BotCon 2014 Theme Confirmed - Pirates vs Knights

I can't wait for the combination of rage and excitement if these "Knights" are the Knights of Cybertron led by a MTMTE-inspired Dai Atlas.

Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

ScottyP wrote:I can't wait for the combination of rage and excitement if these "Knights" are the Knights of Cybertron led by a MTMTE-inspired Dai Atlas.

That would be interesting! what mold will Dai Atlas use? also who else was on his team of knights? can't remember..

That's outta left field. I'm very interested to see the toy reveals.

Bumblebee was "knighted" in Predacons Rising. There's still hope for BH decoes, right?

Right?

I don't care what theme is about lets see what toys look like impatiently waiting what knights look like pirates not so much

I'm sensing thiiiis moooold in the future...!



(because he has a hook for a hand. Like a pirate?)

I am now very interested. I cannot wait to see what figure are used.

Sounds pretty stupid to me. Almost as stupid as Shattered Glass. Maybe if the characters are G1 inspired I might buy the set. But alot of money has been saved by not going to Botcon.

knights could be exciting. if the designs are done half as nicely as that logo.

rpetras wrote:Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Didn't you ever make your Fisher Price Piratesvseige your Fisher Price Castle?

It's not so much of a theme as a guideline.









Also, Arrrrrgh!!!

Nemesis Maximo wrote:

rpetras wrote:Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Didn't you ever make your Fisher Price Piratesvseige your Fisher Price Castle?

I remember those Fisher Price sets! I didn't have them but it did get me thinking about Pirate vs. Knight battles.

I think they also made some Cowboy figures too. I would think the Cowboy is the natural enemy of the Ninja.

So these are Wings Universe Star Seekers. Wasn't expecting that.

Was actually expecting the Maraudicons instead.

Though, it should be pointed out that these are DIFFERENT Star Seekers from those led by Thundertron.

RiddlerJ wrote:

Nemesis Maximo wrote:

rpetras wrote:Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Didn't you ever make your Fisher Price Piratesvseige your Fisher Price Castle?

I remember those Fisher Price sets! I didn't have them but it did get me thinking about Pirate vs. Knight battles.

I think they also made some Cowboy figures too. I would think the Cowboy is the natural enemy of the Ninja.

"Great Adventures"! That was the Fisher Price toyline ya'll are speaking of, and it was awesome.

But then it evolved into/got replaced by Imaginext.

Sabrblade wrote:

RiddlerJ wrote:

Nemesis Maximo wrote:

rpetras wrote:Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Didn't you ever make your Fisher Price Piratesvseige your Fisher Price Castle?

I remember those Fisher Price sets! I didn't have them but it did get me thinking about Pirate vs. Knight battles.

I think they also made some Cowboy figures too. I would think the Cowboy is the natural enemy of the Ninja.

"Great Adventures"! That was the Fisher Price toyline ya'll are speaking of, and it was awesome.

But then it evolved into/got replaced by Imaginext.

Which could create the same themed battles, though they're not producing much pirate stuff right now, what with all the licenses they've acquired. Even their Dino-Riders are getting scaled back.

You could also do that with what Playmobil's selling, though their pirates were all ghosts or zombies for a while. And Lego had both, starting in the mid-'90s; only that line has also produced an abundance of blocky ninjas, though Imaginext might be starting to catch up.

Say, am I the only one here who contemplates the TF Kreo displays, but always buys Cityville instead? Lego townsfolk vs. zombies could've compelled me to collect whole cities back when I was 8.

But back on topic, given how easily TFs can resemble armored humans, "Knights" seems so open-ended that I can't narrow down in my head what molds are most likely. Melee weapons mandatory? Maybe it's just that I watched the Blind Dead Quadrilogy, but I can't get the image of Blackbeard's crew fighting revenant Templars out of my head.

Or, if FunPub's habit of dusting off JBW molds spills over into Botcon, maybe the knights ride around on the Thoroughbred Corps? I mean, this could be way to honor the Year of the Horse outside of Platinum editions, and they'd make as much sense any other troop-builder.

