Fru-Matoran!

Overall, I like yer ideas, though I think lime and orange may clash a bit with the white... I don't mind their current colors, since their brightness gives off nice light effects considering their background. Only thing I miss is two-part torsos, really -- these are just way too simple for $5 sets. Honestly, 16 pieces at best? Still, the masks/limbs/feet/heads do make up for that, so they end up being fairly good sets IMO.

How 'bout 'Ai-Matoran'? I use that And Ra would be good for the light-drained ones. Although Avo and Kra/Kraa would be more logical.

-Ikk

The only problem I see with the white and gold idea is that besides masks and weapons, there would be pretty much no differences between the Light Matoran. I admit, though, that I was expecting those colors, but now I understand why they are not like that.

Technically, though, Radiak, Gavla and Kirop aren't Av-Matoran anymore; the Shadow Leeches in the Makuta's pods drained their light and made them Shadow Matoran (Kra-Matoran, if you will). But wait, their wings are only one piece? Phooey. Ah well; considering their size it makes a little sense. Not much, but a little. And they look so much like imps that they've become cute, despite the fact that they're almost spawns of Makuta.

My other problem, though, is that I don't think their elbows and knees are bendable, which really stinks...

EDIT: Oh, and I think the completely translucent heads work, considering they are Matoran of Light.

Orange Toa feet are awesome, and in any other color.

I have no issues with the color scheme for the most part (though I wonder why the dual-colored masks were necessary, even for the evil ones). The reason the blue one is female is obvious-- younger fans would find it hard to understand when explained to them. "But I thought blue ones were girls!" "No, all water ones are girls!" "But all blue ones are water!" "These ones are light! They can be any color!" "Then why is the white one not a boy?" "Av-Matoran can be boys or girls!" "You're lying!" And so on and so on and so on.

Anyway, their reasons for not all being white and gold are obvious. 1)Since I think 2004 we've known that Av-Matoran can change their colors at will. 2)Noone would buy a set of Matoran who all have the same colors (though your idea of giving them white instead of bley nullifies this argument). 3)The Matoran and Toa really don't look too good together using white on the Matoran in place of grey.

I find little reason to change the masks of the Av-Matoran, besides the issue with the evil ones' masks looking too evil. I like the masks of Solek, Photok, and Tanma quite a bit, though I certainly feel that coming up with new masks was not necessary.

Also, the fact that the eyes are all the same color for the good and evil Matoran is tolerable, as this year it is important so that fans can tell more easily who's fighting whom. The use of the hackneyed yellow-green and orange, however, irks me quite a bit, and I can't really say for sure whether I approve of the new heads until I have seen the actual parts. The Matoran next year look fine in my eyes, but their parts scare me (all except the feet, anyway), and I'll have to wait and see what the MOCists come up with for them.

Sorry that I'm not here to discuss your actual entry, as it's mostly color scheme stuff which is pretty superficial/subjective, plus I'm in a hurry. Just a nitpick about your attempted linguistic comment in the opening.

Avo-matoran

 

(Because I refuse to use that linguistic collision of "v-m." It simply doesn't happen.)

Some of us are blessed with enough money to live moderately well on. But there are people out there who don't have much.

Just so you know.

If you truly are a linguist, you will understand two vital points above, my friend. Whoops, three there.

[Edit: Make that four.]

Sorry that I'm not here to discuss your actual entry, as it's mostly color scheme stuff which is pretty superficial/subjective[...]

If it's subjective, how is it automatically superficial?

Colors are one of the most deciding factors when I buy sets... so make no Hasty Generalization or whatever, bones.

-Ikk

I thought I said I wasn't here to discuss that.

Is this a new debate technique, eh? Can't see why you wouldn't agree, though... 'tis very simple. Superficial = subjective = not universal.

-Ikk

To Aanchir and Takatu – well, obviously you couldn't do a full set of six white and gold Matoran. Or even three. It's just that with only lime/grey, white/grey, and orange/grey, only Solek has even one of the Avo-Matoran colors. My idea is to make Solek in the full-fledged Avo-color scheme, then add white to the other two so you have at least one of the Avo-colors. (Plus, then you get white vs. black for Light against Shadow, as I mentioned, instead of grey vs. black.)

The transparent heads work fine; I added the Metru heads again for at least a little more complexity...

