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Caitlyn/Vi

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< Caitlyn(Redirected from Piltover's Finest)
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Pairing
Pairing: Piltover's Finest
Alternative name(s): CaitVi, Violyn[1]
Gender category: femslash, f/f
Fandom: Arcane, League of Legends
Canonical?: Canon in the Arcaneverse. Their in-game interactions suggest they're more than work partners.
Prevalence: common
Archives:
Other:
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Piltover's Finest, also known as CaitVi or Violyn, is the main ship in the animated series Arcane composed of Vi and Caitlyn Kiramman. It is also one of the biggest pairings in the extended League of Legends universe. This ship name comes from a buff they gain when allied with each other in game, "On The Case: Piltover's Finest".[2]

As of April 2022, there are 3279 works in their AO3 tag, comprising 39% of the Arcane works in the archive [3]. In the League Extended universe, they represent 31,5% of the works in AO3.

Creators are mostly active on Tumblr [1][2][3] Twitter and AO3[4].

Canon

League of Legends

Caitlyn, Piltover's Sheriff, was the first champion added in January 4, 2011. Vi was released in December 19, 2012, and revealed to be Caitlyn's crime-fighting partner. They had several voice lines together and gained buffs when fighting side by side. They also have special lines when used in enemy teams.

Arcane

Fandom

Pre-Arcane

Speculating about Vi and Caitlyn's relationship began as soon as Vi was released as a champion in December of 2012, nearly two years after Caitlyn was initially released. Their shared backstory of becoming work partners as well as certain in-game voice lines that hinted at a romantic connection between the pair lead many to consider them all but confirmed as canon. They have sometimes been compared to Poison Ivy/Harley Quinn as they too went through an infamous period of subtext only readings before becoming canon many years after the fact.

Post-Arcane

Vi wearing a bright light blue armor that recalls the style of the Heartbreaker Vi skin splash art. She's kneeling in front of Caitlyn who's wearing a deep dark blue dress. Caitlyn is holding a red rose and one of her hands is touching Vi's.
Piltover's Finest fanart by art-of-urbanstar

Following the release of Arcane's first season in late 2021 the ship grew rapidly in popularity thanks to broader audience the show reached. Arcane was recommended throughout various sapphic fandoms based on the strength of writing for Vi and Caitlyn's relationship.

By January they began appearing regularly in Tumblr's top 20 ships for Week in Review, first under then Violyn tag and later as Caitvi.[4][5] In Tumblr's Year in Review 2022 they placed 10th in the top 100 ships, this time under Piltover’s Finest. Additionally, they also appeared in the top 100 of centrumlumina's AO3 Ship Stats 2022.

Fans who had only watched Arcane still took inspiration from some of Vi and Caitlyn's cosmetics skin designs available in League of Legends when creating their own AUs. Heartbreaker Vi, Debonair V, Demon Vi,[6] and Sheriff Caitlyn[7] all fuelled fics and fanart of medieval, mobster, daemon and western AUs receptively. There was also a lot of excitement around their matching valentines day skins that were shown in 2023, titled Heartache Vi and Heartthrob Caitlyn, with much fanart being drawn using the new designs.

