Power of the Toa Nuva - analysis

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One question has been asked since 2002/2003 with almost notorious frequency: How much more powerful are the Toa Nuva compared to regular Toa? Today the question will finally be answered after 20 years…

After their transformation via energized protodermis the Toa Mata, now Toa Nuva, are said to (among other things) possess greater inherent elemental power and control than any other Toa. But what does this mean exactly? How much is “more”? And how do they compare to other elementally powered beings?
For one, we know few basic things: 1) Nova blasts of Toa Nuva now have even greater potential than before, drawing on bigger elemental reserve, 2) Nuva are capable of starting a process utilizing elemental energy in advance and setting a timer on it - something normal Toa can’t do.

That’s great and all, but we already knew this. The real question is how much grander in terms of numbers is the elemental potency of Toa Nuva? Concrete information is few and far between even in Greg’s answers - the reason being it was intentionally left ambiguous. But, the hard work researching proved fruitful - among many quotes simply expressing uncertainty, or refusal to elaborate, two are good enough and sufficient to work this out definitively:

Q1: What is the extent of a Turaga’s elemental powers? Hypothetically: 3a) Could Turaga Whenua use his drill staff on the ground, gather the surrounding soil and thrust it at an opponent? 3b) Could Turaga Onewa slam his stone hammer on the ground and make a stone dart up and hit an opponent? 3c) Could Turaga Vakama use his fire staff to gather surrounding heat and make a fireball to launch at an opponent? 3d) Could Turaga Matau use the buzz saw on his kau kau staff to whip up a breeze strong enough to knock an opponent off balance? 3e) Could Turaga Nokama use her trident to gather surrounding moisture and force it at an opponent as a tidal splash? 3f) Could Turaga Nuju use his ice pick to create and launch icicles?
A1: The quick and dirty answer to this is that if Tahu’s can create a firestorm, Vakama can light a torch. Take what a Toa can do, divide it by about 500, and you have a Turaga’s level of power.

Q2: On a scale of 1-10, 10 being a Toa Nuva and 1 being a matoran, how would you rate the elemental abilities of turaga and general toa? (Use decimals if you want)
A2: A normal Toa would be a 9, probably – and a Turaga would be more like a 3.

Ok, so we get a scale with four data points. We also know that value 9 is 500X bigger than value 3.

elemental scale
elemental scale1683×342 6.06 KB

Those two are 6 tiers of power appart. What we need to do now is to find out the multiplier between the neighboring tiers (one appart). This is fairly easy, since we know 500X represents six shifts in power, a single shift needs to be:
Nuva calc

Toa Nuva are a single tier above normal Toa, which means they are 2.82 times more powerful in terms of elemental energy. This seems quite reasonable and even coincides with the vague increase most people already imagined.
But some observant individuals might notice I made an assumption in this calculation. How do I know the multiplier between tiers rises exponentially? What if the differences between tiers are additive instead of multiplicative and the total difference between 3 and 9 just happens to also result in 500X increase?
Well, there is very strong evidence out there that the elemental potential does indeed rise exponentially. We have one instance when a character gains multiple tiers of extra elemental power in real time and we are given added details. It is the scene in Many Deaths of Toa Tuyet when Tuyet finally taps into the power of the Nui Stone, resulting in massive increase of elemental power:

„ Her hand closed on the stone. It began to crackle, a nimbus of crimson energy surrounding her. Lhikan hurled a fire bolt, but she deflected it without even looking at him. Her power was already growing exponentially with each passing moment. In a matter of seconds, she would be able to snuff him out like a tiny flame in a windstorm.“

This prooved the assumption for me and I could proceed with the calculation as described.

We can use this information of 2.82X multiplier further. If we were to extend the scale beyond 10, where would the Tuyet from Reign of Shadows, said to be 200-300 times stronger than normal Toa place? If we take the 300X difference between this Tuyet and rank 9, we would find out that the corresponding rank is 14.5. This agrees with the notion that Tuyet with Nui Stone is much stronger than even a Toa Nuva. We also know that she is even more powerful than a Makuta (elementally), so a Brotherhood member would need to be somewhere between 10 and 14.5 on the scale.