Let's see, sword-wielding figures from 2007 to today (minus molds the Club can't use) include:

Deluxe Animated Sentinel Prime
Deluxe Animated Samurai Prowl
Voyager Animated Grimlock
Leader Animated Megatron
Deluxe Animated Arcee
Deluxe Universe Dinobot
Voyager ROTF Bludgeon
Voyager ROTF Mindwipe
Deluxe Reveal the Shield (Laser) Optimus Prime
Deluxe Generations Cybertronian Bumblebee
Deluxe Generations Autobot Drift
Deluxe Generations Fall of Cybertron Ultra Magnus
Deluxe Generations Fall of Cybertron Air Raid
Voyager Generations Fall of Cybertron Grimlock
Voyager Generations Thrilling 30 Autobot Springer
Voyager Generations Thrilling 30 Blitzwing
Deluxe Generations GDO Autobot Springer
Voyager Prime First Edition Optimus Prime
Deluxe Prime Robots in Disguise Wheeljack
Deluxe Prime Robots in Disguise Ratchet
Voyager Prime Robots in Disguise Dreadwing
Voyager Prime Robots in Disguise Thundertron
Voyager Prime Beast Hunters Optimus Prime
Voyager Prime Beast Hunters Predaking
Voyager Prime Beast Hunters Sharkticon Megatron
Ultimate Prime Beast Hunters Beast Fire Predaking
Go! G01 Kenzan
Go! G02 Jinbu
Anyone armed with a sword-based Arms Micron


Speaking of which, sword-based and sword-like Arms Microns include:

R.A.
Gabu + Baru + Dai = Dark Matter Calibur
Wuji
Giza
L.P.
Bumblebee Sword
Arcee Blade
Wheeljack Kunai

\/\/#@+ +#3 |=^(|< ...

"“Alone Together”. The story will focus on Rampage and Transmutate in a whole new way, in a VERY different universe."


....


wat

Any chance the club might use Vector Prime? He was specifically designed to be "knightly".

Collector's Club: "In your face Roberts, we are going to show the Knights of Cybertron and you will be forced to use our mangled transformer designs instead of something original.

Seibertron wrote: \/\/#@+ +#3 |=^(|< ...

Why this reaction?

Fires_Of_Inferno wrote:"“Alone Together”. The story will focus on Rampage and Transmutate in a whole new way, in a VERY different universe."


....


wat

You didn't think those toys were going to represent the old cartoon versions of the characters, did you?

See here for more about what world they come from - http://www.seibertron.com/energonpub/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=95434

Nemesis Maximo wrote:Any chance the club might use Vector Prime? He was specifically designed to be "knightly".

He might be too old to use since, as of 2013, the Club stopped using Unicron Trilogy molds.

I can sooo see this mold in some way...


I've also seen digibashes of Silas Breakdown as Cannonball and it looks nice

RiddlerJ wrote:

Nemesis Maximo wrote:

rpetras wrote:Knights are NOT the natural enemy of the pirate, ninja are.

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? Didn't you ever make your Fisher Price Piratesvseige your Fisher Price Castle?

I remember those Fisher Price sets! I didn't have them but it did get me thinking about Pirate vs. Knight battles.

I think they also made some Cowboy figures too. I would think the Cowboy is the natural enemy of the Ninja.

Cowboys vs ninjas? That's just crazy talk!

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pirates-vs-ninjas


And my boys have quite a bit of Imaginext stuff, so yes, ninjas fight both pirates and knights, as well as dinosaurs, dragons, a big-ass troll & Batman quite a bit in our house.



But bringing the tugboat back to shore, this has the potential to be a cool set! I have skipped the last few botcon sets due to boring themes/characters, but I'm excited to see what is in this one.

I also expect something done with the Lockdown mold, and that works for me, I really like the mold, and the character. I'd kind of like to see the Generations Lockdown done in the Blazing Lockdown colors from the TFA set:

I think eventually we are going to start seeing Michael bay movie molds at botcon. All those molds from the last 3 movies are in some warehouse in china taking up a lot of real estate. By the time the bay dvds can be found in the $4.99 dvd box at Walmart, somebodys gonna wanna cash in on those molds. A phone call will be made to the movie company and a deal will be hashed out. They like extra cash too. And funpub is the only entity in the world that would have a use for those molds. So of course hasbro will milk them for the only client that wants them.

I'm hoping for a good selection of original Pirate and Knight characters.

We've had a few years where the bulk of the convention sets have been existing characters... and while I DO like getting a few of those peppered in (like a great Diaclone, G2, or SG scheme figure we can repurpose to a couple of dual-purpose places depending on what kind of fan we are... like red Tracks, G2 Thundercracker, etc.)…I'd look forward to getting one where at least half are original.