Cap'n Ikki ~ Yes, I would rather the bodies were more than one piece... like using the Mahritoran-style hips, as I mentioned... since right now they're only 14 pieces each. Kra-Matoran does work well for the corrupted ones. I shall use that from now on.

Takatu ~ They are somewhat cute... I sort of want to snuggle Radiak, even though he's sharp and pointy all over. And Kirop with those round eyeholes.

Aanchir ~ I still say feh to only the blue one being female. For the first time since that annoying rule was established, we can have a Matoran set who's female but not blue, so only making Gavla female is exceedingly boring to me. (Also, if my experiences in TRU hold, the youngest fans [who probably don't follow the story] think all of them are male, even the blue Toa... And adding white or gold as I suggested would separate the three good ones from their normal elements, opening the possibility of being female by looking more like Avo-Matoran.)

Like I said, there's nothing objectively wrong with them; all these are just ideas to make me happy.

Bones ~ I get your points indeed, but in one word next to another any collision can happen naturally (though in many languages (not English), if a word ends in a sound incompatible with the next word's starting sound, something in the two will change). I'm talking about within a single word, or in this case a hyphenated phrase. And I resent the word "attempted" being in there.

It would also seem more natural that the Avo- prefix would follow the same rules as the Onu- prefix, since the two are identical in elements. (Vowel, consonant, vowel...)

To Aanchir and Takatu – well, obviously you couldn't do a full set of six white and gold Matoran. Or even three. It's just that with only lime/grey, white/grey, and orange/grey, only Solek has even one of the Avo-Matoran colors. My idea is to make Solek in the full-fledged Avo-color scheme, then add white to the other two so you have at least one of the Avo-colors. (Plus, then you get white vs. black for Light against Shadow, as I mentioned, instead of grey vs. black.)

But as I explained, there's no reason why they must have either color, and moreover they look better in conjunction with their respective Phantoka in bley.

The transparent heads work fine; I added the Metru heads again for at least a little more complexity...

Metru heads would require that the new torsos be modified. The new heads attach with y-joints rather than ball joints. Weird, I know, but it actually allows for a considerable number of dynamic poses unattainable with the old heads (which is why I so often use Mata heads and y-joints on titan-sized MOCs).

Aanchir ~ I still say feh to only the blue one being female. For the first time since that annoying rule was established, we can have a Matoran set who's female but not blue, so only making Gavla female is exceedingly boring to me. (Also, if my experiences in TRU hold, the youngest fans [who probably don't follow the story] think all of them are male, even the blue Toa... And adding white or gold as I suggested would separate the three good ones from their normal elements, opening the possibility of being female by looking more like Avo-Matoran.)

Ah, but if the blue ones were male it would make it even more difficult to edumacate the chilluns about BIONICLE. Mata Nui knows I have enough trouble trying to explain that blue Matoran are female, but Bohrok, Rahkshi, and Vahki have no genders, and Vezok is male, and (you'd think this wouldn't be necessary) that Roodaka is female... the list of issues goes on and on. You have a point in that this may not be one of LEGO's chief concerns, but it's definitely one of mine.

On that note, if color doesn't matter any more outside of storyline than it does inside storyline for Av-Matoran, then why not have more than one female set?

Bones ~ I get your points indeed, but in one word next to another any collision can happen naturally (though in many languages (not English), if a word ends in a sound incompatible with the next word's starting sound, something in the two will change). I'm talking about within a single word, or in this case a hyphenated phrase. And I resent the word "attempted" being in there.

 

It would also seem more natural that the Avo- prefix would follow the same rules as the Onu- prefix, since the two are identical in elements. (Vowel, consonant, vowel...)

That does make sense... the way I see it, the only reasons they would have done that for Onu and not Av are that 1)Onu without the U wouldn't appear to sound the same and 2)O-N by itself looks just like a real word, "on". And who knows; maybe it's less trouble for Danes, and they didn't realize the difficulties it could pose a native English speaker.

Is this a new debate technique, eh? Can't see why you wouldn't agree, though... 'tis very simple. Superficial = subjective = not universal.

