Thormen

Sometimes it is, but sometimes it isn't. The spacing seems pretty variable actually. Take a look at the picture in the lower left corner, this one has two lines. The first of the double strokes on the top line is actually really close to the big yellow thing, the spacing between the first stroke and the big yellow thing is less than the spacing between the two strokes themselves.

That crossed my mind as well (well not the ironic statement, but the arrogance), but I was hoping there would be a better explanation. Actually he considered Mata Nui enough of a threat to go after him in 2010. He had a thousand years to think out the finer points of his second master plan (the one about taking over the giant robot) so I'd think it would have crossed his mind that there were less risky options. He could have easily expelled the Ignika and killed Mata Nui.

Regarding the OP's question, I don't think we have to involve the OoMN in this at all if we consider the Golden Kanohi: Greg has stated that Artakha made the Golden Kanohi and when the Toa Mata put the Kanohi they had collected on their statues, they were teleported back to him and the Golden Kanohi were teleported there. That must've been a dead giveaway that the Toa Mata were out there near Kini-Nui and since Artakha was responsible for helping them I'm sure he'd check how things were going. IMO the most likely series of events was: - The Makuta attacks Mata Nui and the Toa Mata are launched into the space, landing in the ocean of Aqua Magna after a while. - Artakha realizes that Mata Nui has fallen into a coma and that the Toa Mata have been launched. He then teleports to Kini-Nui to hide the Mata's Kanohi somewhere and finds out that there's an entire island around the temple. He decides to hide the Kanohi on the island. Then he returns to his island and waits, probably wondering after a while what is taking the Toa Mata so long. - Takua calls the Toa Mata and they start collecting their Kanohi. Then they exchange them for Golden Kanohi and Artakha notices that the Kanohi have been teleported and thinks finally... - Artakha keeps an eye on what the Toa are doing. Upon seeing them transform into Toa Nuva and losing the mask powers they collected, he uses his Mask of Creation to figure out how to create 30 more Kanohi Nuva, does that and hides them on the island. I'm assuming here that Artakha was the one to hide the 30 Great Kanohi, but I can't find anything on the subject. In any case, it's not really relevant since we know he created the Golden Kanohi and the Great Kanohi were teleported (back) to him.

OK so we know about the Makuta's master plan. We know he needed to dispose of Mata Nui's spirit somehow and he chose to do that by putting it into the Kanohi Ignika and launching it into outer space. My question is: why the Ignika? It's the most powerful mask in the Matoran Universe. If I were overthrowing someone my first choices would be (a) kill him or (b) put him in a position where he has no power. There were like a million powerless Matoran Kanohi he could've put his spirit into, why did he choose the most powerful Kanohi of all, the one Kanohi that could create a new body and grant its allies Elemental Powers? And come to think of it, why did he put his spirit in a Kanohi at all, which can survive outer space? Why didn't he just put Mata Nui's spirit into Hafu, ejected Hafu into outer space (he did that anyway) and that would be the end of it: Mata Nui would be dead. BS01 states that the Makuta knew about the Ignika's power to obliterate all life in the Matoran Universe and wanted it gone for that reason, but that doesn't answer my question: the Makuta could have easily expelled both the Ignika and a hypothetical other host for the spirit of Mata Nui such as Hafu. That wouldn't solve the problem of having some sentient Kanohi out there with powers over life, but at least it would be controlled by the very immature Toa Ignika. Although the chances of Mata Nui coming back to fight the Makuta might have been small, it's like the Makuta was trying to run a risk here by giving the most powerful object in his universe the mind of the former most powerful being who he had now turned into his mortal enemy. So, why?

