Kalta the Noble Mind
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Everything posted by Kalta the Noble Mind
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from what i understand Skull grinder is a sort of necromancer, using magic to animate fallen warriors to do his bidding yes? maybe wherever he learned his necromancy from they say to give the body you are reanimating a mask similar to your own so it can i dunno act as a proxy head for you. like how the mask that controls the skull spiders looks like a skull spider itself, it' a sympathetic magic interface. or if they are legit skulls form other dead creatures they act as enchanted remotes. he treated those skulls with whatever magic he used to turn dead bodies "on" again and being a necromancer he just wears his bull skull as ritual dress or i dunno a fashion statement. also doesnt the Pokemon Cubone wear the skull of its mother?
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i'd think characters that get toys would be qualified to get names,since they are so integral to the plot that the story is actually built around them going by how these productions work. despite what i wrote i could see them recycling names form G1 for convenience sake since those are already copyrighted ut if done willy nilly it will be disruptive to the older fans which i doubt TLG would mind much. like while makuta isnt a shapeshifting servant of the giant robot he is still the bad guy in the reboot so the name still fits. but i dunno we have a sapient schemer akin to the charatcer of roodaka would it be wise to give such an archetype a name like krekka, or Nuvok? i wouldnt know. but thinking about it i wont mind if they switch up names with new character types. like the protector of fire's name is Iruni despite the name belonging to a character asossiated with air/jungle. that would seem like a cost saving measure. save the new names for character only sets and recycle the old G1 lexicon in the supplimentory material.
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maybe just in the supplimentory material. i remember reading that they canceled bionicle because the lore and terms that went with it were too dense to bring newcomers and those who liked the lore didnt buy the toys so the series was bleeding money form both consumer types. leaving the primary marketing material like the ads and online animations ect with simple and direct terms could keep the line appealing to new customers and wont bog down fledgling fans who may just be interested in cool fighting robots. the supplimentory material will be suplimentory. dont need to know that the Skull grinder was a necromancer by the name of Kulta if just the big devil man being the leader of the other creeps is enough for fighting. older children who re becoming fledgling geeks with a tatse for narrative will appreciate the backstory and how they fit into the plot and can probably impress their friends by laying down the real deal with their favorite hero or villain. but bottom line a bad guy who squeezes the juice form magic masks to power his undead army or a bad guy who has a friggin' mace-axe meant to grind skulls will still be a mighty foe for the goog guys to fight:) anything that makes the consumer want you to just shut up and take their money. also thinking about it these generic titles may have a modular nature similar to the building toys themselves making for even more creative potential for the little ones. as someone said in the original topic giving definite names limits creative potential because that character an only ever be that character, a toa can only be a destined matoran a vortixx can only be a lizard lady from an industrial complex piraka can only be a skakdi ect. i think why dark hunters are so popular is because of how generic and descriptive the title is it can encompass any weird being you can concoct because all that matters in the story is that they are a member of that mafia like syndicate. generic titles are both specific (to their function) while being ambigious (doesnt define any set character). give say the bohrok for example. each name had to end in an "ok" like nuvok or galok or tavok etc. so to make a new bohrok you have to follow that convention, a belok for a bohrok of jungle or fezok for a bohrok of iron , hard to come up with a unique prefix just to get a new element. much easier to just call it a minion of jungle or a minion of iron so your playmate knows what charatcer class and element tye they are so you both can get to see if iron beats stone. can also work for adding new original character types to your play without having to concoct your own unique gobbldygook for your friends to get confused with. say you wanna keep protectors a matoran type character but still want the wise elder that used to be a toa? why not have tahu and his protector meet an older master of fire, a guru of fire to be exact? or know how ekimu and makuta were mask makers? why cant there be others who make magical weapons or magical armor? they can be weapon makers or armor makers! or in your story the mask makers merely craft and shape the metal but dont infuse it with power. who makes the masks of power powerful? mask enchanters of course! they are the ones who have those special chest armor that hold their magic hear (or as the chima ultrabuilds called those orbs,their Chi). a kid can build his own world using those simple terms and can probably help little ones understand narrative by letting them build characters based on literal archetypes. it can also help the less imaginitive kids intergrate their older CCBS and other constraction sets into the new bionicle story with direct names. wanna bring hero factory's drilldozer into Okoto? swap his mask for one of the generic silver skull masks and boom you got the evil skull driller! want to bring Chima's Warriz into the fight between the masters and skull creatures? he's a beast of earth! or fire or icecream for all you care. as they grow older and more into the lore they can ajust and modify their original creations as needed . or something that's my two cents on this.
