It seems that the Ruined King – Viego once designed with more powerful mechanisms than what was introduced by Riot.
According to the article “Champion Insight: Viego,” a lot of fascinating details have been shared about the process of creating the Ruined King. As we already know, this is a famous and long-standing character in the League of Legends universe, however, the idea of making the Ruined King a champion came only after Riot August completed the project of Senna.
Regarding his first design, lead concept artist Riot Lonewingy shares that the Ruined King’s first concept was supposed to be kinda a brother of Mordekaiser. Since reconsidering all of the options, though, the artist felt that Viego was much more complicated than just being a warrior in iron armor. When the design was first announced, Riot August said that the team used a corrupted version of Jarvan IV to create a temporary design for him.
In terms of the champion’s abilities, Riot August disclosed that they had experimented with skills similar to Yuumi for Viego. This character could tie with an ally and stick with them around the map, hop out and strike the enemy at the right time. However, the skill set was not suitable for his “King” status, so this idea had been removed. Riot has experimented with many interesting designs for Viego’s E – Harrowed Path as well
In fact, the Ruined King is an extremely powerful character in the League of Legends universal lore. Therefore, the purpose to make Viego a balanced champion but still making players to feel the power that the king possesses, is not easy at all.
Viego would become extremely unbalanced or even another “200 years of designing” if Riot retained effects such as permanent camouflage or summoning an army of ghosts. Even after removing those ideas, Viego’s current skill set can still create countless unimaginable plays in the game. Perhaps Riot’s going to have a headache for a long time to adjust this champion until he can really fit into the game, just as they have to adjust their “newer” champions like Samira and Aphelios from time to time.