So that is it, the 20 year old question is finally answered in a satisfying and concrete way: A Toa Nuva has 2.82 times more powerful elemental ability than a regular Toa.

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Two are most certainly not good enough, as there’s quite a bit more complexity than “many quotes simply expressing uncertainty, or refusal to elaborate.” The difference between Toa and Turaga has been highly contradictive.

On a scale of 1/10 how much elemental power does a turaga have?
Probably a 1 or a 2

What’s an example of what a Turaga, let’s just saw Matau, could do with his limited elemental powers? You always seem to dodge this question. I fully understand your “paint ourselves into a corner” thing, but this is pretty minor, so could you just fulfill our curiosity?
Take what Lewa can do. Now take 4%-5% of that. That is about what Turaga Matau can do.

To what extent would the power of a noble mask of fire’s control over fire be?
Figure about half the intensity of a Toa of Fire’s power and less able to maintain

(Even though this one’s about Great/Noble Elemental masks, remember that Great Elemental masks have Toa level control, and Nobles have Turaga level control, so it’s applicable.)

I’ve read what you’ve had to say on the Noble Kanohi, but I’m afraid I still don’t understand. You say that the Noble masks have less power than the Great masks, but if you ask me the power to control others, lift objects with your mind, and turn invisible are pretty darn powerful: Now I’ll admit, the Ruru and Rau seem a bit pointless, but still…
Well, I look at it this way. Think of masks as the volume control on your TV. Great Masks are set at 10; Noble Masks are set at 5. Yes, they have cool powers, but the powers do not have the strength, range, or duration that Great Mask powers have.

I did an analysis on my BS01 page a while back to try and narrow it down:

Based on the official model, Sentrakh is approximately 2.29 bio tall, which is 43% taller than Toa. When hit with a Shrink disk, he shrunk to 6 inches, the minimum height for a level 8 disk, the highest possible level (minimum height depends on the level of the disk). This not only confirms that he was hit with a level 8 disk, but also that Shrink does not scale linearly with the target’s normal height. If it did, Sentrakh should have shrunk to no less than 8.5 inches. It is safe to assume Enlarge works the same as Shrink. The maximum height for the Great Mask of Growth is 60 feet. Based on the behavior of the Shrink disk on Sentrakh, it is assumed disks release their maximum power when activated (i.e. a level 8 Shrink disk will always shrink a target to six inches, a level 8 Enlarge disk will always grow a target to 60 feet, etc.). Because of that, and that the sizes for Shrink and Enlarge are fixed, that means one of the Enlarge disk levels must have a maximum of 20 feet, since that is the height Sentrakh grew to when hit with one. Given the possible percentages between Great and Noble attained above, a Noble Mask of Growth would have a maximum height of either 30 feet (if 50%) or 20 feet (if 33%). All the lower percentages have been eliminated, since a maximum of 20 feet would not be possible for any lower level Enlarge disk.

So Turaga actually either have a half or a third the power level of a standard Toa.

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Which is why I sifted through all of the quotes including the ones you cite during this analysis and looked for the highest quality data, which seemed consistent with the rest of the story as a whole.
Not all evidence is created equal and choosing the right quality evidence is part of the challenge. If there is a heterogenous set of contradictive, story-disagreeing, low quality pieces of evidence, and a set of story-compliant, consistent and high quality evidence, I take the quality and disregard the low quality noise.

With high consistency Greg uses analogies when comparing Toa and Turaga level of power. The answer I chose had the most elaboration and was most consistent with the published story. It is also the only one that had a number attached to it, in addition to analogous description.

The scale quote I chose is the best out of all of them because A) multiple beings are compared on the same scale, rather than representing an isolated evaluation of a single being (like the one you provided); B) it has the most data points from the rest of the comparative scale quotes.

I wouldn’t bring noble and great masks into discussion at all because as I have learned over the years, they have their own separate scale, which does not mimic the elemental scale. It is not the same.

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Only the Avokhii and Garai could canonically be on the elemental energy scale, and that’s simply due to them being masks that grant a being “Toa level elemental control”. Unless other official masks have elemental powers like these two.

