On 3/15/2015 at 12:48 AM, MakutaOfWar said:

Hey, I remember that mask! Wasn't it placed over a cgi image of a Mata set or something like that?

Thats the second image :P

  On 3/14/2015 at 5:34 PM, Dorek said:

Can we please not call the dual color Toa Masks funmetal? The whole joke was that funmental was an easy typo error from gunmental; applying the term to something else just makes that confusing and unfunny.

I didn't think it was that big of a deal......But I do need to point out that you typed "funmental" and "gunmental" in your post above. I promise, I won't turn THAT typo into a new joke.....

I've been thinking, I hope we see some true titan/warrior sized sets in the future. I miss those top heavy builds that required complex legs to hold the weight. I definitely don't consider Tahu, Kopaka, and Onua titan sized, my feelings are the same with Stormer XL and Furno XL. I'm sure if they give us larger sets they will probably be 25€/$, like Evo XL(which I consider a titan style build as compared to the cheaper Splitter Beast).

While I too sort of miss the days of titans with complicated legs, Lego created the friction extender piece pretty much exactly so they wouldn't have to do those anymore. Unfortunately I doubt that we'll really see sets like those..

  On 3/15/2015 at 3:59 AM, MakutaOfWar said:

I definitely don't consider Tahu, Kopaka, and Onua titan sized,

Yeah, they're just slightly bigger sets than the other Toa. I mean, Tahu has only 4 more pieces than Lewa.....That reminds me, IMO, Tahu is a terrible build. His legs are too long, and because his mask is too wide, his chest/neck area looks too squashed.

Anyway, I finally got all the Toa (and completed my winter wave collection!), and I'd have to rank them like this: 6) Pohatu, 5) Tahu, 4) Onua, 3) Lewa, 2) Kopaka, and 1) Gali. In terms of Protectors, I'd say: 6) POF, 5) POI, 4) POW, 3) POS, 2) POE, and 1) POJ. In terms of the winter villains, LOSS is #1!!!!

Edited March 15, 20159 yr by LN-01354

The lack of true Titans is infuriating. Even Skull Grinder doesn't fit the category of Titan, more of "$20 set with a $10 set strapped on" which is ludicrous considering he's the only villain without a Toa to fight and the only one that isn't $15. Or, for me, he's going to be a $30 set with a $15 set and an extra $5 mark-up to go. Queen Beast costs $60 around here

CCBS has killed a lot of cool things we used to get all the time. Like Titans, vehicles (yeah, not CCBS' fault, but we've only had one in the entire duration of CCBS), colorschemes that don't feature metallic or transparent pieces, and a variety of other things like Technic being directly integrated into the building system itself.

I'm not kidding on the metallic thing. Of all the released CCBS sets, only one doesn't have metallic pieces, and it was a polybag from last year. I want to see things like Gali Nuva, she used metallic as a highlight but it didn't dominate the color scheme. As much as I love seeing transparent pieces, they're becoming far too frequently used. It's more than a little ridiculous when Kopaka, PoI and PoF have transparent hands of all things.

Edited March 15, 20159 yr by Mandate

I agree, the use of silver and gunmetal in almost EVERY set needs to stop.

  On 3/15/2015 at 6:28 AM, Mandate said:

Of all the released CCBS sets, only one doesn't have metallic pieces, and it was a polybag from last year.

All beasts from Invasion from Below? Thornraxx? Toxic Reapa? Dragon Bolt?

  On 3/15/2015 at 9:52 AM, Voxovan said:

All beasts from Invasion from Below? Thornraxx? Toxic Reapa? Dragon Bolt?

I admit I stuffed up on the latter three, mainly because of LEGO's CGI rendering. However, every single one of the Beast sets from IFB (excluding the polybag, which I had noted earlier) feature metallic pieces. The number of sets is still startling nonetheless, a whopping 131 out of 135 released CCBS sets.

  On 3/15/2015 at 10:23 AM, Mandate said:

I admit I stuffed up on the latter three, mainly because of LEGO's CGI rendering. However, every single one of the Beast sets from IFB (excluding the polybag, which I had noted earlier) feature metallic pieces. The number of sets is still startling nonetheless, a whopping 131 out of 135 released CCBS sets.

Emm... no?

From the IFB line, the only beasts which used metallic parts were Splitter Beast and Queen Beast. And their use of those colours wasn't for "metallic-ness" sake: Splitter beast used Titanium Metallic scarcely in a mostly-black colour scheme, and Queen Beast featured very few Warm Gold pieces as an accent colour, which exactly what you say metallic colours should be used for.