Whether I'd like to see a Matoran-style language on Okoto? Definitely! I also think it's very possible we're getting a new alphabet in 2015, since we got one in 2001 as well and it looks like TLG is really trying to bring that 2001 feel back. However, the thing about there being a sequence in there that is repeated and rotated 180 degrees kinda makes me think that this stuff is either not an actual alphabet, or filler in an alphabet we have yet to see. Although it's not unheard of for alphabets to do this (the Greek alphabet was originally in 'Boustrophedon', which means: first line written from left to right, second line written from right to left upside down, third line again from left to right, fourth line right to left upside down etc. etc. as if you're plowing a field) I don't think TLG is going to make an alphabet like that unnecessarily complex. I wonder though why you distinguish between the two vertical stripes and the single vertical stripe? It seems to me the two vertical stripes could easily be two instances of the single stripe.

I really love the new story, IMO it takes a lot of the good stuff from 2001 but still changes the plot enough to get me excited about where this is going. As other have mentioned before, the visual style of the video is a little too cartoonish, but considering MNOLG was also cartoonish I am sure I can learn to like it. I like the idea that the mask makers are actually very powerful and ancient beings, I was imagining the same thing already in 2001 and was actually a little bit disappointed that mask making turned out to be just the stereotypical Ta-Metruan job in 2004. I think this video in no way spoils the mystery of the story. Okay, it visually depicts Makuta and Ahkmou (or whatever his name is), but a cartoonish depiction doesn't necessarily reveal everything about the character, particularly if they can shapeshift. We saw a cartoonish version of Makuta in MNOLG as well, that didn't take the mystery out of him. There are so many unanswered questions about the two brothers: where did they come from? Why do they make masks? How did everybody end up on Okoto? Besides, we haven't even been to Okoto yet, so we don't know what it's like on the ground there. Maybe the resting place of the brothers is a mystery? And what about that ancient city and the Lord of the Skull Spiders? What are they? What do they want? Where did they come from? IMO it's not fair to say the new story is not mysterious or complicated enough based on a two minute video. The original 2001 video about the legend with the stones in Amaja Nui wasn't enough to create a complicated and mysterious story either, that was built over time with MNOLG, the comics, the books, the movies etc.

This is a pretty good article that I found recently that mentions that same thing, and seems overall pretty cohesive to this conversation. (I'm not saying that I agree with everything in the article, but it certainly provides a good helping of food for thought on the subject.) I looked at the picture and read the article. It's a nice ad and the author makes a couple of good points, but one question remains unanswered: was the ad successful? 'Cause it's a nice idea that TLG was marketing to girls in the '80s by simply including them, but unless the ads actually worked, they didn't help anybody: they didn't bring in more money for TLG, but they also didn't increase the number of girls who played with LEGO. In fact, the only purpose the ad seems to serve to me is so that we, years later, could look at it and marvel at the gender equality. So was the ad successful? I highly doubt it. The author doesn't say anything on the subject. TLG is not stupid, they have a marketing team full of professionals who know how this stuff works. Aanchir mentioned the research that went into designing LEGO Friends, that kind of research is expensive and TLG really wouldn't have bothered if it didn't make a difference. If marketing was as simple as saying "What it is is beautiful." they could just fire their entire marketing team. Dunno how this is supposed to be a new thing with LEGO Friends either, to my knowledge there has always been something like LEGO Scala or LEGO Belville or whatever. What TLG is doing is trying to design something for girls, evaluating the results and learning from those results how to proceed with trying to design the next line for girls. The author does mention that TLG's sales increased by 24% in six months, although he manages to present that in a bad light. He acts like this figure only reflects on TLG's corporate greed, but guess what? This 24% represents girls (mostly I guess, there could also be boys in this category though but definitely not as many) who play with LEGO because of LEGO Friends and wouldn't be playing with LEGO if it weren't for LEGO Friends. And I highly doubt they'd be playing with monster trucks. This 24% represents kids who play with the pink sparkly stuff, whether it's because they themselves want to or because that's the stuff their parents buy for them is irrelevant here. A heavily emancipated toy doesn't help anyone if it just stays on the shelf in toy stores, only when the toys actually arrive at the girls for them to play with do they make any real change. So the question is: do you want this demographic to play with Barbie or with LEGO? 'Cause that's where LEGO Friends makes a difference. It's great if you want to challenge society's stereotypes, but you're going to have to have a successful approach if you want to do so and that requires meeting society halfway. That's definitely true, but that doesn't mean TLG can't try. Is TLG going to change the world by getting rid of gender stereotypes in toys? No. That doesn't mean they can't make some change. Yes it's completely nonsensical for parents to blame TLG for the way they market LEGO Friends if those same parents only buy LEGO Friends for their daughters because of the way it is marketed to girls, but that doesn't mean LEGO Friends or the OP's girl-marketed constraction line can't make a change.

