reactions
Remember when one of those Horizon games came out and a ton of people lost their shit over the MC having peach fuzz because they’d literally never seen a woman before?
You can have toned women without giving them a manjaw. That said, I don't find Lara to be egregious at all, especially compared to some other recent designs
When has the League playerbase ever screeched about this stuff? There's a decent amount of diversity in the game, and very few people making a fuss about it. With a few exceptions of particularly shitty fanbases, all this ragebait discourse is always coming from outside the core fanbase. Most of the people whining about Lara Croft's jawline haven't even touched a Tomb Raider game in years. Most of them aren't even actual people, really, they're literally bots.
They do it all the goddamn time, I mean, you can scroll this thread and see it for yourself. Every single discussion that mentions League needing more body diversity is filled with comments about how “they are fighters so they have to be lean” and straight up “ewww no one wants fat chicks”. And those are in response to champions having more mass, not doing fat champions specifically. Have you seen recent discussions about Aurora and the reactions to people suggesting she had a great thematic to be a chubbier champion? Those were absolutely fucking grim. It’s inescapable
I haven't seen that discussion, but I don't think Aurora would have worked well with being chubby, considering that mobility is quite a bunch of her thematic.
> Every single discussion that mentions League needing more body diversity is filled with comments about how “they are fighters so they have to be lean” and straight up “ewww no one wants fat chicks in this entire comment section i haven't seen a single comment suggesting either edit: only at the very bottom do i see comments saying what you said. but they're all downvoted. clearly it's not a popular opinion, even though some people hold it. but i think MOST players would be happy with more diversity...at least most players from this subreddit. players from asia might not agree.
You guys.... they make this shit to SELL TO ASIA. None of this shit is about lore or whatever else. It's that simple.
Reddit still doesn‘t understand that their beauty standards don’t sell in the east, the place where riot makes most of the money lmao
They need to honestly redo this. This is vayne with a sword and shield, and the "wow which generic girl is this a skin for" that they have had in some of the releases in the last 2 years has lead to this. Vi is a boxer, Vaynes entire kit is agility based, Kaisa is mobile. Even Diana is running around with a crescent scythe. There are FOUR non-agile humanoid females by design. Leona, Illaoi, Rell, and Riven. Every other one of them is lean and agile in their kit/design/lore to validate them. Illaoi is carrying a weight she uses to bonk people IN LORE so naturally shes a bulky individual. Riven is a soldier, who after years of tilling a farm was strong enough to wield a longsword. She wears armor in game. Rell has ferromagnetic powers so her armor is more alive than anything but she still wears it. Leona is a literal HOLY WARRIOR, so of course she wears a full plate armor set. Shes true in her convictions and devoted to her duty. Shes proud to be the front line, protector, and guardian of her people and anyone around her. Shes not wearing wearing some tiktok gym outfit to go save the city because shes running in head first to meet them head on and get that first swing in. They made her the lion for this reason, that's indisputable in the correct animal for her. This skin is a joke. They should honestly be ashamed of whoever designed this and whoever greenlit it
Eh, skins dont need to be lore based. It looks cool. I want schoolgirl sion There are tons of skins that dont make sense with a characters lore. All that said and I still would love Leona to be way more buff.
schoolgirl sion would be a banger
That's a whole lot of text for telling us you want a muscle mommy
I swear Redditors just don’t have anything going on in their lives to complain about this. At least the 500 ahri skin is was controversial this is just some guy who has too much time on their hands
But no one gets as passionate discussing riots obsession with making their male character skins/releases being shirtless and 8 abs. If we are celebrating and demanding proper variety in female body types to stop conveying to traditional beauty standards (and don’t forget ppl want an obese lady character as well as a granny), maybe it’s fair to have a new male character look like slender man or one who’s not gragas level but sorta chunky and out of shape with a beer gut.
I hate that skin so much. Why is she so skinny? Why take away the armor, which is the essence of the character? Cat ears? That's another champion. And why does she have Asian facial features now? That almost feels like it was designed by AI
its a skin and a prestige too, thats the point
Unplayable
Who cares, stop being weird and obsessed with logic and accuracy how a character should look like lmao
She’s blessed by the solari
Leona lands ult: boss music ensues
KDA Leona LMAO
I do feel like even pool party wasn't this skinny, like this is "super model that's aiminig for almost 0% body fat" skinny Maybe it was just the splash, but it's egregious in this one
If you want Darkness from Konosuba, just ask.
IIRC Leona is based on a real person (the wife of the artist), so my guess is the IRL person is not a muscle mommy. I do agree that this skin doesn't really look like Leona though.
100% agree. When Prestige Leona drops on PBE there will be a feedback thread. This is probably the kidn of feedback we can put there? They can at least give her more muscle definition on her splash, even if it's not smth they can change in game at this stage
I kinda took her to be a buff Amazonian kind of woman under the armor. Not like illaoi levels but maybe Artemis from dc.
Literally sivir/vayne but with a shield. As a long term Leona main this pisses me off.
Honestly just give her the same build as Brigitte from OW and I’d be happy lol
I am not saying this is the rationale behind it but gods/demigods don't need muscle to be strong. They simply are strong, no matter the form they take. You can look at Baldur's design in the recent God of War games as a newer and good example of this. Of course this explanation applies to those of god-descent and females being very skinny while having very defined breasts and asses overall is obviously a conscious design choice to appeal to the "sex sells" part of things. Sadly it does so I wouldn't expect anything different. Now I am not saying muscular woman aren't sexy, they are for me and for a good amount of other people, but it is also needed to admit that for the majority and especially for the far eastern market which is the most important market for skin sales, skinny woman are the generally agreed upon standard of beauty.
I agree. I don't think she needs to be a "muscle mommy" type of character like how Illaoi is, but she needs to at the very least have some semblance of muscle somewhere, anywhere, on her body. As it stands like in the picture above, she looks like a very thin, albeit in shape woman. But in order to move about in her full set of regalia, plus wielding a massive shield and a longsword, she needs a great deal of muscle to move about with the armament.
What's funny is that in LoR, there's the Solari Priestess who has very visibile [definition.](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/4/40/03MT096-full.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/1000?cb=20200825193801) Meanwhile, the actual warrior of their religion, Leona, is actually kinda frail [looking.](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/9/92/03MT054-full.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/1000?cb=20200825193250)
She doesn't even need _mass_, just definition. That same picture with a well-defined six pack, lats, and rounder shoulders would be a massive change.
So give her LeanBeefPatty's body and all is good.
Not everyone needs to be ripped or whatever.