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So what's a Protector?


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It just seems weird that a year that has put an emphasis on Mask collecting is avoiding creating more unique masks though.

 

-NotS

Funnily enough, I've seen the opposite impression voiced by some fans—that the Protectors are the closest thing we're getting to the classic mask packs, seeing as they all include the same mask in a wide range of colors.

 

In any case, the Protector's masks aren't really being collected by the Toa, are they? In the original Bionicle, the Toa Mata ostensibly collected and used the Turaga's noble masks along with the great masks, but that specific quest was never shown, and in fact the Mata Nui Online Game was the only story media to ever feature the Toa using noble masks.

Formerly Lyichir: Rachira of Influence

Aanchir's and Meiko's brother

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It just seems weird that a year that has put an emphasis on Mask collecting is avoiding creating more unique masks though.

 

-NotS

Funnily enough, I've seen the opposite impression voiced by some fans—that the Protectors are the closest thing we're getting to the classic mask packs, seeing as they all include the same mask in a wide range of colors.

 

In any case, the Protector's masks aren't really being collected by the Toa, are they? In the original Bionicle, the Toa Mata ostensibly collected and used the Turaga's noble masks along with the great masks, but that specific quest was never shown, and in fact the Mata Nui Online Game was the only story media to ever feature the Toa using noble masks.

 

 

I don't think Protector masks are being collected. As far as we know, they are probably powerless.

 

I don't remember if Noble Kanohi were a thing back when MNOG was made. I think it was introduced later (maybe around 2004), but I'm not totally sure.

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Noble Kanohi were definitely a thing, at least in 2003; I remember it being mentioned in the Bionicle guide that was printed then.

 

Hmmm. What about 2001? Maybe they were made later. And if they did exist when the game was made, we can probably assume they didn't want to make whole new designs for the great versions of those masks.

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Noble Kanohi were definitely a thing, at least in 2003; I remember it being mentioned in the Bionicle guide that was printed then.

 

Hmmm. What about 2001? Maybe they were made later. And if they did exist when the game was made, we can probably assume they didn't want to make whole new designs for the great versions of those masks.

 

The distinction between Great and Noble Kanohi was clear from the very beginning. Toa could use Noble Kanohi as well, but they never really did so after 2001 (probably largely because there were no new Noble Kanohi after 2001 besides Turaga Dume's mask).

Formerly Lyichir: Rachira of Influence

Aanchir's and Meiko's brother

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What's up with the lack of names tho?

I don't think they will be doing Kanohi names. It confuses the kids. It's why the Toa are being called "Masters".

 

I don't think you can confuse anyone by using the term Toa. Even kids. Even today's kids...

They're still using the word Toa in the story. It's just not in the set names. And it's not just a matter of "confusing kids". ANY newcomer to Bionicle, no matter what their age, could be confused by a set name like "Toa Tahu". Is Toa his first name? If so, why do the others have the same name? Even assuming that they can figure out that Toa is a title, a set name like that tells them nothing about the character. The new names, on the other hand, are much more informative. This is Tahu! He is the master of fire! Before the customer has even bought the set or gone online to figure out who this character is, they know that their primary power is the ability to control fire. THAT'S why the new names are so much better than the old ones—not just because they're less confusing, but because they convey a heck of a lot more information.

 

As a final note, a lot of people don't seem to realize that the word "Toa" never appeared in the name of a Toa set until 2004. And it only started being used then to help distinguish the Toa Metru from their previously-released Turaga forms. The original Tahu set was just called "Tahu", so I don't see why people act like the set names not including the word Toa is some grave sin.

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Formerly Lyichir: Rachira of Influence

Aanchir's and Meiko's brother

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I mean, like name-names. Like Tahu's name is... Tahu. Are the Protector sets just generic villagers without names or any sort of significance?

The Protector sets aren't generic villagers—they're village leaders, like the Turaga. Whether they'll have names of their own or simply be referred to by their titles (Protector of X) is up in the air, but I don't think it'll be a problem even if that is the case, since it's not a bad title to be known by and the focus will be on the Toa anyway.