Basically the way magnetism works is that a piece of metal consists of billions of little metal atoms. Each of these atoms is a little magnet in itself, but normally all the atoms point in different directions and cancel each other out so the overall piece of metal doesn't seem magnetic. However, when a lot these atoms are rotated so they point in the same direction, they don't cancel each other out anymore but bundle their magnetic power and turn the entire piece of metal into a magnet. IMO that's where the answer lies: Yes a Toa of iron could turn a piece of metal into a magnet, if he has the mental capacity, the patience and the concentration to turn billions of atoms in the right direction. They would probably find an easier solution to the problem at hand.

OK, so Greg says he's been under the weather and that's the reason he hasn't answered a lot of questions yet. I'll see if he answers the question in the coming days but if it gets buried I'll repost it. I was also approaching it from a programmer's angle like Katuko, though I'd like to modify the script a bit to factor in what Fishers said about the Toa Energy needing to disappear somewhere: Function "Turn Into Turaga" Loop Start If destiny is completed Then: If Toa Energy > 0 Then: "yield", i.e. pause this code for a little while then return later. Else Change stature, remove Great Mask usage etc., in short the actual transformation into a Turaga. Exit Loop Else "yield", i.e. pause this code for a little while then return later. Loop End (Return to Loop Start)End of Function So this script describes what happens from the moment you decide you want to become a Turaga. The entire function is only executed when you make this decision, this script will not run before that time. However, once you make that decision you end up in a loop that first checks if you have completed your destiny. If you haven't, you go straight to the second "Else" and you "yield", which means you pause this script for a little while so that you can do other stuff and then come back to the script a little later. Then you end up at "Loop End" and you go back to "Loop Start", i.e. rinse and repeat. If your destiny is completed the code checks if you still have Toa Energy left. If you do, you again yield, hit "Loop End" and rinse and repeat. Essentially you keep sporadically running this loop until both conditions are true: you have completed your destiny and you don't have any Toa Energy left. In that case you hit the "Change stature" etc. and actually turn into a Turaga. Essentially this keeps the three requirements completely separate: you have to have completed your destiny, you have to have no Toa Energy left and you have to choose to give up being a Toa. The three requirements are each independent, it is perfectly possible to fulfill two but not fulfill one. HOWEVER: I would like to add a line of code elsewhere to the effect that a Toa who gives up a part of his Toa Energy voluntarily automatically checks if it is the last part, and if so automatically triggers the above function. So the function for voluntarily spending Toa Energy could look like this: Function "Spend Toa Energy" Decrease Toa Energy by specified amount If Toa Energy == 0 Then Turn Into TuragaEnd of Function This function is also called voluntarily, the first line says to decrease the Toa Energy, and subsequently the code checks if the amount of Toa Energy has hit zero and if so, calls the first function to turn into a Turaga. To be fair, this is not factoring in where the energy comes from that is used to fuel the actual transformation: I have never assumed Toa Energy to actually fuel the transformation into a Turaga, I simply assumed that that energy came from elsewhere (life energy absorbed from food etc.). There have been so many transformations in the storyline without an actual explanation of where the energy for these transformations came from that I don't find it difficult to assume the energy just comes from "somewhere". I also find it hard to believe that the miniscule amount of energy that should be left would be enough to fuel the entire transformation. The reason I am a little hesitant to accept Fishers' theory is because Greg said: This quote does not 100% prove that all of a Toa's Toa Energy can be drained due to the vague wording of 'what you are suggesting to happen', but it comes really close and Greg's wording "for all his Toa power to be drained" suggests to me that, in his mind, it is really possible to drain Toa Energy to 0. I also think that, if any remaining Toa Energy would have to be used to fuel the transformation into a Turaga, this quote would have given Greg the opportunity to say that since the asker asked if it is possible to drain so much energy that a Toa will turn into a Turaga: Greg could have answered there that draining a Toa of his energy will never turn him into a Turaga since he needs to use that energy himself in the transformation, but instead he simply made the point that it was not voluntary. OK, so as it turns out Greg leans towards the option that none of us was expecting: I personally would lean toward #1, however -- you could also have a case where the Toa is locked up and CHOOSES to remain so for some reason (maybe to protect others), and so could become a Turaga because he chose to remain in a situation where his energies were drained. Apparently it really is possible to prevent a Toa from ever turning into a Turaga by draining all his/her Toa Energy. IMO the last part basically boils down to the idea that a Toa could turn into a Turaga by use of the Nui Stone, if he/she voluntarily let his/her Toa Energy be drained. Edit: Double post merged. -Wind-

