So as my thread title probably didn't explain well enough (yep, another topic sparked by someone's post), what sort of hierarchies & continuities did we have with our toys as kids, and this can even apply now that we're older.

For example, I didn't have a Megatron or anything when I was younger, so G2 Ramjet was essentially my deception leader, and Flywheels & Blitwing were his generals. They spent a good amount of time bitching with each other, so Scrapper was probably more of the level headed one. Speaking of which, the constructicons that I had were pretty much the flunkies, and Slag/Grimlock/Scorch took turns being mind controlled or whatever for the sake of evening the odds. Inferno probably did too, pre getting his feet broken off anyway.

Things were a little more standard on the Autobot side however, as Optimus Prime led the way, being backed up by Jazz (while I still had him), Sideswipe & Inferno, with Scorch as his personal guard who also acted as a general for the minibots. I actually had no idea who Scorch was at this point, so I called him Blazer & apparently got most of his character & stuff right by happenstance.

Once I got Rodimus & Hero Megatron, I was sort of at an age where I didn't "play" as much, so they didn't change things too much. My Beast Wars era was kinda the same, as I didn't put as much thought into who was on what side or anything. I mostly just liked the figures for what they were, and that's probably why they're not all broken.


... so yeah, who were your leaders, who were your turncoats, and who ultimately paid the price for their insolence?

 

I always had a multiverse of sorts going on. GI Joe and Transformrs crossed paths many a times. Mainly my Actionmasters, which worked with a few GI Joe vehicles. What I do specifically remember from the late 80s was my Decepticon leader. I didn't have a Megatron, but I did have an Optimus Prime (Powermaster). I chose this guy to lead my Decepticons: STA: Gobots: Monsters: Laser Gun

I called him Megawave. I pretended that Megatron and Shockwave got merged in a freak spacebridge accident. Crude, but effective.

~Z

 

I had my G1 Soundwave effing up everybody! He was his own faction and everyone else was dead. I guess I was just a little biased lol.

 

Onslaught was the leader of my cons for a long time with Ruckus as his bruiser in back up. AM Prime and Slingshot didn't know what to do til Sludge turned up  

 

I had various characters' minds inhabit regular guns to make them new Targetmasters during one game I had with my toys as a kid.

 

shockwave led my cons for a while until he left, then dreadwind and darkwing led after

 

I had two squads:
Ultra Magnus lead Jetfire, Red Alert, Freeway and Hot Rod.
They were up against:
Soundwave (Cassette Man with Ravage) the 'con leader, who was backed up by Astrotrain, Ramjet, Chop Shop, Apeface and Skullcruncher.

Worked out to some pretty epic battles, on a lego cybertron and sometimes against a small crew of GIJoes.

 

I assume that as a child you weren't really aware of their individual personalities?   Those two serving as leaders could make for some interesting stories.

~Z

 

DOTM Mirage, Leadfoot, and Wheeljack are en route to Earth, while Soundwave and Laserbeak are on a mission (my story for them not being in my collection yet  

 

I didn't have Megs as a kid either, but I did have Starscream, so I'd just pretend SS took over and Megatron was AWOL, until Galvatron came around. I also didn't have several 84-85 characters (Sideswipe, Smokescreen, Trailbreaker, Thundercracker, Skywarp, Ramjet, plus quite a few more) so I just pretended there was some huge battle that ended with Rumble & Frenzy making a huge fissure in which the characters fell into and never came out of. LOL imagination is great  

 

I couldn't play real stories with my regular Transformers, as I had too few Transformers that were in scale and I never mixed Transformers that were out of scale. I mean it is ridiculous to have Powermaster Optimus Prime fight against Pretender Starscream for example  

Basically the only real stories I could play with, were with Micromasters, because I had many Autobots and Decepticons and many bases as well.

When playing with Micromasters I pretended that Overload was Optimus Prime and Flattop was Starscream  

And later when I had Countdown, I pretended that he had taken over the Autobots, because I liked his toy so much and liked to play with him very often.

 

My decepticon leader was starscream and the for the autobots it was inferno, since i never had a prime as a child. When g2 came, Ironfist became the leader as he was 2 cool  

 

well as a child, i never watched the show, as it didn't play on tv until g2, which even then i didn't watch much of. so my only bit of information came from the double comic book magazine number 2. and my older brother.

and i didn't have prime until g2, and during g2 i was 10/12 years old.

even though i still played with my transformers then!

anyways i used Pointblank as my autobot leader, and shrapnel as my decepticon leader, later i'd use g2 eagle eye.

i'd always have huge battles, i'd mix toy lines, with exo squad, and battletech, star wars. ect. i'd have battles that spread out through my whole room. i created bases for both sides! using boxes!

i probably used my batman figures at some point too lol!

oh and i basically just created my own characters for them.