Formerly Lyichir: Rachira of Influence

Aanchir's and Meiko's brother

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That seems better than just dropping villagers completely, and if defenders are villagers, they look pretty capable of defending themselves. So why do they need Toa again?

Because Toa makes Lego gain more money.

 

or just because the toa are on a completely different level.. even matoran could protect themselves

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That seems better than just dropping villagers completely, and if defenders are villagers, they look pretty capable of defending themselves. So why do they need Toa again?

Because Toa makes Lego gain more money.

 

or just because the toa are on a completely different level.. even matoran could protect themselves

Matoran can defend themselves from village- or individual-level threats fairly effectively. Toa are needed when the opponent(s) can wipe out towns or large populations of matoran.

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Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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Yeah,while a Matoran(or Protectors in this case) could overpower most rahi or fight off Bohrok and the like, when faced with the big bad, the man behind the man, the head honcho, the big cheese, etc. (Like Makuta, the Bahrag, or most Rahkshi) they would want to have someone a bit more powerful on their side, such as the Toa.

 

Take year '01: the Matoran could fight off individual rahi(eventually) more or less on their own, with pretty good results, but when the rahi led an all-out assault on the villages or just got lucky the Toa were needed, and for the battle with the Manas, Shadow Toa, and Makuta, the Matoran wouldn't have stood a chance(whereas the Toa could defeat the, sorta)

 

Now this year: the Protectors and other villagers could most likely fight off small groups of these Skull Spiders, heck with enough planing they could probably take on a Lord of Skull Spiders with minimal losses, but what about hordes of these things? When letting a single one get through turns your forces against you? Better to leave it to a small team of skilled and powerful masters, who can turn the very elements into weapons against their foes.

 

Not to mention that there is almost certainly something behind these spiders who must be fought...

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-END OF LINE-

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.... I don't see why people act like the set names not including the word Toa is some grave sin.

 

I don't think people are so much upset that the set names don't contain the title 'Toa' so much as confused as to whether or not these sets actually still ARE Toa... I'm going to keep calling them Toa because that's what they are, but if the writers come along and say "no they are absolutely NOT Toa, they are ONLY to be called 'Masters'" then that would be a pretty big bummer for me. It would be a pretty significant step away from the original continuity after all and, although I don't want to relive the same story we've already seen, I at least want to be able to pick up on the connections to it as we go along with the new story...

 

 

I mean, like name-names. Like Tahu's name is... Tahu. Are the Protector sets just generic villagers without names or any sort of significance?

The Protector sets aren't generic villagers—they're village leaders, 

 

The protector sets aren't generic villagers, they're GENERIC village leaders...

 

On the facebook they have a image of the fire Protector or perhaps he's a villager which seem to look like smaller versions riding on Tahu's back kinds Yoda style while he's climbing up a volcanic mountain, I think that's pretty neat.

 

Yeah because the Phantoka and Mistika sets got the whole concept of riding Toa SOOO right didn't they?! Come on, that was awful... Bring back the combiners, that would be cool. Protectors riding Masters. Not so much...


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.... I don't see why people act like the set names not including the word Toa is some grave sin.

 

I don't think people are so much upset that the set names don't contain the title 'Toa' so much as confused as to whether or not these sets actually still ARE Toa... I'm going to keep calling them Toa because that's what they are, but if the writers come along and say "no they are absolutely NOT Toa, they are ONLY to be called 'Masters'" then that would be a pretty big bummer for me. It would be a pretty significant step away from the original continuity after all and, although I don't want to relive the same story we've already seen, I at least want to be able to pick up on the connections to it as we go along with the new story...

 

The issue then is that it's already been confirmed numerous times that the Toa are still officially called Toa. It was confirmed at New York Comic Con, it's confirmed on Kopaka's character page, and it's confirmed in the press release for the 2015 BIONICLE relaunch.