And I think the movie molds are probably at the bottom of the list for the Botcon choices, though they have worked in a couple in a pinch.

The demographic at conventions consists of loyal, long-time and serious fans — instead of the newbie, kid demographic the movies captured. I think the Botcon crew knows they will get more satisfied customers milking the Classics style molds.

Plus the movie molds have been saturated and repainted on the shelves. I think those bases are pretty covered.

gothsaurus wrote:And I think the movie molds are probably at the bottom of the list for the Botcon choices, though they have worked in a couple in a pinch.

The demographic at conventions consists of loyal, long-time and serious fans - instead of the newbie, kid demographic the movies captured. I think the Botcon crew knows they will get more satisfied customers milking the Classics style molds.

Plus the movie molds have been saturated and repainted on the shelves. I think those bases are pretty covered.

Almost half the molds from last BotCon were Movie-verse though, right? Obsidian was Powerdive I believe, and Thundercracker was made from the ROTF Dirge. And then the other ones who used that same mold.

The thing about the Movieverse molds is that they can't use any from the 2007 movie line, any based on onscreen move characters, or any that were designed by Paramount (as those are partly owned by Paramount). Thus, they can only use Movieverse molds that were fully Hasbro-made.

These are the "Deluxe-and-up" ones they can use:

ROTF
Deluxe:
Breakaway/Thrust/DOTM DA12 Air Raid
Blazemaster/Evac/2010 Tailwhip
Dirge/2010 Jetblade/Timelines "Machine Wars" Skywarp/Timelines "Machine Wars" Thundercracker
Lockdown/2010 Axor/Timelines Circuit
Brawn/Reveal the Shield Fallback

Voyager:
Stratosphere (maybe)
Bludgeon/2010 Banzaitron/Timelines "Classics" Gigatron
Mindwipe/2010 Strafe/Tokyo Toy Show Dreadwing

2010
Deluxe:
Hailstorm/Mindset
Terradive/DOTM Space Case/Timelines Depth Charge
Tomahawk/DOTM Vortex/Generations GDO Springer/Timelines "Classics" Spinister

Voyager:
Sea Spray/Deep Dive/Timelines "Shattered Glass" Octopunch
Highbrow/Generations GDO Powerdive/Timelines "Machine Wars" Obsidian

DOTM
Deluxe:
Air Raid (maybe)

Voyager:
Skyhammer/Timelines "Machine Wars" Sandstorm

Nemesis Maximo wrote:

gothsaurus wrote:And I think the movie molds are probably at the bottom of the list for the Botcon choices, though they have worked in a couple in a pinch.

The demographic at conventions consists of loyal, long-time and serious fans - instead of the newbie, kid demographic the movies captured. I think the Botcon crew knows they will get more satisfied customers milking the Classics style molds.

Plus the movie molds have been saturated and repainted on the shelves. I think those bases are pretty covered.

Almost half the molds from last BotCon were Movie-verse though, right? Obsidian was Powerdive I believe, and Thundercracker was made from the ROTF Dirge. And then the other ones who used that same mold.

The catch is that some of movie mold are directly based on Paramount designs, and others are in-house designs. Put bluntly, if a certain design was not featured in any of the movies, FunPub (and Hasbro for that matter) can freely use it. Examples have included:

RotF Bludgeon for Gigatron
HftD Sea Spray for SG Octopunch
HftD Tomahawk for Spinister
HftD Dirge for Skywarp & Thundercracker
HftD Highbrow for Obsidian
HftD Terradive for Starscream & Depth Charge
RotF Lockdown/HftD Axor for Circuit

By my count, I'm looking at 6 movie toys to 9 otherwise (Classics/Prime) featured last year. But I get your point. They did have three movie molds — Dirge, Highbrow and Terradive. That was a first.

While I liked the theme, I kinda cringed at the mixing of three toy lines. Styles are so different between the movie, prime, and classics toys. (I know they're at the mercy of what molds and characters are available.) But that said, in hindsight — and with the new head sculpts added — they pulled it off pretty well. It was a pretty unified looking set, and I think that the Prime mold (Megaplex) helped bridge the movie and classic aesthetic.

I thought Strika, Mirage and the Seeker Jets were the stars of the set though. There were some great homages — and I thought ALL of the new heads were knockouts. Glad to see there weren't any issues going from sketch to fruition. I'm also so glad they changed to a screen accurate color scheme on Obsidian. Huge props for listening to the fans on that, too.