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i remember reading that TLG only had a finite list of approved names during G1 which is why they use those generic term code names for the darkhunters since they could get more characters without wasting names. wonder if the current generic title naming convention in G2 is there for the same reason. not only do they get the ideas of the characters across but lets you use the copyrighted names sparingly. like in the summer wave Skull Grinder is the leader of the skull creatures so needs to have an actual name to make him distinct and integral to the story thus only he gets named Kulta. or something. makes even more sense when i heard elsewhere in this thread that the G2 story team want to do their own thing with no connection to G1 so outside of using the original 6 Toa/masters for brand recognition they have to come up with their own lexicon of names and terms which would cost money to copyright. using generic terms where they can saves them on copyright cash, like here in year one of G2 we have i believe a grand total of 3 unique names (okoto,Ekimu,Kulta) while i think we had a total of 27 unique names in the first wave of G1 (6 toa,6 turaga,12 kanohi, 3 aformentioned character/element terms). that's what i take away form this anyway. EDIT: also just remembered the Maori fiasco that made Tohuga into Matoran. so maybe lego is going super safe and using generic terms when possible so they dont have to worry about copyrighting existing languages or put the money used on that once extensive lexicon towards research into finding truly unique names that wont tread on any existing terms. also i think i read elsewhere about the trouble translating fantasy terms into other languages so generic descriptors are ideal as most if all languages have words that can describe the same concept thus make translation easier.
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Jang Bricks just did a review of Mask Maker versus Skull Grinder. He usually reviews sets that he can get from stores so does that mean his residence in canada has the summer wave?
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so does the torso piece. it's actually why i think at least the sketches are legit. they came out last year or earlier this year from someone who's kid nephew was part of a focus group for the 2016 toys. the fact those parts came to be seen in the new star wars constraction lends credence to those old claims.
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outside of the steep slope armor addon we have seen every other piece shown in those sketches. the torso armor with the belt detail, the slender leg shell, and now what seems to be the technic/ccbs adaptor for the shooter brick. i wanna say those images are legit.
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i would be totally in favor of that. have a specialty tool arm would be considered a very powerful upgrade! i can also imagine them utilizing a new blaster piece with them, or some other gimmick that can make it sell.
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that's it! and that is true. they seemed to match the description though and going by the elemental blasters the Protectors had i figured Lego was making such action features more generic so they can be utilized in other themes. i think those figs can fit comfortably on the head of the new missile brick and can be modified slightly with a compatible connector and be casted in rubber. cant really explain the size though.
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i forget if we have confirmation on the nature of the Trans/Gold masks the skull people come with because if we don't i could see them being bursting with transformative elemental energy which could upgrade the Masters into the sort of elemental golems the Element lords were supposed to be. i think we saw some form of elemental traits in the Protectors, most notably the ankle vines of Protector of Jungle and the rocky armor on Protector of Earth. as for adding new elements/changing out characters didn't Hero factory change its roster every wave? like they had the original 6 and over time added more heroes and periodically left one or two heroes out or swapped some with others. i could see Bionicle G2 do something similar to change things up a bit and maybe emphasize the fantasy element with finding fellow heroes to join on their quest. i can also see new elements come about as upgrades to the main six as opposed to being distinct elements in and of themselves. so far it has been established that the masters' elemental power comes from their masks so it wont be a stretch that any new toa centric masks could be of other elements rather than the stock superpowers of G1. like Tahu gets the Mask of Plasma to shoot laser beams and Onua can have the mask of Gravity to make his blows more powerful or something. on a related note i saw Jang Bricks' nw Ninjago dragon review that comes with slime green ghostly Screamers. $50 says those are the weird slimy ghost heads that play tester talked about for the 2016 wave.
