Summoners: Vote on where next to explore

See the recent exploration summary post for more information on the story so far.

The League of Legends is overseeing the exploration of Nyroth. Expressing wariness as to what might be unleashed by incautious exploration, it has cordoned off most of Nyroth to start with, opening it up piece by piece.

Each sector contains pieces of the mainland, as well as associated islands. The League is about to open up a new sector: either the south of Nyroth or the northwest. It has invited Summoners and Champions of the League to vote on this question. Once a sector is opened up, it will become more readily accessible for island and mainland exploration.

Each island contains a subnexus, part of the network created by the mega-nexus believed to be at the center of Yoroth, once the Nyrothian capital. The cataclysm has thrown these subnexuses out of alignment, warping their magical effects. This has generally been a Bad Thing for the islands’ inhabitants.

Outside of the islands, the only place where living Nyrothians can now be found is a floating hextech city located above Yoroth. The winged inhabitants of this city in the clouds are few in number and largely ignorant of what has transpired since the cataclysm. They do possess a small library of pre-cataclysm books and records, but the ancient Nyrothian language has become largely unintelligible to them.

Vote Here

Click here to cast your vote for which sector of Nyroth should be opened up for exploration next. The sectors are:

• Northeast. (Already unlocked.) Monsku and Bobu. Includes the islands of Avalon, Emain Ablach, Argyre, and Daeyux.
• South. Arcadia and Yanti. Includes the islands of Krocylea, Scheria, and Mag Mell.
• Northwest. Pelu-Pelu and Korag. Includes the islands of Neritum, Aeaea, and Kibu.

Read on for more information. I’ve decided that revealing a little more for each island would be appropriate. There will still be plenty of surprises.

Challenges and Rewards

For more complete rules, see the island exploration rules page.

Factions can open up an island through weekend Featured Match victories. If a faction goes 2–1, it may select any island within those sectors that are currently open. If a faction goes 3–0, it can select any island. If a faction goes 1–2, it gets a smaller mainland exploration event in one of the currently available regions.

An island exploration is handled as a lore event. The faction is presented with an opening setup, and is then given several choices for how to proceed. These involve overcoming challenges of various types: for example, there might be a hostile force to be overthrown (Military), or a magical or scientific puzzle to solve (Research).

If successful, a faction will resolve the story of that island along the lines of the option they selected. It will also receive rewards commensurate with the challenges faced. They are of various types:

• Military. Gain a Military unit for the rest of the arc.
• Research. Accelerate Research progress. (e.g. finding a new moonstone for Nami, rebuilding the Kinkou Order.)
• Commerce. Discover valuable artifacts or treasure, or marketable goods. Gain wealth and commercial power.
• Favor. Choosing benevolent or generous options, or advancing the League’s interests, will often result in a Favor bonus.
• Champion. Islands do not generally grant a Champion outright, but they may make an unlockable Champion easier to recruit, or may add another Champion to their list of unlockable Champions. (The main way to add Champions is through League petitions.)

In the list below, I give general indications of what sorts of rewards seem likely for each island. Note that there is some flexibility here, and the categories above are not the only categories available.

Current Sector: The Northeast

The northeastern sector includes Monsku and Bobu, as well as the islands of Avalon, Emain Ablach, Argyre, and Daeyux.

Monsku Region

Monsku is a northern region of Nyroth, covered in evergreen forests. It is cold and inhospitable, but not frozen over like the Freljord—though snow has begun to fall. Many temples, libraries, and other centers of learning are located here, now mostly in ruins. Nyrothian lore mentions it often as a place of scholarship and research, to rival the finest academies of Yoroth.

The factions of Valoran have settled in Monsku, building makeshift camps around the Port of Stormhaven established by Bilgewater. The League has successfully created a small embassy with a ritual summoning circle. This conduit allows Summoners and Champions to teleport between Valoran and Nyroth. (As with the teleportation circles that link the Institute to the various regions of Valoran, only Summoners and Champions possess the innate magical power to travel in this way, and they cannot bring significant quantities of materials with them. A Zaunite warpgate could, perhaps, be used to allow larger-scale transport.)

Bobu Region

Bobu is located along the eastern coast of Nyroth, and enjoys more a more temperate climate. It was once a wealthy commercial center, and there are many ruined shipyards and factories.

The Island of Avalon

Controlled by Bilgewater.

When Bilgewater came to Avalon, it found little sign of the bustling cities described in Nyrothian legend. They discovered that most of the automata that powered Avalon’s industry had gone berserk in the cataclysm, tearing the great cities apart piece by piece for scrap components. They continued to grow food, weave textiles, and produce consumer goods in enormous quantities, but the malfunctioning constructs would slaughter any Nyrothians who came within their sight. Instead, the survivors of the cataclysm lived out a wretched existence under siege conditions, cowering in fortified fortress-valleys, barely aware of one another’s existence. Bilgewater unified the survivors together, and with the assistance of a small number of automata whose sanity had withstood the cataclysm they shut down the central automata factory and deactivated the berserk constructs that had held Avalon in terror for centuries. They then restored the island’s nexus, potentially allowing the creation of new, sane automata—though the natives are not yet ready for that.

