They're not. Armada Optimus, for instance, is 5 meters tall, compared to G1 Optimus Prime which is 6 meters tall. Bayformer Optimus is even taller, but was scaled down for the Bumblebee movie.

I've been operating under the assumption that Hasbro considers the Pretender inner bots their "default" modes, thus would model their Siege-on scale based on them. Though I'm not sure how tall Thunderwing's inner bot would be in Siege scale, admittedly...

 

Yup! IDW published all the surviving design notes.

The Ark Compendium.

ISBN: 9781600100802

Transformers: The Ark - Transformers Wiki

Contains 500 character models, most of which have been compiled into the two commonly circulated fan “scale charts” which come direct from the book.

Volume 2 does JG1. There was a compilation of both with a few extras.

EDIT: The book itself is full of designs, many human and environmental. Many of the classic designs were character sketches without assigned scale and fans have had to take these designs and assign them scales.

 

Pretenders would be interesting scale wise, we know marvel scale is less of a consideration, otherwise impactor would be a voyager.

 

Ah thank you, I'll see if its available for download somewhere because I looked it up and I'm not paying hundreds for a book not essential to my doctoral degree.

 

Leader class shell with a Cliffjumper sized inner robot would be ideal.
It would allow for the combination in alt mode and the shell wouldn't be overly large compared to other figures.

I'd prefer TidalWave in titan class btw.

 

What if they do pretenders like this
Normal sized inner robots and prime master sized shells

 

For the ones with human-looking shells, that might be a way to get around the "giant humans" situation.
The down side being that a lot of the pretenders had very simplistic inner robots.

 

They can redesign much simpler ones. For example landmine can homage his Energon counterpart.

 

That's too small for the inner robot.
Needs to be legends sized (in order to be proper size and be able to transform in the first place) and in order to combine with the shell in alt mode.

 

What i meant is the inner robot and the shell should be swapped.

 

That's an interesting idea

I can see that as a solution for the regular Pretenders.
I think I'd buy that.
But the Mega Pretenders would need a different solution.

 

Maybe they can come in two packs, a shell as a weaponizer/modulator and an inner robot.

 

This is true. I'd kinda like to see more of the pretenders done like Thunderwing- where both inner robot and shell can transform, and then link up.

 

That would be my preffered way to update them.

I can see that work if the inner robots are ordinary deluxes and the shells are deluxe sized weaponizers. Or maybe it would work better if the shells are ordinary deluxes and the inner robots are weaponizers.

Vroom, Crossblades and Thunderwing should definitely be voyager sized shells and the inner robots deluxe weaponizers in this scenario.

 

I will admit I’m late to the party here, but I really think this next 12-18 months we’ll finally see Pointblank, Sureshot & the Jr Headmasters. I have no proof of this, but from a business standpoint we already know Apeface & Crosshairs are out, while Snapdragon & Scorponok are confirmed too, and it makes perfect sense for HasTak to get the remaining Headmasters out at the same time for crossplaying compatibility.

While Earthrise isn’t totally ‘Titan’s Return 2: Electric Boogaloo’ this is the most Headmasters we’ve had since Titan’s Return, we know Hasbro wants to complete teams & when better to release them? It gets the final ones out the way, there’s quite a few ‘in demand’ characters like Nightbeat, Fangry & Squeezeplay there with easy repaints in a Minerva Nightbeat & ‘police’ Siren redeco right away.

The only reason Earthrise looks so heavily ‘early G1’ right now is Spinister, Apeface & possibly Crosshairs were moved up to Siege Wave 5 (I still think Crosshairs may have been a Selects redeco for early Earthrise) Hasbro specifically mentioned wanting to get the engineering right for Runamok with the dual wheels on the feet to use on the Throttlebots, & from the ‘87 range there’s hardly anyone else to do then (except the Dino cassettes, & my fingers are crossed for them coming up soon!)

I love this Cliffjumper mold, my only problem is I want it for about 4 different characters already! Hubcap I think is a good choice, but I actually think he looks more like the Omnibot Downshift (who I’m convinced/hoping are all coming next year!) while he’d also make a good Tap-Out, AND I’m desperate to finally get a new Bumper as well! So many choices, Oy!

 

If this gimmick was just a couple of bots, it could be really cool. Hopefully not a line wide thing as im' sure it would restrict transformations

Would love to see them. I do really hope they get Skids and Tracks in earthrise and then start getting to the 87 era.

 

No of course not. I'm thinking 3 or 4 pretenders for each side.

 

That'd be perfect.

Wierdly though there are some pretenders i think would be better as normal bots. bludgeon for example his shell is how is him as a transformer...prob due to the original marvel comics. So would love a normal bludgeon. So balancing it would be ideal for me.

 

Also beast pretenders can be Beast Wars characters in a Beast wars line and pretender vehicles don't even make any sense.

 

My idea is that Pretender shells and inner robots are sold separately. There would be Deluxe and Voyager Pretender shells, and Micromaster and Scout sized inner robots. Micromaster inner robots have a Deluxe Pretender shell, with Scout class robots having a Voyager Pretender shell. Each Pretender shell has a vehicle mode as well.

The inner robots would fit into a compartment of the Pretender shell, but I think maybe their legs should detach and become the weapons for the shell due to space issues.