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You keep asserting this but haven’t shown any evidence for it. If you’re referring to the one line from TMDoTT saying “exponentially,” that is very, very, loose.

Again, this is an assertion you make but don’t back it up. If the other quotes are indeed noise, it would have been better to at least reference them, discuss them, and explain why they’re noise, instead of ignoring them altogether.

Except they are the same. Elemental Great masks grant the user Toa level power over an element,[1][2][3] and Elemental Noble masks grant Turaga level power,[4] barring that they can’t absorb[5][6] or protect the user from said element.[7] Elemental masks are on the same scale as any other mask power,[8] so they are indeed the same.

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Question: are any specific masks mentioned? Because I can only think of the Krakhaan, Avokhii, and Garai as elemental great, noble or legendary masks. I don’t know if any other comparable ones exist.

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They don’t have to be elemental to be comparable. That’s my argument. In fact that’s what Greg said in the quote I just referenced.

Elemental masks are on the same scale as any other mask power,[8]

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Okay. I just was confused then. I was thinking the same thing you were, and, by the way, that would place these masks as being at a 5 or 6 on @ToaKebaka ‘s scale, given that they grant the user “Toa-level control over their element “.

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Cool to see more analysis

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I wouldn’t really say it is loose, but even then, I used that one more so as a confirmation that the elemental increase throughout the tiers is exponential in nature as my calculation assumed. When I say consistent with the story, I am talking very broadly - as in the implications do not disagree with how the powers are portrayed in story.

I explained the criteria and reasons behind choosing particular quotes in the previous post, but of course I can elaborate further if that is what you want.
Greg’s favorite analogy is with fire:

Q: What are the limits of a turaga’s elemental powers?
A: As I have said in the past, if Tahu can light a bonfire, Vakama can light a candle. Their powers are small scale.

Q: It is said that turaga have diminished control over their element. How much control do they have; what kind of “moves” could/couldn’t they do?
A: Basically, if a Toa can start a bonfire, a Turaga could light a torch.

A: About how much elemntal power do Turaga have? I have a head cannon that they can’t control their element, but they still have a connection to it and can sense disturbances in it, and I was wondering if this was close to accurate?
Q: Basically, if a Toa can start a bonfire, a Turaga can light a torch.

Q: If Turaga Vakama’s “limited elemental ability” is lighting a candle, what would Nuju’s be? Throw in Nokama’s for good measure.
A: The equivalent – Nokama could make gentle waves as opposed to tidal waves, and Nuju could make a light snow storm.

Q: I was wondering, to what extent is a Turaga’s power over their element?
A: Basically, if Tahu can do a nova blast, Vakama light a torch.

And of course the one I cited in the analysis:

Greg uses this type of analogy to describe big differences in power:

Q: You could have say Umbra’s Kanohi was a Kakama in Ruru’s shape. You decided it was a powerless Ruru. So, if Umbra is so fast with a powerless mask, the perspective of Umbra wearing a mask of speed is formidale, isn’t it?
A: Yes, but if you can already go at light speed, it would sort of be like bringing a candle to a bonfire. Not really much help.

Q: Is Makuta more, less, or just as “great” as Mata Nui?
A: Less. As powerful as he is, Makuta is a candle flame next to the blazing inferno that is Mata Nui.

Q: You once said that if Mata Nui was a bonfire, a makuta would be a candle. What would you say Tren Krom is?
A: Closer to a bonfire than candle

Which is how relationship between Toa and Turaga’s power level is portrayed constantly in story - a very big difference.
As I said before, the reason why I chose the quote I did was because it represented this highly consistent analogy AND was quantified by having a number attached to it, thus making it the most robust answer.

Looking at this and the portrayal in all of the story material, your interpretation of Turaga being 1/3 of Toa’s power cannot be true. While I actually do agree that noble masks are 1/3 of power of the great masks, they exist on a different scale than elemental power (more on that later).

There are many other reasons why Turaga can’t be 1/3 of Toa:

Q: How strong would you say the elemental abilities of a Turaga Nui be?
A: Still not as great as a Toa’s.

This rules out 1/6, let alone 1/3 or 1/2.

