And that's totally fair. Nothing is a done deal until it's done. Don't count on getting all the characters. I just think we are in fully uncharted territory here. There's no reason to think that they won't do it, but you can't know for sure that they will.

 

You got a reply in so early you didn't see my edit which also mentions "uncharted". I personally think there's plenty of reasons to think they won't do it...but I sincerely hope they do.

 

Well, my prediction is the next character will be lower tier now that the ball has been rolling, so let's see what happens! Anyone have any idea when the next reasonable opportunity to announce a new BW MP is?

 

My prediction is it'll be higher tier. Rattrap, Rhinox or Waspinator... unless they have actually been working on a Tigatron all this time.

 

Well let's make it official then. Formal contest. The winner gets to gloat for all time, the loser has to say "I'm bad at predictions". The ultimate humiliation.

May the best predictor win.

 

Whenever the next big show is for Takara. I don’t recall offhand when those are. I don’t think it’s in the next two calendar months though.

If you guys want, let’s start a spreadsheet for predictions of the next character. That way we can poke fun and brag when it’s revealed. What do you think?

 

I've been in since the time of Primus.

 

Ha! I'm no betting man and like I've said TT can be hard to predict. You might be right. At a stretch I could see it being Terrrorsaur, he's little more upper tier...just not Airrazor. My feeling is if you do 6 top tier characters in a row it's more likely number 7 will also be top tier.

 

I think it will be someone that flies. They havent done a character like that yet, do its definitely something new.

 

So who do you consider low tier? Just airazor and scorponok?

Waspinator, Terrasaur, Airazor. Which do you think will break the no-flyer streak?

 

Yeah pretty much. I'd probably break them down into 3 tiers based on their screen time/development and popularity with fans.

Upper: Primal, Cheetor, Rattrap, Rhinox, Dinobot, Megatron, Waspinator, Taratulas, Blackarachnia
Mid: Terrorsaur, Tigatron, Inferno
Lower: Airazor, Scorponok

I think they will almost definitely do the upper tier, they might do the mid and only if they do the mid will they venture into the lower one.

 

Of those mid tier, I'd say Inferno is upper-mid, and almost guarenteed. Tigatron would be the cheapest to make because, while he can't be just a big cheetor, he can definitely have some shared engineering.

So of those three, the only one I feel isn't a lock is terrasaur.

 

Heh, I'm not of the opinion that just because they can do it they will do it. So we will agree to disagree and see how the chips fall.

 

For those doubting the idea that TT will release all 14 Season 1 figures, you really need to get your arguments straight, because at the moment, you're all over the shop.

On the one hand, you're saying TT are only focussing on Season 1, then follow it up by saying Blackarachnia is a 1st tier character.

In the context of all 3 seasons, she becomes 1st tier, but in Season 1 alone, she's not; none of the Predacons are other than Megatron. Characters like Blackarachnia and Tarantulas really don't hit their stride until Season 2.

So are you looking at the show as a whole to justify your pessimism? Because trying to pass Blackarachnia off as a main character in Season 1 in order to rule others out is ridiculous.

 

Ehh, I'm strongly on team all14, but I think it's unreasonable to expect people to pretend season 2 and 3 don't exist when judging how important a character is, even if you are only looking at season 1 characters.

Basically the algarithm would be:

for seasons 1, 2,3

for characters in season

if character important to the overall show?

release​

I don't think that's an insane algorithm. I suspect it isn't the one being used, but that doesn't make it more insane.

 

TT are only (seemingly) focusing on season 1...that doesn't mean TT have voluntarily deleted all knowledge of seasons 2/3 or the enduring popularity of characters that appear in all 3. I fail to see the contradiction.

 

If Takara isn't willing to tackle both the Transmetal and Transmetal 2 designs in the Masterpiece line then 3rd parties will. They're more willing to tackle more mechanical designs then organic ones anyway at least for now.

 

In the context of Season 1 (on which TT is focusing), all 14 characters are important. They all have their little moments to shine through. Trying to justify the selection of a particular character from Season 1 (because they became more popular in Seasons 2 and 3) over another is trying to have it both ways.

Scorponok's name keeps coming up as a lower tier character, yet he was around for 26 episodes of the show. That's half the entire run. He was in it longer than (or equal to) Tigatron, Airazor, Depth Charge, Rampage, Silverbolt, Quickstrike, Ravage, Transmutate and Tigerhawk (much longer in some instances).

He was Megatron's 2IC. He gave the order to salvage Megatron's body when Terrorsaur (in his starring episode) scrapped him. With such a small cast, he's an integral part of the tapestry.

He was ultimately surplus to requirements going forward, with his two major traits executed better by other characters (loyalty by Inferno, and any technical ability by Tarantulas), but that doesn't remove him from the frame when focusing on Season 1.

 

But the thing is you CAN have it both ways. You can go through the seasons and pick out the most popular characters. You don't have to limit them to the popularity due to that seasons, as you have outside knowledge. This is based on projected sales in 2019, not in 1998. If the only reason a character was popular was because of a meme and they felt like the toy would sell because of that, they would release it, even if they were the worst character in the show or only popped up for a half second.

It doesn't matter how many episodes he was in. What matters is the impact.

It doesn't matter his role, it matters how much people liked him, remembered him, want to buy him.

If you are going to write a plot sypnosis of the show, it makes no sense to remove scoroponok. If you are going to rank the characters based on how much money you'll earn off of their toy, the fact it was better executed by two characters is absolutely significant in the equation.

Again, not only am I 100% on board with all season 1 characters being produced, I actually think they will do it.

But you cannot create an argument based on ignoring seasons 2 and 3, or their overall popularity. My main argument is there are so few low-tier characters that it can be expected that those characters will sell for completion sake. You need to base arguments in marketing.

 

@Joalro

You said:
"Alright, here's my actual prediction. In order to get everyone out while keeping, they are going to release lesser characters sandwhiched between more major characters, AND they'll announce the more major character long before the lesser character is released in order to draw up hype for the whole line, trying to encourage people to pick up the lesse character for completion."

On the page before your post, I said:
"The easy solution is to hold off some of the remaining popular characters until the end. Do Rattrap and Waspinator last, for example. Fans will pick up the "less desired" (though personally they're all desired, and I'm sure I'm not alone) characters in the interim."

And:
""Treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen". Get the fans hooked with some big names at the start (which they've certainly done), pad out the middle with these supposedly less popular characters, then finish with a flourish. Seems like a good business model to me."

Are we not making the same marketing plan?!

Read back through the thread. You'll see that this plan was argued against in the context of who is or isn't an A-List character while focusing on Season 1. In Season 1, Blackarachnia is not an A-Lister, thus my points about Scorponok's influence on Season 1.

I'm not ignoring the legacies of Seasons 2 and 3. But they're not a reason to rule out other characters being produced.