Dannylonglegs

(OoC: don't worry about it!) "Alright, good work Lycan. Now, there is a possibility of more than one path and dead ends and what not, so let's go with this: Order: Sylph: Dig B3 (with shovel) Johon: Dig B4 (with shovel) Galen: Dig B2 (with borrowed pickax) Elgar: Dig A2 (with shovel) Lycan: Dig A1 (with borrowed pickax) Alex: Dig A11 (with borrowed pickax) "Yes, that's what I feared. Do you have any idea what they are holding against him, or how we could find out. In order to overthrow this invasion and destroy the unnatural beings perpetrating it, we must liberate this forest and you, its residents. If your master is enslaved by them, we may be the only ones capable of freeing him."

"Lycan, don't use a bomb. Fire plus forest is not a great mix." Sylph gently warns. "And, furthermore, I don't think these spiders appreciate fire." "I understand your desire to test us, but I assure you, we mean no harm too you or the forest. I only burnt your web after conferring with our two spider companions, who saw no harm in it. We have to get through the forest to vanquish the invading ether-born abominations." Sylph says in spider. (OoC: I am right that the glasses make my max ether go down by 2, right? Also, since I can only wear one head gear (right? It'd be great if I could have more than one, but I think I can't by the rules ), then I forgot to say, my max health should go down one too to 32 because I'd need to remove my helmet. Also, I tried to heal myself before too So, I changed my stats to reflect that. I think they're right now.)

"Good work Johon, you seem to have found a good method of figuring out which are trapdoors. Let's try this;" Order: Sylph: Dig A7 (with shovel) loan Alex pickax Johon: Dig A10 (with shovel) loan Galen and Lycan pickax Galen: Dig A5 (with borrowed pickax) Elgar: Dig A4 (with shovel) Lycan: Dig A3 (with borrowed pickax) Alex: Dig A9 (with borrowed pickax)

Ba-Bam! Bad-guys beware! The Bombastic Bright-Blue Bombardier is bere! What is this I hear about baddies beneath our collective noses? Blasphemy! They must be brought to justice! Once and forever true, The colour of justice is Bright-Blue!

You're probably right. The original Insectoids were much darker, creepier, and cooler in both senses of the word . These fit closer to the feel of Chima, with their front-heavy design and cartoony look. I understand the "space-faring" argument, but I can't imagine it being space-faring because of the legs. Cockpit air-tightness notwithstanding, the legs are obviously there for balance. They detract from the cosmetic appearance. I think my major complaint on this set is actually the legs. If it had more of them then it could pass as insectile. Frankly though, even adding more of the same odd-looking, forward-facing legs would not fix it. They'd need at-least one back-facing, and long/bigger than the front. A really good fix would be giving it 6 legs (or 4) and making them shorter, and then making the tail move into a parallel-to-ground or upwards facing (like a scorpion tail) position, so that the legs could serve clearly for use as landing-devices. That would detract from its ability to maintain the C shape when not held though. As it is though, I can't see anything insect-like about it. From the spines to the heavy head, I can't picture it as anything but a snake suspended by two bizarre legs. I guess I can't really focus on the desired side-view for which they are going because I never played video-games as a kid. I guess, I'm somewhat disappointed that they don't have a ship based on a more traditional insect or arthropod shape. I want a thorax/abdomen heavy monster with a small head. I know, wishful thinking, especially considering how front-heavy most sets are nowadays. I'm glad that you like them. I might have liked them too if I hadn't been made completely biased by the original Insectoids. ~Insectoid Aristocrat

Order: Sylph: Prod A7 Johon: Prod A6 Galen: Prod A5 Elgar: Prod A4 Lycan: Prod A3 Alex: Prod A9 (OoC: The scroll I read makes things Badly Poisoned, and It costs 5 ether, so I should be at 8 ether. Also, I equipped the goggles, which should make my max. ether 20. I also healed myself, so I should have full health. Also, I drank the trial potion, so my max ether should be 10, and my max. health should be 16.)

Sylph drew his sickle and prodded the ground before him (A7), hard. "I suggest we prod the ground before us with our weapons." Sylph sighed to the party.