It's hard creating a unified set/story, scrambling to find applicable molds, creating the perfect sculpts — and striving to please our very fickle, whiny, snarky fan base. I'd love to see the fans more educated on the difficulties behind the scenes (and how working with a large company ties your hands quite a lot) ... simply cut some slack to the Botcon crew. They do some deep research and throw a bone to a lot of factions... fans of Beast Wars, classics, G2, G1, UK, Diaclone, Action Masters, Beast Machine... and yes, even Machine Wars.

And let's face it. It's the only place we're going to see obscure homages and fan favorites come to light.

So my point. I'd love to see us all go into the convention season with an open mind. Let's see the bots first. Read the backstory. Celebrate 30 Years like it's a party... instead of a back alley skirmish.

gothsaurus wrote:And let's face it. It's the only place we're going to see obscure homages and fan favorites come to light.

Regarding obscure homages, Hasbro did surprise us with the announced mass retail release of Generations Crosscut.

Regarding fan favorites, the Generations Thrilling 30 line is also helping in that regard with new BW, BM, and Armada-based figures.

I'm gonna predict stuff way too early with no info known, or to base anything on.

Box set:
3 Pirates/2 Knights, probably 2 Voyagers/3 Deluxes again. Cannonball for sure, maybe a Brimstone update, everything else who knows. Would not be surprised to see the Vector Prime mold brought back despite what they've said before.

Bonus figure: Some Knight dude

Custom Class figure: Some Pirate Guy

Souvenir bags: One will have something to do with the theme and the other will be SG Beast Wars stuff (ugh)

Troop Builder: Who knows. Honestly don't know what they'll do here, and that's ok. Can we start the Reflector rumors again?

ScottyP wrote:Souvenir bags: One will have something to do with the theme and the other will be SG Beast Wars stuff (ugh)

Only thing that comes to mind and makes sense for that idea would be Megatron from the BW 10th Anniversary/Cybertron Beast Planet Deluxe and Waspinator from the Generations Thrilling 30 Deluxe (though, that might be a bit too new for this year).

ScottyP wrote:I'm gonna predict stuff way too early with no info known, or to base anything on.

Box set:
3 Pirates/2 Knights, probably 2 Voyagers/3 Deluxes again. Cannonball for sure, maybe a Brimstone update, everything else who knows. Would not be surprised to see the Vector Prime mold brought back despite what they've said before.

Bonus figure: Some Knight dude

Custom Class figure: Some Pirate Guy

Souvenir bags: One will have something to do with the theme and the other will be SG Beast Wars stuff (ugh)

Troop Builder: Who knows. Honestly don't know what they'll do here, and that's ok. Can we start the Reflector rumors again?

I'm not sure why, but all of this made me chuckle incontrollably.

Thing is though, I'm stupidly intrigued by all this. I want to give Thundertron a crew other than Prime Deadend. They're lonely.

Va'al wrote:
I'm not sure why, but all of this made me chuckle incontrollably.

Thing is though, I'm stupidly intrigued by all this. I want to give Thundertron a crew other than Prime Deadend. They're lonely.

Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

ScottyP wrote:

Va'al wrote:
I'm not sure why, but all of this made me chuckle incontrollably.

Thing is though, I'm stupidly intrigued by all this. I want to give Thundertron a crew other than Prime Deadend. They're lonely.

Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

No no no.

I like the newer aesthetics. Axor I'm not concerned about acquiring, as I already have that mold in Lockdown. And it's glorious.

I am very inclined to get Brimshaver - but I'll hold out until a potential repaint comes out of this set/thing. Though the waist puts me off.

Cannonball looks a bit.. underwhelming. Interesting transformation though.

Va'al wrote:I am very inclined to get Brimshaver - but I'll hold out until a potential repaint comes out of this set/thing. Though the waist puts me off.

Cannonball looks a bit.. underwhelming. Interesting transformation though.

These two are great figures. You'll be kicking yourself.

But I personally hate the HFTD Lockdown mold.

PrymeStriker wrote:

Va'al wrote:I am very inclined to get Brimshaver - but I'll hold out until a potential repaint comes out of this set/thing. Though the waist puts me off.

Cannonball looks a bit.. underwhelming. Interesting transformation though.

These two are great figures. You'll be kicking yourself.

But I personally hate the HFTD Lockdown mold.

