The Kumquat Alchemist

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Posts posted by The Kumquat Alchemist

  1. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    This thing is cool looking, especially the top part where the head (face?) is. I have never had a Bionicle, so all the more interesting to me. :sweet:

    Thanks!

    As to your confusion over the head/face, I suppose I should have mentioned that the head on top is the face of the minifigure piloting it; The chest is built on this component, allowing me to hide a minifigure behind the arch created. I neglected to take pictures of this because there is no proper way to "open" the chest and take the pilot out; minor disassembly is required.

  2. Posted

    46993539.jpg Its really that simple guys. If you're not happy with the story or pacing of it for HF, stop following it. I've watched the TV spots because up until IFB they've at least been somewhat amusing. But I've never been all that invested in the story. I'm into HF purely for the sets, and even then its for the parts. The builds are lack luster and (again) amusing at best. This feels very much like the bionicle comics getting thinner every year. Lego's Checkin out on HF maan. The end is nigh...

    All the better if it is; it can only mean more interesting components if we get a whole new constraction line in place of HF. A better story would just be a bonus on top of shiny new components.

  3. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    I have an unusual selection of preferred music. I enjoy many classical composers, but for more modern music I only have a small number songs I enjoy listening to.

    Classical is usually conductive towards all types of MOCing, but if I am working on a MOC related to a piece of music I like, I'll listen to it while building. For example, when trying to make

    a LEGO replica of Team Fortress 2's Robot Pyro, I listened to The Calm, the Team Fortress 2 Main Theme and Robots! during some of the building.

  4. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    --------------------Chivalrous Bones------------------

    img_1472.jpg

    -------------------------------------------------------------

    "This Lich didn’t want to be known as the most bloodthirsty and insane mecha pilot in his home quadrant; all he wanted was a peaceful eternity on his favorite hand-picked solar system, spending his years in the company of fellow Liches and terrified subject colonists. Unfortunately, little things such as “pirates”, “Galactic Command”, and “sentient being rights groups” continued to harass his home system, and thus Chivalrous Bones was born, a mech held together with black magic, tentacles, and blood, to fight these attackers."

    This here is my first (second? This is an improvement on an old model) attempt at a half-decent MOC in quite a few years. Compared to the stuff you experienced builders have put together, this pales in comparison, but hopefully I'll get some decent feedback and criticism that will make Mark 3 of this MOC even better. (Or more tolerable, depending on how you look at it) Mark 1 was posted on BZPower, and thankfully didn't get too much attention since it's even worse than this iteration.

    Because I collected far too much BIONICLE when younger, I have quite the collection of silver armours, weapons, and Kanohi. Unfortunately, many of my BIONICLE socket joints have snapped into pieces, meaning that my ratio of silver pieces to limbs on which to put those silver pieces is very, very high, so I thought I'd try making a MOC with a System frame and BIONICLE armor. I still have a medium-sized tub's worth of nothing but silver BIONICLE pieces to show for this effort.

    Other pictures:

    Axe Readied

    Grasping

    Back

    Perhaps this should be in fantasy/historical themes. I have no idea, Sci-Fi seemed the best place.

  5. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    Sorry to be a party pooper, but vehicles in space don't "swoosh" or make "pew, pew, pew" sounds. In space, as they say, nobody can hear you scream.

    LEGO spaceships telepathically Swoosh. :laugh:

  6. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    I know, right? I wonder who started the idea that a theme won't sell unless it has a TV show, a movie, and a breakfast cereal to back it up. Lego supposedly gears sets to kids, not AFOL's. However, they release 4 Lego sets based on Guardians of the Galaxy, a movie rated PG-13. (Based on what I've seen of the trailer, 13 is pushing it. Zoe's side boob shot, Chris Pratt's middle finger, vulgar language, etc.) Believe me, I'm no prude. Just sayin'. Are these sets targeted towards that elusive 13-18 year old niche market? [emphasis added]

    Not necessarily, no. Films are pushing the limit of PG-13 ratings further and further with each year, and it hasn't stopped young kids from going to see them; LEGO is not going to avoid cashing in on that if they're already in a position to easily get a license; sure, they won't go out of their way to get licenses for more mature or violent franchises like Mega Bloks has done with Halo and COD, but since LEGO is already producing Marvel and DC sets, I suppose they thought it wouldn't hurt to put a few Guardians of the Galaxy kits into their lineup.

  8. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    This is a beautiful creation. The integration of System and small Technic elements has worked very well; It makes me want to play around with System- and Technic-heavy constraction figure revamps myself, something I've never been good at.

  9. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    Not sure how I would feel about this. The aliens looked wonderfully campy, but the humans didnt have any actual space vehicles (though I guess most of them could be used on another planet than Earth). Personally, I'd prefer a return of Ice Planet.

    The return of any civilian or scientist Space theme would be marvelous. LEGO has shown themselves willing to do similar rehashes of old conflict-free themes with this year's upcoming Arctic theme; I can only hope they do the same with a Space theme also. Futuron, Exploriens, Ice Planet, Classic Space, anything based on those themes would be a refreshing retreat from the "Aliens vs Humans" themes we've been seeing for the last 10 years or so. I don't mean to call any of those themes bad; the Space sets we've seen over the last few years have all been very well-designed, with Galaxy Squad and Mars Mission being some of my favorites. It's just that their "Aliens vs Humans" premises all seem worn.

  10. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    If you walk the toy aisles at Walmart, they are full of cheap looking plastic junk for the most part. The LEGO section is very small. The other toys mostly look like cheap junk, which us quite popular in the USA , and much of this junk is made by Mattel. It is scary how much shelf space they control.

    What horror stories are these?

    I must truly take my nearby Wal-Marts' LEGO selections for granted; both nearby me have at least one whole shelf's length of space dedicated to LEGO.

  11. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    I found some Hive Crawlers on sale for $17 USD each, and bought 2.

    I would have bought more, but I already have 1 Hive Crawler that I'm displaying and I'm at a loss for storage space as things are, even if I'm just storing boxes of parts.

  13. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    Though I could perhaps do more with technic-based skeletons and limbs, right now I'm almost purely using the CCBS skeleton and armor pieces.

    Ever since 2007, I've been terrified of MOCing with BIONICLE socket pieces, due to their inclination to break left and right, and being able to use an almost entirely ball-and-socket-based system without fear of breakage for the first time in 4 years is quite refreshing, even if it limits my MOCs for using nothing but the post-2011 CCBS system for skeletons and armor.

  14. Posted · Edited by The Kumquat Alchemist

    I can only hope for such a thing. Classic Space was a wonderfully creative line with its inventive uses of the blocky bricks of its day in highly detailed and uniquely shaped spacecraft. I'd love to see the LEGO designers imitate that triangular, blocky aesthetic using modern parts instead of striving for more streamlined craft, like in their Ep 1-3 Star Wars ship designs.

    I'd certainly love some sets with the Classic Space logo that don't cost 100 USD, like Benny's Spaceship.

  15. Posted

    I'd say Kre-O off the bat, if not for the problem of the plastic used for the hand-sized clips. Good luck using a Kre-O clip of that size even once without stress marks appearing. Would it have killed them to use a softer plastic for Kre-O hands and clips of similar sizes?

    Still, even with that issue Kre-O wins for me. I like the Kreons, because the designers have done such a great job of making them character-accurate despite their blockiness, much in the same way that LEGO handles their minifigures. Mega Bloks, on the other hand, uses a large amount of custom molding per figure, and I don't find any charm in that.