That might be true, but as Lyichir pointed out you shouldn't simply take the girls themselves into the equation. A lot of parents also buy "girly" stuff for their daughters, most of the time without even thinking about how that relates to stereotypes. Picture a random parent in 2008 walking into a toy store to buy a gift for their daughter. Would they buy Gorast or Gali or would they directly go to the pink section of the store? Mind you, the packaging never said those characters were female.

So? They were wrong about having defeated the Makuta in 2008 as well. It didn't stop them from awakening Mata Nui and playing right into his hands. We already knew he was behind the Piraka during the Ignition story and it was pretty clear the Makuta wasn't really opposing the Mata or the Mahri when he just left Jaller and Hahli alone at the end of 2007. And as you mentioned he even helped Matoro at that time. We all knew there was some mysterious master plan the Makuta had at the time (the Mutran Chronicles actually said that explicitedly), we were just waiting for the plan to be revealed at the very end and for the Toa Mata to foil it at the last moment. Oh right, is that what RahkshiToa was referring to? Either way, that's true. He could use those.

I think the pros and cons mentioned by everybody in this thread are almost equally important. Yes it's a good idea to draw girls to a type of toys that is stereotypically meant for boys, but on the other hand creating a line that is specifically meant to be the girl version of BIONICLE actually reaffirms the split between toys for boys and toys for girls. So if it's yes-no question I find it hard to pick a side. However, I think the OP is on to something and I think with a little modification his idea could take the best of both worlds. The OP already mentions how parts from the girly line and BIONICLE parts could be mixed while MOCing and girls and boys might that way cross over between "each others'" lines. How about taking it a step further to the actual story level? What I'm thinking is: make a BIONICLE kind of story with the necessary modifications to be able to market it as a girls' toy. Actually set the story within the same universe as BIONICLE, but keep that secret initially. Now, Greg said BIONICLE was always supposed to have story you had to "work" to understand. Essentially BIONICLE had a superficial yearlong story linked to an intricate backstory that kept existing. The story of the girl line could then remain "girly" and disconnected from BIONICLE on the superficial level, but at the more intricate level where the hardcore fans are concerned, crossovers could occur (in serials, books etc.). This has the advantage of drawing in girls since the line is actually marketed for them, while at the same time destroying the boy/girl separation for the girls and boys who are already fans. Now I get that people might shudder at the idea of something like Barbie becoming a part of the BIONICLE canon, but that's not what I'm advocating. Mixing BIONICLE and Barbie is a bad idea, but mixing BIONICLE and LEGO Castle is just as bad an idea. The "girly" version of BIONICLE should still be compatible with BIONICLE itself, but there's no reason it can't be. I don't think any BIONICLE fan thinks the color pink doesn't exist in the BIONICLE universe or that nothing sparkles there, and while I understand that that is a gross simplification of what it means to market toys to girls I think the point is still valid. I don't think anyone is honestly opposed to a change in the BIONICLE universe aimed at girls, as long as the change doesn't seriously ruin the line. For example, the point about the skewed gender ratio has been brought up a lot and not everybody thinks the same way about it: some think BIONICLE should move towards a 50/50 ratio to defeat gender stereotypes, other people don't think it's a big issue and think BIONICLE is fine the way it is. But as far as I know nobody was ever actually for a skewed gender ratio. Nobody ever said that they preferred 5/6 of every Toa team to be male. The only arguments in favor of the skewed gender ratio that have ever been presented here, are based on BIONICLE being marketed towards boys and what I'm proposing doesn't change that.