Next reason - if Turaga were 1/2 or 1/3, they should approach the power of a masless Toa who is 1/2 of their full power.

You must not remove your masks, unless you are replacing one with another. Without them, your strength is halved. "

Such Toa can still use Nova Blasts, but even fully powered Turaga don’t have enough energy to muster anything close to that effect.

Q: Can a maskless Toa use a Nova Blast?
A: Yes, but it would be a lot weaker.

Q: Can Turaga create Nova Blasts?
A: No.

Q: I was curious, do Turaga posses some lesser form of the Nova Blast?
A: Not something that would be significant enough to attempt.

…

Now onto the masks. As I said I agree that noble vs great is 3X difference. The precise differences between effects of great and noble versions of a mask depend on a specific Kanohi, but we know they can differ in: 1) strength, 2) range, 3) duration, 4) additional effects. For most masks, we don’t have an exhaustive list of specific differences nor any quantification. But luckily, there is one mask, which has a detailed description of its powers The Mask of Conjuring. Thanks to its description we know that the only difference between great and noble is the duration, meaning 100% of the power difference can be atributed to that. And the difference is indeed 1/3 - 15 min. vs 5 min. duration.

This should make it fairly obvious that mask power and elemental power do not operate on the same scale.
You try to correlate the two, but it is not that straightforward. While it may be true that the great elemental mask gives you Toa level elemental power and noble Turaga level, the underlying mechanics are different than simply comparing Toa and Turaga’s inherent elemental ability.
The elemental powers by themselves make use of elemental energy, of which the users have a limited amount which is under constant slow recharge. They can convert it to their element and vice versa or use it to control the element.
Masks (all masks) on the other hand use their own Kanohi energy as power source for their effects. This energy source is finite and cannot be recharged ever. Despite this, we know it is incredibly large (much larger than elemental reserve of a Toa) because there are several masks which were being heavily used for over 101 001 years and they still do not show any signs of weakining. In case of elemental masks, this energy has to be either converted into elemental energy, or into the element directly in order to replicate the effects of real elemental powers - in other words it is indirect.
Note that the fact that these kinds of masks can’t let you absorb the element is also consistent with afformentioned information - elements are converted into elemental energy when absorbed and because masks cannot be recharged in any way, it is imposible for them to hold onto extra absorbed energy. Finally, things like minutiae of conversion rates and ratios between Kanohi energy and elemental energy are simply information we do not have, so we cannot just assume equality. In conclusion, mask power levels and elemental power levels are on two separate scales and cannot be used interchangeably to extrapolate each other’s values.

This analysis focuses on only one of these scales, the elemental one.

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And I could say the exact same for my conclusion. Regardless of Greg quotes, it’s just as consistent with the actual story.

First off, you’ve misunderstood me. I never said the difference, for Great/Noble masks or otherwise, is definitively 1/3. I said it must be either 1/2 or 1/3 based on my analysis of Sentrakh, and personally, I would lean towards 1/2 as being the more likely, based on the two Greg quotes that support it.

There isn’t much info on Turaga Nui to say anything definitive, but I think it can be reasonably assumed to be comparable to other fusions, like Toa Kaita. The BS01 page on Toa Kaita says it “combines and amplifies all attributes of the three component Toa” and “also possesses greater elemental power than its three component Toa” This paragraph only has a single citation at the end of it, and it says nothing about this. From a quick search through the Greg Archive and BEU, I was not able to find confirmation of this. It may be there somewhere, but until we know for certain, it shouldn’t be referenced as a given.

I mention this because your conclusion requires that a Turaga Nui’s elemental power level stacks, when I doubt that it does. I had always thought that Kaita or Nuis simply have access to multiple elemental powers, but still at the same level an individual Toa/Turaga would for a single element.

This quote is ambiguous, referring only to “strength.” Is this only physical strength? To steelman your argument, you should have used this one. However, I’m still not convinced.

To be hypercritical, this apparently contradicts the quote you cited just above it. If we’re to take “halved” literally, I wouldn’t necessarily call half “a lot.” Either way, it doesn’t necessarily contradict the third quote (which I will explain further down).

