believe victims

I think the problem is that the beast head needs to be able to slot over the top of the mask. For most of them, this didn't require major changes, because the upper part of the mask was already fairly workable. Lewa needed to abandon the third vent (which helps make it look more like the miru, actually), but that was pretty much it for the others. But Kopaka's eye piece is so big that to make it look like it did in 2015 would interfere with the beast head. As such, it became necessary to radically change the eyepiece. Since the eyepiece is a big part of the mask's recognizability, it winds up severely impacting its resemblance. I mean, besides the eye piece and the vents at the side of the mouth, the features of this mask mostly find their place in the previous incarnation, just like the others. But man, that eye piece changes a lot.

I really wish they had picked a metal color and stuck with it. I mean, the sword being silver would be fine either way, because weapons are weapons, not part of the character, but geez, using mostly silver and then slapping two gold pieces on because Big Toa Are Gold is not a good look. Either make the silver gold, or the gold silver. Pick a side, or at the very least, don't neglect the more vivid one, because the fact that it's lacking is exceedingly more obvious than if he was mostly gold with a bit of silver.

The new torso plate has upwards of 20 pistons on it, all crammed in a small area and not even seeming like functional pistons. Even at its height of pointless patterning, G1 Bionicle didn't have that level of overdetail in the form of pistons alone. A decent amount of greeble can work as an accent, or visual interest. But greeble for the sake of greeble, just completely smothering a set in detail? Not only does it seriously detract from the versatility of a piece, and make it difficult to build cohesive MOCs, it's just plain ugly.

Exaggerated chest and rear on female MOCs, especially to the point of ridiculousnessItty bitty waist on female MOCs, especially in combination with the aboveBasically, any kind of female MOC that's trying to make it fit some conventional beauty standard, especially in excessDinosaur MOCs that ignore several basic rules of dinosaur anatomy, such as wrist positionScattered, chaotic color schemes. Not necessarily all color schemes with lots of colors, but definitely those with no cohesionHuge, messy blocks of chaotic builds that focus more on complexity than visual appealI'm sure there's more I'm not thinking of, but that's a good rundown of things that immediately turn me off from an MOC.

So, thanks to the convention circuit, I have a free six-month premier membership. However, I already have Lifetime, so I may as well give it to someone else. I don't want people just saying "give it to me", though, so to enter, please give me a one paragraph essay about Chrom in the comments below. Winner will be selected randomly, so don't feel pressured to perform here; write whatever Chromes to mind. (That said, MLA citation is a nice touch.) Let's say you need to get your essays done by... Saturday the 19th. That seems like enough time. Happy holidays! (I also need suggestions for a new member title. I don't want to waste the opportunity, but I also need something as good as "Certified Dinosaur Pedant")

If I don't know how to accomplish something, I either look up how other people have done it (usually to my disappointment, as other people's solutions are either too fragile or too exposed for me) or just put it away to come back to later when I feel inspired again. Usually, if I play around enough with weird ideas, something decent will come out of it.

You'd rather the Uniters be naked!? Nudity is the true way of the Bionicle. Why else would every set that's ever worn a cape be evil?

Sat down and cranked it out today. Probably won't give it until next week, though, so as to give it closer to Christmas.

Lewa 2016 is overall better than Lewa 2015, but I cannot get around the fact that they replaced much of his yellow with... more silver. I already felt Lewa 2015 felt a little washed out (though not as much as Gali, who is definitely more colorful-looking this year), but I would take Lewa 2015's amount of silver over this overbearing amount anyday.

While that would cover the maliciousness aspect, it would sure make things a hassle for both staff and peers, would it not?

Hoo boy. I'd join, but I know it's going to be luck of the draw getting the pieces I guarantee most people (including myself) would be joining to get: those sand blue shells. Not sure if I want to chance it.

Interests: Dinosaurs, primarily. Other major interests include Pokémon, Transformers, Studio Ghibli, and of course, LEGO/Bionicle. Working on: On the forums? Not much. I have some characters in mind for HFRPG, but otherwise, my presence here is mostly none.

