Medullah posted:

Are there any actual gun model Megatron versions around that are any good? I know they changed to the tank for good reasons but it's an empty spot in my nostalgia cabinet

Edit - 3rd party is fine, of course

OneSizeFitsAll posted:

Hi thread! I sure do love Transformers. Haven't bought any in a while, but my birthday and Christmas are coming and why not. Could do with a bit of help focusing from others more knowledgeable, though! I'm mainly interested in the Masterpiece line, and every so often will remember this and check what's been released lately. However, I also bought a Kingdom Core Starscream a while back on impulse when in a toy shop, as it was adorable, and identifiably G1. I love how cool the transformation is despite the small size. I tried researching the line to buy more, but it's quite confusing as to what toys remain at small scale to look good beside Starscream. Ithink it may be specifically the War for Cybertron trilogy stuff but I'm not certain, even from the Wiki.

So, a few questions, if I may tap into your collective knowledge/garner a couple of opinions:


3. I see there are new MP seekers available. I always liked my MP 11 Starscream, Skywarp and Thrust, but these new ones do look great in robot mode. Not sure I like how smooth they are, but the overall shape is undeniably very nice, particularly for fans of the old animated film. Any goon thoughts on these new models and their quality control? More than a few people on TFW2005 have had issues, but hard to know percentages, particularly when reading comments of early purchasers. Is there likely to be a reissue, or if I want one should I make sure I get one now? Part of me is tempted to get all 3 seekers in the new mould; part of me thinks it would be ridiculous.
4. Is there a ghost of a chance of a reissue of MP 44? I held off due to the large number of QC complaints, and the fact that I really like MP 10, but am regretting it a touch now. If not, where is the best place to source one in the UK without selling my children?
5. Any opinions on MP Inferno/Grapple?

xZAOx posted:

Someone earlier said MP collecting was a "dead-end", and I just can't disagree enough. Although, I really do recommend adding in 3P stuff. You'll double, if not triple, the amount of G1 friends to add to your shelf. If you're interested in some starters, let me know. Or I could drop some pictures. TFW2005 has a great pinned post too on 3P substitutions per-character per-season with links and poo poo.

xZAOx posted:

Someone earlier said MP collecting was a "dead-end", and I just can't disagree enough. Although, I really do recommend adding in 3P stuff. You'll double, if not triple, the amount of G1 friends to add to your shelf. If you're interested in some starters, let me know. Or I could drop some pictures. TFW2005 has a great pinned post too on 3P substitutions per-character per-season with links and poo poo.

xZAOx posted:

- Skids - This one doesn't really fit in. Skids was hardly even in the cartoon, so this is based more off the toy. It feels like a better CHUG figure, than a MP to me.

CAPT. Rainbowbeard posted:

Maketoys Despotron is extremely good, I like him better than MP-36. X-Transbots Apollyon is also pretty neat, but there is a scary spindly hinge involved in transformation. It's mostly there so that there is no partsforming, but this way you get the added stress of worrying if the long spindly bit will break when you transform it this time.

3. The quality control issues really came to a head with Hound, who I am kind of afraid to turn back into a jeep. That soured a lot of folks on the MP quality control, for good reason. At that price point? Come on, these things better have excellent QC. I do have the new Seekers, and mine are all pretty good quality-wise. The wings needed a little massaging to tab in properly, they basically turn inside-out for transformation.

4. It was like five hundred dollars new, that's one hell of a niche. What I did was get a knockoff that has considerably less paint overall but is still colored properly from Bababobo for about $100. That model apparently has "fixed" knees... but it just looks like someone clipped the offending tabs on his inner knee. Works fine though, didn't come with any of the Diaclone-esque figures, trailer, or Roller. An acceptable compromise for me.

5. It's good.

xZAOx posted:

I'm a big MP (and 3P MP) collector.

For mainline stuff, I think everyone else has it covered, but the TLDR is - there are overall lines that last a couple of years. Those lines will have all kinds of various size classes (with associated price point).

Collectively, the stuff not based on the Bay movies or whatever the current cartoon is (although the recent Netflix shows got Generations releases), is referred to as "Generations", or sometimes "CHUG". This is the line that's basically "here's the vintage toy but updated" these days.

