Good point; I shall remove them for subsequent photos.
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you would think cobbled together armour would be more, asymmetrical.
that said, I like the builds.
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Good point. Maybe I should switch around some of the pieces. That being said, the spikes on the legs and such were intentionally asymmetrical in the directions they point, since the idea is that she welded those on later.
Thanks!
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Alright; update time!
Remnants
Part 1C: Menkar
(Hiker Mike)
Relevant music: 1
Story: Originally hailing from the mountains of the southwest continent, Menkar moved to the Polar City at an early age to seek his fortunes there, where he eventually joined the Polar Navy, in the same squad as Meridionalis. His brute strength belies a sharp mind, and he quickly rose through the ranks to captain before retiring early and moving back to his homeland, where he spent many a year hiking among the most remote peaks. However, recent unrest has brought him back into action, working alongside the League of Secondary Nations to prepare for the brewing Polar civil war…
It says Dust on his forehead (not in-story, of course) and despite my best efforts with a swiffer cloth, these photos will live up to that. Anyway, this guy doesn’t hold up quite as well as I’d hoped, (hollow and gappy are probably the biggest issues) but he’s still better than some of the previously shown ones. That piece drought was a lot more serious than I remembered it being…
Back view, showing off the Backpack-like structure and his disk launchers. The latter were actually inspired by the original Hiker Mike, who had disk arms on his back as well.
Upper arm. The piece drought strikes again; unfortunately I still lack something that would work better than the Rahkshi waist.
When the arm is raised all the way, the Pahrak Shield sort of slots into the Piraka foot. Sort of.
The thigh is also messy.
Yeah, I think I’m going to have to give this guy a do-over sometime right alongside Heze.
Cough, cough so… dusty… need… water… cough, cough
Head. The tan t-joint is held in by friction alone, which may or may not be a bad thing.
Closer view of the front. I don’t like top-heavy builds (coughonyacough) but somehow this ended up being one. Oh well.
Lower back, where the gappiness becomes much more apparent. Another MOC we’ll see further down the line utilizes the Mata Torso in a much more elegant way.
Upper back, where the hollowness becomes apparent. However, I could see if I can store disks in there…
His hiking staff can become a powerful battleaxe. Seriously, I was going for sort of a “King Bumi” vibe with this guy, despite not having seen Avatar yet at the time of building him.
Interaction!
In their few encounters, Menkar has wisely judged Rex as untrustworthy. Unfortunately, he may have to trust her if he’s to have any hope of success…
Another group shot. I plan to add to this with each installment.
Next Time: Consistency, Solidness, all of these things I verified before typing this! Where there’s one combiner model revamp, the other is sure to follow…
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The dust is real 
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At least it’s pretty appropriate for a mountain hiker person… thing. I’m just getting into larger MOCs myself, and I can fully appreciate how difficult it is to put anything cohesive together when you’re rapidly running out of pieces. These look pretty good.
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I think I might try and make my own Slizer/ throwbot moc…
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Cool!
Also, fancy meeting you here! 
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That it is! XD
I would hope so. And yeah, it can get pretty frustrating. (Even more so when I know that there’s more of my collection lost somewhere in the attic.) On the other hand, I know of at least one occasion when that lack of pieces forced me to come up with a different setup than I’d orginally had in mind, which probably turned out better in the end.
That would be cool to see!
Thanks!
And how do you mean? Have we met before?
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Oh, sorry! I’m Pump It Up on Fimfiction, and I commented on your one video as sillypplproductions2. I also believe that I followed you as manebioniclegali on Tumblr.
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Remnants
Part 1D: Terrabellum
(Robotops)
Relevant music: 1
Story: Also part of the same squad as Meridionalis and Menkar, Terrabellum was badly injured and honorably discharged almost immediately after entering active duty, but her friendships and training remained. After several years spent recovering, she befriended a rising politician named Alcyone, and became involved in the League of Secondary Nations’ covert operations unit in the Polar City, where her sheer competency quickly propelled her to a high-ranking position. Now rejoined by Menkar, the two of them, with help from Alcyone, are making preparations for an oncoming catastrophe…
I did a much better job removing the dust this time around, though it took about ten minutes to clean as many nooks and crannies as I could get into - it’s not a perfect job, but I hope you appreciate it!