I'm not that displeased with the use of two metallic colours in the same set, as long as they are placed in the right places. Of the new sets, Onua is the one I think pulls it out the best, whereas Kopaka's silver and gold main body seems clashing for me...

Metallic is a good color choice because it's pretty neutral and gives the feeling of actual armor. When overused it sure makes things horribly bland but it's in the sets for a reason. To balance out the colors. All white, blue, black and whatever characters are just really bland without any metallic colors in my opinion. Sure I would rather have more pieces with two colors (flame pieces, Strakk's axe, protector masks etc... but I guess the the new attachment and techinic pieces give enough variety to their weapons -minus of course the skull squad which suffers from this problem with all their silver only weaponry and stuff.

On to the Titan discussion, yeah. The three toa really don't feel like titans but I sure hope so that we get some. As they are bringing those sized sets in Star Wars too. I really want to see all dark and edgy towering Makuta with a giant hammer and the MOUP, Maybe not as tall as Witch Doctor given the mask makers' broad shoulders but something close to it.

  On 3/15/2015 at 6:28 AM, Mandate said:

As much as I love seeing transparent pieces, they're becoming far too frequently used.

There can never be enough.

  On 3/15/2015 at 10:57 AM, Darking said:

Emm... no?

From the IFB line, the only beasts which used metallic parts were Splitter Beast and Queen Beast. And their use of those colours wasn't for "metallic-ness" sake: Splitter beast used Titanium Metallic scarcely in a mostly-black colour scheme, and Queen Beast featured very few Warm Gold pieces as an accent colour, which exactly what you say metallic colours should be used for.

Right then, I'll quote myself.

  I said:

metallic pieces

Keyword being pieces. I also recall using the word sets in my post just before yours. The part I'm referring to is this. Did I ever even complain about Queen Beast/Splitter Beast in particular? No. I never even pointed fingers at any sets in particular. I've been referring to, the whole time, the overuse of it. Yes, I'm being overly pedantic about the Beast sets but the point still remains: it's overused. It works well for Toa like Lewa and Gali, but for the most part we see metallic pieces everywhere. Aside from Lewa and perhaps Onua (who still has an overload IMO), we never see sets like Gelu or Ackar who balance out the colors so very well. Heck, we haven't seen any CCBS sets with a remotely similar color scheme to them. People might hate the Glatorian, but from an aesthetic standpoint they were wonderful.

I suppose I'm just tired of seeing gunmetal, silver and gold everywhere. Since I was first truly introduced to constraction after HF came out, it's all I've ever seen in sets.

  On 3/15/2015 at 11:53 AM, Mandate said:

Keyword being pieces. I also recall using the word sets in my post just before yours. The part I'm referring to is this. Did I ever even complain about Queen Beast/Splitter Beast in particular? No. I never even pointed fingers at any sets in particular. I've been referring to, the whole time, the overuse of it. Yes, I'm being overly pedantic about the Beast sets but the point still remains: it's overused. It works well for Toa like Lewa and Gali, but for the most part we see metallic pieces everywhere. Aside from Lewa and perhaps Onua (who still has an overload IMO), we never see sets like Gelu or Ackar who balance out the colors so very well. Heck, we haven't seen any CCBS sets with a remotely similar color scheme to them. People might hate the Glatorian, but from an aesthetic standpoint they were wonderful.

I suppose I'm just tired of seeing gunmetal, silver and gold everywhere. Since I was first truly introduced to constraction after HF came out, it's all I've ever seen in sets.

So using one or two little metallic pieces on minifigures in a set that has no other metallic pieces is an "overuse" for you? :l

I guess you're complaining now just for the sake of complaining.

  On 3/15/2015 at 12:21 PM, Voxovan said:

So using one or two little metallic pieces on minifigures in a set that has no other metallic pieces is an "overuse" for you? :l

I guess you're complaining now just for the sake of complaining.

And if I didn't know better I'd say you were trolling because I even mentioned that I was being pedantic about those sets and that I had no problem with them. I never used the IFB Beast sets as a direct example of overuse of metallic parts, only of featuring [some] metallic pieces. Metallic pieces are overused on a whole, but not in every set.

So please, don't put words in my mouth.

Edited March 15, 20159 yr by Mandate

  On 3/15/2015 at 11:53 AM, Mandate said:

Aside from Lewa and perhaps Onua (who still has an overload IMO), we never see sets like Gelu or Ackar who balance out the colors so very well.