The recent toylines to fall under this are - Combiner Wars, Titans Returns, Power of the Primes, Siege, Earthrise, Kingdom, and now Legacy.

There's not a "core / small" line. Sometimes that size class is called Legends. All the lines above have the little dudes in it. Sometimes the "in scale-ish" small guys get releases here, but this size class also has no problem ignoring scale, to give you some of the big hitters like Starscream or Megatron or Prime or whatever. Once you get to Deluxe / Voyager / Leader / Titan, they try to be scaled more like you'd expect, and all those size classes work together.

The TFWiki that The_Doctor linked above is your best friend! Use it!

But turning to MP - really I think all of the Takara releases are good. Some better than others, some have QC issues, but they all look great together. Here's my thoughts on some you don't have:

- Prowl / Streak / Smokescreen - these are great releases. They're also cheap because they've been KO'd a bunch. So be careful if you're buying on eBay and it's from China. They also have "anime" colored versions that I prefer.
- Ultra Magnus - I love the transformation on this guy. He's pretty old, but I'd still recommend him. 3P is about to put out some new versions of him.
- Tracks isn't as bad as people say. Fun toy.
- Star Saber - We don't hit Japanese exclusive stuff often, so this is my jam. Simple, fun, great looking toy.
- Grapple / Inferno - This is one of those toys with "masterpiece moments". It was the first one to incorporate the ladder and hide it away. Pretty stellar.
- Wheeljack - great toy, although the wings still scare me, heh. Love the "anime" color version.
- Prime (MP-44) - It has some issues, but overall, I extremely love this release. So much stuff, the trailer is huge and has a ton of options and display / play value. Not everyone's cup of tea though. Long transformation, but intuitive. Kind of on MP Megatron (mp-36) level.
- Hound - Awesome sculpt, wonderful transformation. Unfortunately, one of the more notorious poor QC. The plastic likes to crack. Lots of KOs of this one around too, so beware (or get the KO so you don't cry if it breaks).
- The new Seekers - I think they're great. No waist swivel is weird. But, as you can tell, I love the anime / cartoon accurate looks. Really expressive, first toy to hide the tail wings and stuff into the transformation (although Deformation Space ended up coming out around the same time, or even slightly before, and did this too)

These you could pass on, for my tastes:
- Arcee - I hate this toy. Great car mode. But I think the robot mode is soooo far off animation model. The biggest common gripe is that her chest looks really screwy, but for me, it's just about everything in robot mode. Gross.
- Skids - This one doesn't really fit in. Skids was hardly even in the cartoon, so this is based more off the toy. It feels like a better CHUG figure, than a MP to me.

Someone earlier said MP collecting was a "dead-end", and I just can't disagree enough. Although, I really do recommend adding in 3P stuff. You'll double, if not triple, the amount of G1 friends to add to your shelf. If you're interested in some starters, let me know. Or I could drop some pictures. TFW2005 has a great pinned post too on 3P substitutions per-character per-season with links and poo poo.

I'm guessing you don't care about Beast Wars. That MP line is astounding too. Even has a few 3P contributions too now.

quote:

Someone earlier said MP collecting was a "dead-end", and I just can't disagree enough. Although, I really do recommend adding in 3P stuff. You'll double, if not triple, the amount of G1 friends to add to your shelf. If you're interested in some starters, let me know. Or I could drop some pictures. TFW2005 has a great pinned post too on 3P substitutions per-character per-season with links and poo poo.

I'm guessing you don't care about Beast Wars. That MP line is astounding too. Even has a few 3P contributions too now.

Dabir posted:

For shrunken down big guys, the big four Decepticons are all available and all good, plus Starscream has been repainted as Skywarp and will be repainted as Thundercracker. Megatron is the weakest, but he's still fine, just has little things like how he can't point his fusion cannon directly forwards. There's a G2 repaint of him too. As Autobots go, you've got a very good Optimus and Ratchet (with Ironhide inevitably on the way) a tragic Hot Rod and a not great Bumblebee that's way overpriced because it comes with a half sucked jelly baby they're passing off as Spike Witwicky in an exo-suit. There's also a full size Core-class Spike Witwicky in exo-suit, but it's hopelessly out of scale with just about everything.