Tropes, Common Storylines and Fanon

  • Reluctant partners to lovers: Canonical. Usually based on the Arcane lore, following canon.
  • Reversed roles: Can feature Zaunite!Caitlyn (either in a complete revamp or an AU where she lost everything and moved to Zaun), Piltie!Vi or have their roles reversed in other ways, such as detectiveXprisoner, soldierXcivilian etc.
  • Different League lore: There are differences in Caitlyn and Vi's lore based on which media (game, cosmetic, comic etc.) fans choose. The version of the League game also presents changes in lore to characters and world building. For example, in Legends of Runeterra, fans learnt that Caitlyn has a sweet tooth and that she likes "bad girls". League lines also hint at them having a long-time working relationship as sheriff and cop, but perhaps not having disclosed their feelings for each other yet (Caitlyn's dying line being about telling Vi something).
  • Trans headcanons: Depicted and tagged in a multitude of ways. Gender queerness and various types of trans representation are common. Some of the trans headcanons for Vi are based on her binding in Season 2, the most common seems to be transmasculine!Vi. In relation to Vi, trans Caitlyn seems to be more popular. (some anti-fans object to these, calling them lesbophobia or lesbian erasure).
    • Some tagging methods, such as "Caitlyn/Vi has a penis", "girl penis", "GP!Vi/Caitlyn", "futanari", are met with criticism and aren't considered trans headcanons by some.
  • Alternate universe: Canonical. In pre-Arcane lore this was already visible with the characters' skinline, with various skins used to create vast universes, building upon item or skin lore, sometimes even from character lore outside Caitlyn and Vi. Some examples of this are: Officer cosmetics (a police AU), Battle Academia cosmetics (an anime school battle royale inspired AU), Heartthrob cosmetics (a modern highschool AU), Pool Party cosmetics (usually more in illustrations and comics, what it says on the tin). The multitude of military-inspired cosmetics also feature their own lore-close fanworks and serve to inspire other AUs. Arcane lore built upon this canon with the introduction of a different universe to the show's:
    • League/Arcane Mashup: Cosmetic lore can be added to build upon Arcane lore, different plot points, in-game mentions and League-only characters make an appearance.
    • Alternate Episode AU: Although Vi is dead in this universe, many stories and art explores what could have happened in Vi had survived, if Caitlyn had died, or jumps into other universes.
      • Time travel fix-its: Typically inspired by the Alternate Episode, Cait and/or Vi try to correct the course of the episode before disaster strikes. This typically aims to stop Powder from becoming Jinx, although some plots are connected to the birth of Hextech.
      • Travel to a Modern Universe: In this context, Caitlyn and/or Vi travel to a universe similar to our own, but their original universe still exists.
    • Modern AU: These feature a variety of themes, from a more true to canon plot (except in a real world country, such as the USA) Vi meeting Cait and not knowing who she is (or how important/rich she is), leading to shenanigans, to more specific tropes, like coffeeshop AUs that follow along the Arcane main plot in a loose way.
    • Police/Detective AU: based on their jobs in League/Arcane. Cait is usually idealistic while Vi is more down to earth, or sometimes not even a co-worker. Since Season 2, more fanworks where Caitlyn faces a corruption arc became more common (these tend to be the target of anti-fans).
    • Actor AU: Typically in shows based of the Arcane plot, or treating Arcane as if it's a show.
    • Military AU: Although both characters have military heavy cosmetics, in fanworks Vi seems to have more military positions.
    • Prison AU: Based on Vi's imprisonment. AUs where Caitlyn is an undercover investigator, gets sent to jail or is a guard, for example.
  • Terms of Endearment: Vi often calls Caitlyn "Cupcake," initially in a teasing way, but later showing her fondness for Cait.
  • Timetravel: In-world canonical. Although neither Caitlyn nor Vi timetravel, this is used in AUs in a multitude of ways.
  • Star-crossed lovers: Based on the fact that Caitlyn comes from the Kiramman family, who is one of the de facto ruling houses of Piltover, while Vi is from Zaun, the undercity. It's common to have their dynamic revolve around the fact that they come from two very distinct backgrounds and sometimes may clash in their opinions because of this. Fanworks explore several "what ifs" surrounding this, be it in Universe Alteration or Alternate Universe.
  • Penny Among Diamonds: Many fanworks put Vi in formal or aristocratic or high class environments while she's with Cait. Vi is expected to not fit in, or be unable to adapt. These go one of two main ways, either Vi is successful, much to Cait's surprise and delight (many inspired by Debonair Vi's cosmetic), or Vi reacts to mistreatment and exposes the rotten façade of the event or situation she's in.
  • Found Family/Adoption: There are many fanworks where Caitlyn and Vi quickly become each other's family (typically in stories where they've both already lost their other family members). This sometimes leads to Caitlyn becoming a sister figure to Jinx. The adoption of Vi and Jinx sometimes plays into this trope, though it's typically explored in AUs.
  • Sex toys: Notably the hexstrap, typically invented by Jayce and/or Viktor. Straps are a common accessory, but others, such as vibrators also make common appearances.
  • Exes to Lovers: Taken to be canonical by some fans (as some believe they were together in some capacity before season 2). This also is common in AUs as well and it ties into the cheating trope (with Maddie, for example) occasionally.
  • Top and Bottom dynamics: They seem to be tied up, with top Caitlyn and top Vi appeading on AO3 in similar amounts.
  • Power Imbalance: Due to Caitlyn being a Kiramman and Vi a zaunite orphan. The power imbalance trope is common (this also tends to be the target of anti-fans).
  • Birds of a Feather: Many fanworks also feature other queer characters, be they canon or headcanoned as such (Jinx and Ekko's relationship lore outside Arcane, for example).
  • BDSM: Either incorporated into canon or in an AU. Ties into military or police style (even if just in uniform form) BDSM.

Fanworks

Fanfic

  • Off Duty. The first fic posted to AO3 under the Caitlyn/Vi tag. Posted on December 13, 2014
  • Blood of the Covenant. First multichapter fic in their AO3 tag. First published on November 17, 2015. Last updated on December 6, 2015.
  • Piltaunean Wilds. Longest fic in their tag, clocking at 721k words. First published on January 13, 2022. Completed on April 3, 2022.
  • I Would Bring You the Stars and the Moon by GutterWitch, particularly popular Caitvi fic, featuring fanart, animations and author/reader controversies, Caitlyn has been assigned as the personal capcom to one of the astronauts currently on a year long expedition at the international space station. Cue long months of pining and desperate longing. Last updated February 20, 2025.
  • Eras: Caitlyn Kiramman's Coming Out Story by LoadedGunn

Fanart

Fanvids

Fan Animations

Zines

Events

Other

Meta

Archives & Fannish Links

Twitter

Tumblr

References

  1. ^ reddit comment by Forward-Education674 posted 5 March 2025. Replies explain the alternatives and why CatVi was historically preferred by the fandom.
  2. ^ Reddit thread explaining the ship name
  3. ^ "Works tagged as Caitlyn/Vi (League of Legends) in AO3". Archive of Our Own. Archived from the original on 2022-05-28.
  4. ^ Ships - Week Ending January 10th, 2022 Week in Review. Tumblr. Jan 10th, 2022.
  5. ^ Ships - Week Ending February 14th, 2022 Week in Review. Tumblr. Feb 14th, 2022.
  6. ^ Vi/LoL/Cosmetics
  7. ^ Caitlyn/LoL/Cosmetics
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