 

 

-Ikk

It's more like an "I should be writing an essay but I wanted to come here real quick so I don't go insane but don't have time for lengthy debates" technique. Those words were randomly chosen to get the idea across that I wasn't here to talk about the entry. So not gonna bother debating if they fit. Color technicalities aren't interesting to me at moment sorry.

Bones ~ I get your points indeed, but in one word next to another any collision can happen naturally (though in many languages (not English), if a word ends in a sound incompatible with the next word's starting sound, something in the two will change). I'm talking about within a single word, or in this case a hyphenated phrase. And I resent the word "attempted" being in there.

 

It would also seem more natural that the Avo- prefix would follow the same rules as the Onu- prefix, since the two are identical in elements. (Vowel, consonant, vowel...)

Yes, but it is hyphenated. Which is basically the same thing. You write it "Av (space) Matoran", not "Avmatoran." The dash is simply one way of writing a space; and really wouldn't be needed because: what I was testing you on was the fact that linguists have proven that there isn't actually a pause between words for fluent speakers of any language; we simply mentally "pretend" that there are pauses, because in the processing of the speech, we need to seperate the word components to comprehend.

I've seen the graphs; looking just at those, you can't even tell where exactly one word starts and another ends; they sortof blur together. This is why many people erroneously think that foreigners blur their words more than we do -- we actually do the same if we are fluent in English, but our brains can "filter" the blur.

In other words, there's no distinction, linguistically, between two seperate words and a hyphenated word. So my point stands -- it does occur.

Technically there wouldn't be a functional difference if it was just "Avmatoran", though you'd tend to perform the blur faster that way.

Also, in terms of mouth part placement, v and m are actually very close compared to other more "standard" sound combinations. For example, the letter "x" is usually pronounced "ks", which is requires the tongue to rapidly move from the far back of the roof of the mouth to the far front. However, v is done by placing the teeth on the lower lip. All one needs do to make m is to close the upper lip.

In addition, v is a "soft" fricative sound and m is a stop; those can go together much more easily than many combinations of two stops that are frequently done in English. (Like the word "Captain".)

Anyways. You can ignore me if you feel like it; I just love linguistics too much to pass up an upportunity to rant bout it.

And for the record, English does have some less common examples of what you mentioned. Perhaps most obvious is how some say "Ax" instead of "ask". The sound "r" in some American English accents also changes sometimes like that.

That does make sense... the way I see it, the only reasons they would have done that for Onu and not Av are that 1)Onu without the U wouldn't appear to sound the same and 2)O-N by itself looks just like a real word, "on". And who knows; maybe it's less trouble for Danes, and they didn't realize the difficulties it could pose a native English speaker.

Yes, that was my assumption as well. Also, remember the original word wasn't "Matoran" but either "Tohunga" or "Koronan". (Pretty sure the prefix always went with Koronan, and there were alternate spellings of even that.) So it would have been "On-Koronan" which sounds like "encore". Given that the combination "Av-Matoran" flows fairly freely, there really wouldn't be any reason not to go with the automatic two-letter prefix.

All that is basically a fancy and technically-backed-up way of saying that your statement is more about personal taste than any linguistic science itself. Which is fine; but let's be aware of that. Or we could ignore me cuz I'm weird.

And I resent the word "attempted" being in there.

I will assume you're joking, despite the lack of emoticon. If not, aw, come on, man, lighten up. Life be boring without some sense of humor. I would hope that you are past the need for resentment as we hopefully cleared up in past discussions. Again, never mind if I missed the joke.

Takatu ~ They are somewhat cute... I sort of want to snuggle Radiak, even though he's sharp and pointy all over. And Kirop with those round eyeholes.

Haha, same here. They're just so cute.

Personally, I don't care if they have 14 pieces. I love them, and I'm getting them all. My personal favourite is Radiak, because that mask is just so sweet. It's the demonic version of the Avokhii.

Shakar

On that linguistic rant, that is precisely true – not only do we say a sentence as effectively one single word, but b, v, f, and m are all very similar sounds. Hence why in Hindi b and v are the same sound, if I recall correctly (I'm no expert in Asiatic languages), or, on a different note, r and l are the same sound in Japanese. Or in Greek omicron and omega, and epsilon and eta, are short and long o's and e's, espectively, but transliterated into Roman characters they become simply o and e because we Anglophones don't differenciate vowels by length.