 

Meanwhile, "Masters" is not used as a group name anywhere, but people continue to use it as though it's replacing the term Toa somehow, when there's not the slightest indication that this is the case. The movie BIONICLE: Mask of Light called Tahu, Gali, and Pohatu the spirits of fire, water, and stone, but that didn't mean the word "spirit" was replacing the word Toa. Some LEGO Ninjago stories call Kai the master of fire, but that doesn't mean the word "master" was replacing the word ninja.

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Master of X is a marketing tag. Tahu, Master of Fire sounds a lot better than Toa Tahu, especially to the target market. Remember, us AFOLs and the old bionicle fans aren't exactly the primary target for this.

:r: :e: :g: :i: :t: :n: :u: :i:

Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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I am pretty sure one skull spider is no threat, and they all appear to be individually attacking their opponents, so they're not too bright to team up, and lord of skull spiders just appears to be a spider, and nothing else. And it's not too hard to kill a spider, especially one who has some of the worst minions ever.

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I am pretty sure one skull spider is no threat, and they all appear to be individually attacking their opponents, so they're not too bright to team up, and lord of skull spiders just appears to be a spider, and nothing else. And it's not too hard to kill a spider, especially one who has some of the worst minions ever.

Okay, hypothetical question here. Suppose you're walking around in the jungle and a spider the size of a small dog drops onto your head and attempts to pull off your mask. What do you do. You can't shoot it, not when it's on your head. You just have to hope that you have a resourceful companion with you who can pull it off.

 

Besides that, the fact that each set comes with just one skull spider doesn't mean they'll always be attacking the Toa and Protectors one-on-one in the story. Some of the LEGO Movie sets came with just one Skeletron or Micro-Manager, but in the movie those scenes had hundreds of them.

 

Lord of Skull Spiders does just appear to be a spider... a spider with a body the size of a man. If that doesn't terrify you I don't know what does. Also, it's not entirely clear if Lord of Skull Spiders is in fact one-of-a-kind.

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All of the protectors have a missile(stud) launcher and a weapon of some kind, so if spider the size of a small dog dropped on their heads and tried to rip their mask off, they would use whatever elemental power or weapon they be carryin'.

 

Spiders that are the size of a man... Thinking about it, and I think that: The larger a living object is, the slower it reacts. Do you remember seeing giants in fairy tales? They didn't run around like the flash. No matter how fast a person is, they can't compete to the relative speed of an insect. Considering this spider is about 20 times larger than it should be, it will be slowed significantly, but considering it was lightning fast as a regular spider, the larger spider would probably be a little slower than a person.

 

In other words, if they were bright enough, the protectors would have banned together and defeated the "Lord of skull spiders" quite a while ago.

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All of the protectors have a missile(stud) launcher and a weapon of some kind, so if spider the size of a small dog dropped on their heads and tried to rip their mask off, they would use whatever elemental power or weapon they be carryin'.

But I already addressed that. Firing a blaster at your own head would be stupid no matter WHAT is attacking you. And most of the Protectors don't seem to be carrying melee weapons (not that holding a knife to your head is much safer).

 

Spiders that are the size of a man... Thinking about it, and I think that: The larger a living object is, the slower it reacts. Do you remember seeing giants in fairy tales? They didn't run around like the flash. No matter how fast a person is, they can't compete to the relative speed of an insect. Considering this spider is about 20 times larger than it should be, it will be slowed significantly, but considering it was lightning fast as a regular spider, the larger spider would probably be a little slower than a person.

By that argument a cheetah should be considerably slower than a housecat (or at least, slower than a smaller wildcat such as a lynx or bobcat). I think it's common knowledge that this is not the case.

 

I don't honestly know if there IS an science behind this claim you're making, but even if there is, this is a fantasy creature and those rules need not apply. There are plenty of creatures in the old BIONICLE that have abilities that real science could never account for. Neither the Gukko, Kewa, Nui-Rama, or Nui-Kopen seems particularly flightworthy, but that doesn't mean any of them can't fly.