Anyway, here we have the second-smallest MOC in this series, and the first that starts to approach Lazadahki’s level of quality, with a simple yet solid and surprisingly involved build. Also, I had run out of Slizer heads that weren’t already reserved for others, so I went ahead and used a blank Roborider head; we’ll just say it’s a helmet of some sort.
Back view.
Shield, front and back. In-story, it can fold up into a thick cylinder about the size of a stack of disks, and thus can be stored in disk-bags. It’s also rather heavy.
Front view again, without the shield to get in the way.
The upper arm. Terrabellum generally has a smoother style and texture than the others I’ve shown off so far, perhaps more to @Payinku’s liking?
The feet were an experiment. It looked even better than I’d expected, so I kept it. The massively exaggerated heel is more a trick of the armor to help with balance than a reflection of the actual biology.
Obligitory shot of the excuse to get rid of a bunch of spacer pieces - I mean, Lazer Sniper Rifle, which in-story can burn through a foot of solid titanium in just under five minutes! (With the exception of Heze’s energy sword, which was neveer even remotely plot-relevant and may not even be a thing once I redo him, I decided to be a bit more realistic about the logistics of some of this stuff.)
On the other hand, I know of at least one occasion when that lack of pieces forced me to come up with a different setup than I’d orginally had in mind, which probably turned out better in the end.
Closer views of the front and back - I want to point out the truck grille from an old Jack Stone set that I am rather proud to have found a decent use for.
Turtle mode activate! I don’t know that it strictly counts as a function, but both in-story and out, it serves as a rather convenient alternative storage method, with an in-story protection bonus.
While we run through the poses, I wanted to bring something up - as you may have noticed, Terrabellum and Meridionalis don’t seem to remotely resemble the combiners they’re based off of, while Menkar only vaguely suggests his own. The actual set revamps are much more faithful, though I still threw in some ideas of my own.
However, I’d made this decision rather early on - The combiners were quite frankly somewhat awkward, with the exception of Hiker Mike and maybe Dynamo. Thus, I felt that it was better to merely suggest rather than carbon copy them. Meridionalis retains the stooped posture, long legs, and general reptilian hostile appearance of Ultrarex, while Terrabellum’s straight posture and massive shield are meant to bring to mind Robotops’ towerlike torso and frankly bizarre head design.
On another note, of the two previously mentioned characters who remain unbuilt, one is the same Alcyone mentioned in Terrabellum’s bio, an original character created solely for the story much like Heze; while the other is named Caspian and is based off of Dynamo. Caspian actually retains the color scheme of his inspiration, but disposes with the idea of two heads for obvious reasons, and actually plays one of the most minimal roles in the story.
Anyway, back to Terrabellum!
Interactions!
Terrabellum and Menkar are close platonic friends who have the other’s back both in battle and in life, and trust one-another completely.
Terrabellum is disgusted by the terrible, murderous… thing that calls itself Rex, but the worse part is that this assassain seems oddly familiar. Perhaps it’s not so much disgust Terrabellum is feeling, but… disappointment?
And the group shot. Part 1 of 4: Complete.
Next Time: And now for something completely different!
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Ah, that makes sense. XD
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well, more so than the others, yes I like it, though it isn’t the paneled armour I was describing, which you seem to have confused with smooth armour,
paneled armour is more along the lines of a beetles shell, layering together and moving organically.(see the latest version of my teridax revamp{which can be found in my moc topic} for an example)
as for the moc, I don’t have any real complaints other than the thighs looking too thin compared to the bulky shins, maybe silver inika thighs would look a bit better.
I really like the solidness of the shield.
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Okay, that makes a bit more sense. Yeah, Paneled armour is pretty cool, though I myself have yet to really pull it off in an MOC.
Ah, thanks; I shall do that!
So that this topic isn’t completely flooded with Slizers, I decided that I’ll take a break after every fourth one to look at some regular MOCs. And today’s one is… well, today’s is interesting for me.
(Please excuse the crappy photoediting, particularly around the elemental flame pieces.)
Introducing Sanok, the Warrior of Stone! The Skull Spiders grow ever more agressive, but this carver has had enough. Fashioning himself a set of armour, he takes his carving hammer and sulphur sword to defend the gates of the village!
Full disclosure: This guy was really more an experiment than anything else, as until getting Pierre and Pohatu, I haven’t had much experience with CCBS beyond fiddling with some of my younger brother’s Hero Factory stuff.