But anyway, the "vm" combination seems completely unnatural. You mentioned the brain processing things. "Have much," as you said, poses no problem, because the phrase is registered as two words, but a single combination of "vm" within a word doesn't occur in English. (Unless there's a word I can't think of.) And as such, the brain (my own, for instance) stumbles over it because it's never seen like that, working out how such a thing would be pronounced. As a result, one attempts to overcompensate for the V sound by stressing it, and the outcome sounds ugly.

Of course, all that's only initial dealing-with; after some practice (or, as you mentioned, the comparison to such phrases as "have much") it's perfectly easy to say, just like any combination might become.

I concede that the combination of sounds happens, but I do still think "Avo-Matoran" flows off the tongue much more naturally to one familiar with Bionicle nomenclature, especially given the precedent set by Onu-stuffs...

Off on a tangent again, the "ask" to "axe" comparison isn't really what I was talking about; as I said, English doesn't actually have rules like that. I was thinking more of Greek, where the future of peithō (I persuade), which ought to be peithso by the standard formation, becomes peiso because the "ths" sound is an awkward one, so the sigma overrides the theta.

Skakdi is another similarly annoying word – certainly pronouncable, but you have to work your tongue around it for a while because it looks so unusual.

Metru heads would require that the new torsos be modified. The new heads attach with y-joints rather than ball joints. Weird, I know, but it actually allows for a considerable number of dynamic poses unattainable with the old heads (which is why I so often use Mata heads and y-joints on titan-sized MOCs).

Exactly, as I said the torsoes would be different so you have that slight added complexity. Though I'm not sure how one leads to greater head movement than the other...

On that note, if color doesn't matter any more outside of storyline than it does inside storyline for Av-Matoran, then why not have more than one female set?

My point exactly. You have the opportunity to, for once in the storyline, so why on earth not?

On that linguistic rant, that is precisely true – not only do we say a sentence as effectively one single word, but b, v, f, and m are all very similar sounds. Hence why in Hindi b and v are the same sound, if I recall correctly (I'm no expert in Asiatic languages), or, on a different note, r and l are the same sound in Japanese. Or in Greek omicron and omega, and epsilon and eta, are short and long o's and e's, espectively, but transliterated into Roman characters they become simply o and e because we Anglophones don't differenciate vowels by length.

 

But anyway, the "vm" combination seems completely unnatural. You mentioned the brain processing things. "Have much," as you said, poses no problem, because the phrase is registered as two words, but a single combination of "vm" within a word doesn't occur in English. (Unless there's a word I can't think of.) And as such, the brain (my own, for instance) stumbles over it because it's never seen like that, working out how such a thing would be pronounced. As a result, one attempts to overcompensate for the V sound by stressing it, and the outcome sounds ugly.

 

Of course, all that's only initial dealing-with; after some practice (or, as you mentioned, the comparison to such phrases as "have much") it's perfectly easy to say, just like any combination might become.

 

I concede that the combination of sounds happens, but I do still think "Avo-Matoran" flows off the tongue much more naturally to one familiar with Bionicle nomenclature, especially given the precedent set by Onu-stuffs...

Good, I think I can agree with that.

Couple nitpicks -- "sound" isn't quite the right term for things like the Japanese r and l, though I know what you mean. Can't remember if the fancy schmancy term is "phone" or "phoneme", but perhaps "phonetic element" would be a fair approximate.

And I personally don't have the slightest trouble combining v and m, but I'll assume I'm a very rare exception given that I invent alien language (basics) all the time and I usually don't have trouble with new sounds where others do. (For example, I mastered the German ch and r right away while my brother still can't do the r even though I've explained over and over how it's done.) No, I can't think of any vm words in English either.

Also, as said before, Onu really isn't relevant to this, since as mentioned before there were other bigger reasons not to call them "On-Koronan". On, and Encore, being the reasons...

And my guess is the reason you haven't seen anyone else objecting to the combination "Av-Matoran" on the grounds you brought up is that most of us have grown familiar with the sound "Av" for whatever reason as working as an elemental prefix already. Because we can't ignore that this term has been around for a long time, and pretty much everyone has been using without any stated qualms.

