Ballom Nom Nom

Missed an artbook by a single vote! Ah well. Congrats to all the winners! Entering this one was lots of fun.

Medium please!

Flickr The liquid men of the deep are not to be trifled with — their weapons can douse a target at 100 paces, which causes the air-breathers of the land a great inconvenience. They also reek terribly of fish. Entry for the Bio-Cup 2018 prelims theme of elements — for which this MOC represents water, naturally.

Well, in terms of opinion on the movie as a whole, I still really liked it (although the casino subplot was pretty weak and superfluous overall) -- definitely one of my top three favorite Star Wars movies. To each their own, though.

"Her arc culminates in stopping Finn’s suicide run, saying to save what they love instead of fighting what they hate." Except, since no one knew Luke was going to save the day, from the characters' perspective all she did was ruin their one remaining hope (i.e. Finn's kamikaze attack on the ram allowing the Resistance in hiding to survive by giving them more time). I like Kelly Marie Tran and Rose's character, but that final scene with her was dreadful. Obviously this has nothing to do with people being horrid to Tran on the Internet. But that scene in TLJ really bugged me, and I think it should have just been cut entirely.

Definitely #4. And as an aside, I can't make out any details on 1 at all, which surely won't do it any favors in voting...

If by any chance these are still valid I'd be interested in those for both Moon versions -- even several if there haven't been many takers.

Flickr The gentle giant of the ocean depths, survivor of a species mankind has almost forgotten — and the old fisherman continuing his search for the ancient myth of the Leviathan King. Paired entry for the contest, of course, with Sparkytron. Just barely getting this entry in on time!

My MOC is held up on a small Bionicle stand. Is it okay to have that photoshopped out of the entry image if elsewhere in the gallery the stand is visible?

Yeah, that's all a bit of a stretch, especially the "money creates villainy in Star Wars", when the main villains (the Sith) don't have interest in money as a motivation, and the capitalistic groups like the Trade Federation were explictly manipulated by the Sith...

Yes, I’d definitely second the interest in a matchmaking topic. That would be a great help!

Sounds fun! ... And I suppose we aren't having a third winner-only contest because there would only be two entries?

I'd also be somewhat curious what masks are still for sale.

So I've been notably absent on BZP for a long while now, in large part is because of the site slowly plunging further into a death spiral of inactivity. Which I somewhat regret, as I more or less grew up on here. But, leaving reflections on BZP's importance for another time, my main point now is to direct everyone to where my recent MOCs can be found, as they certainly aren't in BBC anymore. All MOCs of mine going forward can be found on either my Instagram (@ballomnomnom), or my Flickr (Ballom Nom Nom). https://www.instagram.com/ballomnomnom/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/ballomnomnom/ Cheers!

What skillful BBCode usage here! Truly the work of a forum master! As for the MOC, I definitely like the look. The Exo-Force armor, Roborider head, and cheese grater all fit together great. His feet look far too dainty and small, though. And the hand connection is a bit painful.

Yes, things are terminal, I'm afraid.

Came here expecting Space Pimp to be number one. Glad to see things are as they should be.

Oh yeah, I got to see this when I went to the museum a few weeks ago. It was pretty cool! Lots of sand green indeed.

#3 seems far too busy. I much prefer the simplicity of #1.

I loved it, and thought it was way better than Episode 7 (and it's not like I didn't like that movie). Different tastes, I guess.

The turret can shoot, from the six-shooter by rotating the Glatorian gear, as I mentioned in its description. Ballom's necklace thingy isn't really intended to cover exposed bits as much as fill in the area around his neck. Like with Velzubn, I'm not quite seeing which part you think is exposed. Red eyes on the dwarf come from having limited parts on hand, since it wasn't built with my own stuff. I wish I had a better, more calm-looking color that could have been used instead!