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Spiders are actually pretty slow creatures for their size. Scaled up to Skull spider size, I imagine them capable of lightning-quick strikes or jumps, but slow enough to be easily grabbed or shot otherwise. The LoSS itself might be tremendously slow outside of a fight, but able to scuttle.quickly up walls and onto ceilings into short bursts.

 

So going back to the 'spider on the head' scenario: a skull spider might be able to jump onto a protector's face, but the protector could very likely be able to grab the creature and prevent it from pulling off its mask. Even then, one of those elemental blasters could probably pick off individual spiders pretty easily if the protector sees it coming.

:r: :e: :g: :i: :t: :n: :u: :i:

Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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Spiders are actually pretty slow creatures for their size. Scaled up to Skull spider size, I imagine them capable of lightning-quick strikes or jumps, but slow enough to be easily grabbed or shot otherwise. The LoSS itself might be tremendously slow outside of a fight, but able to scuttle.quickly up walls and onto ceilings into short bursts.

 

So going back to the 'spider on the head' scenario: a skull spider might be able to jump onto a protector's face, but the protector could very likely be able to grab the creature and prevent it from pulling off its mask. Even then, one of those elemental blasters could probably pick off individual spiders pretty easily if the protector sees it coming.

Depends how powerful the elemental blasters are and how much pain the Skull Spiders are willing to endure in order to steal a mask.
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And then we get the possibility of them ganging up on some hapless Protector/villager/whatever. While he's trying to pull the spider off of his face, another one jumps him, they pin him down, remove the mask, and now that guy is a slave to face-hugging monsters!

 

Sorta like the krana of '02, but slightly worse 'cause it's also a spider the size of a large poodle.

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biofight042_banner_plasmarun.png

 

 

 

-END OF LINE-

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Spiders are actually pretty slow creatures for their size. Scaled up to Skull spider size, I imagine them capable of lightning-quick strikes or jumps, but slow enough to be easily grabbed or shot otherwise. The LoSS itself might be tremendously slow outside of a fight, but able to scuttle.quickly up walls and onto ceilings into short bursts.

 

So going back to the 'spider on the head' scenario: a skull spider might be able to jump onto a protector's face, but the protector could very likely be able to grab the creature and prevent it from pulling off its mask. Even then, one of those elemental blasters could probably pick off individual spiders pretty easily if the protector sees it coming.

Depends how powerful the elemental blasters are and how much pain the Skull Spiders are willing to endure in order to steal a mask.

If they're (semi-)independent minions, as opposed to members of a Krana-like hive mind, I'd say not much.

:r: :e: :g: :i: :t: :n: :u: :i:

Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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Spiders are actually pretty slow creatures for their size. Scaled up to Skull spider size, I imagine them capable of lightning-quick strikes or jumps, but slow enough to be easily grabbed or shot otherwise. The LoSS itself might be tremendously slow outside of a fight, but able to scuttle.quickly up walls and onto ceilings into short bursts.

 

So going back to the 'spider on the head' scenario: a skull spider might be able to jump onto a protector's face, but the protector could very likely be able to grab the creature and prevent it from pulling off its mask. Even then, one of those elemental blasters could probably pick off individual spiders pretty easily if the protector sees it coming.

Depends how powerful the elemental blasters are and how much pain the Skull Spiders are willing to endure in order to steal a mask.

 

If they're (semi-)independent minions, as opposed to members of a Krana-like hive mind, I'd say not much.

 

Well, the product description for the Protector of Fire says "The Protector of Fire is under attack from the Skull Spider emerging from the molten lava lake." Even Ta-Matoran couldn't submerge themselves in the lava and come out unscathed, so that leads me to believe the Skull Spiders are pretty resilient. It's hard to picture fire blasts having much of an effect on a creature that could emerge from a pool of lava and still pose a threat.

 

Also, I was just noticing that even the box art for some of the protectors show that the Skull Spiders aren't attacking the Protectors one-on-one, even though that's how they come packaged in the sets.