Back and side views, showing off his jetpack. As you can see, I based his build off of Ekimu’s. And unfortunately, I was unable to get better armour than the Guurahk staff back there.
Here’s his hammer. One can still twist the axle at the back to fire, but the elemental flame makes it a bit difficult.
Here’s the “action frame” or whatever it’s called; I’ve seen people do this on other MOC topics.
Even unarmed, his boots and gauntlets make him a powerful foe!
Skull Spider abuse is fun.
(Alt. caption: This is just like dealing with headcrabs! Wait…)
So, I have to say that CCBS honestly isn’t all that bad. The gearbox is probably half of it, and I still honestly don’t like the oversimplistic aesthetic or building style, but it’s not bad, and I can definitely get used to it in Bionicle. I also appreciate that it’s a lot more sturdy.
Your thoughts?
Next Time: What do you get when you combine a classic constraction line with TF2’s most intimidating character?
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…
slowly raises hand
That would be me. I’m even more into smooth MOCs than he is.
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Awesome!
I… I don’t think any of the MOCS after this point can really be considered “smooth,” except maybe one. Um…
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Not exactly, though the confusion makes sense. I’d classify the Heavy as TF2’s second most intimidating character. YMMV, I guess.
On that note, I plan to take the next round of pictures later today, so I’ll probably have it up by this evening!
Also, that’s an awesome MOC!
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Some IRL stuff had come up on Friday, thus why this break was a bit longer. Anyway, on to our main feature! Note that the story for the next eight is set fifteen years after the stuff for the first four.
Remnants
Part 2A: Lesath
(Torch)
Story: The youngest of the eight survivors of the Sehran Cataclysm, Lesath barely remembers the time before, and carries a sense of reckless optimism that the others envy. He has somewhat of a split personality, sometimes quiet and watchful, blending into the background despite the bright colors he wears as he observes the others going about the day. More often, however, he is a brash, flirtatious, loudmouthed and quite frankly obnoxious pest who quite enjoys making the others uncomfortable.
He is incredibly acrobatic, and enjoys flipping and swinging his way around some of the Polar City’s more ruinous areas, though someday he hopes to try out the harsh cliffs and other strange features of his ancestral homeland, the volcanic peninsula of the Southeast continent. However, his relationship with fire hasn’t always been a good one, having once singed off the right half of his face with the flamethrower he now carries, necessitating a robotic replacement for his eye.
This guy also suffered from the great Piece Drought of '12, but I think I managed to make him work, more-or-less.
Back view, such as it is; not much interesting aside from his massive fuel tank courtesy of some Life On Mars sets.
The arms and legs share the exact same design. I actually had a different design for a while, using half of a bohrok head connected to the Tahu foot, but I modified it so I could rebuild some of my Bohrok, and I think in some ways this design works a little bit better. Hands/feet were interesting to figure out, as I had to find something a bit more sturdy that could hold up the weight of the model while still functional as hands.
Side view of the body, showing how he goes together. I wanted to find something I could add onto the tank stalk to make his waist wider, but no appropriate pieces were available.
The tank and flamethrower, the latter of which I am particularly proud of. There was a bit of a scare when I was taking photos, as right between these two, my camera finally died, and we had run out of batteries to replace them, but I was able to scavenge some from a Lego Technic motor powerbox.
And here’s where this starts to really kick into high gear. Why did I build his arms and legs the same? Why did I make his tank so loose? Why is this MOC considered better than Heze despite the sloppy build? All questions are answered with this single photo.
Being a rather acrobatic individual, Lesath modified his legs so that he could flip upside-down and walk around on his hands while using his feet to grasp things. It also puts his head in a rather… uncomfortable… position, to the disgust of the others. Naturally, that’s why he does it so often.
And a comparison to the original, courtesy of an extra head borrowed from Onyx Roborider. I’m rather proud that I was able to carry on this tradition of questionable head placement.
And the throwing arm can be used in his spare hand.
Posing with this guy is rather difficult. When spread too far, his legs tend to slide out from under him, and the bilateral knees don’t help. The tank makes him top-heavy, and tends to swing around a lot.
Still, I think this looks cool.
And a headshot with his disk. No interactions or group shots today, due to the in-story time skip.
Next Time: Probably one of my favorite builds, though they may just be drowning under all that armour…
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