Off on a tangent again, the "ask" to "axe" comparison isn't really what I was talking about; as I said, English doesn't actually have rules like that. I was thinking more of Greek, where the future of peithō (I persuade), which ought to be peithso by the standard formation, becomes peiso because the "ths" sound is an awkward one, so the sigma overrides the theta.

Well, yes and no. Yes, I know what you mean by that, but when you say "English" doesn't have rules like that, I'm not sure what you mean by rules. One of the things linguists study is the subconscious "rules" that do govern a particular dialect's pronunciations, and those do exist as "rules". It simply usually takes a linguist to figure out what they are, as most people don't consciously realize why it happens. In the African American dialect, there actually is a rule that is causing that phenomenon.

But it's not the kind of rule you can look up in a grammar handbook.

Skakdi is another similarly annoying word – certainly pronouncable, but you have to work your tongue around it for a while because it looks so unusual.

Yep. That one actually gives me trouble too. Not that it looks unusual though. I want Bionicle words to look unusual.

My point exactly. You have the opportunity to, for once in the storyline, so why on earth not?

I think someone raised a reason not -- so as not to confuse people.

I think someone raised a reason not -- so as not to confuse people.

No more confusing than an iron grey and yellow Toa being Hewkii, or a four-legged, spiky, bat-winged set being a Matoran, the Rahaga formerly having been Toa, or the tubes on the Toa Mahri being gills instead of the diving equipment one would expect them to be... If you want to break from tradition, or the expected, you have to confuse some people.

Of course, said confusion could be made less if color schemes more Avo-Matoran-like were used... Anyway, again, there's nothing canonically wrong with any of these, it's just so much potential unused.

On the issue of rules, I was indeed referring to actual rules of grammar; rules of speech I'm not as familiar with...

Mm, German phonetics are fun. That provides another example, though; non-German-speakers often try to overstress the ch, making it harder than it needs to be; likewise, the v in Av-Matoran almost (but not quite) becomes an f in speech. And yeah, it's been around for a while, so people (myself included) have gotten used to it... I would be curious to see people's initial reactions thereto.

I'll never understand how you and Bones can come up with such great, strong, and lengthy debates...

Tell me, what piece, coming from the new sets, do you find most valuable for MOCing?

Also, about how big are the Matoran? You do have them... short term memory

I think someone raised a reason not -- so as not to confuse people.

No more confusing than an iron grey and yellow Toa being Hewkii, or a four-legged, spiky, bat-winged set being a Matoran, the Rahaga formerly having been Toa, or the tubes on the Toa Mahri being gills instead of the diving equipment one would expect them to be... If you want to break from tradition, or the expected, you have to confuse some people.

Trust me. Male/Female issues are more confusing for younger kids. I could probably tell them "the tubes are gills" and they'd be fine with that. After all, I've never told them that that wasn't the case. I could tell them "That is Hewkii" and it wouldn't cause them too much more difficulty. Most people who care about who's who and have followed BIONICLE since 2001 should have the sense to understand that characters can change forms. If they fail to fulfill those criteria, then from my experience they typically don't care.

The Rahaga having been Toa doesn't need much effort to convince people of it, either. If a frog or horned beast could have once been a prince, then I'm confident that similarly radical and curselike transformations could be understood by the masses. Anyway, the Hagah have from what we've seen maintained the color schemes of their Rahaga counterparts minus the bley; this appears to be one of your priorities in transformations from what I've seen. Certainly the lack of part similarities detracts, but is that truly enough to draw these sets below, say, the Metru, on whom I still haven't seen one significant similarity to the Mata Nui Turaga after all these years? (If you do find similarities, by all means, follow my example and make edits. It's important to my drawings that I see any mask similarities or part similarities there are.)

But if you tell them "This blue Matoran is male; this white Matoran is female," they'd be confused, because chances are they will have heard from me many a time that "blue is female. Everything else is male." I've had trouble convincing people that Roodaka is female, I dare say that it might take some good convincing to explain how the Av-Matoran are an exception to pretty much every rule that has been preached over the years.

As for the Av-Matoran vs. Onu-Matoran comparison, think about it. On would likely be pronounced. "Ahn" or "Awn," rather than "Own" like it ought to be to match Onua's name. More importantly, it could be confused with a real word, "On," and bad puns in comedies would have plagued us more than they already have. What better solution than to place a vowel after the "n" and make it a long "o"? And what better vowel to place than the one that's already a component of the name?

