You are ignoring all the people who deeply love Bionicle but that were not necessary following TTV at the time. I did not participate in the original vote because I was not aware of it.
Look to eljay for your problem, but:
You don’t HAVE to live with it. You make the choice of what you want it to be. No-ones saying you have to follow. The majority would rather do the contest, you can make whatever you want. MOVs exist for a reason, canon exists for those who want it to
Please remember that while we are operating them the best we can and managing them within a clearly defined ruleset, the way these contests are being held was not, strictly speaking, our choice. The current MoC/Art compromise was born out of the BS01 Wiki’s absolute refusal to allow custom, 3D printed pieces to be featured on their website and recognized as “canon” clashing with our vehement and steadfast belief that to exclude 3D printed pieces from a building contest in 2020 would be needlessly prohibitive to creative and and incessantly disrespectful towards the current community culture. We clashed, we debated, and we arrived at this compromise. It worked out pretty well for Helryx, all things considered, and I think it will here as well.
The MoC is a visual framework. It designs the stature of the character, their armor, their overall build, creative design techniques that can be creatively translated into artwork form, and their coloration. Even in this instance, where the primary canon color is already pre-decided, that says nothing of color distribution or secondary shades, all of which will be determined by the MoC. Please understand that the allowance of other shades of green to be used is an olive branch towards the MoCing community to enable for more participation and better, more creative entries overall, not something that should be leveraged against the very notion of MoCing contests at all. The MoC is not the canon representation, yes, per BS01’s mandate, but it still plays an important role in designing the character and will feature on the character’s wiki page.
With respect, the odds of that happening are incredibly, incredibly unlikely, so unlikely that it’s not something I’m interested in concerning myself with. I can attest that Eljay and I disqualified several entries in the Helryx art portion for straying too far from the source material, even though they were excellent art pieces. Maintaining visual continuity between the MoC and the art is of paramount importance, and quite frankly, the MoC being a different shade of green will not harm that. For the scenario you’re describing to occur, there would have to be a piece of art that perfectly skates the line between clearly resembling the MoC it’s based on enough to where Eljay and I don’t disqualify it, while also being “completely different” enough to cast doubt on the link between MoC and art in the first place.
It just ain’t gonna go like that
8 Likes
No, I did not. I said “Not right now.” I have already explained why we’re not doing this now, and I’m not interested in repeating myself again. Look through my posts for an explanation. Until then, this discussion is over.
Thank you for replying. I did not know that you said “Not right now”. I think the TTV messages are very hard to navigate on huge threads like these. I hope when you say “Not right now” you mean “maybe after this context or the next one” and not “when we are done with the entire list” because the latter would basically the same as “no”. I truly had the feeling that you outright refused all discussion on the matter so I am happy to be wrong and to see that you considered us anyway, thank you.
3 Likes
I would love to see the guy who’s draw of Helryx became canon made a draw of all the characters together in that same art style after all the contests are all finished
1 Like
It means after this contest or the next. Like I said, not right now - let’s get some contests that have gone well before we decide they’re done.
3 Likes
I agree with this sentiment. The contests do have a downside in that they break some people’s headcanons by making them incompatible with canon. Some people are ok with their headcanons being ‘broken’. Others, like me, who have made creative content that aims to fill the gaps of canon, are somewhat uncomfortable with it. For us, it’s hard to just say ‘well I don’t conform to this new canon entry so I’ll pretend it doesn’t exist’. Canon is canon to us. Still, it’s undeniable that there is some good in the contests.
Something that helped me deal with the fact that my Artakha MOC might not become canon and thus ‘break’ my headcanon, and which might help some of you who feel similar, is this: Bionicle is a theme based on the philosophy of set lineages. Tahu has four G1 sets, all of which are canon. In the case of Artakha and some other characters, there’s nothing to say your version can’t be the appearance of the character at some other time in the story, when they weren’t described by Greg’s material.
5 Likes
Whatever wins is canon and at the end of the day, it’s a toy. I didn’t support the contests initially due to not knowing the terms but it is what it is. Not everything is going to your way and sometimes you can’t undo choices.
