Rodimus Prime.

He's seberly under-appreciated except for the fact as soon as Optimus comes back i'm giving up the gig,

 

ultra magnus because he is awesome

 

Ultra Magnus. He is literally Galvatron's counterpart in function, and seemed to do quite well when he didn't think all the pressure was on him. He let Optimus and Rodimus take all the credit and responsibility while effectively leading his squads. It was just being stuck as the overall boss of the whole Autobot cause that made him break.

+-MWG-+

 

I voted Star Saber but since you also asked who 'could have been' there should be an 'other' option on the poll.

 

I voted Beta, if only because it would be very interesting to have a femme as a Prime.

Plus, she only appeared in one episode, so she needs more love.  

 

how does Ginrai not count but Beta does?

she wasnt even the leader

 

Ultra Magnus. He has all of the qualities of a great Autobot leader, his only big drawback is his own inability to recognize it.

 

Anyone who didn't vote for Star Saber is nuts! He is the best Autobot leader PERIOD.

 

I would say Cerebros. He did a pretty good job of leading them in Headmasters.

 

I put the "could have been" in there for the case of Magnus, who was only leader for about a day.

 

Beta was leader (or part leader, but Trion later became neutral) of the resistance against the Quints. Ginrai was just a human who found a robot suit.

 

So why wouldn't he count? He was still an Autobot leader. Besides, it wasn't a simple robot suit. Ginrai was a Godmaster and would actually fuse with his transtector.

 

Well like i said at the start, i'm only counting supreme commanders. But to tell you the truth maybe Beta wasn't the best choice for this poll.

 

I choose Ultra Magnus. All jokes about dealing with something aside, he did try to take on Galvatron, Cyclonus, Scourge, and the Sweeps all by himself to save the others.

 

Neither Beta nor Ultra Magnus were Supreme Commanders, and Ginrai was.

Supreme Commander - Transformers Wiki

 

Going by the cartoon, I would have voted Metalhawk, but he isn't listed...


Ah, Metalhawk wasn't a Supreme Commander...

Then I'd have to go with Star Saber then.

 

I'm partial to Star Saber.

 

Terribly sorry everyone but it appears that i'm an idiot who doesn't check his facts. Carry on.

 

In other words, a typical bland and boring Japanese Autobot leader.

If the Victory Autobots hadn't been portrayed as a stiff military organization who always addressed each other by their rank rather than their name, they might've actually been tolerable. Star Saber really, really needed something to humanize him; even his adoption fo Jan felt nothing more than an excuse to have an obligatory human kid hanging around, their relationship was never given any proper depth.

Now, Victory manga in the other hand...

Okay, I'm prioritizing the characters by their level of personality. But if the question is "who is the best because of what they accomplished"...my vote would still fall to Rodimus, but Fortress would still give him a run for this money; the Great War ended with Rodimus Prime's leadership, decepticon activity was reduced to little more than belligerent action under Galvatron's leadership...but Fortress drove Decepticons off earth completely (apart from the Pretenders but those don't count) AND defeated probably the most dangerous Decepticon leader of the G1 animated continuity.

 

I say rodimus. I don't think they wrote his season 3 character correctly though. I'm of the opinion that animated prime is a good example of how Rodimus should have been developed as a character.