As for Av-Matoran, it's easy to tell how Av's pronounced. Though some people prefer "Uhv," like in "Uhvohkee" (or as I say, "Uh-Voh-Key-Ee"), there is the same important problem as before, that being that it is homonymous to a real word ("Of"). "Ahv" is a reasonable pronunciation, but that can still be applied without confusion to the current prefix, without a need to add extra letters as was done for Onu.

This is just how I believe the issue with Onu arose, and what I feel about the current issue with "Av." It's by no means an exact explanation of how it went down, but it makes sense to me. And, as I said above, those Danes may have better pronunciation skills with such consonant blends. Who knows?

I have to ask, how old are these kids to whom you are referring? If my own memories of being the age serve, I think it would be a severe underestimation on Lego's part to assume that the target audience, 9- to 11-year olds, couldn't grasp that a new type of Matoran could be both male and female...

Besides, Lego decided to make the Matoran of lightning female; wouldn't that be as much of a problem as a few female Avotoran? — Of course, that question goes hand-in-hand with the facts that one, all of these are virtually the standard six types just by set design, and two, we don't have an official color scheme for lightning yet. The solution to both of these is, of course, to introduce a new color scheme – i.e. white and light gold for Solek – and then have her be female, unbound by the marketed gender of Ko-colors. Since I assume a similar thing would be done for Lightning, whenever Matoran/Toa of the element are released.

Again, no matter how justified it is for only Gavla to be female, there's no denying that the fact that Avo-Matoran are both genders (a truly wonderful thing) comes to absolutely nothing from a set design/gender point of view. Finally the potential is there for a non-blue Matoran set to be female, but it goes unused.

Is it an understandable decision? Yes, I have to admit it is, but it's an extremely unoriginal one.

The other examples were to illustrate things that are unexpected or unprecedented: a Toa in an entirely new, unseen color scheme being an old Matoran with a completely different one (people were very confused by that, as I witnessed); sets one would definitely not expect to have been Toa in the past; something one would assume to be exactly what it looks like canonically being entirely different... and Radiak, who speaks for himself. If people can deal with all of those, they (meaning the target audience) can deal with a non-blue Matoran being female, really.

On the elemental prefixes, the Onu-prefix wasn't chosen for reasons at all like that – it's like that because all Bionicle names were originally based on, or taken from, Maori. And in Maori, things always end with vowels (which is the overriding rule here), and you rarely have two consonants next to each other anyway. (ng and wh are the only ones to my knowldge.) Plus, the elemental prefixes were taken from the Toa's names, so Onu- was a given. Given that, Avo- would work the same way.

Since then, of course, the Matoran language has evolved to include a frighteningly wide variety of sounds and styles (to some extremities of which I have always disapproved), so in today's standards there's nothing wrong with Av-Matoran, but placed against the other six it sticks out immensely.

I think someone raised a reason not -- so as not to confuse people.

No more confusing than an iron grey and yellow Toa being Hewkii, or a four-legged, spiky, bat-winged set being a Matoran, the Rahaga formerly having been Toa, or the tubes on the Toa Mahri being gills instead of the diving equipment one would expect them to be... If you want to break from tradition, or the expected, you have to confuse some people.

 

Of course, said confusion could be made less if color schemes more Avo-Matoran-like were used... Anyway, again, there's nothing canonically wrong with any of these, it's just so much potential unused.

 

I would be curious to see people's initial reactions thereto.[/color]

You got me curious too; wanna make a poll?

And I don't at all buy the logic that varying color schemes in one element would be anywhere near as confusing as changing the "blue Matoran = female, others = male" rule, because varying color schemes in one element has also been established since 2001. There's no fundamental change there by making Pohatu orange or the Av-Matoran a little different too.

And the male/female thing would be more confusing to anybody, regardless of age, because with that there's always the "pronoun question". When you, for example, are visiting somebody's house and they have a pet you don't know, you often have to ask the gender. With Matoran it would be the same way. As it is, the problem doesn't exist.

Things like the Shadow Matoran being Matoran or the Rahaga being former Toa are more story geek facts than basics. The old "Oh, the blue guy is a she?" thing is a lot more basic.

