League of Legends has a lot of Sanderson/Stormlight allusions

[Matt O]

I have googled this and even searched this forum and have not seen that many people talking about how the popular video game, League of Legends, has a surprisingly large number of allusions to Sanderson's work, particularly the Stormlight Archive.  Has anyone else noticed this?  Someone there is definitely a fan!

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Ashe: (Elantris) a female archer in the game, one of the original characters

Shen: (Stormlight) a tanky ninja

Graves: (Stormlight) a ranged marksmen/jungler

Voidbringer illaoi : (Stormlight) one of the skins for the character Illaoi.  This one is particularly blatant.  See http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Illaoi/Skins

Talon: (Mistborn) he basically wears a mistcloak and his kit involves pushing and pulling metals

I think there are at least one or two others that I am forgetting at the moment.

I was introduced to the game before I read Sanderson's books so I kept getting surprised when I'd see in-game character names in the books.  Pretty sure the books came first though

[+ILuvHats he/him]

My thought is maybe some of them are connected to inspired by Sanderson works, but definitely not all of them.

-Graves was released in 2011, three years before WoR, so likely the name is just a coincidence.

-It’s generally agreed by fans that Talon was drawn from Assassins creed and Thief games.  I can’t find specific source confirming it, so maybe he could be based on Mistborn, but it doesn’t seem likely.

The other ones seem to work though.  Ashe was released in 2009, Shen in 2010, and Illaoi in 2015.  Also, there’s a hero called Azir, so that could be another connection.  Most of the heroes in LoL are intended to allude to other video games, movies, books, and myths, so it is entirely possible that one of the developers is a Sanderson fan.  Thank you for bringing it up @Matt O because I would never have noticed it myself.

[Matt O]

2 minutes ago, ILuvHats said:

My thought is maybe some of them are connected to inspired by Sanderson works, but definitely not all of them.

-Graves was released in 2011, three years before WoR, so likely the name is just a coincidence.

-It’s generally agreed by fans that Talon was drawn from Assassins creed and Thief games.  I can’t find specific source confirming it, so maybe he could be based on Mistborn, but it doesn’t seem likely.

The other ones seem to work though.  Ashe was released in 2009, Shen in 2010, and Illaoi in 2015.  Also, there’s a hero called Azir, so that could be another connection.  Most of the heroes in LoL are intended to allude to other video games, movies, books, and myths, so it is entirely possible that one of the developers is a Sanderson fan.  Thank you for bringing it up @Matt O because I would never have noticed it myself.

Ah, yes.  Azir.  That is one of the ones I couldn't remember.  I think Azir was _definitely_ inspired from Stormlight.  Who would just make a name like Azir?  (well except for Mr. Sanderson of course!)

 

 

Also... Blizzard has a game called Hearthstone.  Coincidence?  (I know Blizzard is not Riot Games hehe)

Edited December 21, 2017 by Matt O
adding hearthstone mention

[Toaster Retribution he/him]

@Matt OInteresting stuff! I second the Graves thing though. Graves is a real name I believe, and can be found in different franchises (Percival Graves in Fantastic Beasts is another example).

I doubt Hearthstone is Sanderson-inspired either. Hearthstones has been an item in WoW since 2006 or something, I think. It is basically a method for fast-travel, and they named the card game after that.

Edited December 23, 2017 by Toaster Retribution

[MistLord he/him]

If anything, Sanderson made Hearthstone to tribute the game, rather than the other way round.

[Matt O]

Just found another one.  Lulu!

https://coppermind.net/wiki/Lulu

 

[kaellok he/him]

I mean, it's possible that these are allusions, but seriously--these names are NOT uncommon or unique.

For instance, Azir is also a major city in the Pathfinder RPG, from a campaign setting book released in 2009.  

Ashe was a main character in Final Fantasy 12, released in 2006 (considering it had a playable demo released in 2005 6 months after the release of Elantris, and had been in development since 2001, it is highly doubtful that there was any influence at all between the two in determining the name).  It's also a real name that real people have.

Shen is apparently a Chinese word for "god", "deity", or "spirit."  

Graves is a somewhat common last name in the real world.  Graves' disease is an autoimmune disease named after the doctor who described it.

Talon Karrde is a Star Wars expanded universe character that's been around since at least the early 1990s.

Voidbringers appeared in vanilla WoW as summonable demon minions for warlocks, as well as enemies, starting in 2003? 2004?  

 

There's quite a few other examples for these names, too.  Whether there is an intended connection or not, I do not know--but speculating on the basis of name alone would only work when there aren't other examples that pre-date both the Sanderson works and League of Legends.

[TJtheWiz]

I doubt that this is an allusion, but I was playing Skyrim the other day and I realized that it referred to a group called the Synod, like the Synod from Mistborn.

[kenod]

3 hours ago, TJtheWiz said:

I doubt that this is an allusion, but I was playing Skyrim the other day and I realized that it referred to a group called the Synod, like the Synod from Mistborn.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synod

 

[Matt O]

2 minutes ago, kenod said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synod

 

Only problem with that link is that the list of notable synods does not include the Mistborn one.

Edited January 8, 2018 by Matt O
clarified that I was joking

[kenod]

True enough, mostly saying that they probably both used a common source for the word.