Am I the only one who thought about Energized Protodermis when he saw this? You know, leaking from the core through the cracks at the start, collected in a vial by the Great Beings... Here's a crazy idea: what if 2015 is supposed to be a continuation set in the time when the Great Beings had just built the Mata Nui robot? We know Artakha and Karzahni fought for the Mask of Creation in those days, which would explain its significance in the 2015 story, and we know there were Toa, who could easily be fighting a rising evil on the island of Okoto. It even makes sense that Greg wouldn't continue writing the serials if the story is set looong before the time period in which the serials take place. Edit: And to top the crazy idea off: we know Artakha named his island after himself, right? Who says it didn't have a name before he did so? Okoto perhaps...?

For me the reason I like the idea that the entire MU is made out of Protodermis ("the stuff of life") is because it's a HUGE clue regarding the true nature of Mata Nui and the MU. Protodermis is like cells: your entire body is made of them, but the only stuff outside your body (or that of others) that is made of them is stuff that used to belong to another living body. If everything in the MU is made of "the stuff of life", what does that say about the MU? [insert dr. Frankenstein screaming "It's alive!" here]

While that's true, it would have to be a different time period since Krakua was supposed to be the lone guardian of the island, while the line Irafa found says multiple elemental heroes battle a rising evil. In my mind that falls under option #3, really. Greg said his bosses in Billund want his "focus on current lines" so unless the bosses are incorporating serial plot points in the new line, I doubt they will care enough to make Greg finish the serials. In any case, the main story would be ignoring them, hence option three. With a little imagination that fourth option can be grouped under the third option, yes. But I don't think the fourth option is an option at all, since Greg has stated he wasn't asked to continue writing the serials and as Fishers stated above, he is not allowed to do it without permission from the story team. So yeah, there's a small possibility the story team turns around, but it's very unlikely IMO. Not quite komodo dragon unlikely, but still very unlikely. It really depends on if the serial plots really have a bearing on the new story. If it's a reboot, they don't. Some types of continuations don't either. Still, you may have a point... I never interpreted Greg's quote as saying that TLG would say something at NYCC that would, in itself, rule out any possibility of Greg continuing to do the serials. I interpreted his quote as saying NYCC will make it clear why they didn't ask him to do it, and all of the other things he said before should make it clear that if the story team doesn't ask him to do it, it's not going to happen. To be fair, people were saying it should have "Nui" in it to give it that 2001 feel, and none of the islands you mentioned were introduced in 2001 (only Mata Nui was). Still I think the idea that the island should have "Nui" in its name is motivated by a lot of nostalgia bias, and nostalgia bias is only going to lead to disappointment.