And they weren’t brought up earlier; that’s a separate problem. I will never understand why people voted for the contests and thought they could back-pedal as soon as moc they didn’t like won. I’m for the option of stopping the contests if enough people want that, but I’m pragmatic enough to know that’s not how the world works.
3 Likes
This
I still stand by my disagreement for canon breaking any headcanons, I believe anyone could work around it if something really bothered them, though nothing’s seriously broken my own yet so we’ll see 
I completely understand your position regarding the artworks.
However, because of exactly what you said, I don’t think this should bear any impact on the MOC. The utmost should be done to make the MOC come close to canon as well. Right now the rules as good as enforce it not being grey-green with the rule of 60% green + only one shade of green (who has that much olive green/sand green?). Like I said, I’m completely fine with an Artakha that uses other greens as well, BUT the grey-green needs to be there prominently enough. Otherwise it just doesn’t fit canon.
And just like with the announced forced Metru build for the Hagah, I feel like this would be a completely doable and reasonable thing. To some degree it would even be less restricting allowing multiple shades of green.
If one wants to have discussions about the Bionicle canon, they have to follow the Bionicle canon.
My headcanon could be that Tahu is blue, but that would severely hamper my ability to engage with other community members on the topic.
You can’t just tell people to ignore the canon if they do not want to.
5 Likes
Sand green’s not too hard to come by
I barely buy Lego and I had enough to make a decent build with it.
1 Like
This is true to an extent - it kinda works for characters who wear masks, for example, but for characters like Lariska, who don’t wear a mask, you can’t apply “different version” that easily if your head design looks entirely different from canon.
And that kinda is a major problem - and the one I’m fearing the most for myself…
Another point would be a canon design introducing specific details - like, say, wings. What are you gonna do if you never wanted that character to have wings (I know, that’s an unlikely extreme example, but things in this regard are a possibility).
That’s definitely true. Some of the characters we might get contests for are harder to apply the ‘this is the same character at a different point in time’ logic. Say for instance you made a Marendar MOC with one eye (which, of course, I haven’t) and the winning entry had two eyes, you’re on very shaky ground if you make the argument that both designs are the same character.
1 Like
I shouldn’t even be surprised that controversy has suddenly flared up with the announcement of the second canon contest, where relatively little dissent existed during the polls between contests. Reminds me of interference during general election years but not midterms
6 Likes
And some people wonder why the break is three weeks. =P
16 Likes
I personally don’t understand the issue with any of this
If you wanna make a sand green entry, go right ahead. There’s nothing saying you can’t, and you’re probably better off for doing so. The criteria says grey/green, so I personally won’t be voting for anything that’s not grey/green.
3 Likes
Bit surprised by the single shade of green rule, but I’m down for it. Works if someone wants to make the MOC without (necessarily) painting pieces, but also works if someone does. Also completely down for the Staff of Artakha ruling.
Overall, really looking forward to this contest, especially after the improvements made from last time. Bring on the maker of things!
(Also, not that anyone asked my opinion, but… headcanon isn’t canon. End of story.)
2 Likes
Well, honestly when I saw the poll for choosing what the next contest was, I saw that one of the first reply was someone asking for a “no more contest” option then Eljay dismissing him outright, so I thought that was it.
If Eljay’s “not right now” came after that (or before, somewhere else maybe ?) then this is why I did not see it.
After that I lived my life then I started ranting about it a few days ago to some of my friends because I thought Eljay would never consider adding a “no more contest options” and I thought that revolting. So when I saw the video on youtube an hour ago, I came here. It’s just a coincidence that I was ranting about it a couple of days ago, actually.
Now I know that Eljay was not as dismissive as I thought on the matter so I have hope for the future.
I might be proven wrong, but from just preliminary LDD testing of my Artakha, sand green doesn’t look good as a primary colour. I’m hoping the artwork takes some liberties with the sand green colour or he’ll look like he’s wearing a Master Chief pyjama suit.