 

I my self have pretty much ALWAYS had a Multiverse of figures, including now. I had things go pretty much like the shows when it came to the cartoons, since iw as fortinate enough to have (most) of the cast. And the only that "broke" was Armada Megatron, so that i could have a battle dameged Megatron from the Unicron battles (broke his horns off leaving only 1/3rd of them just like at the end of the show) I only had 2 Starscremas when i was younger though so i had to make do without him.

 

My armada jet prime always fought unicron until I got hotshot and I killed optimus jetfire went to fight megs and hotshot went on fighting cons. Nowa days I have legit storys

 

This thread has got me thinking. With children having so much imagination, maybe we need them to write movies for Hollywood. You know how I feel about Hollywood these days, so why not let the kids write some stuff up? LOL!

I had Prime as a kid, but never had Megatron as I don't think he was one I wanted as a kid. My favorite TF toy back then was Omnibot Overdrive and Smokescreen, they were Primes two best buds.

 

One of my favorites were RID Optimus Prime, RID Arctic Camo Ruination, and Armada Starscream as their G1 selves and G1 Bruticus recreating on of my favorite G1 episodes, "Starscream's Brigade".  

 

When I collected G2 the only media I had access to were videotapes of TFTM and FFoD, but the only toys on shelves were repaints of Optimus and other pre-movie characters. At a loss, I just decided that I would only depict pre-TFTM stories. (It never even occurred to me that Prime could have come back to life...death wasn't that cheap, was it?)

So Optimus was the overall commander, but his lieutenant was Mr Rank-10 himself, Rapido. The Axelerators (I didn't learn that this subgroup had an actual name until 20 years later) Rapido, Skram, and Windbreaker were like the "main cast," with their group dynamics and the trouble they tended to get into motivating most of my play. Windrazor and Terradive were their archenemies. In accordance with their bios, and borrowing on various TV cliches, Windrazor was the vicious and ambitious type, while Terradive was his powerful yet dimwitted assistant who always screwed things up.

So these groups tended to clash, and then would call in what I thought of as the "heavy back up," i.e. characters who were cool by virtue of having actually been in the movie. For the Autobots, there was Optimus Prime (G1 mold with soundbox and missile launchers) who would barrel though/over the few things he couldn't blast. Blue Grimlock and green Slag were there as more heavy hitters, with their movie personalities. Jazz was Optimus' friend, and a respected source of wisdom (I guess I thought Scatman Crothers sounded wise?) Fireflight was marginally-competent air support and damage control.

The Decepticons got a much needed boost when Megatron came out. Though he was easily twice Prime's size, Prime could always take him by getting into a fistfight like in the movie. Windrazor slid into place as a slightly-more-loyal version of Starscream. I also got the Rotor Force Decepticon helicopter, Powerdive, and G2 Blast Off (who tended to get the better of Fireflight). I also think I had Deluge, but for some reason I despised him and never used him.

EDIT: Oh yeah, I also had all the G2 minibots, but I didn't use them as much because they didn't have weapons. Also, my young self had a hard time figuring out what Seaspray's "hovercraft" alt mode was...the name wasn't enough of a giveaway, I guess. I liked to transform Beachcomber but couldn't think of much to do with him. Bumblebee was Optimus' responsible friend, and Hubcap always got into trouble.

 

Since I'm a "kid", I organize current collection with ROTF LDR Jetwing Optimus and DOTM LDR Sentinel as sort of Supreme Commanders with DOTM DLX Jazz, my soon to be DOTM DLX Leadfoot, DOTM DLX Sideswipe, TFA TLX Rodimus and Cybertron DLX Cybertron Defence Hotshot as commanders of their own personal troops and on the Decepticon side I have a half "Shattered Gssesque" half decepticon army lead by TF1 Target exclusive VOY Prime sitting on Cybertron Supreme Starscream's face with the crown on Primes backpack.

 

my brother and i didn't have transformers until 86' and even then we only had a few. back in, 84 and 85, i pretended that my matchbox car collection were autobots. i had gi joes like everyone else. christmas 87' my dad gave us a famicom and toys weren't as cool anymore until ghostbusters and tmnt came out.