Thanks for the comment. I actually didn't consider the legs to be all that bulky, given some other MOCs I've made and that I went through some larger leg designs before sticking what what we've got here. As for the neck armor, I'm not entirely sure which part you mean. The hands at the ends of the Bohrok limbs are the parts closest to the front, but I wouldn't really call them exposed. Speaking of that segment, the idea was that those parts coming over his shoulders could be like straps or something as part of the attachment of the part of his suit with the wings.

Flickr A member of a fly-like insectoid race, Velzubn became a trailblazer as the first non-human member of the Galaxy Federation's xenophobic Space Police. Protected by his powered armor, Velzubn's wings give him superior maneuverability, and despite his need for a breath mask, his incredible sense of smell has assisted the capture of many a criminal. I had been wanting to make a full body for this head for a while, so here he finally is! There wasn't much medium blue to work with, but I think there was enough to get the job done. I imagine this guy fitting into the same universe as the most recent Space Police set line, where in a galaxy full of varied aliens, at least some of them should get to be heroes instead of convicts. Maybe one day Velzubn will even topple the mighty space pimp!

So I've somewhat dropped off the radar on BZP recently, but I have actually been MOCing a fair bit (an exceptional amount for me, compared to regular rates, really), and I thought I'd finally post those things here. All but the one I really spent time on will be simply lumped together in this one topic so as to not spam the forum. Oh, and come to think of it, a few of these are from a backlog of older stuff, so I've not been quite as prolific as this may make me look. Matoran Gatling Turret Flickr A gatling turret designed by intrepid Matoran designer Wula of Terra Nui for defense of Matoran villages through the use of continuous firepower. Contains gears inside which allow the six-shooter to be fired by rotating the Glatorian gear underneath. When firing, the six-shooter itself rotates, so the shots all come from the bottom chamber. The countdown on the Glatorian gear's teeth even decrements with each shot fired. Tactically Gracile Drone Flickr A TerpLUG MOC. Presumably a relative to the Tactically Corpulent Drone. Toa Ballom Flickr Following his disastrous defeat on the isle of Punt Nui at the hands of Toa Chompshi, who destroyed his leg, Ballom barely escaped with his life. He eventually made his way to the land of Shakaz, where he found a curious Mask of Undeath... A minor update to an old MOC for story purposes. (And man, looking at the old version, my photos sure have improved since then!) Grðrûrím the Stout Flickr Some sort of generic fantasy dwarf fellow. Made in collaboration with Grayson at TerpLUG using the LUG's limited parts. Arch Bridge Flickr Made for Disty's architecture contest. A quick little entry and nothing fancy, but I wanted to make an entry of some kind and those treads jumped out at me as perfect for a bridge. Purple tiles because I have little System and purple is a great color anyway. There's a fair bit of System with the studs, cheese, and tiles, but with all the pins inside holding it together I think the System's less than a quarter of the parts. Armored Dragon Head Redesign of the Barbed Drone to be an actual dragon head. A dragon wearing gold armor, in part because I had about exhausted the decent dark tan available. Probably a WIP for the overall dragon. Once again made at TerpLUG.