It's not that they don't look like earth insects, but that they don't even look insectoid. Almost all of the original Insectoid ships did not look exactly like insects. Many had only four legs, or like the Celestial Stinger, no functional legs at all. But, they did capture the feel of insects/arthropods, Alien or otherwise, successively. I'm sorry my post was so negative. I had my hopes set too high, and my thoughts too tied to the original Insectoids theme. That said though, I can't bring myself to like most of the Insectoid ships as ships in general. The space mosquito, the flagship of these Insectoids, does not look spaceworthy, or battle worthy in any way. It's not streamlined and it's awkward in shape, and the two legs are just bizarre. The insects from starship troopers do not look like earth insects, but they are Insectoid. It's not fair to say these ships are not based off of Earth Insects, because they are. (especially the Mantis). Even the minifigures are clearly based off of earth arthropods (Mosquito and scorpion.) My problem with the two large ships is that they are both heavy-headed, without enough focus on the thorax/abdomen. They are front heavy. The one small ship I do not like is an after-thought, but does not look as good as the other after-thought ship. If it was more than an after-thought, I'd complain more about how it looks, but in this case it's little more than cannon-fodder to the tank. I think it would benefit from looking more like a scorpion, but if they made it something else, even not explicitly insect-like, I'd be happy too. Ultimately, I'm admittedly very biased because I was hoping for a more Insectoids like theme, when this is not that. ~Insectoid Aristocrat

Well, I've been trying hard to like like this theme, and I really can't. The only thing I like about it is the new look for the aliens. Aside from that though, the ships are all meh. Warning: rant-ish. The best alien ship is the dragonfly one featuring in the largest set. It successfully captures the creepy-crawly look with its multitude of legs and mandibles and wings. the wings are perfectly sized for the ship, and the lack of canopy makes it not-too bulky. The only problem I have with this set (aside from its price) is the repeat of the mosquito. It's my least favorite alien, and it's the most frequently appearing. I would be tempted to buy it if it had any other alien... because, yes, I'd be buying it for the figure. My second favorite is the "beetle" from the smallest set. I'm okay with it, but there are several problems I find. 1. and most glaring, but the easiest fix= 3 mandible jaw, 4 legs. It doesn't look insectoid at all. 2. it's way too bulky for a mini-ship (which I guess it isn't really) My third favorite? The after-thought ship from the second smallest set (the blue-team jet set). It's a great mini-ship, but it just doesn't seem to jibe with the other alien ships (which is OK because the others suck.) The other Alien ships suck. I'll go through them in terms of least horrible. Third worst of the remaining? The scorpion because it's an after-thought. It's terrible. It's billed as scorpion-like, but it's just not. It's not even insectoid. Please! Throw another leg on because it looks naked! That at-least. If you want to bill it as a scorpion, give it pincers or something. Ugh. Second worst: The Mantis. It's all head and all trash. The actual legs are really weak. It's not horrible, but I don't like it. I don't like the shape, mostly; It's like a bad caricature of a mantis. I don't have a really legitimate complaint with it aside from a gut dislike of it. I'll might actually get this set, but it'd mostly be for the red Insectoid. The head looks fine, but the body's not big enough to hold it. I honestly expected worse though, considering the difficulty of capturing the shape of a mantis, and the concept of making a mantis shaped ship, so good job Lego! THE ALL OUT WORST? The space mosquito. By. Far. From the moment I saw it in the comics I was traumatized. Even seeing it from behind scared me. I turns out my unspoken fears were legitimate. I turned off my dislike so that I would not have my judgement clouded on the rest of the sets, but none of the others made up for how bad this one was. I'll start with my biggest problem with this set, which is its shape. It is so head-heavy that it looks like a snake and not at all like a self respecting insect. ALMOST ALL ARTHROPODS HAVE LARGER THORAXES AND/OR ABDOMENS THAN HEADS. There are exceptions to that rule of course, but the mosquito is not one of them. I won't judge this by the fact that it doesn't look like a mosquito though. That would be both stupid and unfair. The only reason I judged the Mantis on that is that the Mantis is obviously supposed to look like a mantis. This does not look like anything. It looks like a snake with 2 legs. TWO LEGS. Two spindly, bizarre legs, ending in toes? The head is really bad. The cockpit pieces are to blame. They force the head to be way too big, and don't serve much of an actual purpose in making the craft air-tight, or anything at all accept for being its "eyes." I don't even understand what's going on with the rest of the head. It doesn't work for me at-all. I don't like the shooter at the tail either. And, finally, the wings are way too small. Use another piece damn-it! that piece does not work on a ship that big! It looks more like gills than wings. All in all, I do not like the Insectoid faction. The attempt to capture the insect-feel is really poorly executed. I also don't like the colour scheme. The bright lime and the dark red does not give me a spacey vibe. I'd have much rather had blue feature. I know "red is the colour of villains," but it doesn't work in this case. I want a cool, mechanical feeling, or even an organic look, but I'm not even sure what this look is supposed to inspire (probably closer to the latter, but it doesn't work.). The Aliens themselves are really good looking. There are only two (one's a recolour), but they're both good. I like the beetle/arthropod alien better (and I like the red one best), but the mosquito, while gimmicky, is not bad. I find the Human ships to be mostly uninspired, with the notable exception of the largest one, which I actually like. The ship's brilliant, the set is too expensive for me to buy, especially considering how bummed I am with all of the other sets. The other exception is the truck/mech combo in the second largest set. I do not like this though. The truck is horribly front-heavy and the mech is just not good. I imagine it'd look OK with the mech inside the ship as a turret, but as-is, it's just a bad truck/tank. It'd work better if the back wheels had any sort of protection comparable to the front set. I'm sorry for the rant. I've been holding in these bad feelings from the beginning but didn't want to say anything because I hadn't seen the whole picture yet. Now that I have, I can say that, even though I was really hopeful for this theme, I'm not loving it as much as I thought I would. These are just the worst of my thoughts. I will still buy some, because I actually do love the Insectoids. I will likely buy the smallest set, the second smallest and the mantis to get one of all of the Insectoids. Ironically, this means I'll only get humans from the blue-team. . Like always, my thoughts will probably warm up to them when they show up in stores and on the Lego website. ~Insectoid Aristocrat