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Star Wars Constraction 2015 Discussion
Kalta the Noble Mind replied to just2good's topic in LEGO Action Figures
i just watched a special on how they did the BB-8 droid using the same remote control ball technology in the Sphero toy. and i just saw jang Birck's review of the jurrassic world set that has the new ball vehicle that seems to be made of a sturdier plastic meant for more rigorous play. and given what i have seen with Lego's releases of new license themes more often than not they are meant to be direct tie-ins with that license's latest release (POTC had On Stranger Tides sets more than the other 3 movies and LOTR only came about slightly before the Hobbit sets) could it be possible that we will have a functional BB-8 constraction figure utilizing that new ball piece? i could see it being made into a static display piece by turning the ball piece on its side with the axels facing up where one can place the head and the base but i can also see them make it roll around with a small motor or simple weighted brick and have the head stay in place by a magnet like the actual animatronic droid. -
ooh wonder if the revelation of the skull warriors give insight to the nature of the G2 bionicle characters:) are they biomechanical with 85% mechanical and 15% organics or vice versa? maybe these guys ar emore glatorian esque with bionics implanted hence why they could rot into skeletons. i think.
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how exactly? it simplified roleplay? like rather than designating a figure male or female they just need a blue fig for the female role? dint think the rahkshi and bohrok or visorak count, and i think the skakdi could fall under the same category as the first two species i believe were genderless constructs and i don't think the visorak were treated as gendered beings. and the skakdi i think were designed with the same "lack of gender" as well. but do agree with the rest as i think it made it easier for the story team to assign characters to toys. but from what i hear orde was brought in the worst way. he was essentially a cheat/copout for a contest that had two female elements in a serial and we still only got one female in nikila. and the explanation was incredibly insulting as it fed into two horrible gender stereotypes . agree with hahli inika but disagree on macku. i think the original G1 masks were fairly gender neutral which made them very versatile. and with the noble huna i think it was the upturned eyes and the pointiness of the mask that made it feminine for that character, like you can see that mask fitting for a perky young girl type character as well as the old wise priest elder for vakama. if i make sense.
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when exactly did GregF have that "no reproduction = no romance" rule put in place? was it after we learned that the MU was artificial/constructed and the matoran are more or less nanobots? if so i took that to mean that due to being an entirely artificial species matoran and the like would not have had any drive to form such bonds let alone pair up like humans would .especially after we learned that they come from factories fully formed making traditional child rearing unneeded. i think GregF missed a lot of clever opportunities that both quashed those hard questions as well add to the world and tying into the series' themes. like since matoran were built to be mere workers they could have been originally "born" in batches of six,enough for a worker cell or something. and that could explain why so many toa teams come in six, it's their version of Couples or a family unit which is why they call each other brother and sister. and that 6 point unity formed the basis of the first of the 3 virtues. what really got me is why in G1 each tribe was monogendered. was it an extension of the initial character lineup,like since they designated the water character female al water characters are female now?
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i want to guess due to how different in setting and such G2 is LEGO wanted to try a whole new team to have a fresh new take on this franchise. heck i think this is the first sequel/reboot/reimagining lego has ever done. but most likely i am betting GregF is too busy with ninjago and such to tackle this new endevor. though given how overt the references to time is in G2 and how opposed to time travel gregF was i would lean to the former. but most likely a bit of both: GregF has too much on his plate so why not let the new creative team work on the reboot of our most popular toyline?
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i's just 3 more months till we get the Skull Warriors right?
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Pohatu design video. the 3d prototype looked more like his original kakama.