Chapter Sixteen Piles of Rahkshi armor, some marginally intact, others shattered husks, had begun to accumulate on the dark dunes outside the oasis, as testament to the abilities of Rhakjasp’s fighting force. In the time since the battle had begun, the two scores of Rahkshi had slowly shrunk to roughly one score, with only one of the band of the seven opposing Sharaku falling in battle — Wehtrab, a battle-hardened Lauxak who had acted as Rhakjasp’s advisor during past raids. When he saw his friend collapse for the last time, the Lauxak chieftain had sworn to take his revenge upon the remaining Rahkshi opposing the Sharaku, but the recent trend in the battle had complicated this promise. Indeed, after the destruction of the first wave of Rahkshi, the fall of the last Rahkshi of Silence, and the eruption of the noises of battle, the creatures had learned caution. They had soon adopted more closely-knit defensive formations, falling into pairs and trios where one could launch volleys of energy while guarded by the staff of another. In return, the Sharaku held their distance, harrying their foes with their own innate powers or speedy weapon strikes. It was an apparent standoff. Rhakjasp knew that both sides were hoping to stall enough to receive aid from their fellows warring below in the fortress. The question, he thought as he dodged a burst of plasma from a bluish Rahkshi, if we can last the fight, and which side will get reinforcements. Making an elaborate swing with his improvised staff in one hand, he feinted to the side and flung one of his few remaining knifes at the defending Rahkshi, whose colors marked it as controlling chain lightning. The blade stuck in its spiny backplate, to no apparent effect. Rahkskasp growled in annoyance. This exchange summed up the fragility of the Sharaku’s defense: it was not apparent which uses of precious ammunition or elemental energy actually harmed their targets. Makuta’s forces could have powers of confusion, shape shifting, and healing which would mask or, worse, reverse damage inflicted. The two vermin before the chieftain displayed many scratches and tears in their armor, but others appeared suspiciously unmarred, particularly those in the middle of the battle. These three, who drifted casually like wraiths, sporadically glittered with the shine of new protosteel in the moonlight. Rhakjasp had slowly watched their movements out of the corner of his eye over the course of the battle, and he knew that they held the key to achieving victory. Why would these Rahkshi purposefully shun combat to shadow their brethren? Their abilities must turn the tide in a subtle way their physical prowess cannot, the Sharaku chieftain reasoned. And the power of healing would be quite the trump card — and the most plausible explanation for their being unscathed. Quickly ducking behind the cover of a nearby dead Rahkshi, he dropped his staff, took a moment to compose himself, and muttered a prayer for success before leaping up to charge at blinding speed. The Rahkshi of Plasma was swift to react, flinging plasma bolts as Rhakjasp rose. He blocked them with a sweep of a gauntleted arm, continuing the motion to smack the Rahkshi aside heavily. Before the second Rahkshi could counter, he brought down his other arm like a hammer, smashing the embedded knife blade through the creature’s back armor. A horrific screech told him that he had lanced the Kraata inside, and the Rahkshi collapsed as the leech convulsed within it. Keeping the disabled creature in his peripheral vision, Rhakjasp glanced at his vambrace, finding it rendered a corroded wreck by the plasma. He unsheathed his long claws as a substitute, and darted toward the blue Rahkshi, which backed away warily. As it did, out of the corner of his eye he caught a pale form gliding toward the dying Rahkshi. Ignoring the Rahkshi of Plasma completely, Rhakjasp pivoted to hurl himself in the direction of the arriving being, claws outstretched. The Rahkshi had stooped near the injured one, and energy had begun to swirl in its hand as Rhakjasp’s tackle battered it aside. Tumbling through the sand, Rhakjasp recovered first, pressing the Rahkshi’s torso to the ground with one hand as he slashed across its faceplate. The blow left deep gouges, but the metal rippled and reformed almost instantly, as the Rahkshi’s slits of eyes glared at him. A Rahkshi of Healing indeed. Grinning, Rhakjasp raised his intact gauntlet for a killing blow to its head. Just before he could strike, an explosion of pain wracked his arm as a ball of plasma engulfed it. His vision dazzled by flashes of white from the incandescence, Rhakjasp heard a cry that he distantly realized was his own scream of agony. He reeled as the Rahkshi pinned under him surged to its feet. By some primal instinct his other hand closed tightly into a fist, clenching a protrusion of the