These two quotes directly contradict eachother. One says Turaga cannot perform a Nova Blast, while the other says they technically can, but it wouldn’t be worth the effort (and there’s another OGD quote and a CwGF quote that support the first). You might think I’m splitting hairs, but what I think is important is the reason why Greg said no in the first one, which he doesn’t explain. If it is because Turaga, regardless of power level, are physically unable to perform a Nova Blast, then it is irrelevant to this discussion.

Even if the later quote is to be favored, it only says it wouldn’t be powerful enough to attempt. Perhaps that is still true when only halved, and thus there is no contradiction with Turaga having half the power of Toa. Considering what we know about Nova Blasts, even half would still be intense, but we have to remember the toll it takes on the user. It may not be worth it.

The Mask of Conjuring was a fan created mask, and the detail about the duration was not included in the original canonization. Although Greg did let Bonesiii (who created the mask) answer questions about how it works, his description contradicts Greg on the general difference between Great and Noble Kanohi. It’s dubious, at best.

Maybe I just misunderstood you here, but by suggesting that elemental masks can’t absorb because that would effectively recharge them, you’re indirectly suggesting that absorbing recharges a Toa’s elemental energy, when that’s definitely not how it works.

Could a Toa quickly absorb their element if they are out of it, and then quickly release it?
No, because the ability to do that is part of their elemental power. If they have no elemental power left, they can’t do that.

If that’s not what you meant, then why does that have to be the case for masks (to clarify, I’m not suggesting that elementals possibly could absorb, but rather objecting to your reason for why they can’t)?

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I think here that Greg answered that way because it’s really the same question repeated twice. Any elemental attack would count as a “lesser form of a Nova Blast”, so really all Greg is saying here is that Turaga don’t have enough elemental control or power to do anything close to a Nova Blast. Sorry if this is off topic, but I think this quote is rather unhelpful here due to its ambiguity.

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No, it wouldn’t. First, that would suggest Turaga are incapable of any kind of elemental attack, which is seriously doubtful. Second, a Nova Blast isn’t just some powerful attack. It is the release of all your elemental energy at once, and therefore can’t really be controlled, and again, I seriously doubt that Turaga have that little control, where they can’t do anything with their element besides that.

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I don’t see how that could be true. The way Turaga are portrayed is definitely not as being 1/3 or 1/2 of Toa’s power. The gap is vast and Greg describes it as such.

Ultimately it does not matter if it is 1/2 or 1/3, because neither of those are possible for Turaga level elemental control as I explained.

Well, the disbelief of the stacking of power is just an opinion for which you provided no basis. Even ignoring the obvious fact that it wouldn’t really make any sense for the fusion not to have more elemental power than its individual components, we have plenty of confirmations that natural fusions work that way:
2022-03-13 00_19_29-2001-09-18.jpg (Obrázok JPEG, 774×1004 bodov)

2022-12-30 21_13_10-2002-09-04.jpg (Obrázok JPEG, 2500×3145 bodov) — Mozilla Firefox
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“Combine their powers”, “Merge their bodies and minds” - this logically means that any energies contained in those bodies have to end up in the resulting body. The Bohrok-Kal Kaita provides proof of the amplification effect. And there is more of course:

Q: You said that if 6 Toa joined together, they would have Mata Nui level power. Does each Toa then have about 1/6 as much power as Mata Nui, or do their powers amplify each other when they join?
A: Amplify. But it doesn’t matter, because I doubt it will ever happen, at least anytime soon.

Q: When the Toa Mata became kita they had gold masks which had all powers, so why would the kaita masks only have 3 Powers? Is is this a downside to a kaitia?
A: Question of balance. You had three Toa merged together, so three times the elemental power. Give them all six mask powers too, and you have a character who is out of balance with the rest of the story. Would you really need two kaita in that case? Wouldn’t one have been enough to beat the Manas with three elemental powers and six mask powers?

Q: Can Makuta fuse together like Toa or Matoran or would their individual minds be lost when the two different Antidermis’s went together?
A: I don’t think they would ever do it – possibly they could, but they never would be willing to give up their individuality
Q2: On four, would they be more powerful if they did or would they just have more antidermis and would they be able to seperate the antidermis?
A2: They probably would be more powerful, just as Kaita are more powerful than individual Toa.