Oh yeah, the other current line is Studio Series. Studio Series hits the same price points as the main lines, but they're movie-based toys designed to be as screen accurate as possible for the price. The relevant subset for you is Studio Series '86, which is stuff based on the G1 movie (even characters that got about ten seconds of screen time). Core Ratchet and Spike are from SS86.

They also have a kind of super-subline that I don't understand at all floating around called Buzzworthy Bumblebee, which seems to sort of latch on to other toylines and implant a Bumblebee in them. Or one of Bumblebee's friends. Or a character that has nothing to do with Bumblebee. And sometimes it's a standalone thing. The not great Core-class Bumblebee with sucked jelly baby Spike are Buzzworthy Bumblebee.

The_Doctor posted:

Sentinel Red posted:

With the sole exception of the upcoming 'lab Victory Saber (and I guess Deathsaurus later too), I only do MPs these days. I'm just not interested in the cheap looking, hollow and unpainted product that makes up the mainline stuff of late, it's not my cup of char at all. Would agree there have been a few missteps the last few years though (Arcee, Crumbling Hound, that revolting from all but one angle Bumblebee) but hopefully Trailbreaker will be more on the Inferno/Sunstreaker side of things.

OneSizeFitsAll posted:

and what the hell do I do with the old ones, considering I cannot be bothered to sell them.

OneSizeFitsAll posted:

but I have quite a few hobbies and interests, as well as responsibilities, and only so much display space, so I can't get sucked too far into this hobby. As someone who grew up in the 80s who now has disposable income, just give me the expensive rear end, complex G1 MP toys for my man cave, and maybe a couple of the tiny Core figures for my desk.

Anora posted:

I miss when leaders were bigger then Voyagers, it's sad that TR Blitzwing is a head larger then Legacy Blitzwing.

Medullah posted:

Are there any actual gun model Megatron versions around that are any good? I know they changed to the tank for good reasons but it's an empty spot in my nostalgia cabinet

Edit - 3rd party is fine, of course

Anora posted:

I miss when leaders were bigger then Voyagers, it's sad that TR Blitzwing is a head larger then Legacy Blitzwing.

Nodosaur posted:

I can’t collect MPs because they’re too expensive. They also have a very dissatisfying range of characters available. If you want a new toy of someone like Bomb-Burst or Hot Shot, MP and 3rd parties aren’t going to give it to you. It’s just those first few years of characters, over and over again.

OneSizeFitsAll posted:

So Core-class, Leader-cass, Voyager-class are scale designations? With Core the smallest?

Good Listener posted:

Paul Autoblart: Mall Cop

Joe Fisto posted:

Ladies and Gentlemen, AARNHIIDE

DoctorWhat posted:

Hot tip! If you carve through 86 Ironhide's diaper flap with a hobby knife along the sculpted lines, it instantly becomes way less obnoxious with no evident downside. My guess was that it's a dummied-out feature that didn't pass drop testing.

Knormal posted:

Carve through where, to do what? Disclamer if it's obvious in hand: I don't have the figure yet.

Dabir posted:

If you cut through the sculpted lines on either side of the center of his crotch plate, it becomes three separate perfectly secure pieces, so you don't have to lift the entire flap to accommodate moving just one of his hips.

Joe Fisto posted:

Excellent tips!

I don’t know how mobile Ironhide needs to be. Most bots from space Texas walk straight legged all the time.

Moai Ou posted:

Got some bots in today that I forgot I preordered!















The color schemes really make them feel like completely different toys. It's nice to finally have a screen-accurate Alpha Trion. Between these, Jhiaxus, Star Saber and now Deathsaurus, this has been a great year for a lot of my dream figures.

Vector Sigma is just a hollow plastic ball, but it's a nice accessory. The key can't really be held though, so you kinda have to wedge it in Trion's hand and hope for the best. And a word of warning DO NOT wedge it all the way into Vector Sigma. The fit is very tight and I had a hell of a time trying to get it back out without breaking it. Where I have it in the above picture is about the safe limit.

Dabir posted:

If you cut through the sculpted lines on either side of the center of his crotch plate, it becomes three separate perfectly secure pieces, so you don't have to lift the entire flap to accommodate moving just one of his hips.

Anora posted:

I miss when leaders were bigger then Voyagers, it's sad that TR Blitzwing is a head larger then Legacy Blitzwing.