Rahkshi’s chest armor. With this death grip, he was swept to his feet as it rose and swung its staff. Rhakjasp tried to bring up his other arm to block it, and was dimly aware of a cauterized stump swinging by uselessly instead. Unimpeded, the staff’s blade sliced Rhakjasp’s bicep. It drew back for another blow. He watched as the barbed staff tensed in the Rahkshi’s hand, and when it sprung forward curled his arm with all of his strength. His opponent did not budge, and Rhakjasp managed to pull himself higher, up to his full height. The stab meant to sever his arm tore into his pauldron, through the flesh of his shoulder and bone, then stopped. With a moment left, grateful for the chance to look his killer in the eye, Rhakjasp stared at the yellow monster, and spat in defiance. Roaring, it clawed at his torn shoulder, raking the puncture as it fished out the spear. For a split second the talons sliced deeper, and then a vortex of power emanated from the clawed hand into his shoulder, knitting the flesh and armor closed around the staff. The Rahkshi recoiled as if burned, but the strands of energy continued to repair Rhakjasp’s shoulder. The healing energy can be captured, he realized in awe. Instinctively, Rhakjasp swung his other arm, pummeling the Rahkshi in the face with the stump of his forearm. It barely flinched, but as his limb recoiled from the armored head energy leapt to it and swirled around where his hand had been. He struck again. More energy arced, pooling into a faint shape. He felt plasma splash over his back in a sizzling wave. At any other moment the pain would have been crippling, but it was deadened as his mind resonated with a single thought: Contact with the Rahkshi of Healing meant life. ------ The shadows enveloped Hanak, the world around him seemingly winking out of existence like the extinguishing of a light. There was only darkness cocooning him in its inky shroud, its tendrils sucking warmth from his body as the Sharaku of Fire felt himself propelled forward. Cut off from the sensations of the world, it seemed as though the journey were taking an interminable time, as all the while he was clutched by the shadows. Hanak soon felt the spreading burn in his chest from lack of air, and realized it could not have been so long a time, as he had not drawn a breath since entering the gloom. He just found himself wondering how much longer he could last without another breath when the frigid presence around him receded, and he once more felt air moving. The Sharaku of Fire gasped for breath, while his vision returned to him and his surroundings hazily coalesced into view. Gone were the dank stones and vegetation of the preceding tunnels; before Hanak was a wide room lined with intricate technology. His gaze slowly worked its way down the room as more became visible to his recovering eyesight. Pale blue screens and armored panels dotted the walls to his left and right, while between them were numerous protodermis tubes of fluid, many of which contained the mummified remains of age-old Kraata. The extensive floor was a level, unbroken panel of protosteel, sweeping all the way to the far wall of the room, where a shadowy figure hunched over a solitary large control panel, only a few gold, clawed digits visible working beyond the expanses of its cloak. Finally responding to Hanak’s presence, it folded its arms behind its back, and leisurely turned to face him. In an instant Hanak felt the color drain from his face, his eyes widen in terror, and his body reflexively take a half step back. For a second, he was once again a scared, diminutive Torika, facing a specter he had seen many times in his nightmares. Before him, impossibly, was the Makuta of Shakaz: the fiend known as the Dark Lord, still clad in his rusted gold armor and worn ebony Kanohi, through which his eyes glowed a baleful crimson. Then the instant of frozen terror passed, and Hanak remembered his memories of the throne room of the Sharaku stronghold on Terra Nui, where he had watched the eight Toa Terra reduce the Dark Lord to ashes in an elemental whirlwind. He recalled his days of protecting the inhabitants of Terra Nui, both as a Torika and as new Sharaku. He was no longer the weak Torika of his past, and whatever this apparition was, he no longer had any fear of it. Fury filling him, Hanak curled a hand into a fist, and found his glowing firesword already readied. “You died on Terra Nui!” he screamed, flinging arrows of flame from his firesword toward the dark phantom. The figure barely raised a withered hand, summoning a tiny black void to absorb the flames. “Really, Hanak,” it murmured, “Is that the way you should treat your master once you meet him again? You should know that death means nothing to Makuta such as I.” Hanak clenched his teeth. “You were never my master.” “Such a temper,” the phantom chuckled, beginning