What’s up guys it’s me Jeremy.
You're in for a treat with this one!
It took a couple of months, but I actually had a custom skin made to go along with a
fan made champion concept.
It was something I wanted to try and in the future will probably never be doable again,
but should be fun as a one off!
The champion is RAE - a mobile fighter with an awesome pair of gravity boots powered by
a stolen hextech battery.
Rae was created as an application to Riot by Chris Zimmitti and we’re going to look
at her lore, abilities and general development.
You can find a link to the full concept post in the description.
As always we’d love to get your feedback so make sure you leave us a comment, and if
you like the video hit that like button, if not then hit the dislike, and let’s get
started.
Rae was born in a poor town on the edge of Piltover called Gaetro.
Growing up in poverty she had to raise her younger brother, placing his protection above
everything else.
As a young girl, the only way to survive was to steal - food, money, whatever she could
use to provide for her family.
As she grew older, her skills improved and she turned the streets into her playground,
jumping from rooftop to rooftop and perfecting the art of stealth to take whatever she needed,
or wanted.
At the age of 18 she pilfered her most valuable haul ever.
Bringing the technology to her close friend and master mechanic Vi, she discovered it
was a rare Hextech battery, capable of powering almost anything and recharging itself.
Vi constructed a pair of boots for Rae, giving her the power to escape even gravity and take
her to new heights.
Rae, The Piltover Thief is a mobile fighter that uses technology to give an extra kick
to her physical abilities.
She can use terrain to dash around the map and punishes enemies with her powerful kicks,
drawing upon the charge in her battery to cast abilities.
She can function like a bruiser or an assassin, with a focus on painting targets for extra
effects on her ability casts.
Rae starts the game with an exclusive item called Gravity Boots.
Her signature Boots cannot be sold and will take up one item slot, and they can be upgraded
three times as the game progresses in a similar way to Viktor’s Hex Core.
Her Passive, Hextech Battery, can be activated to switch on the Gravity Boots and give Rae
the benefit of the stats on the item.
While active the battery will slowly drain over time, or have the supply drained as she
uses abilities.
When she first switches her Boots on, Rae will generate an electric shield that will
damage anyone she attacks and shield her for 5 seconds.
Her Battery Supply will recharge if Rae stands still for 5 seconds, taking 7 seconds to charge
up to 75%, before going on cooldown for 100 seconds.
Going to base will fully recharge her supply.
Rae starts with the Supplementary Battery Upgrade, giving her 5% move speed, 3% attack
speed, 20 attack damage while her Boots are active, and increasing her battery supply
by 50, so she starts each game at 150 Battery Supply.
For 1000 gold she can upgrade it with the Enhanced Battery Upgrade, boosting the active
stats to give an extra 10% movement speed and 8% attack speed, along with an extra 50
Battery Supply.
The final upgrade, Perfect Grade Battery Upgrade, costs 1600 gold and will give a further 15%
movement speed, 14% attack speed, 20 more attack damage and 150 more Battery Supply.
She also gains a Unique Passive on her Boots that causes her to recharge her battery supply
by 4% after every 3rd auto attack.
Fully Upgraded, her Gravity boots will give 30% movement speed, 25% attack speed, 60 attack
damage and 400 bonus battery supply, along with the passive.
She can still only gain the benefit of the item stats while it is active, though, so
managing the battery supply is key to success.
Rae’s Q is Double Kick Combo that causes her to charge forward in a one-two combo of
gravity-powered kicks.
It costs 8 battery supply to use, and the first kick will knock back an enemy, causing
Rae to reposition herself closer to the target.
She then delivers a second kick, pushing them further back, or knocking them up if the target
is painted.
The ability can be re-cast after the first kick to cause Rae to leap away from the target,
throwing a small grenade that blinds enemies around the original target.
This is Rae’s main harass tool, and the reactivate is intended to give Rae some extra
control over what to do if the situation changes and she finds herself in danger.
The first kick will deal 35/60/85/110/135 physical damage, and the second deals 70/95/110/135/160,
and the ability has a cooldown of 14 seconds, or 8 seconds if the target was hit with a
charge from her passive item activation.
Her W is Paint Bomb, and activating it will cause Rae to throw a bomb at a target area,
dealing physical damage over 2 seconds and painting all targets in the blast area for
7 seconds, amplifying her damage dealt to them by basic attacks or her Double Kick Combo.
It deals 20/50/80/110/140 plus 30% of her AD and has a 10 second cooldown.