Sure, I'm game. I can sort of draw; may as well put it to use.

just make sure to capture the menacing undercurrent of Darth Binks.

it's two in the morning and i'm thinking about monotremes. like, dude, they seem so weird, but now that i think about it, they actually make complete sense with our current understanding of mammal evolutionary history. like, with our synapsid ancestors being rather reptile-like and egg-laying, it stands to reason that at one point mammals could have had fur and milk but still laid eggs. of course, that there are still monotremes today works just fine with that understanding; evolution is a tree, not a flight of stairs. some monotremes went on to become marsupials, some of which went on to become placental mammals, but a small group of monotremes just stuck to the monotreme thing, because hey, they had no reason to change and that's why platypus are so weird. well, one reason why. still doesn't explain the venom. i need to sleep.

I don't see how? For starters, if they went with the Muaka's function, it would interfere with the head slotting over the mask when combined. Without that, a "mini-Muaka" would basically just be a small mammal... which is what Kopaka has.

Wouldn't two creatures with different evolutionary adaptations be different species? And wouldn't that eventuality make sense for creatures on an island? Astonishingly, correct on both counts. I don't think his point was about being able to explain it so much as speaking to how similar they look, and how he'd rather their designs were more different, to set them apart from each other. I'm not too bothered by the similarities between Melum and Terak now that I know they have different functions and aren't simply clones of each other. Would I rather have more unique creatures? Perhaps, but I guess there's only so many feasible ways they could design creatures with some form of combining functionality with the Toa.

The backstory is satire. I hate Frankenstein-clone stories that make people fear science, based on unfounded and irrational arguments of pathos. I apologize if that wasn't clear. What I meant by asking you to run that by me again was to ask if you were really telling a lesbian her MOC's backstory "[puts] forward a great case for those who are anti-gay". I want to know if you meant to word it like that, which seems to imply supporting anti-gay viewpoints, or if it was simply a misstep.

uh... ya wanna run that by me one more time? i'm... not sure if that came out the way you intended it to.

No, it's impossible. Those pieces cannot be used as 3-stud axles, which these clearly are. Besides, yellow 3-stud axles already appeared in the WALL•E set. They clearly exist.

Color schemes are very iffy this year. Lewa's replaced his keetorange with more silver, Tahu's more gold than red, Kopaka doesn't know what he wants to be, and Pohatu just becomes a huge mess, especially combined with his creature. Builds are a bit spotty in places, too (Onua's shoulderpads are struggling to find somewhere to sit, Gali's got itty bitty lower legs, Umarak's legs) but I am glad to see some torso variety. It comes at the expense of solidity in some, but man was I sick of monopiece torsos. (Also all of the Toa except maybe Onua should have had a foot piece that takes into account the need for friction extenders because it is not a good look right now. Their ankles are so tall.) Creatures don't look good from some of the angles presented, but maybe it's just bad stock imagery. I might warm up to them in person. As clever as using tails for levers is, it makes Ikir look ridiculous with its tail sticking perpendicular to the middle of its back. Most solid creature would be the Creature of Jungle, I'd say, but then again I'm always happy to see arthropods not take antagonistic roles. (A shame Ikir's the only dinosaur, though.)

Yep! I only wish they came in red, or better yet, dark red.

like. it's so good i've replayed it, like, four times and i can't get over how good this game is. best Pokémon game by a long shot (though I suppose ORAS made that shot slightly less long) there need to be more Pokémon games like Pokémon Black/White

OOC: This character is ~18 feet tall, assuming an average Hero is ~6 feet tall. Even an XL is going to have a hard time justifying going over that, considering they usually seemed to be, at most, ~2 times as tall as an average Hero. Your concerns about strength are well-founded, though. The power to lift 3 whales is definitely absurd. Even at his size, his strength should have a much lower upper limit. According to my research, an African elephant can lift 9 metric tons. That means each arm can lift more than 33 elephants can. I understand wanting him to be big and strong, but this is just too strong. He's a few orders of magnitude stronger than what is literally a T. rex with robot arms.

... ...you mean like this?