Tale of the Toa chapter 13:
Lewa was the first to speak. “Well,” he said, stretching and bending. “That was a powerfeeling that you don’t get every day.” Laughter bubbled from Gali like a spring. “Brothers,” she cried, stretching her arms wide. “We did it! We became part of something larger - and did what we never could have done otherwise.”

…and I could go on and on with examples - both from published content and Greg quotes.

So the way natural fusions work is they are more than just a sum of their components. It could be mathematically described with following equation:
Fusion equation

…or in other words the resulting power of the fusion (F) is the sum of the power of all its components (E) multiplied by an unknown factor of amplification (a).

So yes, natural fusions absolutely do have all of the power of their component beings combined, and in fact even more than that. And that is how they were handled during the entire run of G1.

So once again, in case of Turaga Nui which is comprised of 6 Turaga, the amount of elemental power is that of the six Turaga added together and amplified further by an unknown (but greater than 1) number - and yet it still isn’t equal to the elemental power of a single Toa. Meaning a single Turaga does not even have 1/6 of said power.
Therefore Turaga having 1/2 or 1/3 of a Toa’s worth of power is impossible.

So your interpretation which is indirectly extrapolated through 2 extra layers of unrelated information (disks→masks→elemental power) is not consistent with the story.
Meanwhile, my analysis which deals with information directly relevant to the topic, does not having this problem, making it much more credible.

…
PS:
I could adress the rest of the stuff from the reply, but I don’t think it’s necessary as what I said here is sufficient to show that 1/2 or 1/3 Turaga power is an impossibility.

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You’ve provided no references from actual story material to make this claim, only Greg quotes. While they’re canon, I meant the books, serials, etc. As far as I know, none of the Turaga really ever use their elemental powers, so the story is totally silent on the matter, hence why I said my conclusion is just as consistent with it as yours.

Do you not understand how proof works? I literally said I was not able to find confirmation of that being the case. You’re the one saying it stacks. The burden of proof is on you, not me.

How is that obvious? In fact, if we’re to apply “earth physics” (I know Greg says it doesn’t apply, unless he says it does; it’s applied loosely), then you obviously can’t get more out than what you put in.

Okay, I think I see the problem, you’ve again misunderstood me. I am not at all contesting that the combined power of the three Toa are present in the Kaita. It certainly is. But as I said just above, what I’m doubtful on is that Kaita’s contain more than the sum of their parts.

None of these confirm that Kaita have more elemental power than the sum of their parts. The last one does say “even greater strength and range,” but no mention of elemental power.

I’m not going to argue this, because I have no idea where this equation is from or what it’s context is, but frankly it doesn’t matter, because Greg outright says you’re wrong.

1b: If so, would a Turaga Kaita have heightened elemental powers?
1b) No.

EDIT: I think there may be confusion in what I’m actually trying to argue on the Turaga Nui point. Your argument is that because Turaga Nui is made of 6 Turaga, and their elemental power is still less than a single Toa’s, a Turaga’s elemental power cannot be 1/2 of a Toa’s. From what you’ve suggested, I think you’re looking at this in terms of pure elemental energy, regardless of what elements are in the fusion. If that were the case, you’d be right, but I don’t think it is. Based on the above quote, Turaga Kaita (and presumably Turaga Nui as well) would have control over 3 (or 6) elements, but their control over a single element is still only as powerful as a single Turaga’s. In the quote you brought up that compares Turaga Nui to Toa in power level, I think Greg is comparing them on individual elements, not total elemental energy.

EDIT2:

Did you edit your answer? I didn’t see these when I initially made my response.

For the first quote, I’m hesitant to accept it at face value, because ultimately it’s a hypothetical about Toa Nui, which Greg has confirmed is an impossibility.

For the second one, I think Greg was just saying the same thing I did in my first edit. Control over 3 elemental powers, but each is still only as powerful as a single Toa, not that each element is now 3 times as powerful.

The third and fourth quotes are ambiguous because they don’t mention elemental power specifically.