Alright, the question has been posted As far as I know what Fishers said is correct. Remember, in you example none of the victimized Toa ever chose to give up their Toa Energy and Greg stressed that that was necessary. Toa OP himself would turn into a Turaga though, since he chose to give up his Toa Energy. We're going to have to wait for Greg to answer that one Basically Fishers thinks a Toa whose Toa Energy has been siphoned still has a last bit of Toa Energy left (because the Nui Stone can't siphon 100%, just 99.9999999%) and he/she could sacrifice that last bit to become a Turaga, while my theory is that he/she would just will it as you suggested. There's a small possibility neither of these theories is true and the Toa would actually be locked in Toa form forever, but I find it unlikely that Greg would go for that.

Sacrificing nothing means sacrificing nothing... it's simple logic; if you sacrifice zero Toa Energy, you didn't sacrifice any TE. Right? If I give you zero apples, I gave you no apples. Basic math yo yo. And yes, that's a mathematical proof, but in this case likeisay you don't even need that as we can just ask Greg. That's not the same. Any amount you ate IS more than nothing. But nothing remains nothing. No, that's not really how it works. (And we don't necessarily know there are no martians, though I don't think there are, but we're getting waaay off topic now.) It's true that we don't know that all martians are NOT green. Anyways, can we stick to actual Bionicle and real logic/math here pleazerzorz? I disagree but I'll PM you about that since you're right about staying on topic. I'd say it's more like a symbolic sacrifice of Toa Energy (although as you mention there's also the Great Mask usage to consider), but that's also the case in Fishers' theory since a miniscule amount of Toa Energy doesn't do anyone any good. But anyways, I added my idea for a question to Greg in the above post like three seconds before you posted

The answers don't contradict it as far as I can tell, since Greg said a Toa has to complete their destiny and choose to give up their Toa power. However the question whether sacrificing zero Toa Energy counts as sacrificing Toa Energy is important. It's essentially the question "Is a zero amount still an amount?" and people simply disagree about the answer, there's no way to prove either side wrong. The other day I was talking to someone about the sentence "I ate more than you did, because you didn't eat anything at all.". Is that correct? You could say it's technically correct, but people would avoid wording it that way. The other guy said it was basically a "bad joke". Same as "All martians are green.". That's true 'cause there are no martians, har har har. I don't think Greg ever meant to say something on this subject that was technically correct, but still a misleading way to word it. So that's a big pro for your theory. My line of thinking was simply: a Toa basically decides they are ready at some point in their life to let go of their Toa Energy, and this decision turns them into a Turaga. A Toa can apparently be robbed of their Toa Energy before they are ready using the Nui Stone, but maybe the Toa could later come to a point in their life where they'd think to themselves "I feel like my duties as a Toa are finished, I have developed mentally into someone wise enough to be a Turaga, so even if my Toa Energy had not been robbed by the Nui Stone I would still let it go now.", and that change of mental state might turn them into a Turaga. I see, that does indeed work for Toa who are drained of their Toa Energy before their destiny is complete. But what if Jaller for example would be captured and imprisoned right now and drained of all his Toa Energy? He has already completed his destiny, would he unwillingly turn into a Turaga? I'd say no, since Greg explicitly said Toa have to CHOOSE to give up their Toa Energy. But I also don't like the idea that Jaller could subsequently never turn into a Turaga. Yes, the "everything that happens is destined"-explanation could also be used, but I'm just as hesitant about that as I think you are. It basically turns "Toa become Turaga when their destiny is fulfilled." into "Toa become Turaga whenever, 'cause it's destined anyway." Maybe that's best, yeah. I'll write something up and anyone who wants can comment. (We could call it teamwork? ) Edit: How does everybody feel about this:

I agree mostly, but I find it highly unlikely they'd go for option #1 or #2 since it's messy (option #1 is going to be very, very difficult to do without either contradicting other parts of the story or confusing new fans and both option #1 and option #2 leave new fans with a lot of back story to catch up to, also confusing them) and option #3 is what I understood the term 'soft reboot' to mean, but I'm getting the idea not everyone agrees on what exactly a 'soft reboot' and a 'hard reboot' is. In any case, I don't think anything can be definitively ruled out, but based on Greg's statement and the sentence Irafa found about Okoto, a reboot seems more likely to me than a continuation.

