Makuta Wanitama: The Red Titan

2020 Update-
In case anyone finds this topic again, here’s a link to an updated version of Wanitama: Manguopo & Wanitama Makuta Revamps

Wow, I wrote this when I was in 8th grade… this takes me back.

-End of 2020 update

Name: Wanitama
Assigned Region: None
Kanohi: Hau, Great Mask of Shielding
Status: Dead


Some makuta were Rahi makers. Others, architects. Some, even, fierce warlords. But not Wanitama- he was, as a matter of fact, a botanist (which could be argued to be simply a different type of Rahi creator, but that is neither here nor there). While he didn’t really end up doing much that affected the universe as a whole, he did make a major impact on a number of the Makuta themselves. You see, when he was first forged from the antidermis, he attempted to become a Rahi maker, like most makuta. However, he became fascinated with plants, more
eso then the animals living off of them, and realized that botany was his true calling. He proceeded to plunge himself into his work, staying in his sprawling greenhouses for sometimes weeks at a time. He lived for hard work, building things with his own two hands. He was also quite amicable, and became friends with nearly everyone he met. He even received his great Hau as a gift from a fellow Makuta- and Makuta don’t give gifts. By the time Teridax proposed The Plan, he had already created a number of sentient plants. He joined Teridax in his efforts to take over the universe for two main reasons. One, he owed him for eliminating a Makuta who’d been sabotaging his and other’s work, and two, he thought that, even though The Plan itself was evil, is people like him had there say, it could turn out for the betterment of the universe despite the elimination of Mata Nui. He may have been right, too, but unfortunately he met an untimely fate. He was on an exploratory mission to an uncharted island, and became fascinated with a new species of plant he discovered there. He brought is back to Destral to experiment upon it, but aster a few years, mysterious spores from ot lead first to a severe cough, and then to a painful and slow death of asphyxiation.

As for the MOC itself, I’m quite satisfied with him. He is my first real attempt at a MOC with a custom “gearbox”. The function is simple (the arms swing) but I like it.

A better shot of the gears.

His only real problem is the head connection. It’s solid enough, but limits articulation.

That’s about it! I hope it makes the project.
@Gilahu, is this better?

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Well, I definitely have to say that this is the best MOC I’ve seen from you so far.

As to the MOC itself, the gear function is nice, but sticks out a little bit too much - perhaps you could put the smaller gears that connect to the arms below the bigger gears instead of above them? This probably would also fix the arms seeming so short.
Alos those shoulderpads would probably look better if properly aligned.

As to the pictures: Could you try getting them all as sharp as the one you took of the gear mechanism? Perhaps it helps if you take them upright instead of broad. Better lighting would perhaps help, too - maybe try taking pictures outside?

And the story:

His assigned region should be “none”, since Destral is the assigned region of the Brotherhood’s leader. Hau is the Great Mask of Shielding, not Fire. Kolhii was invented by Onewa and Whenua on the island of Mata Nui if I remember correctly. Also the Barraki didn’t attack Destral.

In general I feel like the “inventor of sports” role might be a little difficult to make believable, since the the only sports that are canon are Akilini which was invented by Kodan, Kolhii, which was invented by Onewa and Whenua and - if you want to call it a sport - the gladiator fights on Stelt.
The idea of a Makuta who actually liked to make others happy is interesting, but you should try to find another, more plausible way for this in my opinion.

Oh yeah, and a Matoran rebellion at this time doesn’t really fit in either. In addition I just can’t see a Makuta being killed by Matoran. It just doesn’t work for me. And if he is a nice guy with many friends - why would someone even want to hurt him?

Sorry, but I also highly doubt that Destral ever was fun for anyone.


I could try to think of something using Wanitama’s personality in a better and more plausibel way tomorrow, if you like.

Otherwise I would be curious what @pizzacheetah and @21sselliW think about the backstory and its current potential. It’s a very original one but I can’t really see a way for it to work as it is now.