to slowly creep forward, curiously making a clicking noise periodically with alternating footfalls. Its voice rose slowly, and a pale pink hue came to its eyes. “I was not your master; I was — am — everyone’s!” it shrieked manically. As Hanak tensed, preparing to fight the evidently unhinged specter, the room behind him rumbled with an explosion, and he used a burst of speed to dash away from the detonation. The apparition did not move, merely cocking its head out of curiosity, observing a section of the wall next to the shadow barrier collapse. Protodermis, protosteel, stonework, and clouds of dust tumbled out of the hole — and then Chazok, emerging from a combat roll with his Kemet Nui blaster on one hand and a miniature rocket launcher in the other, his chain gun pivoting above his shoulder to track movement. “Ah, Chazok.” The spectral Dark Lord barely registered any surprise, despite the explosive entrance the bounty hunter made. “I wondered if you would arrive. Have you come to kill me after all these years? I’m afraid you’ve lost your chance — I’m dead, or so I’ve heard.” Chazok ignored its speech, examining its cloaked shape carefully though his modified helmet, whose scoping eyepiece and spiked forehead Hanak recognized as being modified parts of the Kanohi Akaku and Rode. “You are not a Makuta,” he declared, raising both handheld weapons, leveling the Kemet Nui blaster directly at the shadow’s Kanohi. Shots crackled from the gun in rapid succession, but were absorbed by pockets of dark energy right before the mask’s warped surface. Undaunted, Chazok advanced on the figure as he unloaded the rest of the clip, whirling into a powerful kick to its left leg when he came within reach. The being caught the kick with a clang, using the momentum to cartwheel away as a single fluid mass of darkness. As it did, the bounty hunter turned his rocket launcher toward the near bank of protodermis tanks, expending his last four rockets to reduce them to smoking husks. Discarding the useless weapon in a corner, he reloaded the Kemet Nui blaster with lightning speed only to hear — laughter? Yes, it was laughter: raspy, cackling laughter as cold as the knifelike wind over the dunes, resonating from their foe even as the shape of its body melted away in wisps of smoke to reveal a different being. Wearing black and purple, his frame was armored in silvery-black, from his necklace of metallic trinkets to his clawed boot — only one, for his left leg ended at the knee, a tangled mess of wire connecting the stump to an articulated pegleg. And, upon his face, this Toa wore a terrifying Kanohi, a frightful visage with countless horns, which appeared squeezed together out of a tangle of snakes and worms, out of which his pink eyes blazed. “No, Chazok, a Makuta I am not,” he said. “You wish to know who I am?” “A walking corpse,” came the flat reply, as Chazok squeezed off another shot. This bullet did not vanish, but hovered in front of the Toa in the grip of a stasis field, then fell harmlessly. The Toa smirked and turned to Hanak. “I see the recognition in your eyes. The name, it rises to the top of your mind, does it not?” “Ballom,” Hanak supplied quietly, naming of the Toa of Shadow the Toa Terra had encountered on the island Punt Nui, who Chompshi and Vrael had defeated, with the Toa of Electricity destroying his leg. “And this?” Ballom inquired, tapping the grotesque Kanohi. With a start, Hanak recognized the object, and what it meant. “The Dark Lord’s Mask of Undeath,” he answered, cursing inwardly. “The Mask of Undeath!” The Toa exulted, his body faintly glowing gold with a temporary shield of energy. “The greatest treasure of this brilliant place. When I placed it upon my face, I felt the shadow of the Dark Lord’s soul. Malice, insanity, anger at his body’s death mio away — and the strength of a lord, the will to command Rahkshi, and the vision to seize the universe! When Chompshi set into motion my arrival here, he took my leg but gave me an entire land. With the pulse of the Dark Lord’s powers from this Kanohi through my body, I have the strength of both Makuta and Toa.” The golden glow dissipated as Ballom stretched out his empty hands, in which shadows twisted to form into broadswords. “I have seen my death long ago, and it is not in this room,” he boasted. “But when will you two meet yours?” “Not today,” Hanak vowed, extending his other firesword. This one, as a result of its encounter with the seal of darkness, was coated with a dark film which seemed to have disabled its latent element, but he readily raised it nonetheless. Near him, Chazok had holstered his blaster, removing a cylindrical object. With a flick of his hand, it expanded outward into a staff, one end of which ignited into twin blades of sizzling energy. “How quaint,” Ballom sneered, as he spun a blade in a glittering arc and lunged. Review