Then I think we'll really have to agree to disagree.

ScottyP wrote:Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

Not those particular versions. The Cannonball, Brimstone, and Axer who are Star Seekers are the Aligned Continuity ones, not the Cybertron and Movieverse ones.

But the Cannonball who will be a Star Seeker captain in this BotCon story will be a G1 Cannonball.

Sabrblade wrote:

ScottyP wrote:Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

Not those particular versions. The Cannonball, Brimstone, and Axer who are Star Seekers are the Aligned Continuity ones, not the Cybertron and Movieverse ones.

But the Cannonball who will be a Star Seeker captain in this BotCon story will be a G1 Cannonball.

A non-Wings version I presume? The Wings one was killed and his crew was called the Maraudicons.

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

ScottyP wrote:Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

Not those particular versions. The Cannonball, Brimstone, and Axer who are Star Seekers are the Aligned Continuity ones, not the Cybertron and Movieverse ones.

But the Cannonball who will be a Star Seeker captain in this BotCon story will be a G1 Cannonball.

A non-Wings version I presume? The Wings one was killed and his crew was called the Maraudicons.

A Cannonball was killed. Note that Cybertron Cannonball is not one single person, but an idea. Like the Dread Pirate Roberts.

This Cannonball will not be the same person who died before, but is said to still be a Wings Uiverse version of the guy, suggesting a similar "Dread Pirate Roberts" concept like his Cybertron namesake.

Sabrblade wrote:

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

ScottyP wrote:Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

Not those particular versions. The Cannonball, Brimstone, and Axer who are Star Seekers are the Aligned Continuity ones, not the Cybertron and Movieverse ones.

But the Cannonball who will be a Star Seeker captain in this BotCon story will be a G1 Cannonball.

A non-Wings version I presume? The Wings one was killed and his crew was called the Maraudicons.

A Cannonball was killed. Note that Cybertron Cannonball is not one single person, but an idea. Like the Dread Pirate Roberts.

This Cannonball will not be the same person who died before, but is said to still be a Wings Uiverse version of the guy, suggesting a similar "Dread Pirate Roberts" concept like his Cybertron namesake.

TFWiki will have a field day on this one

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

ScottyP wrote:Cybertron Cannonball, Cybertron Brimstone/Galaxy Force Terrashaver, and HftD Axor are all established as Star Seekers I think. Can get a head start!

Not those particular versions. The Cannonball, Brimstone, and Axer who are Star Seekers are the Aligned Continuity ones, not the Cybertron and Movieverse ones.

But the Cannonball who will be a Star Seeker captain in this BotCon story will be a G1 Cannonball.

A non-Wings version I presume? The Wings one was killed and his crew was called the Maraudicons.

A Cannonball was killed. Note that Cybertron Cannonball is not one single person, but an idea. Like the Dread Pirate Roberts.

This Cannonball will not be the same person who died before, but is said to still be a Wings Uiverse version of the guy, suggesting a similar "Dread Pirate Roberts" concept like his Cybertron namesake.

TFWiki will have a field day on this one

They were fine with IDW G1 Ultra Magnus being basically the same thing.

Pete Sinclair from BotCon answered a question about the upcoming toys at BotCon 2014 over at fellow fansite The Allspark. When asked if all the toys this year will be part of the theme Pirates vs. Knights or just the box set and will there be roughly equal number of Pirates and Knights? This is the answer Pete gave.

Pete@BotCon wrote:Yes, all the toys are Pirates and Knights. There are 5 Knights, 5 Pirates (there MAY be some more Pirates in the story though), some Pirate troop builders and one Decepticon rogue who may or may not end up on the side of the Pirates.





The story is very fun, and I can't wait to announce who was behind it this year

There you go folks, a little more info you can factor in when trying to guess the BotCon toys this year.

Beat me to it.

Sabrblade wrote:Beat me to it.

LOST Cybertronian is our resident ninja, after all.

I am intrigued. I'm quivering in anticipation to see the toys. Hopefully those'll start going up this month.

Not exactly the "30th Anniversary Bonanza Spectacular" most people were hoping for.
But I like knights. And I like pirates. And I like goofy mashups. So I'm on board with this idea.

Any butt pirates

I could care less about the silly them e. If the figures homage G1 characters, ill get them. Im not fond of the whole "theme" concept. I wish they would do more gap filler sets like games of deception. I never considered that a theme, just a set of repaints people wanted including the convention exclusives.