Hypothetical - Factions Re-Imagined

[Dan]

Paulbot

Those 35 years of conditioning are difficult to get passed, but we all seem to be doing a pretty good job of it.

Your system is pretty comprehensive. It’s also interesting that some of your new Decepticons, like Ironhide and Brawn, had a tendency to act like bastards, even as Autobots.

An evil VW beetle character might work better if it were given a different colour. Something like purple with pink ‘go-faster’ flames. Bumber could always be the cute yellow character.

FatalityPitt

I like the underdog aspect of Autobots. Even now I try to get aircraft Decepticons that are bigger than car Autobots, but it’s quite difficult to do with the Generations line.

I’d agree to a Nazi-made handgun as being evil, but what if that gun has Man From UNCLE extensions?

I always found Windcharger underwhelming, but it’s amazing what a cool personality can do for a toy, and having him as the POV character might have been interesting.

I like the idea of Prowl as an Autobot leader, and having a ‘crooked cop’ off-sider is inspired. Mind you, I’ve sometimes thought of Inferno as an alternative leader figure. Firefighters are pillars of the community and heroic by definition, and there’s something appealing for kids about those big red engines.

I could totally see the Battle Convey toy as the ‘non-leader but last line of defence’ character, more like a ‘Little John’ than a ‘Robin Hood’. You could also give the Powered Convey that role, or even make it the same character who can simply choose between two different trailers.

Metroplex as a neutral force fits nicely with the toy having attachment points for the various Scramble City leaders. You could even have all those teams as his minions. Another variation on the idea would be for the citadel to be the objective of conflict for both sides, like a kind of Castle Greyskull.

Also, I more generally like the idea of a third faction. This slides into the ‘non-transforming Transformer’ problem, but if they’d made a few Quintesson toys, they could then have assigned the Sharkticon to that faction, made an Alicon toy, and even aligned the Predacons and Terrorcons with them, given that both teams were seen working with the Quintessons now-and-then.

GoktimusPrime

I had been wondering if there was a meaning behind Destron, as I was looking for something to call an evil faction, who were not remotely into deception but rather open conquest.

I guess my youthful impression of the cartoon Autobot-Decepticon divide was like the scenario of an historically legitimate civil authority supplanted by a military junta. However, one day I might have to delve into the far more mature story-telling of the various comics, which really seem to do justice to the complexity of power and ethics.

Also, I should acknowledge that SWAT services have their place, and the Rook toy itself looks like a nice design.

Somehow the Auto-Scout made a big impression on me. I understand there is a third-party toy of it, which looks cool. I agree that just two alt-modes is usually a pathetic thing, but more forgivable in a mere accessory.

The huge disparity in faction numbers has always bothered me and, in what may be an overly fussy way, I’ve done my best to keep my sides even. I tend to wait till I can see both an Autobot and a Decepticon in shops that I like, and maybe look like they could take each other on, before I buy. This has slowed the growth of my collection over the years, and I’ve only started to relax this standard recently.

As for Velociraptors, I'm just impressed how a movie took one or more obscure dinosaurs and made them a household name.

[FatalityPitt]

I always found Windcharger underwhelming, but it’s amazing what a cool personality can do for a toy, and having him as the POV character might have been interesting.

I think another reason I picked Windcharger was because he was cheap. Maybe it's my inner socialist talking, but I always felt that the main character in a toy line should be a character that any kid (or their parents) can afford. Also, I don't think G1 ever established a POV character that had a toy. Spike Witwicky was the closest they had to such a character, but he only got represented in toy-form in 1987, and he was a component of the Fortress Maximus toy (a very VERY expensive toy back in the day).

I think the problem with Optimus Prime back in the day was that even though he was the main hero of the franchise (I can't think of anyone else), he was a very expensive toy that few can afford. A lot of kids I knew who played with Transformers who didn't have Optimus Prime would pick a random Autobot they owned (say Inferno for example) and assign him as the main protagonist and defacto leader. Later on there were other cheaper Autobot toys, like Rapido, who had the role of Autobot Commander, but they weren't as well-known as Optimus.

I think one of the cool things about the Legion class (formerly Legends class) toys was that they were smaller and cheaper representations of popular characters. It meant that any kid could now buy Optimus Primes and Megatrons without needing to save their pocket money for a whole year.

Metroplex as a neutral force fits nicely with the toy having attachment points for the various Scramble City leaders. You could even have all those teams as his minions. Another variation on the idea would be for the citadel to be the objective of conflict for both sides, like a kind of Castle Greyskull.

Also, I more generally like the idea of a third faction. This slides into the ‘non-transforming Transformer’ problem, but if they’d made a few Quintesson toys, they could then have assigned the Sharkticon to that faction, made an Alicon toy, and even aligned the Predacons and Terrorcons with them, given that both teams were seen working with the Quintessons now-and-then.

When I was a kid, I always wondered who was the ruler (or highest authority figure) on Cybertron in the G1 lore. Even though Optimus Prime and Megatron were the commanders of their respective factions, I couldn't imagine either of them as rulers. They're both very combative and hands-on (for a lack of better terms). I think to fulfil that role, it'd have to be someone (or something) that is not only very powerful, but someone who thinks of "good and evil" as a trivial notion and only cares about the survival and prosperity of the whole Transformer species. Sunbow and Marvel Comics eventually expanded the G1 lore, and the role described above was eventually filled by Vector Sigma or Primus. But I think if we were to represent the Transformer king as a toy, it would have to be a toy that transformed into something big and majestic, like a building or monument. Definitely not a truck or gun. Metroplex seems like a good candidate.

One thing I notice about Transformers is that they're always assigned factions (Autobots, Decepticons, Maximals and Predacons). I don't think I've ever seen a factionless Transformer. I don't think there's been any lore that described the Junkions as Autobots, and yet all Wreck-Gar toys are always labelled as Autobots. Titans Return Gnaw is labelled as a Decepticon too, even though Gnaw's loyalties mainly lie with whoever feeds him regardless of their faction. I think if Hasbro created a third faction early on in the franchise to represent the factionless/neutral characters, probably the likes of Junkions, Sharkticons, Unicron and the Primes (Solus Prime, Alchemist Prime, Prima, etc) might be assigned to that faction.