I wouldn't call Ackar's color scheme "balanced". Sorry to put it bluntly but in my opinion his color scheme makes him look like a glaring, visually unappealing blob of two bright, warm colors without any neutral one to balance them out. Because of this I'm glad that most of HF and G2 Bionicle sets have black skeletons, which seems to be an unpopular opinion as most people would rather see colored bones for some reason.

Well yeah, we have to remember these all are at least half robots. It's not a very common thing to paint insides of a car so why should you paint the mechanical parts of a toa. If anything painting pistons and stuff might break their function. Also take a note that we have got transparent bones quite a lot and more are to come, I don't spot that many black bones on the skullguys either.

And as it has been said, the bones need to be of a neutral color so they don't stand out too much.

  On 3/15/2015 at 6:28 AM, Mandate said:

CCBS has killed a lot of cool things we used to get all the time. Like Titans, vehicles (yeah, not CCBS' fault, but we've only had one in the entire duration of CCBS), colorschemes that don't feature metallic or transparent pieces, and a variety of other things like Technic being directly integrated into the building system itself.

Here, you specifically said colour schemes that don't feature metallic pieces. By that definiton, the IFB beasts do not count.

  On 3/15/2015 at 6:28 AM, Mandate said:

I'm not kidding on the metallic thing. Of all the released CCBS sets, only one doesn't have metallic pieces, and it was a polybag from last year. I want to see things like Gali Nuva, she used metallic as a highlight but it didn't dominate the color scheme. As much as I love seeing transparent pieces, they're becoming far too frequently used. It's more than a little ridiculous when Kopaka, PoI and PoF have transparent hands of all things.

And here you're pointing fingers at the majority of CCBS sets then getting angry when people give you examples of sets where metallic colours aren't part of the colour scheme, saying you never pointed fingers at them, when you pointed fingers at nearly every CCBS sets. For the record, IFB sets count as CCBS sets, therefore they fall under that accusation.

If you're going to point some fingers, give some solid examples and don't get surprised when people do give you examples of sets that don't have metallic colours in their colour schemes after you said that nearly all CCBS sets suffered from overuse of metallics.

  Quote

It works well for Toa like Lewa and Gali

  Quote

perhaps Onua (who still has an overload IMO)

I'm at a loss at how you can say that how Gali doesn't have an overuse of metallics when she has an imbalance of gunmetal and silver, yet say that Onua has an overload when Onua has a lower metallic colour to non-metallic colour ratio than Gali does. Gali has gunmetal and silver, possibly the worst combination of metallic colours out there, with azure and transparent blue, not helped by yellow. If anything, Gali is the perfect example of a mess of a colour scheme. Similarly how do Lewa's knee piston attachments not look out of place? It'd be fine if they were gone, but they just disrupt the colour scheme.

  Quote

And as it has been said, the bones need to be of a neutral color so they don't stand out too much.

So they don't stand out when contrasted with the bright colours of the Toa Okoto? Okay.

Personally, I don't really mind the use of metallic pieces in the 2015 BIONICLE sets. The metallic colors sort of unite all the Toa's color schemes--like the Toa Nuva, they each have their personal elemental colors, and then the silver to unify them as a team. The only thing that bugs me is how half the Toa have silver, and the other half have gold.

Now, I am completely against trans-shells. I don't know why, but they just look terrible to me; I would much rather trans-bone pieces, since it looks more "natural" to me.

Also, can we not call them Toa Okoto? What about just "Masters"......Or the Toa New-va?

I personally just want the boring and ill-fitting grey bone pieces gone. Preferably, they would be replaced by black pieces, except in sets where they make sense aesthetically.

  On 3/15/2015 at 4:03 PM, LN-01354 said:

Now, I am completely against trans-shells. I don't know why, but they just look terrible to me; I would much rather trans-bone pieces, since it looks more "natural" to me.

I love me some trans shells, but I gotta agree with you there. Trans bones with solid shells gives a nice "underlying energy" look to things.

Anywho, I don't see the issue of metallic. I mean, yeah. Sometimes it doesn't look good, but other times it works well for breaking up colors. Just look at the Toa Mata who use black shoulders and hips to great effect. I think swapping those out with their primary or secondary color would look terrible. Okay, alright, that's black, but the same goes for metallic. To me, having black, gray or metallic pieces breaking up a color scheme is much more visually interesting than a figure who is solely one or two colors.

Now the Toa Phantoka and Mistika. That was a bit much.

  On 3/15/2015 at 1:54 PM, Onepu the Protector said:

I wouldn't call Ackar's color scheme "balanced". Sorry to put it bluntly but in my opinion his color scheme makes him look like a glaring, visually unappealing blob of two bright, warm colors without any neutral one to balance them out. Because of this I'm glad that most of HF and G2 Bionicle sets have black skeletons, which seems to be an unpopular opinion as most people would rather see colored bones for some reason.