The Island of Emain Ablach

Controlled by Bilgewater.

Bilgewater traveled next to Emain Ablach. They found an island teeming with plant life, but also afflicted with deadly plant monsters. They were able to repair the misaligned nexus and destroy the plant-monsters. The natives granted them ownership of a swath of reclaimed territory as a show of appreciation; Bilgewater generously chose to dedicate it to staple crops to help feed Avalon and other Nyrothians, rather than converting it to the production of cash crops to enrich themselves.

The Island of Daeyux

Controlled by the Shadow Isles.

Once a land of potent healing magic, the cataclysm inverted the Daeyux subnexus. The natives, who had enjoyed wondrous longevity and splendid health thanks to the life magic flowing through Daeyux, were instantly converted into undead monstrosities, most of them incoherently insane and near-mindless. A few mages were spontaneously transformed into liches—an unprecedented arcane phenomenon. These lich-barons rule over Daeyux, except for the area nearest the nexus, where wild currents of life magic still flow, rendering the undead nearby entirely uncontrollable. The Shadow Isles attempted to seize control of the subnexus to stabilize it, but their armies were defeated. They will need time to recover before they can attempt a second conquest.

The Island of Argyre

Open for selection.

Argyre is a mountainous, snowy island not unlike the Freljord. Legends tell of small furry inhabitants who sound suspiciously like yordles, as well as a great artifact, “Lanpoa”, which sounds an awful lot like the Mothership. Bandle City recently succeeded in restoring their Mothership to full operation; perhaps something similar could be done here.

Locked Sector: South

The southern sector includes Arcadia and Yanti, and the islands of Krocyclea, Scheria, and Mag Mell.

Yanti Region

Nyrothian texts often associate Yanti with religion, and speak of many temples there. It seems to have been somewhat politically independent from the other regions, and sometimes antagonistic toward them. As for geography, it is principally made up of plains and grasslands, and is quite pleasantly warm even in November. Curiously, there are no signs of shipyards, though there does seem to be some construction of some sort along the coast.

Arcadia Region

Nyrothian lore lavishes Arcadia with praise. It is made out to be a balmy paradise and the cultural center of Nyroth, particularly when it comes to the fine arts.

The Island of Krocylea

Unexplored.

The ancient Nyrothian’s scribbling was the source of much confusion, until the Valoranians consulted maps in the possession of the modern-day Nyrothians. It is sometimes the case that a piece of land will become flooded or erode away over time. Krocylea seems to have undergone the opposite change: the part scribbled out by the Nyrothian does not appear on older maps. It seems as though the cataclysm altered Krocyclea into a mirror-image of Argyre. Given that the magical energies of the nexuses are believed to have created Nyroth in the first place, this is perhaps not surprising, but why it should mirror Krocyclea in particular is unclear. Ancient records describe Krocylea as an independent kingdom with a fairly isolationist policy.

The Island of Scheria

Unexplored.

Scheria is associated often with Yanti, and likewise seems to have been home to uncommon religious fervor. It is hard to glean much from the few scraps of records that remain, but the dominant religion seems to have been particular focused on balance and duality, such as between the sun and the moon. Many geometric and mathematical texts had origins in Scheria.

The Island of Mag Mell

Unexplored.

Is that a dinosaur? Yes. Yes, it is. Mag Mell has always been known as a savage land, with extreme levels of volcanic activity and bizarre wildlife. There are stories of heroes voyaging to Mag Mell to do battle with fire elementals and the like. They may only be stories, but they have the ring of truth—not least because, unlike most such legends, in these stories the heroes often don’t come back.

Locked Sector: Northwest

The northwestern sector includes Pelu-Pelu and Korag.

Pelu-Pelu Region

Pelu-Pelu enjoys a tropical climate. Although not apparently very fertile, and thus historically having a rather low population density and only minor economic-industrial significance, it sounds like it was a pretty nice place to live.

Korag Region

Korag was once a major military and industrial center. There is a remarkable dearth of greenery here, even centuries after the cataclysm. The terrain is rocky and the climate quite cold; it is already blanketed in heavy snow.

The Island of Neritum

Unexplored.

There is virtually no mention of Neritum in the ancient texts that have been deciphered so far. Indeed, the only clear reference to Neritum is in a book of epic poetry, in which one of the characters is said to be a Neritian swordsman. There are signs of an active civilization now existing there. It does not appear particularly welcoming.

The Island of Aeaea

Unexplored.

Aeaea was known as an exceptionally wealthy and prosperous island-city. Their chief export, other than vowels, seems to have been automata.

The Island of Kibu

Unexplored.

It’s readily apparent to anyone with some degree of magical sensitivity that Kibu is overcharged with wild magic, perhaps representing a sort of break in the network of nexuses and leylines that generates the veil and protects Nyroth from the ether-storms. It sounds like Kibu was fairly chaotic and unstable even before the cataclysm.