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Not to mention Turaga used to be Toa :/ so they also have experience with the whole hero thing a Matoran would never understand.

Don't Bionicle fans normally tend to overuse the classic quote "You don't have to be a Toa to be a hero"? The protectors aren't likely to be pushovers in battle, seeing as until the Toa arrived they were basically in charge of defending their respective villages.

 

The only significant and consistent difference between Turaga and Matoran is that Turaga could use the powers of noble masks, while Matoran couldn't. And for all we know, in the new story mask powers might be usable by anyone who wears the mask.

 

There will be no Mask powers in Bionicle G2 apart from the three "legendary" Kanohi. The Toa's masks are just elemental, meaning their elemental powers come from the masks, not from the Toa themselves.

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There will be no Mask powers in Bionicle G2 apart from the three "legendary" Kanohi. The Toa's masks are just elemental, meaning their elemental powers come from the masks, not from the Toa themselves.

Not necessarily. It could just as easily mean that the masks are tools that help the Toa access the full extent of their inherent potential.
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 Protectors are awesome if you think about it. I feel as if I am getting just as much out of these guys as I would buying a hero for HF. They have elbow and knee articulation. They have sweet weapon builds. They have a true rapid fire launcher - did you see that thing go off at NYCC!? All this justifies the 10$ price tag imo. All of the sets have around 60+ pieces (protector of Stone has the highest at 67, I think). 

 

Storyline wise, I'm fine with the villagers being the same species as the elders. This means that the role of the elder can change. Also, this doesn't necessarily mean there are no variations amongst the protectors. Maybe the mask we are seeing from these six sets are symbols of leadership amongst the protectors, hence why all the elders wear one? 

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Spiders are actually pretty slow creatures for their size. Scaled up to Skull spider size, I imagine them capable of lightning-quick strikes or jumps, but slow enough to be easily grabbed or shot otherwise. The LoSS itself might be tremendously slow outside of a fight, but able to scuttle.quickly up walls and onto ceilings into short bursts.

 

So going back to the 'spider on the head' scenario: a skull spider might be able to jump onto a protector's face, but the protector could very likely be able to grab the creature and prevent it from pulling off its mask. Even then, one of those elemental blasters could probably pick off individual spiders pretty easily if the protector sees it coming.

Depends how powerful the elemental blasters are and how much pain the Skull Spiders are willing to endure in order to steal a mask.

 

If they're (semi-)independent minions, as opposed to members of a Krana-like hive mind, I'd say not much.

 

Well, the product description for the Protector of Fire says "The Protector of Fire is under attack from the Skull Spider emerging from the molten lava lake." Even Ta-Matoran couldn't submerge themselves in the lava and come out unscathed, so that leads me to believe the Skull Spiders are pretty resilient. It's hard to picture fire blasts having much of an effect on a creature that could emerge from a pool of lava and still pose a threat.

 

Here's an alternate angle; the skull spider wasn't submerged, but further out, relying on heat haze to cover its approach. Once its close enough, it jumps forward, and then we get the Protector firing fire blasts at it to slow it down while he brings his flame blade-things into play.

:r: :e: :g: :i: :t: :n: :u: :i:

Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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Well, we can always adopt it into gen 1 for one of the Kanohi that doesn't have a design, like the Mask of Clairvoyance.

:r: :e: :g: :i: :t: :n: :u: :i:

Elemental Rahi in Gen2, anyone? A write-up for an initial video for a G2 plot

 

I really wish everyone would stop trying to play join the dots with Gen 1 and Gen 2 though,it seems there's a couple new threads everyday and often they're duplicates of already existing conversations! Or simply parallel them with a slightly new 'twist'! Gen 2 is NEW, it is NOT Gen 1 and it is NOT a continuation. Outside of the characters we already have I personally don't want to see ANY old characters return. I think it will cheapen the whole experience to those of us familiar with the original line...

 

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