But if you tell them "This blue Matoran is male; this white Matoran is female," they'd be confused, because chances are they will have heard from me many a time that "blue is female. Everything else is male." I've had trouble convincing people that Roodaka is female, I dare say that it might take some good convincing to explain how the Av-Matoran are an exception to pretty much every rule that has been preached over the years.

Heh, exactly. And Roodaka is visually obviously female -- with Matoran there is nothing else. It would be purely a storyline factoid only. Kids would call her "him" even more than they already do with blue sets.

Now, I'm not saying it would necessarily mean "Don't ever do it", but to say that it wouldn't confuse people more than other things is, I think, incorrect. So that is a reason to at least be cautious with the idea.

I have to ask, how old are these kids to whom you are referring? If my own memories of being the age serve, I think it would be a severe underestimation on Lego's part to assume that the target audience, 9- to 11-year olds, couldn't grasp that a new type of Matoran could be both male and female...

I think you're forgetting that most in the target audience don't know all the little obscure factoids us story geeks know. The color coding gender thing is a basic and clear system that's been in place from the beginning. Why throw a wrench in that system?

Besides, Lego decided to make the Matoran of lightning female; wouldn't that be as much of a problem as a few female Avotoran

Apples and oranges, IMO. Lightning is a totally different element, and also one we have yet to see in set form. Av-Matoran aren't naturally these colors anyways, it is just being done so as not to completely risk the tradition. Don't forget that that is already a level of confusion that will probably be out there -- "What? These guys aren't really stone, ice, air, etc.?!" Hopefully the idea that they're light-Matoran will make that less confusing, because light has to do with colors as kids do know. To add a second level of confusion at the same time?

? — Of course, that question goes hand-in-hand with the facts that one, all of these are virtually the standard six types just by set design, and two, we don't have an official color scheme for lightning yet. The solution to both of these is, of course, to introduce a new color scheme – i.e. white and light gold for Solek – and then have her be female, unbound by the marketed gender of Ko-colors. Since I assume a similar thing would be done for Lightning, whenever Matoran/Toa of the element are released.

Yes, but since that hasn't been done...

Again, no matter how justified it is for only Gavla to be female, there's no denying that the fact that Avo-Matoran are both genders (a truly wonderful thing) comes to absolutely nothing from a set design/gender point of view. Finally the potential is there for a non-blue Matoran set to be female, but it goes unused.

Let's not forget that the whole Av-have-both-genders thing is a nod towards us older fans in the first place. Be careful not to treat that nod as something to be ungrateful for and overly demanding of. This is something I think is better left to fanfics -- to make up your own male and female Av-Matoran with whichever colors you feel like.

Is it an understandable decision? Yes, I have to admit it is, but it's an extremely unoriginal one.

I don't think that's the issue we've been debating, though, whether it's "original". Originality can, after all, only go so far. Keeping Kanohi around is "unoriginal," and keeping Toa around is "unoriginal." There's plenty of us who wouldn't mind these going bye-bye at all to be replaced by something new. But they're kept because the sense is that they help hold Bionicle together and keep a consistent framework behind it.

The other examples were to illustrate things that are unexpected or unprecedented: a Toa in an entirely new, unseen color scheme being an old Matoran with a completely different one (people were very confused by that, as I witnessed)

There was a market driving force behind Hewkii's color change. The change you're suggesting lacks that driving force. The only motivation would be to please older fans and "not bother much" the target audience. Big difference there.

In essence, LEGO had little choice with the yellow/orange move.

sets one would definitely not expect to have been Toa in the past

Yeah, but everybody including little kids that I've heard have always reacted "Cool!" to the Rahaga having been Toa. They like funny little mutants. Changing color/gender isn't that kinda thing. Gender at that age seems a lot different from how it seems to us old fogies.

something one would assume to be exactly what it looks like canonically being entirely different...

Maybe I'm losing track here, but wasn't the next thing on your list the Mahri tubes? How are those "entirely different"? Both are underwater breathing apparatus. The only reason we in real life don't have a machine that does the same is that we just plain aren't advanced enough yet (at least for it to be affordable). To us, tubes mean air tubes to a tank. But the Bionicle world isn't limited in that way. I fail to see how gills are that much different from air tubes. Especially in biomechanical beings... That's still a "Ooh, cool!" thing.