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i am imagining Carlos D'Anda's work when you say stylized set-accurate art. he kept most of the form and sillhuette of the toys intact while filling in both "gaps" and "blanks" the gaps are like fattening the spine/abdomen of the toa so they look more full and solid,as well as squashing the black ball sockets so the orbs of the limbs better lined up with the proper shoulders and hips. the blanks are more standard stylization where he fleshes out the bare bones of the toy such as making the molded gear detail in the pelvis into a separate piece and properly separating the joints in the sculpts. he also characterization, such as bulking up tahu's form to enphasis his hero stature, or enlarging onua's arms to enphesis his strong,underground dweller nature , or making kopaka's mask more geometric to enphesis his cold sharp demeanor or lewa's limbs stretched and thinned to make him look slinky and bendy like a monkey, or the angling of gali's chest socket so it looks more like a human woman's bust,as well as thickening the wide parts of her legs so they look like women's thighs. and pohatu's shrinking of his gearbox and the widening of his other end so his upside-down body construction looks more natural. and i love how he made the eyes expressive and solid with specular and shading denoting an actual object behind the mask. he essentially pushed and prodded the initial bionicle designs until they made sense as living moving beings. they weren't lego toys that were plopped into natural environments asomuch these are natural beings native to these environments who coincidentally resemble lego toys. if i make sense. stuart sayer does similar stylization but embraces the “flaws” of the toys rather than try to fix them like D’anda did. he enhanced and exaggerated the geometric shapes and greeble of the toy’s elements for full effect. the piraka’s wide torsos and thick limbs were warped and bent to emphasize the brutal size and strength suitable for the orc-like thugs. their feat are suitably organic talons and their teeth are sharp and gnashing as well. the voya-matoran had their cobbled together builds put on full display to emphasize the weakness of these robot people who were put back together poorly,playing up the vastly different elements used to show mismatchned-ness. the toa as well as axonn i think had their humanoid torsos sculpted just a tad to enphisize heroic builds yet still paid homage to their element built nature. but where sayer shined was the background characters where he basically made them all up on his own using original deigns that i would swear could have come form the official prototypes. he had the freedom to make original bit characters. i guess using those two artists what i want out of the artist for the new graphic novels would be “pragmatic verilsmatude” , where they keep the general shape/look of the toys but are suitably modified to either work out logistics like the articulation of the toa mata or to enhance/manifest character traits like the threatening designs of the piraka. i figure the area this artist should have most creative license would be the bone elements of the CCBS construction. the initial shapes of the figures are more defined by the shells and add-ons so the characters can still be recognized as their toys if yo keep the shells intact. and the bones are bland as is so it is preferable to add invented detail. i kind of liked those european comics where they had more mechanical greeble to them,and the skull spiders looked more like clockwork drones.
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it was. i kind of forced the realization as a joke. though i admit i kinda like the idea of multi-elemental masks becoming G2's legendaries as well as being sentient. like the mask of time is the mystic/diefied half of mata nui with the mask of ultimate power being that counterpart for makuta. and maybe akamai and whiura becoming the masks of war and wisdom respectfully when the masters fuse their golden masks (or those translucent/gold masks in the summer wave). though i am curious to know how masks work in G2. i just remember in the description of the MoCr that it was made of literal metal gold and magic rather than the phlebotinum G1 gave us and that the Masters' masks now hold their elemental power rather than it being inate. also dont recall what the golden masks do. also with the Legend of the mask makers confirming that the masks are infused with elements i am curious to know what counts as an element. of the 10 masks we know of 8 of them were considered elements in G1 (6 toa elements + time + creation) while the last two (control and skull spiders) seem like the standard kind of superpower G1 kanohi ad, and the latter seems to be a more specific/restricted version of the former. could this be a mere flub on the narrator's part and he meant to say "powers" rather than "elements" (as elemental power is still a superpower) or can G2 have more abstract classical elements than G1 (sonics,psionics,plasma.etc) . and unless i overlooked it i dont recall any explanation on how said powers worked. like i know G1 mask of creation allowed the wearer to materialize any object they knew how to create by hand and granted instant knowledge on creating anything they didnt know how to build themselves. does Ekimu's mask allow him to do the same?
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but the mask of ultimate power is made up of the 6 natural elements of the masters. how can fire water earth stone ice and plantlife cause mutations in lifeforms? then again in G1 IIRC 6 kanoka disks i think containing each metru's element managed to make the mask of Time. but that mask already exists fully made in G2 only other legendary mask that was in existence already outside of the mask of creation was the mask of life, i believe said to be the most powerful mask in the MU. so in G2 we have two legendary masks in existence already ,time and creation. and the only one missing is life. and the only legendary mask that was created during the story was time but that was already made. and here the story is kicked off by having the most powerful mask made, but there is no mask of life which i believe was considered the...Ultimate ...Power... oooh...