Her basic attacks will deal 4/7/8/10/12% of her AD as bonus damage, and Double Kick Combo
will deal an extra 8% damage to painted targets too.
Rae’s E is Wall Vault and it works like a gap closer.
When activated, she launches herself forwards.
If she collides with Terrain, she’ll launch herself off it in the opposite direction,
repeating the effect whenever she launches herself into another wall, draining her battery
for each bounce.
If she runs into a champion, she’ll slide on the ground and perform a tripping attack,
stunning the target for 1 second.
She can re-cast Wall Vault to end her dash with a slide early, knocking enemies hit to
the side and dealing damage that is amplified by the number of wall bounces.
Painted targets will be knocked up instead.
The kick will deal 40/60/80/100/120 physical damage and is amplified by 4% for each vault
from terrain.
It has a cooldown of 18 seconds and will drain her battery by 2/4/8/16% for each activation
or bounce.
Wall Vault would give Rae the ability to quickly navigate tight areas on the map such as the
jungle, along with working as her main CC or as an awesome escape tool.
Heel Hammer Kick is her Ultimate, and it is used on the condition that Rae must be stood
against a wall to build up enough force.
Rae kicks off with her Gravity Boots to leap into the area before smashing down to the
ground with her heel, creating a shockwave that travels outwards knocking up all enemy
champions hit.
Once she kicks off the ground, Rae can choose her landing point 1400 units around her, and
the shockwave will deal less damage the further an enemy is from the epicentre.
Subsequent shockwaves are also sent out, dealing less damage for each wave that hits an enemy.
Heel Hammer Kick is on a 160 second cooldown and deals 130/260/390 physical damage.
Rae’s Ultimate is an awesome disruptive tool for teamfights and it can dish out a
lot of damage or be used for the utility alone.
Smart positioning is required to make the most of this ability as you need to be near
a wall to activate it, but landing a well timed Heel Hammer Kick will make short work
of a grouped enemy team, along with making cleanup duty easy for your team.
Chris spent a lot of time working on both Rae’s kit and her overall design.
His concept post documents the development process really well - starting with an anatomy
study to understand the human form and help refine Rae’s pose to get the right personality
across.
Numerous iterations are required in the ‘ideation’ phase to really narrow down the best look
for a concept, and Chris spent a lot of time working on Rae’s clothes and equipment,
searching for something that combines both what she would likely wear in her home environment
with the equipment created for her by Vi.
It’s important that each part of a design has a clear function, so a lot of priority
was placed on the look of her belt and battery, so that it kinda makes ‘sense’ how it
works along with looking the part of a piece of Hextech technology in the world of Runeterra.
The real eye catcher and core part of Rae’s design is her Gravity Boots, so a lot of time
and effort went into trying out different styles to find something that both looks the
part but also feels believable.
Considering in the lore these were manufactured by Vi, Chris opted for a piston design similar
to what Vi used while constructing her gauntlets, and it really gives that feel that Rae is
a part of the world which is pretty impressive considering it’s not a Riot-produced piece.
Similarly Rae’s grenade needed to be refined, as an ability it’s important for it to really
look the part as it’s going to be actively used during each game.
The last piece of the puzzle was her own personal crest.
Like a phoenix rising from the oppression of the rich citizens of Piltover, Rae needed
something iconic that really represented who she was and what she stood for, and she proudly
wears it on her back.
Bring it all together and you get her final concept, and honestly it gives the perfect
vibe to compliment her kit and backstory.
As the great Thief of Piltover, she has a blend of hextech technology created by Vi
from stolen parts along with the lightweight and hooded clothing you would expect from
someone wanting to stay light on their feet and keep their identity hidden.
To be honest we’ve never seen a champion concept so fleshed out, and every part of
it just makes sense.
The kit feels impactful and unique while also introducing some new mechanics, and her design
is pretty fresh and unlike other champions in the game so far with the exception of Vi,
and that’s for pretty good reason!
We were so impressed with her design that we wanted to help push the concept further
by making it usable in game, and we think the skin came out really well.
This isn’t something we will likely be able to do again because the amount of time it
takes to create something like this, but we definitely wanted to try it at least once
so we’re really glad it came out looking so cool and true to the design for Rae that
Chris Zimmitti created.
We really hope you guys liked the video, we’ve wanted to try something like a champion concept
spotlight for a long time and Rae was so well produced that it was definitely worth showcasing
for you.
And it looks like that’s gonna be it from me, if you enjoyed the video drop a like,
subscribe if you want, thanks for watching, and I’ll see you guys next time!