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I think this pretty much sums up the complaints I have with this MoC and its story. I appreciate what you tried to do with the gearbox/mechanism, but it just seems a bit awkward.

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Since everyone else commented on the story… :stuck_out_tongue:

The gear function is clever, I like what you’ve done. The placement of the shoulder armor seems awkward. If possible lower that. There needs to be more yellow if you are going to have those spikes.

@Gilahu First- the gear function could take a while to fix, as the whole MOC is built around it, but I’ll see what can be done. Second, I didn’t actually notice the shoulder pads being messed up until I was putting them in the post. As for the story: I’ll change the thing about Destral. I feel really stupid about the great mask of fire thing (so I’ll just blame G2). I’ll also change the thing about him making sports. I think the reason I said the Baraki attacked Destral is because in the bionicle origins stopmotion they use the same background for more-or-less all of the bad guy type scenes. I’ll also change his death. The reason it is what it is currently is because I just really couldn’t think of anything else.
@Leoxandar I put the yellow spikes there to balance out the yellow on the thighs. I guess I’ll try adding a wee bit more.

If this is 500 years before the Barraki form the League of six kingdoms, then it’s around 94,500 years Before Great Cataclysm. The earliest story we have for the Makuta is the Mutran Chronicles, which starts sometime before 94,000 BGC. The Brotherhood was formed around 99,000 BGC, so that leaves 5,000 years during which we know nothing about the Brotherhood except that it made the Zivon during this time.

In the beginning of The Mutran Chronicles, even Mutran and Chirox were good friends. And you yourself have suggested a Makuta of light during this time. It does appear that maybe the Makuta were actually friendly types back in those days.

Yep. Was just reading about that.
However…

Just checked BS01 on this, and there are several games listed under the “Sports” section… but just for Metru Nui and Mata Nui. And unfortunately, we only truly focused on those islands – we have no idea what sports were played on Stelt, Zakaz (pre-Spiriah), the Northern and Southern Continent, etc.

I do agree with this, and I do have an idea. BS01 says that the Zivon was put in the field of Shadows “for unknown reasons”. The Zivon is one tough cookie; maybe it was able to kill a Makuta?
In fact, given his personality, I seems odd he would die trying to fight. So what if he died trying to befriend the Zivon, and it turned out the Zivon wasn’t really all that friendly?
@darkbrick999 if you still can’t think of a good death idea, feel free to use this.

~W12~

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Thank you profusely for that suggestion! I might just use that!
Also, @Gilahu, I just did some pics of him outside, and you’re right, they turned out MUCH better!


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I just wanna say that the MOC itself has an EXCELLENT stature. I think yellow could be employed a little bit more as an accent (there isn’t enough yellow in MOCs these days), and frankly I’m impressed that you incorporated a gear system, but I’m usually one for posing over playability, so I can’t truly express any “yay” or “nay” on that.

As for the story… here goes.
Introducing Makutaball! /s

In all seriousness, friendly Makuta are fun, and we need more of them, but I think this one could be better off as a botanist. I dunno, big creepy hand, hunchback, I can just see him caring intently for his little daisies.

Also, is it just me, or is his name super Japanese?

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Actually, his name is Maori for “Swanson”. I considered making him a botanist, but I would want a botanist Makuta to have some green on him. And I have almost no green pieces.

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I think the colors are fine for anything, but do what you wish. That’s an interesting idea behind the name, though.

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I like the idea of a hulking, mech-like titan, but it could be better executed. I like the gears, maybe try to intigrate them throughout the MOC. I.e. in joints, on the back like a backpack, or in the hands. Use less large shells, make it detailed in its armor. Also I’d remove the upper shoulder pads. Overall the shape should be more hunched over, maybe the legs could have three joints.

Show that its carrying a lot of weight, and has just enough constitution to do so.

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I personally REALLY like the leg design. I wouldn’t touch it. However, that could work.