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i believe someone here claimed a major theme in G2 is "time" with the constant hidden vahis and how the toa were summoned out of time using the mask of time at the temple of time ect. what if not only were these Skull warriors falen toa but past/future/dopplegangers of the current toa. essentially this is a never ending time loop of an ultimate evil taking control and the inhabitants of the island try desperately to break it via summoning capable heroes from the before or after time to take care of the now. it could explain how Ekimu ,essentially a celebrity craftsman, could know about the prophecy of heroes to tell the protectors: he has lived through these events before so knows what needs to be done to set things right. it can also explain the sacred law of making masks with no more than one element. there are other multi-elemented mask wearers (or masks if the speculation of the MoUP is indeed sentient) who not only wreaked havoc in the past but still do so today,or in other times. or something to that effect. this could be the new meta-plot twist taking place of G1's mata nui robot. there are many timelines out there with the toa coming from/inhabiting one of many which all lead up to some sort of climax. bet it can be a clever way to get new versions of the same characters in less cumbersome a manner, they are from different situations or different "chapters" or so. could also be a unique way of honoring the original themes of G1. time here could be G2's take on destiny but with the intention to defy it rather than discover it. basically the heroes can fight fate and not let the world control their actions,maybe even letting them control the world instead by way of being masters of the elements. or something.
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Future of LDD: Next Lego Digital Designer Update?
Kalta the Noble Mind replied to minchellabrick's topic in Digital LEGO: Tools, Techniques, and Projects
i do not think LDD will get updated anytime soon. from my understanding it was just a gimmick app meant for the Designed By Me service which has long been discontinued. so unless they are going to start a similar service again or find out ways of making money off this free app i am afraid LDD will just be abandonware:( though with a patent filed for an app that lets one put in compatible connections into any model and the new interactive lego dimensions videogame system that puts built models be use din a videogame i can think of several ways LDD can be implemented yet again. and i can see LDD be used as a prototyping app for lego ideas/cuuso, probably with editing features like custom decals so you can truly make original pitches. but i am guessing not otherwise we would have had an update over the past 4 years. -
maybe this is cuz i am currently taking american history in collage but rather than the hypothetical new villains from another island be pirates or vikings or other classic hoard archetype they were like more technologically advanced "civilized" colonists,only coming for the island's resources and are free to oppress the natives? i can see this as a good way to bring back the original notion of the makuta species experimenting on the matoran and other lifeforms i the MU, specifically Spiriah and his involvement with the skakdi species. as others mentioned we need more non-humanoid baddies like the reptilian rahkshi or the bug-like bohrok i can imagine the small protector tier sets be little scout drones designed for Otoko's specific environments, like the bohrok were. and maybe for bad guys whatever tech/magic these Colonists use to experiment on the natives could mutate half the Toa into their minions and to fill out the the good guy roster we will have three good rebel Colonists working with the remaining toa who are equipped with the Colonists' own super tech making them upgraded for a final battle or something. [EDIT] the whole mutant thing could start with Lewa as i believe he was the one who kept going over to the darkside in G1. basically takes the mutant/monster themes of the toa hordika and the toa mahri but a more dramatic take on the good guy/bad guy split form the Phantoka and Mistika. i am betting this is way too dark for bionicle's reboot and i bet a bit convoluted for the children but i think it could work.
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that is another thing i noticed. usually there is an equal amount of hero and villain so you have one on one fights s was curious why there are only 5 skull badguys. then i realise LoSS would have made up the 6th bad guy. and from what i seen people say LoSS is the worst of the winter wave in both look and functionality. i am curious to how planned out the line was. EDIT: i forget but wasn't there a rythem/formula to g1 bionicle with like 6 heroes 6 bad guys 6 mini guys and 2-3 big sets? if so what happened to it?
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i am unsure if anyone caught it but someone counted the recolors of the new toa masks. 3 masks of ice (regular ,gold,funmetal) 3 masks of earth (regular,gold,funmetal) 3 masks of jungle (regular,gold,funmetal) 3 masks of stone (regular,gold,funmetal) 2 masks of water (regular,gold) 4 masks of fire (regular,gold,trans-red,trans-clear) it all adds up to 18 masks total, 3 masks for 6 figures. i am unsure of how budgeting works for lego but i a guessing why tahu and gali aren't getting funmetal masks is because their masks were spend on those two promo trans-masks . so maybe we wont get those 2 masks anytime soon.