Sylph walked over to where his bat saw the eyes. "If you be Guardians of the forest, or residence of it, then you need not fear us. I am a druid, leader of this party. Please, show yourselves."

Sylph equipped his goggles and healed himself, borrowed Elgar's scroll of poisoning, cast it on his arrows and Alex's blade, then drank the Trial Potion.

Blasphemy! That's like not starting a DnD campaign in a tavern! ~Insectoid Aristocrat

"Hmmm. We seem to have arrived at a clearing." stated Sylph, redundantly, still brushing off his rod until it gleamed like a full moon. "I'll have my bat scout around." Sylph whispered into his cloak and his bat emerged from beneath the cloth. The bat then leaped into the air and scanned the nearby woods for signs of anything abnormal, particularly listening for the metallic noise with her powerful bat ears.

"Hmm. Well, not to worry." Stated Sylph, who stuck one of his fire bombs to the web and ignited it.

"Alright, you're right. We do need to get through." stated Sylph, "Morxes, Lyrol, do you mind if we tear down this web? If it's a warning, no one's coming through here anyways but us, and if it's a threat, then it's probably not doing much. We need to get into the forest." With this justification, Sylph took out his sickle-tipped rod and began carefully tearing each thread. "Delightful. I'd love to meet him"

"Yes, Morxes, I have no doubt that you will grow up to be a big strong spider! You're well on your way." reassured Sylph. "How big is your daddy?" "Thank you for the report Lyrol... Hmmm. Rhythmic metal clanging. What's north of here, do you know? Would that be the blacksmith's shoppe?"

"Morxes, Lyrol," cooed Sylph, inviting them onto his hand. "Do you know anything about a Dragon-Lord? Do these web-messages mean anything to you? Do think you could climb up the tree to see if you can spot anything? My bat could accompany you if you would like."

"Indeed." stated Sylph. "Alright!, let's go back to Ayla's and see if her spiders will join our company. We can purchase more poison when we need it."

"Well, in that case, let's just pass on the poison for now and return to Ayla to request the company of her two spiders and visit the blacksmith." (We'll probably have a chance to return soon, and no one's feeling loose with their money. We probably don't need it yet anyway. If Elgar wants poison, he still has time to buy some.)

"Spiders are wonderful creatures, my friend. And, if they guard the forest, then they are already my allies. We should bring Ayla's pet spiders with us if that is our destination. And, I will put 20 gp in the pool for the poison."

Sylph was intrigued by the werewolf's statement. He heard the darkness and aggression in Lycan's words, he could see Lycan's dark future. 'hmmm,' he grimly thought to himself. 'This werewolf will grow to be a force with which to be reckoned... But it is possible he will fall on my side... Tragic.' "Interesting." jibed Sylph cheerfully. "Yes, I do believe this blacksmith may be an interesting catch. It's possible that we could make an enemy's enemy out of his guardian too, which may be more valuable."

"I would be fine with that." agreed Sylph. "Ha! I can imagine." commented Sylph. "Thanks for the intel. I wonder what sort of monster they stuck near the poor black-guard..."

"Info is always welcome my friend. What have you ascertained since we last met?" Sylph said as he removed some metal scraps and studs from his animal-skull helmet to make room for his newly-acquired goggles. (OoC: Yes, I'll deequip the helmet and equip the goggles.)

It's weird how your RP worked really well with mine. It's just a sentence, but it's true to Sylph's character. ~Insectoid Aristocrat

"That's what the cape was for. It saddens me to see a spirit of nature don a mask." "Thank you for the wares Toxic Proggs, but I still have some left over from our last visit." chuckled Sylph, his demeanor becoming less serious.