Really? To me it looks too stiff, maybe it’s just the posing.

The reason I don’t use digitigrade legs much is that it’s hard to get the proportions right in comparison to the arms.

Sure. And now that I have your attention, I’d like to remind you not to just use ccbs because it’s easy. ccbs has a time and place, and using it to carelessly will make a MOC look like it took less effort. Make sure all the shells you use are conducive to the shape of the MOC. In the case of the lower legs the chestplates don’t quite work. The feet are smaller than that shape, so it makes the feet look smaller. By flipping them upside down you could put more emphasis on the knees. This would, again, make it look more able to carry it’s own weight. Just make sure the upper leg armor connects. I would say make ccbs armor “flow” but for this MOC a more rugged texture is required.

@darkbrick999

I have to say with better lighting and aligned shoulder pads the shoulders look actually pretty ok - only a little gappy.
Perhaps put that second pic in the first post.

@21sselliW[quote=“21sselliW, post:6, topic:29150”]
It does appear that maybe the Makuta were actually friendly types back in those days.
[/quote]

Well, at least some of them, I guess. Still I can’t see Destral as a place of joy and beauty - it’s more of a place were some pretty serious folks work on pretty serious things in my opinion.

Yes, after I shut off my computer yesterday I realized that there was stuff like Ussal Racing, Lava Surfing and such, too.

I think I had this discussion once already … was it with @E44? My objection to this are still the powers of Teleportation and Rahi Control the Makuta possess. I just deem it unlikely a Makuta would get killed by the Zivon.
My idea in that regard was that a Makuta created the Zivon together with Chirox, but then eitehr Chirox killed the other Makuta to take all the credit for the Zivon, or the other Makuta gets accidently trapped in the Field of Shadows and there looses to the Zivon because the Rahi has enhanced senses, while the Makuta, mostly relying on sight, is blind there and thus can’t target his powers.

@pizzacheetah

Since a Makuta who specialized on creating (sentient) plants like the Daikau is needed, I quite like this idea.
Of course plantlife was likely added to the Matoran Universe by the Great Beings to ensure the supply of Oxygen for its inhabitants - they breath, after all. Also plants are life-forms and the Makuta species was created to create life - undoubtedly someone of them had to take interest in plants somewhen. Waitama could have experimented with how plants adapt to various climates, he could have created “livelier” plants like the Daikau to make them more like Rahi, he could have collected all species found in the Matoran Universe and created some kind of botanical garden on Destral. As to his death… since I need some more backstories that fit with a “Book of the Brotherhood” entry I’ve already written, I would like his death to happen after Teridax becoming leader of the Brotherhood - Wanitama joined Teridax because he owed him a favor (dealing with another Makuta who had sabotaged the experiments of various Makuta, including Wanitama)
As to Wanitama’s death, well, Energized Protodermis was known to do strange stuff to some things. On a remote island Wanitama might have found a strange plant - and took it with him to Destral. This plant however set free spores or something that Wanitama inhaled over a great period of time - before the Makuta’s evolution he thus died because his lungs stopped working or something.


Might that last one be something for you darkbrick?

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I suppose I’ll use that (though I still wish he had some green if he’ll be a botanist).

Well, plantlife can be pretty colourful in terms of flowers - also a red guy in a green jungle is much easier to make out if you want to talk to him :wink:

Only two things about the new backstory:

I deem it more likely that he discovered his interest for plants during his work as a Rahi creator. Also there are so many warrior Makuta around that I don’t think another one who wanted to become one is needed - even if he didn’t.

You should make a “T e ridax” out of the “Tridax” :wink:


Otherwise thanks again for participating!

What about Kohuru by the way?

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Those two things are now corrected. As for Kohuru, I plan on taking his pictures today, as soon as my tablet finishes charging.

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What was the idea behind the black hand? A gauntlet built for battle or utility? Both? (Also, why “Swanson”?)