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I don’t even have to say anything here. You agree Greg quotes matter and I provided many. 1/2 and 1/3 are not consistent with Greg’s view. On the story side the fact that Turaga don’t show much elemntal feats is evidence in itself - if they were as powerful as you claim, there would be much less need for a Toa.

Not true. You are the one putting forward personal headcanon that differs from the default. Published story, Greg quotes and narrative (and most importantly simple logic) as a whole clearly show Kaita are component beings added together and then some. It is a power up. What you claim is that an individual Toa’s power is reduced 3-fold when entering the fusion to somehow add up to just 100% of a single Toa rather than 300%.

This has nothing to do with earth physics. When you have three glasses of differently flavored soda and you pour them into a single glass, yes the resulting soda will be a mix of all three flavors - but it will also have the combined volume of the previous glasses. Kaita fusions combine the bodies, minds, energies etc. off three component bodies - so any amount of energy contained within them ends up in a single body.

If you don’t doubt it then what is the problem? I provided proof of amplification (extra comments later), but the thing is I don’t even need any amplification to proove the original point. If you agree that a fusion is the sum of its components, than Turaga Nui contains all the elemental power of the component Turaga. Greg said Turaga Nui still does not reach the elemental power of a single Toa. Therefore a single Turaga does not even posses 1/6 of Toa’s elemental power. This means Turaga having 1/2 or even 1/3 is impossible. Any amplification effect would merely proove my point even more by removing Turaga further from the highest possible fraction.

Yes they do: “But the Bohrok-Kal are able to combine their forms and powers as well creating two powerful Bohrok-Kal Kaita. Each Bohrok has the powers of its three original forms, but with even greater strength and range.”

This necessarily inlcudes their elemental powers. And you already agree that fusions contain the combined powers of their components, so you shouldn’t even need this part to begin with.

One or two outlier quotes against a sea of otherwise consistent statements (which also agree with the published material) does not invalidate the majority. Greg was just wrong as he sometimes is. This cannot be true because it is in contradiction with his previous answers, later answers and the pre-established rules on how fusions work. Again, evaluating the quality of evidence and choosing the right one is important. If I took every stray quote as a given then I would have to believe Turaga Nui does not even exist:

Greg: First off, there is no such thing as a Toa Nui. As for a Turaga Nui, we have never shown one because I do not believe we ever did a combo model of all six Turaga.

But vast majority of other Greg’s answers about it, as well as published material and the physical set say otherwise. Same case here.

Yes, that is what I’m saying.

Why? You agreed that fusions have at least the sum of their components energies. It cannot not be true - it’s just basic math. “I don’t think it is.”, implies that you believe the overall power gets reduced somehow.

I didn’t edit anything. Toa Nui may be impossible due to technical limitations of Toa physiology, but the mechanisms of fusion are confirmed regardless. And Toa Kaita and Turaga Nui are possible, so it still applies.

It says three times the elemental power. They would have at least three times because it’s a body comprised of three Toa.

Why is that a necessity? If a statement is general it talks about all the aspects including elemental energy. Also, in the Kaita battle all of the Toa were present and we know they can and do combine their elements while working as a team of separate Toa, so they could have easily done that. If what you are suggesting were true and Kaita did not get any benefit other than being two bodies instead of six, this statement by Gali wouldn’t make any sense:

Also this:

Q: What would happen if a Toa Kaita did a Nuva Blast? Are they even able to?
A: It would be a lot larger.

If your assertion about Kaita having no more elemental power than a single Toa were true, Kaita’s Nova would need to be the same size as normal Toa.

PS: I provided multiple explicit sources stating or demonstrating how the fusion’s power is amplified and you used it to edit the BS01 Kaita page to be less accurate??

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They matter when they’re canon. Not everything Greg has ever said is canon, because he either contradicts himself, or is ambiguous, etc. But my emphasis on published material is because it ranks higher than anything Greg has said online. I don’t know what your standard is, but mine is the Tiers of Canonicity.

You’ve failed to demonstrate the “and then some” part.

No? Not at all. Again, you’re thinking about this in terms of pure elemental energy only, as if, say, Pohatu’s elemental energy, can be converted by Akamai and used to make Fire. From how I understand the sources given in this conversation, that’s not what happens.

