Lucian the Gun Templar

So, a back in May a champion was leaked on the riot forum. The concept art was dual wielding AD Carry that has dubbed as "Lucian the Gun Templar", due to the thread being created by a riot employee with the username Lucian. Almost instantly riot removed the thread and closed any other threads discussing the leaked art work in the forum. Since then, Aatrox has released and the possible champion has been all but forgotten. 

"Lucian" concept art signed by former Riot Employee Eoin Colgan

However, today Riot just released a champion teaser with pictures depicting guns very similar to the guns that "Lucian" wields in his leaked concept art. Along with the teaser pictures Lucian, the riot employee, posted what could possibly be the splash art for "Lucian". It would be a small leap to assume that Lucian will be announced for release within the upcoming months.

Lucian's Forum Post

I know this blog isn't really about League of Legends news but, as an ADC main I have been waiting for more info on "Lucian" since the leak on the forums and I just couldn't contain myself. 

Nerf Phobia and The OP Mentality (Part 1)

I was going to post something about the meta of League of Legends, you know, how the word meta means "Beyond" in Greek and all that blah, blah, blah that you have heard in every video and forum post about League. I'm going to spare you that,  for now, because I want to talk about something that has really bothered me about the LoL community and it's not the refusal to touch a ward even if their life depended on it. It's actually the mentality towards changes in the game.

Nerf Phobia

It's pretty obvious what this is. It's when a champion or item gets 'nerfed' in a patch and, suddenly, using that item or champion is to bring defeat crashing down on your team. There is a long list of champions that have been 'beaten with the nerf bat' and are no longer 'viable'. The argument that "You don't see them in competitive play for a reason." comes up a lot, but you can't really say a champion isn't viable because pro don't play them, when the professionals are looking to push any champion they play to their limits with mechanical skills and animation exploits to win a tournament match that could mean the difference between having a job and being unskilled and unemployed.

There are few champions that have actually been nerfed so hard that they legitimately have no place in the meta, however, if you look at popularity of champions as an indicator of what champions are considered to have fallen out of the meta.

Image from LoL King

This indicates is that Zilean, Hiemerdinger, Galio, Poppy, and Urgot are considered the least viable champions in the current meta. Why? What makes these champions useless? Because pros don't play them? The fact that Urgot is so unpopular even thought the new Blue Build would be just as impactful on Urgot as it is on Ezreal, perhaps even more so, is a sign that Nerf Phobia is a real thing at it is something that effects the champions people play.
 
Just food for thought with no hard stats or facts. The OP Mentality post will be coming soon.