Besides that, I don't think Ackar's color scheme would have suffered in any measurable way if his Dark Stone Grey hands had been Silver or Metallic Dark Grey (pre-2010 gunmetal). And I agree, Ackar's color scheme was hurt by the sparse use of neutral colors, as was the 2010 Tahu's. The Toa Mata, Bohrok, and Toa Nuva used bright colors quite well, but a lot of people seem to neglect how important their black, grey, and silver parts were to their color schemes. A color scheme dominated by bright colors often just looks garish unless there are some neutral colors to balance them out.

Frankly, I really love the frequent use of metallic colors in CCBS. Silver Metallic and Titanium Metallic in particular are extremely fun colors to build in, since they are neutral (meaning they can be paired with anything) without looking dull, and their shininess really helps the contours of the parts stand out.

I don't understand the weird aversion people have to sets that use more than one metallic color, either. Gali and Onua are easily my favorites of the new Toa, and while that's not strictly because of the multiple metallic colors in those sets, I think both sets look much better with multiple metallic colors than they would look if all their metallic parts were the same color. And that's not just conjecture. I've swapped Onua's Warm Gold detail pieces for Silver Metallic ones, and Gali's Silver Metallic torso shell for a Titanium Metallic one, in both cases because I genuinely thought the sets might look better that way. Turns out, they didn't.

As far as the other CCBS gripes mentioned above, it's hard to really blame any of those things on the CCBS. Speeda Demon and Jet Rocka could both qualify as vehicle sets. Fire Lord, Rocka XL, Witch Doctor, and Black Phantom all qualify as true "titan" sets any way you slice it, and I'd argue that Evo XL Machine and the new Darth Vader figure from the Star Wars constraction series do as well. If CCBS "killed" these types of sets, it's taken its sweet time doing so.

And I don't even know what "Technic being integrated directly into the building system" is supposed to mean. There's nothing less "direct" about the way Evo XL Machine, Jawblade, Rocka XL, Tunneler Beast, Dragon Bolt, and the Protector of Fire use Technic than the way BIONICLE sets would have used it. I'm guessing this complaint is based on the idea that the new Toa's Technic gearboxes are snapped to their torso beams instead of the torso beam and gearbox being a single piece, but that's a bit like complaining about the Toa Metru's thigh armor snapping to their thigh beams instead of the beam and armor being a single piece. By having the gearbox and torso beam as separate pieces, both pieces are more versatile than they could ever be as a single piece. And as a bonus, it makes the new Toa look much better in profile than if their shoulder and hip joints were vertically in line with each other.

I think I'm the only one who likes having multiple metallic colours in sets if done right. Kopaka, yeah, that silver chest does bother me seeing as it's the only silver armour on the set. Gali on the other hand also has only one silver armour shell, but this is balanced by the shoulder add-ons and hands being silver. Really as long as it doesn't dominate the colour scheme *cough* 2008 *cough* then it's alright with me.

  On 3/15/2015 at 4:41 PM, DraikNova said:

I personally just want the boring and ill-fitting grey bone pieces gone. Preferably, they would be replaced by black pieces, except in sets where they make sense aesthetically.

I second this. I am completely sick of 5M B bones in dark bluish grey in particular. Last time I did an MOC bin count on my personal collection, I think for every 5 of all the other bones in all other colours that I have loose, I had 1 5M B Bone in dark bluish grey. I have 100 5M B Bones in dark bluish grey (loose), just to put that into context, and I have so many loose ones probably because I keep swapping them for black in the sets, and then they don't get used in MOC's as dark bluish grey rarely fits the aesthetic I go for.

I don't mind trans shells or gunmetal/silver/gold at all, while I do think it is sometimes overused, from an MOC'ing standpoint I can never have enough (my last MOC completely drained my supply of gunmetal shells for instance) as they tend to be my primary colours. But I do prefer trans-bones to trans-shells though, as they seem to be the closest we're going to get to getting actual coloured bones again nowadays.

Edited March 15, 20159 yr by TheOneVeyronian

  On 3/15/2015 at 4:41 PM, DraikNova said:

I personally just want the boring and ill-fitting grey bone pieces gone. Preferably, they would be replaced by black pieces, except in sets where they make sense aesthetically.

I don't understand why we get them in sets. Most of the Toa have their upper arms in grey, and then black forearms, and it just looks terrible.