You’re preaching to the choir. I’ve already said Kaita’s have the combined power of three Toa. You’re saying Kaita have more than that.

I feel like you’re just talking past me at this point. You’re completely ignoring my actual argument and just knocking down a strawman. I’ve said multiple times already that Kaita and other fusions do in fact have the combined power of their component beings. What I disagree with is that they have more than that.

You’ve provided no objective metric by which to determine which Greg quotes are accurate and which are not. This so called “majority” isn’t as strong as you keep making it seem.

Then show me these other Greg quotes where Greg answers the same question, whether a Turaga Kaita would have heightened elemental powers compared to 3 individual Turaga? There are none. These other Greg quotes you say talk about it are really only interpolated based on your interpretation of them.

If you believe that my edits to BS01 are truly inaccurate, you’re welcome to bring this up on the appropriate talk pages. The Toa Kaita page originally had no citations on this matter whatsoever, and when I tried to find sources for it, I found none that explicitly confirm it, but some that suggest quite the opposite. The sources you’ve provided to try and say otherwise are ultimately not sufficient.

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So the question at hand is:

Tahu unleashes the biggest blast of fire he can muster. Then he fuses with Potato and Onua to make Akamai, who also unleashes a blast of only fire. Is this blast bigger or more powerful than what Tahu himself can do?

I think the Nui Stone suggests that the answer is yes. Tuyet can do feats no other Toa of Water can, because she has more Toa power. A Kaita has the Toa power of three Toa. This fits with things Greg and the story have said about Kaita being stronger than 3 Toa.

But would the same apply to a Turaga kaita/Nui? It’s hard to say, because there’s so little information on Turaga power, but it doesn’t seem to be the result of Toa Power. It’s very possible that whatever power Vakama uses to make fire can only make fire,. Therefore, if Vakama makes a fire, then merges with Onewa and Whenua to make Unnamed Turaga Kaita and UTK makes a fire, it would be just as strong. It also means that neither Vakama nor UTK can make a fire as strong as Tahu. This lines up with both Greg quotes: a Turaga Nui has less elemental power than a Toa, and doesn’t have more elemental power than a Turaga.

As for the topic at hand: how strong is a Turaga compare to a Toa? We have three contradictory data:

  1. Turaga are significantly weaker than Toa, with Greg saying 500x at one point and 4%-5% another.
  2. A noble mask of fire is half as strong as a Toa of fire.
  3. Noble elemental masks give their users Turaga level control.

One of these has to be wrong. 1 has numerous Greg quotes backing it up, even if the numbers don’t line up exactly, Greg is consistent that the gap is big. 2 also has multiple quotes backing it up, saying that Noble masks are half as strong as great masks, and it fits what we see noble masks and great masks do in the story. 3 is the weakest, having only one quote, the most recent one at that.

Side note: @ToaKebaka it would help if you link the quotes you use, as it’s nice to see when Greg said these things.

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This is a great explanation. Unfortunately, there’s still not much to definitively say it’s canon or not, but it makes sense to me.

Without quantifying how much “big” is, this is meaningless information, so the fact that the quotes don’t agree on the exact number is crucial.

To be honest, I don’t understand this logic that seems to be rather common. Just because Greg said something once and/or later doesn’t make it weaker. This should only matter when he contradicts himself. On points 2 and 3, Greg never contradicted himself. He has only contradicted himself (and majorly so) on point 1, so I would argue it is the weaker of the three.

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The logic is that the later an answer is, the more likely it is he forgot something, and Greg’s own statement that if he contradicts himself, the first answer is usually correct.

Look at it this way:

We’ve got
one saying they’re 20-25 times stronger
one saying they’re about 4 times stronger, probably more(as I doubt Greg did the math on the scale)
one saying they’re 500 times stronger
one series of quotes that together say they’re twice as strong
We also have several quotes with the bonfire-candle/torch analogy.
Also, we have statements like Turaga can’t do a Nova blast, and Turaga Nuva would still be weaker than Toa.

Of these, only the 2x stronger is a series of quotes, so more likely to be an unintentional contradiction. All other answers either directly say or imply the difference is far more than 2x.

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