How many elements should we have represented in our core Toa Team? (This doesn’t mean that other elements do not exist in the world, but this is to gage opinions on the number of main characters/elements)
Four
Five
Six
0voters
Out of these elements, which one would you rather see represented?
Air
Jungle
0voters
Out of these elements, which one would you rather see represented?
Earth
Stone
Sand
0voters
Out of these elements, which one would you rather see represented at some point, down the line? (Choose up to three)
Sonics
Gravity
Plasma
Magnetism
Lightning
Iron
Psionics
Other
0voters
Should Light and Shadow be represented in our main characters?
Yes
No
0voters
And finally, if you had to choose four to six elements, which ones would you want to see represented? (Choose any number from four to six)
The issue I have with Magnetism and Gravity is that they’re really just different types of telekinesis, effectively.
Plasma is just… more powerful fire.
Psionics isn’t an element, it’s a bunch of random powers, but if it was limited to just mental powers (telepathy, mind reading, mental attacks, etc), it would work.
Sound… it’s not really an “element”, but I guess it could be a secondary one.
I also propose the idea of “alchemy” – changing one element into another – as one of the secondary elements.
Six characters in a team may seems much from today perspective; especially for their “screen time”. But they can start small (about 4) then add more variety of characters overtime just like Ninjago or Hero Factory for a better introduction on each one.
I think iron should be represented alongside stone and sand under earth. Also, toa of ice should be able to control ice, but primarily manipulate cold. Toa of water should still be able to control ice as they would water.
Why is there any question as to how many elements are represented? Wasn’t the protagonist roster going to be the OG Toa Mata by default?
Regarding the representation of Light and Shadow, Shadow should be depicted as a sort of “void” element; it should literally be nothing because then the line “You cannot defeat me, for I am nothing” makes a little more sense.
Also, just a thought, but what if Takanuva was a mentor figure to the Toa? It’d be a different way to work him into the story.
To this, I propose lumping in Sonics with whatever materials the sound would travel through. Sound is just waves; a Toa should, therefore, be able to manipulate their element to make it produce sound.
I honestly wish fire was no longer an element (or at least not a primary one), not only because fire characters hog the spoltlight, but because fire technically isn’t a “natural” element, in which you can easily see it in nature. It’s a violent chemical reaction, whereas all other elements are rather stable and grounded in their forms (water, earth, jungle, etc), fitting for peacekeeping heroes. One wrong move from a Toa of Fire, and an entire forest would be wiped out
But I highly doubt fire would be omitted because red products catch kid’s’ attention…perhaps they should just be reserved for villains who presumably don’t sell as well?
The term “Fire” could just refer to the actual flame and not the combustion-ey part. This would also enable us to simplify things by lumping in Plasma, as it would make sense to lump in the super-hot fluid with other super-hot fluid.
Magnetism is the introduction of a field effect, whereas Gravity is the irregular warping of space-time, which happens to most closely match a field effect as opposed to a point effect.
So… Plasma then? (BTW, this change makes a lot of sense. It’s just that we already have that element…)
Ice is the second element I would remove (after stone) because of this - there is no such thing as ‘cold.’ If a toa can manipulate cold, then they are manipulating the heat, and just removing it. For example, Tahu can freeze areas by removing heat, and inversely Kopaka should be able to warm areas up by ‘removing’ cold (adding heat.
I think sound is a really cool concept, but yes, this is true. I mean, a toa of sound may as well be a very skilled toa of fire, (or heat), as sound is simply moving particles in waves - therfore a more skilled toa of fire. Perhaps it could be introduced as a different style of fire? As in,Tahu learnt to manipulate heat in a powerful and physical manner, whereas the toa of Sonics learnt to manipulate heat in a manner whereby they exert a fine control, as opposed to being uber-powerful.
Note that I said “effectively”. I’m actually quite interested in the four fundamental forces, and I am well aware of their differences, but ultimately, what does a Toa of Gravity mainly do with that power? He moves things. Same thing with Magnetism.
Surely a toa of magnetism effects metal in specific ways, whereas a toa of gravity affects the behavior of mass?
Sure, they will often appear similar, but there would be subtle differences (by design, the toa of gravity would need to be alot weaker for power scaling to be remotely decent).
Well, at least in G1, Magnetism doesn’t jut affect metals – Gahlok-Kal magnetized Lewa’s feet to the ground at one point, presumably dirt and rock.
Anyway, I still argue that they’re too similar, and really, isn’t that the whole reason for getting rid of Stone/Earth?
This was a fun poll. I know I said four instead of six, but I wouldn’t really deviate from G1 Bionicle that much. Only seeing four elements would be interesting, though it would be a bit too similar to Avatar depending on the elements used as the core four, which isn’t bad, just not the Bionicle I know.
I think fire, water, ice, air, stone, and jungle would be the best lineup for the main elements, stone would encompass all ground elements, I just think toa of stone sounds better than toa of earth, though I’d rather expand jungle to simply nature, and allow the toa the ability to communicate with more intelligent animals and control plant life and less intelligent animals, such as insects, also I think nature sounds better as well.
As for color schemes,
Fire, red and azure
Water, blue and orange
Ice, white and dark blue
Air, light blue and green
Nature, dark green and burnt orange
Stone, dark grey and tan
Light would of course be gold and trans light blue,
And shadow would be dark red and trans purple
I feel like G3 should be centered around the primary 6 elements (the G1 elements), with our heroes (at least for the first Toa story line) being of that primary 6 then later introducing titan-styled characters with other powers such as jungle, magnetism, gravity etc. I classify the non-primary elements as secondary elements and they should be seen as the elements from far lands that our heroes must eventually journey to, with the only secondary elements in the early story being shown in “mysterious traveler” type characters.
Later after establishing these characters and that characters in this new world can have these other powers as well as the limits of these powers, a new team could have a mix of the primary and other elemental powers and themes. Perhaps the story takes our heroes to a series of floating islands held aloft by gravity and magnetism, made of large portions of iron or with heavy jungles on them and they can only take a few of their team with them, they have to bring in heroes with powers best suited to the environment to complete their new quest.
These are just my ideas but I think they’d work out for a good story.
Telekinesis (or Psychokinesis, if you prefer) is basically defined as the act of making something move by only utilising one’s own mind or willpower. Therefore, it does actually belong in Psionics’ wheelhouse, as there are no other outside forces causing said effect.
As for the poll itself, I went with having six starting elements, no light or shadow, and all of them (with the exception of Jungle) being based off of the Bohrok Kal. From what I’ve been hearing about G2 around the community (even though I did personally enjoy it for what it was), it didn’t sell well, partially because Lego was effectively marketing a nostalgia trip to a completely different generation of children. The inclusion of an entirely different team of Toa, starting off with a setting more akin to that of Metru Nui, and possibly relegating the original six elements to the villains of the story could’ve potentially been enough to fix that, even if the original themes of G1 remained mostly intact.
This is true. However, in the bionicle universe it’s always seemed like cold is a seperate type of energy than heat. Either that or fire toa control temperatures that can be seen as hot, while ice toa get the other end of the spectrum. Man, elements are confusing.