I see, that's a possibility indeed. In my idea the left and middle categories would be merged into one category of Toa Energy, that can be completely emptied by either the Nui Stone or the decision to turn into a Turaga, although it obviously wouldn't be emptied a second time if it had already been emptied before. I re-read it twenty times but it still says the same thing to me... Though I agree that we don't have to waste a page on the way that sentence was worded if Fishers already drew a picture of what she meant. Edit: Pronoun fixed

No, didn't say that... You said: How can you remain a Toa after the transformation into a Turaga has been triggered? Yes, but you said completing your destiny would turn you into a Turaga. That contradicts the fact that the Toa Mata and Toa Inika are still Toa even after their destinies were completed. Basically, what I was talking about was: if a Toa who has already completed his/her destiny is put inside a prison, then drained off all his/her Toa Energy using the Nui Stone, he/she would not turn into a Turaga yet since he/she hasn't given up his/her Toa Energy voluntarily. Only if he/she later voluntarily gives up the remaining Toa Energy he/she has (which is zero, because he/she was already completely drained), he/she would turn into a Turaga.

That's not at all what he seems to be implying to me. He says "They didn't ask me to do it.", not "They don't want me to do it.". Essentially he's saying it's not a part of his job anymore. And even if he would expect the story team to reject his permission, that could also be because the story team wouldn't want any official storyline in the universe of 2001-2010 BIONICLE to continue while they're starting a new universe of BIONICLE canon. That's perfectly reasonable given the fact that they wouldn't want to confuse any new fans. You pointed out earlier that they could let him do it on BS01 or BZP, but you're forgetting that Greg, as an employee at TLG, is not allowed to contact BIONICLE fans outside the official channels since they might be minors. TLG would have to set up some kind of place for the serials to be posted, which is a hassle and it's really unlikely they'd do that for such a small niche of BIONICLE fandom.

Hmm, that's another possibility. I guess the sentence is ambiguous. You mean it's not possible to remain a Toa after completing one's destiny? Because it is, that's what the Toa Mata and the Toa Inika did.

Yes, if they have completed their destiny and they make the willing sacrifice of the last bit. That's what I understand the answers I posted above say - they don't mention the destiny completion requirement, but there's a bunch of Greg answers and official stuff that says that. Hmm, I'm not sure about the "make the willing sacrifice of the last bit" part, because if that's a requirement it is technically possible to "lock" a Toa, in the sense that he/she will forever be a Toa and can never become a Turaga, by taking all their Toa Energy without their consent. I think it's more likely Toa have to willingly choose to sacrifice everything that's left of their Toa Energy (which can be equal to zero) to become a Turaga. Under normal circumstances this would mean using all their energy for stuff like creating Toa Stones or awakening the Metruans as in Legends of Metru Nui, but if the Toa has been drained of all his/her Toa Energy, he/she will simply become a Turaga without being able to create Toa stones, awaken Matoran etc. because he/she is sacrificing zero amount of Toa Energy.

That's true, but how would that have helped him here? His goal was not to defeat the Toa Mata, but to delay them. The Makuta would only be able to use this power during the final battle in Mangaia. During the final battle, he could have used his power over magnetism to either defeat the Toa Mata (which he didn't want to do) or keep the battle going on for weeks, and I don't think he'd want to do that either since the Toa Mata could get fatigued and he would have no good excuse not to kill them at that point. What the Makuta would need was not to have useful powers against Toa of iron/magnetism himself, but he would need minions with such powers, since minions are expendable. If he had minions that were more powerful, but still weaker than the Toa Mata, the minions would end up delaying the Toa Mata for a longer period of time.