And how else could it work, really? If they were air tanks getting air would have to become a major part of the storyline for the Toa too, but it was already being done with the Matoran. Methinks it would get a little old. Gills are more economical.

Besides, that's a very obscure factoid. I know what you're trying to say, but none of this changes the fact that the gender change you're suggesting would be a much more radical, fundamental change with much less reason to do it coming from the target audience.

and Radiak, who speaks for himself.

Why? Mutants are nothing new to Bionicle, as you stated with the Rahaga.

If people can deal with all of those, they (meaning the target audience) can deal with a non-blue Matoran being female, really.

Sorry, but this is still a non-sequitar argument. That conclusion doesn't follow at all from the things you're pointing out. Remember it's not whether they "can deal" with it, but whether it's worth doing it compared to how much it will confuse them. After all you said, these facts still remain:

1) No evidence the target audience wants that change.

2) Gender is very different from whatever other story whatevers you think up.

3) All fundamental 2001 "rules" have remained consistent, including varying colors in one element, "blue" being female, and the six standard elements "appearing" each year (in this case, appearing only literally speaking; not actually being fire, etc.). Your suggestion would change one of those rules as far as the marketing "appearance" is concerned.

4) The Av = both genders thing is a treat already given to us older fans. Why demand "more more more"?

To be super clear, I would also love what you're suggesting. Anyone who's follow my fanfics knows I completely abolished the gender rule within them (though I have a fundamental story reason for it, too, that is still a mystery to readers). However, having done so, I've actually realized that things are waaaaay more confusing that way, and almost wished at times I hadn't done it. For example, in my RPG, there's quite simply no way to tell the gender of a lot of the extras, unless it happens to be mentioned in passing. I always have to adjust the storyline to be sure to use the word "she" for every Ta-female and "he" for every Ga-male. In official storyline, I really do think it's best to stick with the blue=female rule.

BTW, though, if it's worth anything, remember there was some blue in MNOG Le-Matoran, and in Ko-Matoran. And Takua, obviously. So some exceptions already have existed (but in each case, it was only a secondary color). Perhaps a compromise along those lines would have been okay.

On the elemental prefixes, the Onu-prefix wasn't chosen for reasons at all like that – it's like that because all Bionicle names were originally based on, or taken from, Maori.

Do you have quotes to confirm this, or is this simply your personal theory? I don't think you can just brush aside all those reasons when in fact, if they were called "On-Matoran", it would have the mentioned problems. You don't think LEGO thought of that?

And in Maori, things always end with vowels

LEGO changed tons of things in terms of how they were using the Maori language -- question is, even if that's true, why did LEGO choose not to change that part? That doesn't come close to ruling out what we've been bringing up.

(which is the overriding rule here), and you rarely have two consonants next to each other anyway. (ng and wh are the only ones to my knowldge.) Plus, the elemental prefixes were taken from the Toa's names, so Onu- was a given. Given that, Avo- would work the same way.

Yet again, even if that's true, it's an argument against your suggestion, because Maori is something LEGO is now trying to actively avoid.

Since then, of course, the Matoran language has evolved to include a frighteningly wide variety of sounds and styles (to some extremities of which I have always disapproved), so in today's standards there's nothing wrong with Av-Matoran, but placed against the other six it sticks out immensely.

Why frightening? Especially to speakers of English, which already has a wide range of styles? (Though not really of sounds, compared to things like German.) I think you're making the mistake of "grounding" your sense of Bionicle linguistics in Maori, when in fact it is now grounded in English, and also for good reasons; most fans speak English.

Ah well, unlike bones here talking about talking and stuff (bones being the BZP dictionary ), I'll comment about the colors.

I thing they're all good ideas, but I don't know how people would take to a non-blue Matoran being female.

As for Kirop... if only black Trynas and red visors did exist... I love the idea.

However, the Matoran masks are really Matoran versions of their counterparts' Great masks, you know? At least, they look like it.

And if Gavla were to have an Arthron, please only make it one color! I have enough problems using Jaller's successfully!

And yeah, white and gold would be sweet, at least gold, but make the Kra-Matoran have gunmetal grey like Makuta (of Metru Nui, silly).

But to what bones said before (or rather, a variation): v-m is fine. At least, when I say Av-Matoran it sounds fluent.

-Z-