Unspoken Words

If I remember correctly, each has unique setbacks. Such as Earth not being able to control anything other than dirt, sand, clay, etc. And Stone only being able to control solids like crystal, stone, etc.

 

Combining them together without nerfing each to make them less powerful would essentially be making a super-soldier. 

...How exactly would it? Those just seem like arbitrary barriers. Are Toa not already super-soldiers - they have elemental powers - so what is your point? Fire, Water, Air.... the distinctions between those three are clear. Stone and Earth, not so much. Just sounds completely arbitrary.

And perhaps it is, I was explaining what I thought they were thinking.

 

Need 6 elements, split the two up.

 

Wham bam thank you ma'am, six elements.

 

It also seems to me like giving someone the power over sand and Stone at the same time would make them, if clever, a lot more...let's avoid the term powerful and use something else...It'd make them a lot more effective at their job. If they had both powers they could probably defeat Makuta themselves if they put some thought into it.

 

Throw sand in his face, encase him in Diamond or something stronger we don't know exists perhaps, and the story's done right there.

 

I just think a Toa of Earth with both control over sand, dirt and solids would be twice as dangerous.

 

I think from a writing perspective, it would have been too efficient and they would have had to nerf it down to elongate the story. I know I've had to do it to characters to make sure the story progressed at the pace I wanted it to.

 

Just because it's for kids doesn't mean it doesn't deserve the tending to story, writing style and pace that a full novel the likes of Upton Sinclair or Ernest Hemmingway gets.

Could an experienced Toa of whatever beat a Makuta anyway? With fire, you could attempt to melt the armour and burn the antidermis. With a wind strong enough you could probably dent the armour and tear apart the antidermis. With high water pressure... with small ice crystals between the armour... 

The differences are pretty apparent. One is brown or orange, the other is black. Also there's the difference of torso orientation (right-side-up vs up-side-down) but I guess that only applied to the first two years...

 

earth is immune to electric type attacks

 

....wait....

Could an experienced Toa of whatever beat a Makuta anyway? With fire, you could attempt to melt the armour and burn the antidermis. With a wind strong enough you could probably dent the armour and tear apart the antidermis. With high water pressure... with small ice crystals between the armour... 

 

Imagine having sand seep into the openings in the armor and tearing it apart form the inside, or ripping the armor to shreds with diamond shards/Crystal Shards. Or even having small diamond fragments seep into the armor and tear it apart.

 

I'm obviously being more creative than Lego would, but you see my point.

Well, I suppose any element could do something that would sound overpowered given a little creativity and imagination. They never really used their elemental powers in creative ways much, now that I think about... it's kind of blurry as to what extent of control a Toa has. Limited, presumably, stopping at a point. Preferably not arbitrary. And of course there's the elemental energy which needs to recharge which was only a thing in the first four years and then dropped or forgotten about.

Earth is at least partially organic and semi-solid. Dirt, clay, etc. Not sand, because sand is wholly inorganic, and therefore part of Stone's purview, along with rocks and such.